(Echoes of the Orient p. 353-362)
Eastern School of Theosophy
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animal and scourge. Depending upon its Karmic energy it exists for centuries as such, undergoing torments in more and more debased incarnations: it is ultimately doomed to annihilation and to “fade out in Myalba.” Occasionally it may thus endure for centuries, and yet fade out previous to the reincarnation of the Higher Ego.
If the degradation during the life in which the separation occurred, has been sufficiently intense, or if it has “become immortal in Satan,” i.e. in spiritual evil, the Kāmic Soul is not re-born, but remains in an active state of Avīchi within the terrestrial aura. In both cases the Kāmic Soul is ultimately doomed to annihilation after a period which varies with the energy inherent in it. Its effect on the Reincarnating Ego may be very great. That Ego is led by Karma back to a new series of incarnations. It evolves from itself a new Kāma-Mānasic reflection, which is at once warred with by the Kāma-Mānasic spook either reincarnated as a soulless entity, or especially if in a state of Avīchi within the terrestrial aura. The attraction between the “father” or Higher Ego and the doomed “son” or Kāma-Manas is very great, and the latter endeavors to force its way into “the astral current and through the Auric Envelope of the new tabernacle of its Parent Ego, declaring war to the lower light” [cf. 636] — the Kāma-Manas newly evolved to replace it. It is thus a “Dweller on the Threshold” to the Parent Higher Ego. In addition to thus affecting the parent Ego this Kāma-Rūpa declares war on all humanity, preying on the living, such as sensitives, mediums, and all others to whom it is magnetically attracted; through this it vicariously satisfies its gross desires [see BCW XII:632-40].
Many members have asked how the new personality can be formed for the separated Higher Ego when it reincarnates, as it seems to them that there can be no personality remaining. The new personality is formed and evolved from other Atoms within the Auric Egg, wherein Karmic records exist from all eternity. No one personality gives manifestation to all such Karmic atoms. The evil personality is dropped from the Sūtrātma and the Reincarnating Ego, provided it resists the “Dweller,” proceeds in obedience to the Law.
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New Series No. 3
Nov. 12, 1891
It is well known to many members that H.P.B., at the time of her departure, was engaged in perfecting the organization of the School as such. It has held well together in the critical moment of that departure. But there is still need of three things. These are:
Unity, study, work.
By the first is meant that true Brotherhood which feels all the members as one’s own self, to be neither criticized nor condemned nor weighed in the balance of the mind, but to be helped to work, each in his own way. It is not sufficiently understood that, in group study, the intelligence of the assembled members is at that time augmented by unity of thought and purpose, as well as by help from higher planes. Hence it is not for any member to say, “I am weak; I have nothing to give.” Nor is it for us to say of one such, even in thought, “He knows nothing; he cannot aid me.” When the Instructions of the School are studied in the way prescribed and at fixed times, a higher Force is drawn upon; it seeks expression through channels opened to it; the inner, devotional, and fraternal attitude is the opener of the sphere. The Force may find expression through the simplest mind present quite as well as through the most intellectual: perhaps better, for the methods of intellection are fixed habits and often interfere with intuitive action. In these moments of mutual study it must be remembered — it must be realized — that the Group is a unit, a single mind. Only so far as that is realized, and so far as that is carried out in thought and practice, abandoning all distinction between minds for the moment, is progress possible. For members residing at a distance from all Groups, correspondence with the Central Office and constant endeavor to feel at one with the Correspondence Group must answer the same purpose.
Study. In regard to this point the School is in need of help. It will hereafter be carried on more as a School, somewhat after the manner in which home study is assisted by the various colleges formed for this end. When a new member of the School has passed his three months’ probation, he will then receive Instructions Nos. I and II. After he
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has studied these for some months, an examination paper will be sent. Upon his replies to this paper will depend his receipt of Instructions No. III. It is useless to give more food when a previous meal is still undigested. Satisfactory replies upon the subjects already studied will ensure the receipt of the next number of the Instructions, and so on and on. In all cases, further Instructions than those already held will go as and when members show progress and fitness by answers, and not until then. Due regard will also be had to the record and fraternity of students, since mere intellectual progress without true devotion is not helpful, but is hurtful to every member of the School.
Members who fail to pass examinations. When a member’s replies show a want of comprehension of the subjects studied, such member will not receive further Instructions, but will be assisted to a more careful study of those already received. At the next recurrent examination of members holding those Instructions, all who have previously failed will again have a chance with the rest; such opportunity of passing on will always be offered to them from time to time.
Members who are unable to grasp the Instructions. Although such cannot receive further Instructions, they need not despair. There is enough matter in Instructions Nos. I and II to engage the close attention of advanced students for many years. With persevering effort and fraternal work for Theosophy, the spiritual nature opens and the student is helped from within. All should remember that we gain nothing in life without great preliminary effort.
Assistance in study. Plans by means of which the Central Office will promote and assist Group study are being formed, and will soon be carried out. It is probable that subjects for study will be sent out monthly to Groups. A consensus of the thought of the Group on such subjects can be sent to the Central Office, and will assist it in framing examination papers suited to the needs and requirements of the School as thus shown.
