Secret Doctrine (Wednesdays)

SUMMARY KEYWORDS

Ether, primordial substance, divine thought, Akasha, cosmic ideation, spiritual vehicle, intellectual evolution, initiation, perceptive mysteries, Raja Yoga, theurgy, karma, cosmic substance, Manas, Buddhi.

P.W. 00:02

Okay, all right, okay, let’s see. S.D., do you want to get us started there at the bottom of 325, and let’s say take it to. Let’s start with the first part to the last break on the next page, 326, they do not understand it even now. Stop there. Okay.

S.D. 00:39

Primordial substance and divine thought, as it would seem irrational to affirm that we already know all existing causes, permission must be given to assume, if need be, an entirely new agent, assuming what is not strictly accurate as yet, that the unduly undulatory hypothesis accounts for all the facts we are called on to decide whether they whether, Oh, it must Be they exist. Oh, I see there’s a period there. Whether the existence of an undulating ether is thereby proved, we cannot positively affirm that no other supposition will explain the facts Newton’s corpuscular hypothesis is admitted to a broken down on interference, and there is, at the present day, no rival. Still, it is extremely desirable in all such hypotheses to find to find some collateral confirmation, some evidence allyunde to the supposed ether. Some hypotheses consist of assumptions as to the minute structure and operations of bodies from the nature of the cause. These assumptions can never be proved by direct means. Their only merit is their suitability to express the phenomena. They are representative fictions. And this is from the book logic by Alexander Bain in being ether, this hypothetical Proteus, one of the representative fictions of modern science, which nevertheless was so long accepted, is One of the lower principles of what we call primordial substance, Akasha in Sanskrit, one of the dreams of old, and which has now be become again the dream of modern science. It is the greatest, just as it is the boldest of the surviving speculations of ancient philosophers. For the occultists, however, both ether and the primordial substance are a reality. To put it plainly, ether is the astral light and the primordial substance is Akasha, the Upadhi of divine thought in modern language, the latter would be better named cosmic ideation, spirit, the former cosmic substance, matter. These the alpha and the omega of being are but the two facets of the one absolute existence, the latter was never addressed or even mentioned by any name in antiquity, except allegorically in the oldest Aryan race, the Hindu the worship of the intellectual classes never consisted, as with the Greeks, in a fervent adoration of marvelous form and art, which led later on to anthropomorphism, but while the Greek philosopher adored form and the Hindu sage alone perceived the true relation of earthly beauty and eternal truth, the uneducated of every nation under. Stood neither at any time.

P.W. 05:04

Thank you. Let’s take a break. Then, isn’t that an interesting comment that she makes there, with regard to the Greeks? Well, the Greek philosopher adored form, and the Hindu sage alone perceived the true relation of earthly beauty and eternal truth.

S.D. 05:25

Yeah, I’m kind of uneducated, so I follow in the “understood neither” category.

P.W. 05:34

Of course, she’s saying that in the context of what she’s discussing here, because in other places she adores also the Greek classics and and the arts, of course. So you have to understand that in the context here, because the next sentence, where we will continue, says they do not understand that even now. So we are so obsessed with form. So what she’s referring to here is that in her time, scientists were still discuss discussing that concept of the ether, which in the 20th Century was left behind. And strangely enough, although we all know or heard of Albert Einstein, one of the foremost and cleverest thinkers with regard to physics, you know that he actually never let go of that idea that there is indeed an ether. He never released that. And I think that even though scientists don’t speak of ether anymore, although not long ago, maybe a couple of months ago, I have read an article where a scientist post that question again. Maybe we ought to start thinking about ether again, and usually because we’re thinking of space as a vacuum, which is an absolute ridiculous concept. Of course, if space would be a vacuum, it would instantly collapse on itself, because that’s what vacuums do. So yeah, they’re they’re giving it some thought, but in a sense, they actually never let go of it. They just subdivided it in different structures, like fields of gravity, for instance, or magnetism. So because all of these are just different aspects of the ether, so in a certain sense, even though they rejected that the idea per se, they actually never let go of it. They just gave it different names, because the ether is indeed a field.

S.D. 08:11

Can I ask a clarifying question? You know that the first paragraph of HPB’s ends with, to put it plainly, ether is the astral light, and the primordial substance is Akasha, the upadi of divine thought. And then the next paragraph begins in modern language, the latter would be better named cosmic ideation, spirit, and that means Akasha, right? And the former ether, cosmic substance, matter, am I understanding that correctly? 

P.W. 08:50

She likes to play with words. And there you see how careful we have to be by not attaching ourselves too much to one or the other explanation. Because on the surface of it, it seems as if there is a contradiction, but there isn’t they. Each sentence has to be understood in the proper context. So ether is the astral light, and that would be cosmic substance, and the primordial substances. Akasha sees, she says, The upadi of divine thought, and the latter, here in modern language, the latter that is divine thought. So of which Akashi Akasha is the upadi, the vehicle. So it’s a spiritual vehicle, of course. So cosmic ideation, or divine thought, ought to be called Spirit the former. And I would imagine that Akash the former here applies to Akasha. So Akasha versus divine. And thought that’s why she puts them both in small caps.

S.D. 10:06

Great, thanks.

