HPB-SD(ed.1) v.1 ch.Proem: Difference between revisions

phenomenon in Nature. * Intra-Cosmic motion is eternal and ceaseless; cosmic motion (the visible, or that which is subject to perception) is finite and periodical. As an eternal abstraction it is the {{Style S-Small capitals|ever-present}}; as a manifestation, it is finite both in the coming direction and the opposite, the two being the alpha and omega of successive reconstructions. Kosmos — the {{Style S-Small capitals|noumenon}}—has nought to do with the causal relations of the phenomenal World. It is only with reference to the intra-cosmic soul, the ideal Kosmos in the immutable Divine Thought, that we may say : “ It never had a beginning nor will it have an end.” With regard to its body or Cosmic organization, though it cannot be said that it had a first, or will ever have a last construction, yet at each new Manvantara, its organization may be regarded as the first and the last of its kind, as it evolutes every time on a higher plane . . . .

{{Style P-Quote|two are able to understand the profound logic of their philosophy. The former will allow of no other God than the personified secondary powers which have worked out the visible universe, and which became with them the anthropomorphic God of the Christians — the male Jehovah, roaring amid thunder and lightning. In its turn, rationalistic science greets the Buddhists and the Svabhâvikas as the “ positivists ” of the archaic ages. If we take a onesided view of the philosophy of the latter, our materialists may be right in their own way. The Buddhists maintained that there is no Creator, but an infinitude of creative powers, which collectively form the one eternal substance, the essence of which is inscrutable — hence not a subject for speculation for any true philosopher. Socrates invariably refused to argue upon the mystery of universal being, yet no one would ever have thought of charging him with atheism, except those who were bent upon his destruction. Upon inaugurating an active period, says the Secret Doctrine, an expansion of this Divine essence from without inwardly and from within outwardly, occurs in obedience to eternal and immutable law, and the phenomenal or visible universe is the ultimate result of the long chain of cosmical forces thus progressively set in motion. In like manner, when the passive condition is resumed, a contraction of the Divine essence takes place, and the previous work of creation is gradually and progressively undone. The visible universe becomes disintegrated, its material dispersed ; and ‘ darkness ’ solitary and alone, broods once more over the face of the ‘deep.’ To use a Metaphor from the Secret Books, which will convey the idea still more clearly, an out- breathing of the ‘ unknown essence ’ produces the world ; and an inhalation causes it to disappear. This process has been going on from all eternity, and our present universe is but one of an infinite series, which had no beginning and will have no end.” —(''See'' “ ''Isis Unveiled;'' ” ''also'' “ ''The Days and Nights of Brahmâ'' ” ''in Part II.'')}}

The first illustration being a plain disc [[File:Sd-circle.jpg|x25px]], the second one in the Archaic symbol shows [[File:sd-circle_with_dot.jpg|x25px]], a disc with a point in it — the first differentiation in the periodical manifestations of the ever-eternal nature, sexless and infinite “ Aditi in {{Style S-Small capitals|that}} ” (Rig Veda), the point in the disc, or potential Space within abstract Space. In its third stage the point

 

is transformed into a diameter, thus [[File:sd-circle_with_horizontal_diameter.jpg|x25px]] it now symbolises a divine immaculate Mother-Nature within the all-embracing absolute Infinitude.

When the diameter line is crossed by a vertical one [[File:sd-circle_with_cross.jpg|x25px]], it becomes the mundane cross. Humanity has reached its third root-race ; it is the sign for the origin of human life to begin. When the circumference disappears and leaves only the [[File:sd-cross.jpg|x25px]] it is a sign that the fall of man into matter is accomplished, and the {{Style S-Small capitals|fourth }}race begins. The Cross within a circle symbolises pure Pantheism ; when the Cross was left uninscribed, it became phallic. It had the same and yet other meanings as a {{Style S-Small capitals|tau}} inscribed within a circle [[File:sd-circle_with_tau.jpg|x25px]] or as a “ Thor’s hammer,” the Jaina cross, so-called, or simply Svastica within a circle [[File:sd-circle_with_svastika.jpg|x25px]]