P.W. 10:09

But of course, Akasha also stands to astral life, that spirit to matter. It’s all a matter of formula and perception. So we have to be flexible in our in our approach and the use of terminology, because ultimately it cannot be expressed on our plane anyway. So HPV has to beat about the bush there sometimes to get us to to shake us out of our preconceived ideas because what is, then the difference between prakriti and Akasha, you could say, or mulaprakriti? Well, the difference is that Prakriti is usually referred to as the passive homogeneous substance, whereas Akasha is already a dynamic substance in which spirit has began to operate, you could say so that’s a distinction that you can make. When we speak of Akasha, we speak of spirit and matter. When we speak of prakriti, we just speak of one aspect of the two. And like she says, These the Alpha and Omega. So the divine thought, or cosmic ideation, and cosmic substance are the alpha and the omega of being, and are but the two facets of the one absolute existence. Well, that’s pretty much as what she said was that, I think page 18, in the beginning, we’ve read that where she refers to on page 18, she says, in its absoluteness, that’s the first break there, the one principle under its two aspects of parabrahm and Mullah pracri. So it’s that’s the same as actually saying divine thought and Akasha, spirit and cosmic substance, except that in this case, here on 326 she’s referring to it in an already manifested condition, of Course, whereas parabrahma and Mullah prakriti are absolutely unmanifested aspects of it, of the one absolute. And now you can in terms of evolution, you can go either way. There are people that follow the road of Mullah prakriti, or prakriti, and forgetting that that is the, relatively speaking, a passive aspect of the two Para Brahm is that we what becomes the active aspect, and is thus hierarchically higher, but it cannot manifest without Mullah prakriti. So don’t see the two as two separate, independent realities, because that’s not what they are. They are one, and one cannot be without the other. There is no point in having space, for instance, with no substance in it, and there’s no point in having substance with no space to put it in. Although you can make a distinction conceptually between the two. In reality, they are one in

V.K. 14:04

So one quick thought, it seems that if you take Akasha and have seven gradations of Akasha, or break it down, Akasha could be the highest one, and then it seems, comes Aditi, and then comes ether, with A, E, T, H, A R, aether, and the last one, or the lowest, which is ether, which is equivalent to the astral light, but in between, I’m not sure what is this.

P.W. 14:39

Yeah, it also, again, depends on in what context you look at it Vikash, because there are places where HIV says there are seven planes of Akasha and the four, the three lower actually, because the fourth, the lowest is physical, the three lower, we call astral. Then there are other places where she says there are seven planes of seven astral planes, the three higher, we call Akasha, and the three lower, we call astral and the lowest, disaster light. So it depends on the context in which she tries to explain something, and the in terms of Akasha, the two planes that she most refers to as Akasha, although it’s all the three higher planes. So whenever you have seven planes, the three higher all are all Akashic, but she uses it most in connection either to the highest or the third and now, then you could say, okay, but then why does she call the third one some sometimes eater? And that’s where that idea comes in, that the fifth plane is a dual plane, just like our mind, because cosmically, it corresponds to Mahat, and Mahat corresponds with Manas, our mind and our Manas is dual has a higher and a lower aspect. So the higher Manas is the Akashic part of our mind, and the lower Manas is the ether part of our mind. But so look at the context in which she speaks of the fifth plane, whether she uses Akasha or ether, and then see what she has to say about and you will see when she’s referring to ether, she’s usually referring to the more substantial aspects of the mind, whereas if she uses Akasha, you know that she’s talking about the higher aspect of mind, but all the three higher planes are Akashic, and the three lower are astral, and the lowest is physical, of course. And that’s that’s our problem with the words and our probably our lack of understanding Sanskrit, I think because in Sanskrit, they have particular names for all these divisions and even the subdivisions, and we can have those subdivisions in our language because we never developed the ideas about them. Whereas in the East, especially in India, of course, in antiquity, and long before antiquity, even those ideas were already developed in those days. And so they developed the language for it in order to communicate with each other.

V.K. 17:55

So when it is mentioned that in the fifth round, ether, the gross body of Akasha will become more familiar to men. Is that the lowest which, I mean, which is akin to astral light, which will which people will start seeing?

P.W. 18:17

Well, as says that the mind will be fully developed in the fifth round. But she also says that towards the end even of the sixth rays, I think she says the Akasha will start the ether will start to become visible in the air. Okay, visible. That means that there is a substantial aspect to it. So she’s indeed referring to ether. And what we what we can understand from it is that in that in the whole of the fifth round, the full development of mind has to happen also through the lower mind, which is the ether aspect of mind, whereas Higher Mind is Akashic. So maybe there’s something to say that during the involution, we develop the lower mind to its maximum capacity, and during the evolutionary period, we develop the higher mind to its full capacity, and then in the sixth round, it will be the turn of buddhi. Of course, that’s one way of looking at it. Do you have any other or your own ideas about this? Vikash?

V.K. 19:35

No, this makes sense. I always get confused between these so many terms, like Akasha, Aditi, aether with an AE, and then astral light and ether. And then there’s something in between that. And I mean, it’s like you rightly said, playing with words, but becomes very confusing.

P.W. 19:56

Yeah, HPB tries to prevent you from getting into a rut in your thinking. So that’s why she says some there is the ether with a AE together. And that should be pronounced “aye”, because that’s a Greek Greek letter. That’s the Greek letter Æ. So that should be called aether versus ether, which is with an E, and the aether is sometimes equated with Akasha, and sometimes HPB makes a distinction even between the aether of the Greeks and the Akasha of the Hindus. Because, of course, they those were ideas that correspond, to some extent, but that doesn’t mean that they are the same in all the details, and that’s why she’s using so many names. Remember that there is not a single theosophical word used in all our writings, in all our literature, maybe one or two. You could definitely say, well, yeah, the word Theosophy is a theosophical term, and maybe the word fohat. But apart from that, HPB always uses the terminology that is used in exoteric works. You and very often, she then points out what the pitfalls are by using those words, or she uses an exoteric term, and she uses it in an in a theosophical sense, rather than in the sense in which the philosophy from where she draws it, is using it. We see that sometimes with Manas, which obviously is a Sanskrit term used in Hindu philosophy, but sometimes HPB gives it a twist, a theosophical twist. All right, any other comments on this section? Otherwise, we can continue the evolution of the god idea that we will see in the next paragraph there, where she says, that’s where we continue. They do not understand that even now, the evolution of the god idea that is that itself is a title. And I think she used that expression from that title of a book by Grant Allen that appeared in 1840 and that was called the evolution of the god idea. So I guess that’s where she derived that expression from. So maybe we can continue here. G.K., can you do some reading?

G.K. 23:01

Okay.

P.W. 23:02

From 326, the last break. And take that to the middle break on 327.

G.K. 23:10

Ok, they do not understand it even now. The evolution of the god idea precedes a pace with man’s own intellectual evolution, so true it is that the noblest idea to which the religious spirit of one age can soar will appear but a gross caricature to the philosophic mind in a succeeding epoch, the philosophers themselves had to be initiated into perceptive mysteries before they could grasp the correct idea of The ancients in relation to this most metaphysical subject. Otherwise outside such initiation for every thinker, there will be a thus far shall thou go, and no farther, mapped out by his intellectual capacity as clearly and as unmistakably as there is for the progress of any nation or race in its cycle, by the law of karma, outside of initiation, the ideas, ideals of contemporary religious thought must always have their wings clipped and remain unable to soar higher. For idealistic as well as realistic thinkers and even free thinkers are but the outcome and the natural products in. Of their respective environments and periods, the ideals of both are only the necessary results of their temperaments and the outcome of that phase of intellectual progress to which a nation in its collectivity has attained. Hence, as already remarked, the highest flights of modern Western metaphysics have fallen far short of the truth. Much of current agnostic speculation on the existence of the first cause is little better than veiled materialism. The terminology alone being different, even so great a thinker as Mr. Herbert Spencer speaks of the unknowable, occasionally in terms that demonstrate lethal influence of materialistic thought, which, like the deadly Sirocco, has withered and blighted all currents ontological speculation from the early ages of the fourth race, when spirit alone was worshiped and the mystery was made manifest, down to the last Palmy days of Grecian art, at the dawn of Christianity, the Hellenes alone had dared to raise publicly an altar to the unknown God, whatever St Paul may have had in his profound mind when declaring to the Athenians that this unknown, ignorantly worshiped by them, was the true God, announced by himself, that deity was not Jehovah see the Holy of Holies, nor was he the maker of the world and all things. For it is not the God of Israel, but the unknown of the ancient and modern pantheists that dwelleth not in temples made with hands. Divine thought cannot be defined or its meaning explained except by the numberless manifestations of cosmic substance in which the former is sensed spiritually by those who can do so.

P.W. 27:47

Ok, thank you. Let’s, take our break there and discuss that part that she expressed here. That’s quite a very beautiful part, and the way that she explains that: the evolution of the god idea proceeds a pace with man’s own intellectual evolution. Everybody grasp that? So the way we think about God, what it might be, how it looks like if there is anything to look at in the first place, proceeds or develops at the same pace as our own intellectual evolution. So it is our intellectual evolution that limits our perception of divinity, and that’s why a lot of people, even brilliant scientists, can still go to church on Sunday and believe in a personal God. And in that next sentence, so true it is that the noblest ideal to which the religious spirit of one age can soar will but will appear but a gross caricature to the philosophic mind in a succeeding epoch, as we evolve them, our perceptions concerning divinity improve, and then the old forms of looking at it fade away and look sometimes as A gross caricature. And then the next one the philosophers themselves, had to be initiated into perceptive mysteries. Can you think of another word for that? Perceptive mysteries? HPB uses it from time to time. It’s a Greek term. Well, you can also use a Sanskrit equivalent, if you like, the perceptive mysteries relates to Pog. So theog or Raja Yoga, as HPV says, and that’s what, when the, that’s what the that’s what was the process in the larger mysteries in the Mystery Schools, it’s where you became initiated into the perceptive mysteries.

G.S. 30:48

So how could you initiate somebody into those mysteries? It seems to me, they have to develop that capacity themselves.

P.W. 30:59

Yeah, but you’re just gonna walk into the mystery school and say, Can you initiate me? So indeed, there was a whole training that preceded that particular moment, just like with the Egyptians, like the pyramid was actually a place for initiation in the king’s chamber.

B.M. 31:28

Why Raja Yoga and not Jnana yoga?

P.W. 31:32

Well, because Raja Yoga is the kingly yoga, and it incorporates all the other yogas as your business, and jnana yoga is a part of it, because you may, may have come upon that expression where HPV says, Theosophy is Jnana Yoga. And that is an aspect of Raja Yoga. You but before you made it to this point, initiated into perceptive mysteries. Those are there are different degrees of course of initiation, and that is what we refer to. Theurgy is basically, or can be equated with the antaskaronic pattern, or Raja Yoga.