Occultist will recognise as one of the “ left-hand,” and used in ceremonial magic. *

philosophy ? Parabrahm is, in short, the collective aggregate of Kosmos in its infinity and eternity, the “ {{Style S-Small capitals|that}} ” and “ {{Style S-Small capitals|this}} ” to which distributive aggregates can not be applied. * “ In the beginning {{Style S-Small capitals|this}} was the Self, one only ” ''(Aitareya Upanishad) ;'' the great Sankaracharya explains that “ {{Style S-Small capitals|this}} ” referred to the Universe (Jagat); the sense of the words, “ In the beginning,” meaning before the reproduction of the phenomenal Universe.

return to, Brahma (Brahmâ): ” for Brahma (neuter), the unmanifested, is that Universe ''in abscondito,'' and Brahma, the manifested, is the Logos, made male-female * in the symbolical orthodox dogmas. The God of the Apostle-Initiate and of the Rishi being both the Unseen and the Visible {{Style S-Small capitals|space}}. Space is called in the esoteric symbolism “ the SevenSkinned Eternal Mother-Father.” It is composed from its undifferentiated to its differentiated surface of seven layers.

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accepts revelation as coming from divine yet still finite Beings, the manifested lives, never from the Unmanifestable {{Style S-Small capitals|one life}}; from those entities, called Primordial Man, Dhyani-Buddhas, or Dhyan-Chohans, the “ Rishi-Prajâpati ” of the Hindus, the Elohim or “ Sons of God,” the Planetary Spirits of all nations, who have become Gods for men. He also regards the Adi-Sakti — the direct emanation of Mulaprakriti, the eternal Root of {{Style S-Small capitals|that}}, and the female aspect of the Creative Cause Brahma, in her A’kásic form of the Universal Soul — as philosophically a Maya, and cause of human Maya. But this view does not prevent him from believing in its existence so long as it lasts, to wit, for one Maha- manvantara; nor from applying A’kâśa, the radiation of Mulaprakriti, * to practical purposes, connected as the World-Soul is with all natural phenomena, known or unknown to science.

of a highly philosophical page in the World’s Cosmogony. (''See'' Book III., ''Gupta Vidya and the Zohar.)'' Left in their symbolical disguise, they are a nursery tale, an ugly thorn in the side of science and logic, an evident effect of Karma. To have let them serve as a prologue to Christianity was a cruel revenge on the part of the Rabbis, who knew better what their Pentateuch meant. It was a silent protest against their spoliation, and the Jews have certainly now the better of their traditional persecutors. The above-named exoteric creeds will be explained in the light of the Universal doctrine as we proceed with it.

{{Style P-Quote|''contracts ''(''exhalation and inhalation'')''. When it expands the mother diffuses and scatters; when it contracts, the mother draws back and ingathers. This produces the periods of Evolution and Dissolution, Manwantara and Pralaya. The Germ is invisible and fiery; the Root ''(''the plane of the circle'')'' is cool '';'' but during Evolution and Manwantara her garment is cold and radiant. Hot Breath is the Father who devours the progeny of the many-faced Element ''(''heterogeneous'')'' ; and leaves the single-faced ones ''(''homogeneous'')''. Cool Breath is the Mother, who conceives, forms, brings forth, and receives them back into her bosom, to reform them at the Dawn ''(''of the Day of Brahma, or Manvantara'')''. . . . .”}}

far more numerous than those known to Science) are simply ''conditional ''modifications and aspects of the {{Style S-Small capitals|one}} and only Element. This latter is not ''Ether'', * not even ''A’kâśa'' but the ''Source'' of these. The Fifth Element, now advocated quite freely by Science, is not the Ether hypothesised by Sir Isaac Newton — although he calls it by that name, having associated it in his mind probably with the Æther, “ Father-Mother ” of Antiquity. As Newton intuitionally says, “ Nature is a perpetual circulatory worker, generating fluids out of solids, fixed things out of volatile, and volatile out of fixed, subtile out of gross, and gross out of subtile. . . . . Thus, perhaps, may all things be originated from Ether,” (Hypoth, 1675).

the Kosmos is the pure noumenon of thought. This advance on his part brings him very near to the esoteric and Vedantin tenet. *

But just as the opposite poles of subject and object, spirit and matter, are but aspects of the One Unity in which they are synthesized, so, in the manifested Universe, there is “ that ” which links spirit to matter, subject to object.