B.M. 32:39

So you’re making it the same. So Raja Yoga is equal to and the Karana,

P.W. 32:49

well, it should be, says that Raja Yoga is the same as theology, but that that process of DlG is is not just a single thing. It is a path, and that path is the Under path. If you’re looking at volume two, page, 558, 558, she says, to crucify before, not against the sun. Is a phrase used of initiation. It comes from Egypt and primarily from India. The Enigma can be unriddled only by searching for its key in the mysteries of initiation, the initiated adept who had successfully passed through all the trials, and those trials is the antoscharonic path was attached, not nailed, But simply tied on a couch in the form of a towel that’s a tear in Egypt, over of a swastika without the four additional prolongations. So a cross thing. It is called to this, in the sleep of Siloam. It is called, to this day among the initiates in Asia, minor in Syria and even higher Egypt. That’s Upper Egypt. He was allowed to remain in this state for three days and three nights, during which time his spiritual ego was set to confabulate with the gods. That’s an expression also used by Jacob Berman, confabulate with the gods, descend into Hades Amenti or patawa, according to the country, and do works of charity to the invisible beings, whether souls of men or a. Mental spirits, his body remaining all the time in a temple crypt or subterranean cave in Egypt. It was placed in the sarcophagus in the king’s chamber of the Pyramid of Cheops, and carried during the night of the approaching third day to the entrance of a gallery where at a certain hour, the beams of the Rising Sun struck full on the face of the entranced candidate who were woke to be initiated by Osiris and taught the god of wisdom. So that’s just one aspect of that initiation into perceptive mysteries.

B.M. 35:47

Does this still happen today?

P.W. 35:51

I would assume, so, yeah, where and how and when? We don’t know, of course, but it still happens, I imagine even in our days, there must still be individuals that reach the level of an adept ship, a certain level of a depth ship, or even Mahatmaship. It’s not limited to a particular cycle. Now, there may be certain cycles that are more conducive to reaching it, but I guess it can be reached at any moment, and I think it’s mentioned somewhere even i

G.S. 36:44

What’s the purpose of an initiation?

P.W. 36:50

That’s a good point. And since we’re not initiated, we don’t know what the purpose is, but we can formulate some ideas around it. It’s where the lower mind, and that depends on the level of initiation, of course, where the lower mind becomes one with the higher mind. Then there’s another step, where the higher mind becomes one with the buddhi, and an even higher one, where the buddhi becomes one with Atman, and we see that will happen to humanity in the course of our evolution. When HPV said, like we mentioned before, that in the fifth round, the higher Manas will be developed in the sixth buddhi, and, by extension, in the seventh round atma. Then, of course, and all of these ideas, they recur again, correspondentially, on every globe in every round, on every globe, in every root race, in every sub race. That’s like a formula.

G.S. 38:04

I understand that the person has to develop on his own, and that’s what you’re describing. Is this progression or development or evolution that is going to happen in all of us. I’m just wondering why there is a special ceremony to commemorate that and and what exactly it accomplishes, or does it accomplish anything other than just mark the point?

P.W. 38:41

Well, you could say we cannot initiate ourselves. So somebody has to initiate us. And so the candidate can only reach up to a certain plane. And then it is usually referred to as by the Grace of the Guru. We even see that idea in Christianity, where it is misunderstood and the grace of God, but ultimately it is the guru who helps us to be to wake up within a certain realm of consciousness. And yeah, what else can we say about it? Not much, because we don’t know what that process exactly entails. What HPV explains. There is a very superficial synopsis of what goes on there, like the candidate has to descend into Amenti and help people there, and even elementals Jesus. What do we know about that? Nothing, but it’s something, at least, to give some thoughts to.

G.S. 39:50

Apparently, once you go through this process, then you’re given extra help. You’ve reached a certain level where there are those. That will extend more help.

P.W. 40:03

Yeah, we see that expressed in the Bhagavad Gita. We see that too in that expression where it is said that whenever we extend our hand into the direction of the Master, the Master is, by law, required to reciprocate that effort, and that’s why we sometimes receive help that can be by means of intuition or in a dream or in deep sleep, and then we only realize that in a waking condition three months later, for instance, all those things belong to the possibilities, just the fact that we get an intuition. How come that that intuition takes place? Well, that intuition is a little bit like the guru in us, because we plow the field with our intellect and our concepts, and then the field becomes ready to receive the seed, and that the receiving of the seed is the grace of God or the guru that helps You, whatever terminology you want to stick to it. You didn’t give yourself intuition. It just comes out of the blue, and you you can’t even invoke it in that sense. The only way to invoke it is by doing the job, by doing the work, plowing the field, or, yeah, living like HBB says, How do we get there? Well, by living the life that is necessary to acquire this wisdom and like it is said in in the Gita, by doing service, by asking questions, but we have to ask the right questions, because the answer can only go as far as your question will reach.

B.M. 42:12

Do students have to go through initiation? I understand that we have inner help and guidance, but initiation, it looks like it’s more a formal ceremony. Do students have to go through that?

P.W. 42:26

Yeah, there may be some kind of, yeah, a kind of, formal element to it. Most likely, yeah. I mean, I’ve never been, I don’t know if I ever, maybe in previous lives I may have in the pyramid of Cheops, but, I mean, we don’t know anything about that then. But Mr. Judge, oddly enough, says we may have been initiated already, up to a point of course in previous lives, and in this particular life, our mind is not susceptible to that knowledge, but we have it in our higher being.

S.D. 43:12

You know, in one of the Gita classes, Alex was talking about the correct pronunciation of the Gita in Sanskrit, and I think that gives us a clue to some of what may possibly go on in an initiation ceremony when you reach a certain level of development, intellectually, morally and so on. There are centers that can be activated. I’m my I’m guessing by, you know, the repetition of montromic sounds that are imparted to you at initiation, you know, so that would be one aspect of what’s going on, perhaps.

G.K. 44:09

We could also look at theosophical literature as helping helping people remember their past experiences, possibly initiation or, just the effort of the reading and the study of theosophical work is, would seem like it’s it’s all aimed towards helping an individual realize some higher concepts and ideas about themselves and the universe. It’s, it’s a, it’s a work all designed to bring a person to that point of being initiated.

P.W. 45:23

Yeah.

V.K. 45:24

But, but it’s not that straightforward, because it seems that it involves lot of effort on the individual’s side, wherein it can be a culmination of work of many lives also, and it is basically what wqj says. It’s the cleansing of your mind, your heart, your Sheaths of souls of all your seven bodies. It’s the cleansing of that and only then the light which shines in all of us can shine forth. So, as he says in “Letters that Have Helped Me” from page 47 to 50, exactly, there is in depth explanation about the same what we are discussing.

P.W. 46:12

And there’s no guarantee that, because you go through an initiation phase that you necessarily succeeded. Maybe you fail, and then have to try again. So that that example that she gives of the candidate being put on a towel or a cross, and then there’s a three day period of going through the initiation. I think we see still some echo in that when people study for doctor, for instance, and they they get their degree at the University at the end of so many years study, and then they go to a hospital. And then how do they call that period before they are really allowed to independently practice? There’s a name for that intern, intern. That’s the word, yeah, yeah. So the intern cycle, you could say, corresponds a little bit to that idea of the process of initiation, because it is only at the end of those three days. And it is possible that those three days may be symbolical. Also, we don’t know that, but it’s only at the end of those three days that he is accomplished. If he succeeds, he or she succeeds.

S.D. 47:54

There’s also a period of intense, selfless desire where it has it. It’s like a light that flashes. It’s like a light that you light up within you. So you have to get to that point where you’re either so hungry for it or something, something has to initiate that will within you, to reignite that within you. And so, yeah, all those things that they’re talking about in Egyptian times and all that, you know, when you think about the reincarnational aspect, we’ve probably all gone through some portion of it here or there in our past lives. And so when we come to this day and age, it may be coming to us differently, rather than through lying on a cross and the tao and all that other stuff.

P.W. 48:46

There’s sort of a similar subject discussed a few pages ago, with regard to where we started reading here, the evolution of the god idea proceeds a pace with man’s own intellectual evolution. If you go back to page 298, in the same volume, and there, HPB refers to H. T. Buckle in his history of civilization. And she quotes there. Let’s see. Well, we can start from the beginning of that quote. So 298, owing to circumstances still unknown, and HPB says, karmic provision, there appear from time to time, great thinkers who devoting their lives to a single purpose are able to anticipate the progress of mankind and to produce a religion or a philosophy by which important effects are eventually brought about. But if we look into history, we shall clearly see. See that although the origin of a new opinion may be thus due to a single man, the result which the new opinion produces will depend on the condition of the people among whom it is propagated. If either a religion or a philosophy is too much in advance of a nation. It can do no present service, but must bide its time until the minds of men are ripe for its reception. Every science, every creed, has had its martyrs according to the ordinary course of affairs, a few generations pass away, and then there comes a period when these very truths are looked upon as commonplace facts. And a little later, there comes another period in which they are declared to be necessary, and even the dullest intellect wonders how they could ever have been denied. That’s also the period in which we are at present with our pandemic.

S.D. 51:14

Yeah, so I have a question along these lines, because she says, on what we just read, the progress of any nation or race is under the law of karma. Well, when you when you you think about the past all of these. You know, initiations took place in specific countries and areas, and, you know, unknown to one another, but all of a sudden there’s this worldwide presentation of theosophical ideas. So what does that mean for the the it seems like we’re now in a period of the karma of the the race as a whole, the globe as a whole. I mean, even though we may just be in the beginning of it.

P.W. 52:10

A part of the karma, of course, is also our ability to communicate those ideas. And now we can, in principle, within a matter of seconds, you can reach somebody on the other end of the world. So that is part of the karma, of course, our ability to develop the means and the technology for communication. Now it’s not because we have some online classes and we can communicate with each other that all of a sudden the world is going to wake up to Theosophy, of course, but the fact that we entertain these thoughts has an influence on the world. I often think of Theosophy as a kind of spiritual or mental homeopathy. The smaller the dose, the stronger the effect can be. Although the dose does not always have to be very subtle. It depends on what level of the being that you want to apply it to. But we Theosophy is like in our thinking about this, while we’re having these classes as a kind of homeopathic effect on the mind of our world. And like she mentions that here, with regard to karma, otherwise outside such initiation that’s us. For every thinker, there will be a thus far shall thou go, and no farther. And that has to do with the ideas that we find in in in our society. How far can we penetrate into that and at the same time, the limitations of our own mind, our own capacity to think things through it so mapped out by his intellectual capacity as clearly and as unmistakably as there is for the progress of any nation, so the same for nations or races in its cycle by the law of karma. But the law of karma is not some some external power to us, that karma is us. Like she says, for idealistic as well as realistic thinkers and even free thinkers are but the outcome and the natural product of their respective environments and periods. And we see that also in the manifestation of certain inventions, somebody invents something, and then all of a sudden, there are all kinds of branchless to to that invention. But had that one invention never happened, the branch which never would have appeared. So there is one person who thinks in a certain direction and liberates the limitations of our mind, and all of a sudden it opens a floodgate of new ideas. And that’s how Theosophy can sometimes make relatively rapid progress, because I’m pretty sure that nowadays, there are more theosophical thinkers than probably 500 years ago, especially in the West. Look what she says on 327, that first break there from the early ages of the fourth race, that’s the Atlantean race, when spirit alone was worshiped. That’s before the fall of the fourth root race, and the mystery was made manifest, down to the last Palmy days of Grecian art at the dawn of Christianity, the Hellenes alone had dared to raise publicly an altar to the unknown God, because they had materialized the idea so much that they literally represented them by sometimes very low level representations, anthropomorphic representations of divinity.