of the Eye of Self-Existence (Book of Dzyan.) “ The appearance and disappearance of Worlds is like a regular tidal ebb of flux and reflux.” (See Part II., “ Days and Nights of Brahmâ.”)

antiphrasis as illusive and Mayavic. For although the root of every atom individually and of every form collectively, is that seventh principle or the one Reality, still, in its manifested phenomenal and temporary appearance, it is no better than an evanescent illusion of our senses. (See, for clearer definition, Addendum “ Gods, Monads and Atoms,” and also “ Theophania,” “ Bodhisatvas and Reincarnation,” etc., etc.)

not perish with created things ” (or Achyuta, a name of Vishnu) ; whereas the orthodox Christian separates his personal creative Deity into the three personages of the Trinity, and admits of no higher Deity. The latter, in Occultism, is the abstract Triangle ; with the orthodox, the perfect Cube. The creative god or the aggregate gods are regarded by the Eastern philosopher as ''Bhrantidarsanatah'' — “ false apprehension,” something “ conceived of, by reason of erroneous appearances, as a material form,” and explained as arising from the illusive conception of the Egotistic personal and human Soul (lower fifth principle). It is beautifully expressed in a new translation of Vishnu Purâna. “ That Brahmâ in its totality has essentially the aspect of Prakriti, both evolved and unevolved (Mulaprakriti), and also the aspect of Spirit and the aspect of Time. Spirit, O twice born, is the leading aspect of the Supreme Brahma. * The next is a twofold aspect, — Prakriti, both evolved and unevolved, and is the time last.” Kronos is shown in the Orphic theogony as being also a generated god or agent.

Secret Doctrine. Brahma (neuter) is called Kalahansa, meaning, as explained by Western Orientalists, the Eternal Swan or goose (see Stanza 111., Comment. 8), and so is Brahmâ, the Creator. A great mistake is thus brought under notice ; it is Brahma (neuter) who ought to be referred to as Hansa-vahana (He who uses the swan as his Vehicle) and not Brahmâ the Creator, who is the real Kalahansa, while Brahma (neuter) is hamsa, and “ A-hamsa,” as will be explained in the Commentary. Let it be understood that the terms Brahmâ and Para-brahmam are not used here because they belong to our Esoteric nomenclature, but simply because they are more familiar to the students in the West. Both are the perfect equivalents of our one, three, and seven vowelled terms, which stand for the {{Style S-Small capitals|One All}}, and the One “ All in all.”

that of the chain of planets of which that earth forms one, to the solar Universe to which that chain belongs, and so on, in an ascending scale, till the mind reels and is exhausted in the effort.

 

 

 

into the septenary hierarchy of conscious Divine Powers, who are the active manifestations of the One Supreme Energy. They are the framers, shapers, and ultimately the creators of all the manifested Universe, in the only sense in which the name “ Creator ” is intelligible ; they inform and guide it ; they are the intelligent Beings who adjust and control evolution, embodying in themselves those manifestations of the one law, which we know as “ The Laws of Nature.”

 

 

 

 

than useless to make the subject still more difficult by introducing the archaic phraseology of the original, with its puzzling style and words. Extracts are given from the Chinese Thibetan and Sanskrit translations of the original Senzar Commentaries and Glosses on the Book of {{Style S-Small capitals|Dzyan}} — these being now rendered for the first time into a European language. It is almost unnecessary to state that only portions of the seven Stanzas are here given. Were they published complete they would remain incomprehensible to all save the few higher occultists. Nor is there any need to assure the reader that, no more than most of the profane, does the writer, or rather the humble recorder, understand those forbidden passages. To facilitate the reading, and to avoid the too frequent reference to foot-notes, it was thought best to blend together texts and glosses, using the Sanskrit and Tibetan proper names whenever those cannot be avoided, in preference to giving the originals. The more so as the said terms are all accepted synonyms, the former only being used between a Master and his chelas (or disciples).

''dreamers;'' and, at the worst, as an additional hypothesis to the many Scientific hypotheses past, present and future, some exploded, others still lingering. It is not in any sense worse than are many of the so called Scientific theories ; and it is in every case more philosophical and probable.