S.D. 57:34

So are these the gods and goddesses that she’s referring to?

P.W. 57:38

Yep. And that too, to some extent that also counts for India, of course, HPB makes that comment somewhere that the first fall into matter was the establishment of the pantheons of divinity. And the Pantheon there is like the you have the Greek pantheon of gods and goddesses, and you have the Hindu pantheon and the Egyptian pantheon of gods and goddesses. That was actually the first anthropomorphization of those ideas. And that doesn’t mean that those ideas are all bad, but you see that there is a downward tendency, and then eventually it culminated into Christianity, and to some extent the Jews and to some extent Islam, with monotheistic, personal gods, anthropomorphic gods. And even there are distinctions, because, for instance, the God in Islam is not an anthropomorphic God, but it’s nevertheless a personal God, but it’s not anthropomorphic. You do not give a shape to Allah, whereas in Christianity, well, think of all actually beautiful paintings that have been produced through that anthropomorphization of the of divinity. But on the one hand, there is the capacity of the artist, and on the other hand, there is the idea that he represents. So you can represent very coarse ideas with a great technique. And the Christians. That’s why she brings that up here, whatever Saint Paul may have had in his profound mind when declaring to the Athenians that this unknown that’s in times of Christianity, in in Greece. That this unknown, ignorantly worshiped by them was the true God, announced by himself, that deity that Paul was referring to was not Jehovah, and that’s what the Christians thought that he was referring to, Jehovah. See, it is not the God of Israel, but the unknown of the ancient and modern pantheists that dwelleth not in temples made with hands. So Paul was referring to the first logos, not the third, because Jehovah is only. Jehovah is the material aspect of the third logo. Sage releases, besides other things, of course. Therefore, whenever you see some kind of a definition of something, don’t use it as all, it’s always that again, look at context. Are we good with this section? We can move on. Gail, do you want to do some reading?

G.S. 1:01:38

If I can open my mic.

P.W. 1:01:42

And take that from “divine thought cannot be defined” to the bottom of 328, where it says “cosmic ideation is said to be non existent during pralayic periods,” stop there, okay.

G.S. 1:01:57

Divine thought cannot be defined or its meaning explained, except by the numberless manifestations of cosmic substance in which the former is sensed spiritually by those who can do so. To say this after having defined it as the unknown deity, abstract, impersonal, sexless, which must be placed at the root of every cosmogony and its subsequent evolution is equivalent to saying nothing at all. It is like attempting a transcendental equation of conditions for the true values of a set having in hand for deducing them only at a number of unknown quantities. Its place is found in the old, primitive symbolic charts in which, as shown in the text, it is represented by a boundless darkness on the ground of which appears the first central point in white, thus symbolizing co evil and CO eternal spirit matter making its appearance in the phenomenal world before its first differentiation, when the one becomes two, it may be referred to As spirit and matter to spirit is referable every manifestation of consciousness, reflective or direct and of unconscious purposiveness, to adopt a modern expression used in Western philosophy, so called, as evidenced in the vital principle and nature’s submission to the majestic sequence of immutable law. Matter must be regarded as objectivity in its purest abstraction, the self existing basis, whose septenary Manvantaric differentiations constitute the objective reality underlying the phenomena of each phase of conscious existence during the period of universal pralaya, cosmic ideation is non existent, and the variously differentiated states of cosmic substance are resolved back again into the primary state of abstract potential. Objectivity. Manvantaric impulse commences with the reawakening of cosmic ideation, the Universal Mind, concurrently with and parallel to the primary emergence of cosmic substance, the latter being the monvearic vehicle of the former. From its undifferentiated proliac state, then absolute wisdom mirrors itself in its ideation, which by a transcendental process, superior to and incomprehensible by human consciousness, results in cosmic Energy fohut Thrilling through the bosom of inert substance to hot impels it to activity and guides its primary differentiations on all the seven planes of cosmic consciousness, there are thus seven profiles, as they are now called, while Aryan antiquity called them the seven prakriti, or natures, serving, severally, as the relatively homogeneous basis, which in the course of the increasing heterogeneity in the evolution of the universe, differentiate into the marvelous complexity presented by phenomena on the planes of perception. The term relatively is used designedly because the very existence of such a process resulting in the primary segregations of undifferentiated cosmic substance into its septenary basis of evolution, compels us to regard the profile of each plane as only a mediate phase assumed by substance in its passage from abstract into full objectivity. And the footnote for protyle: The term protyle is due to Mr. Crooks, the eminent chemist who has given that name to pre matter, if one may so call pre primordial and purely homogeneous substances, suspected, if not actually, yet found by science in the ultimate composition of the atom. But the incipient segregation of primordial matter into atoms and molecules takes its rise subsequent to the evolution of the seven protops. It is the last of these having recently detected the possibility of its existence on our plane that Mr. Crooks is in search of.

P.W. 1:08:40

Thank you. Well, that’s quite well, quite well, explained. Any problems. That’s a beautiful section. You see the quality of writing here. It’s incredible. Any comments or questions.

B.M. 1:09:06

Well, start with the first sentence when it said, divine thought cannot be defined or its meaning explained. But I thought divine thought is the universal laws that we see everywhere. So why is it not able to be defined or explained?

P.W. 1:09:28

Yeah, well, you can define or explain it in terms of intellectual concepts, but that is not divine thought. That’s an explanation. That’s an intellectual explanation of it. So what she’s basically saying that we see around us, everywhere in nature and in the cosmos, the effects of that divine thought. That’s why she says except by the numberless manifestations of cosmic substance in which. Which the former, the divine thought, is then sensed spiritually, as through our intuition, of course, by those who can do so and and you don’t have to be an initiate or a mahatma to to realize that within yourself. There’s many people who feel that, especially when they go in nature, that there is an element of sanctity to it, the sacredness to it. So in that sense, you really, it’s more, it’s closer to a feeling than to a mental representation. Let’s put it that way. I don’t know if that solves your problem there, because all the rest are just commentary. This is just words that we’re using.

B.M. 1:10:58

Could it be seen as a state of awareness rather than consciousness, that where this the self has gone, the ego is gone. So that’s one of the reasons why we can’t see it, because it’s beyond conscious, like thinking it’s consciousness.

P.W. 1:11:11

No, it’s not beyond consciousness. I mean, a state of awareness is a quality within the field of consciousness. It’s the quality of your consciousness, because consciousness means to be able to perceive something. But to what extent do you perceive it? There’s people who go in nature, and when they see a tree, they think, I can cut it up. Can cut it up and turn into wood chips. You know? There’s other people who feel a reverence when they go in nature with and so they feel that there is something deeper to it, instead of using it for commercial purposes, for instance. So all people are conscious in the world, but not everybody is on the same level of awareness, and then it also depends on this, the topic of awareness. There’s people who are not politically aware, others are not environmentally aware. There’s people with a lack of mathematical awareness or a language awareness. So awareness is a broad field, but it represents the quality of your consciousness,

S.D. 1:12:25

So it’s not consciousness itself?

P.W. 1:12:32

Oh, sorry. Can you repeat that?

S.D. 1:12:35

Is divine thought, consciousness itself?

P.W. 1:12:40

Well, that’s definitely consciousness itself is an aspect of it, but it is more than just consciousness per se. It also contains the plan, you could say the archetypes, because remember, spirit and matter or substance is a better word, is one. But for purposes of evolution, you need to separate the two, because it is the interaction between the two—that’s why she brings up Fohat—that brings about involution and evolution. So the divine plan is more than just only consciousness per se.

A.N. 1:13:35

I have a question, is nature as a whole, like a scene in nature, like a like a forest, is it on, is it collectively, on a higher level of consciousness than the human consciousness? Or does it need the human to be at that level?

P.W. 1:14:00

Well, it’s definitely not on the level of a human consciousness, but it is extremely intelligent on its own plane. You don’t need to teach a plant when, when it starts developing out of a seed. You don’t need to tell it what to do with the water, with the light, it just does it. And she brought that up in that where was that again? Oh, yeah, there was there at the top of 328, look what she says there to spirit is referable every manifestation of consciousness, no matter what level, whether it’s human or elemental, or whatever reflective or direct. Now you could say what is reflective, that’s Manas direct, is buddhi you could say so reflective of direct and of unconscious purposiveness. Yes, what is that? Well, that’s exactly what she referred to in the third fundamental where she referred to the natural impulse, that’s unconscious purposiveness, which we see expressed in the lower kingdoms. They like the vegetable in the animal kingdom. So like she says, to adopt a modern expression used in Western philosophy. I don’t think they use it anymore today, but she says, So, drop that section there and read from unconscious purposiveness, evidenced in the vital principle and nature submission to the majestic sequence of immutable law, because all the intelligence that we find and to which we usually refer to as instinct in the lower kingdoms is actually the emanation, You could say, in limited vehicles of highly developed hierarchies of spiritual beings. So the spiritual beings are not only concerned with man, they are concerned with all the kingdoms. Because when Mahat first differentiates into seven rays to which half of The Secret Doctrine is pretty much dealing with every one of those seven rays is responsible for one of the kingdoms and also for one of our principles. And she mentions that in The Secret Doctrine. So the intelligence that we see in the lower kingdoms is actually the intelligence of spiritual beings that manifests itself through lesser developed vehicles. So even in what we would call not self conscious beings or entities, it still represents an incredible wisdom nature knows how to balance itself chemicals. When you bring two chemicals together, they know what to do. They know whether they should react or not, maybe even an explosion. So where does that intelligence come from? Well, that is the the mirroring, you could say, of the wisdom of highly spiritual and intelligent beings, or the divine thought, into the lower realms of nature. The problem, however, is that they do not have a choice. They are perfect at what they’re doing in the lower kingdoms, but they’re at the same time limited. You can put a cat in front of a piano, but you’re not gonna gonna get a back out of it. So in order to reach that level, you need self consciousness that allows for self induced and self devised efforts. But don’t forget, don’t think that because we have now reached the human stage, that the natural impulse has dropped away that’s still working in us. The little that we have left of this intelligence that we developed in the lower kingdoms is still working through us. You see that in the how do they call it the flight or what reflex there fight or flight reflex? That’s an aspect of that. But at the same time, once you have self consciousness and you can choose, then it comes with a caveat. You have to learn. It just doesn’t come naturally anymore. We have to learn things. And there you see where our mind starts kicking in around our sixth some people 567, year, that’s where our self conscious mind really starts to kick in. And from then on, we have to learn before that you just adopt the language of your parents. If you’re if you grow up in China, you learn Chinese, no problem, but try and learn Chinese now, that’s going to be a tough cookie. And vice versa, of course.

G.S. 1:19:35

Aren’t our higher principles also the divine thought of hierarchies?

P.W. 1:19:43

Yeah, in different degrees.Our three higher principles, Atma, Buddhi and higher Manas, correspond directly to the higher realms of divine beings.

G.S. 1:19:57

So why do we have to learn anything? And why can’t we just draw on their wisdom?

P.W. 1:20:05

Well, we can, and we used to, in the third race, we used to, and up into the fourth race that was called the third eye that allowed us contact with the spiritual elements of our own being with the divinity within us. But due to the misuse of those powers, that organ, because it had to manifest through a vehicle, through an organ, the pineal gland, it deteriorated. And so now our third eye occasionally, HPV says, may open in deep sleep. The question is, when you wake up, do you remember anything from it? And usually we don’t. We don’t, or it may manifest itself in a simple intuition sometimes as well. When you study something, all of a sudden you have this great idea and you see the light that may have had something to do with your third eye opening during deep sleep. But as long as you were asleep, the rest of your sleep before you woke up, it could not manifest itself. And even in your waking condition, it may not be able to immediately manifest itself. It needs this moment of quiet, so to speak, of the mind, and that’s why it can sometimes takes months before all of a sudden that particular intuition comes through.

G.S. 1:21:47

But I assume the plan has always been that we learn through self-induced, self-devised effort that we don’t rely on the efforts of anybody else. So where is this balance between these hierarchies and their wisdom and our working for through self induced, self-devised effort? Is it that we’re reaching up to them and we have to reach them in order to bring it through to our level?

P.W. 1:22:24

Yeah, because we have lost it, so we have to regain it and and the level of equilibrium is there where the lower mind—which we can basically equate it with the lunar monad that has gone through the lower kingdoms—it is that aspect in us that forms the the the Manasic potential that is lighted up by through the higher Manas. So it is, it is through that anti pattern that forms the beginning, you could say of that equilibrium. Once you move through that onto the first step, so to speak, of the antiscarantic path, you move into another direction, as long as you are lost in your desires. There is no beginning, almost. It’s very difficult, and that’s where we are, and that’s why we see how difficult it is and how difficult it is to acquire an understanding of these subjects. But there is something in us that is awake and aware up to a certain point, we can feel that there is something there, whether we understand it or not. That’s why I assume that we’re part of this class. There is an intuition in us, even though it be the size of a candle. But there is an intuition in us that says there is something here and just re I mean, look at what we just read, the brilliancy of such an explanation that I haven’t seen it anywhere else, honestly, and I’ve been through quite a Few philosophies. Or you find it in the best of and the highest of the exoteric philosophies, you could say. There are some brilliant sections in the Upanishads, in the Puranas, but it’s very hard for us to penetrate through the allegorical language that is used there. Besides the fact that we don’t even speak Sanskrit, we have to deal with translations, which is already a step down, of course.

S.D. 1:25:06

You know, because we read this last paragraph that begins “manvantaric impulse,” could we? Could we start there next week and read that paragraph again, because there’s a lot in there we didn’t have time for.

P.W. 1:25:25

Yeah, mavantaric impulse there?

S.D. 1:25:28

Yeah.

P.W. 1:25:29

Yeah, we can start from there again, sure. And if you have still questions about anything previously, bring it up. Don’t forget The Secret Doctrine is one hole so but we try and stay with the subject a little bit, but if it relates to something else, then bring it up. I mean, the what we try to to teach ourselves in our study is primarily to see the connections. And seeing Connections is a physical or a mental representation, you could say, of brotherhood. Because what is brotherhood besides making connections on this plane with other people, that is brotherhood. But we have to do that in our own study as well, between the different ideas that are brought forward in The Secret Doctrine. So whenever we… you learn the most by looking up references on the same subject in another place in The Secret Doctrine or anywhere else in the literature. And that’s how you start seeing connections. And that also releases the intuition. Okay, so I would say maybe we ought to take it again from “divine thought cannot be defined” on 327, should we start there?

S.D. 1:27:08

Yeah, I would be happy if we did that.

P.W. 1:27:10

Yeah, let’s go back to 327, and start on “divine thought cannot be defined” and we go over that again, and give it some thought this week, the sections that we read here, because there’s some beautiful sentences there to think over. All of this is meditation material. So in the meantime… and yeah, it’s recorded, so you can download it after we finish, you will see it appear in the link in the chat box. And so next week we continue, then, in volume one, page 327, the second break: Divine thought. Okay. Thank you. See you next week, bye.