Replies to examination papers. These will have the careful attention of the outer heads of the School, and will be returned to each student with any necessary corrections upon them. At the same time ideal replies to the questions asked will be published in the next number of the Suggestions and Aids, and sent to every member of the School for comparison with his or her previous replies.
Work. This refers, not alone to the study of the Instructions, but also to work done for the Theosophical Society and its members. When a student is only able to do a little, he is too prone to think that little does not count. Or, because some are not able to do much, while others again have not the will and energy to combat difficulties
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of circumstance or environment, they refrain from doing anything at all. The first class should remember that we are only expected to do what we can. The Chohan in his place, and the atom in its place, do what they can — no more. The Law judges us by our opportunities only. The second class should remember that axiom of The Voice of the Silence : “Inaction in a deed of mercy becomes an action in a deadly sin” [p. 31]. The student who will not do both kinds of work cannot advance; more he retrogrades, for there is no standing still, and he is also a drag upon all the rest of the School, just as an inactive organ is detrimental to the corporeal body. This does not apply to those whose limitations are real. But such should guard, in their turn, against the common error that right action is confined to the physical plane. They can greatly assist, on the inner planes of being, by right thought, meditation, and the mental practice of true fraternity. Brotherhood is not sentiment. It is not emotion. Nor yet is it so-called love. It is putting one’s self mentally in the very place of another and realizing his difficulties, while showing him that true compassion for which we would hope in like place. Mental exercise in this direction helps to develop that power of the Manas by means of which the Adept projects his consciousness into that of the stone or any other object in Nature.
The principal synonyms for Padmapāṇi are: Chenrezi, Avalokiteśvara, Kwanyin, Daksha, Lokapati, Lokanātha, Bodhisattva, Daivīprakṛiti, Kwan-shi-yin.
Under the legend of Padmapāṇi two great facts are concealed. The first relates to the creative modus or evolutionary process. The second relates to the mystery of a great incarnation, or Being. “Padmapāṇi is Avalokiteśvara or the great Logos in the highest aspect and in the divine regions. But in the manifested planes he is the progenitor, in a spiritual sense, of men. He is the synthesis of all preceding Races, the progenitor of all human races after the Third. He is the culmination of four primeval races.” (Condensed from Secret Doctrine II:178-9; cf. stanza 39 and pp. 249-51.) “Padmapāṇi (the lotus bearer) is the supporter of the Kalpas, the last of which, the present Mahā-Kalpa is called Padma, and represents . the life of Brahmā (or of an age of Brahmā). Though a minor Kalpa, it is ‘great’ because it comprises the age in which Brahmā sprang from a lotus” (Secret Doctrine II:179). The lotus is the symbol of generation,
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and it is with the advent of Padmapāṇi that is produced that Fourth Race which possesses Manas and develops speech (II:173,198). Daksha also typifies the early Third Race, pure and devoid of individual Ego. After Daksha “living creatures were engendered by sexual intercourse.
Before the time of Daksha they were variously propagated — by the will, by sight, by touch, and by the Yoga-power” (II:183). “The separation of sexes is allegorized by Daksha” (II:275). The term “Kalpa” also means Race (II:282,320). We see thus that this present Kalpa is esteemed great, both as a race and as an age, because it inaugurated the advent of Manas, the division into sex, and the differentiation of speech.
In the pure Third Race were primitive men, of “Kumāric condition,” and “these elect were the germ of a Hierarchy which never died since that period.” There are said also to be four Kumāras, the Head, Heart, Soul, and Seed of Knowledge; pure ascetics who sacrificed themselves for the sins of the world and the instruction of the ignorant, to remain till the last of the Manvantara; they are the progenitors of the four Races above mentioned, being “reborn in each Kalpa” or Race (cf. II:281-2). But they have one common and mysterious Root. It is said of Padmapāṇi: “This heavenly Being is credited with manifesting himself from age to age in human form,” and that “it is believed he will incarnate as the most perfect Buddha, in Tibet,” and does incarnate in the Perfect Lamas (II:178). After mention of the four Kumāras we find this pregnant sentence: “Higher than the ‘Four’ is only One, on Earth as in Heaven — that still more mysterious and solitary Being described in Book I” (II:282). Turning to the reference (I:207-8), we find that the Third Race was not at first a race, but a wondrous Being (Padmapāṇi, the synthesis) called the Initiator, who was the Tree from which, in subsequent ages, all the great historically known Sages and Hierophants, such as the Ṛishi Kapila, Hermes, Enoch, and so forth, have branched off. He is the nameless and mysterious One, the Great Sacrifice, who holds sway over all initiated Adepts throughout the world. Changing form, he remains ever the same. Knowing all things, he remains to help the few Elect. It is under his guidance that all the less divine teachers and instructors of mankind became the guides of early humanity from the first awakening of human consciousness. In Row’s Notes on the Bhagavad-Gītā, pp. 46-9 [TUP, 1-9], the same mystery is hinted at, apropos of Kṛṣṇa as the incarnation of a specific Logos helping our present humanity, typified by Arjuna under the name “Nara,” or man. We must be careful not to materialize this conception, remembering the statement of The Secret Doctrine that a Dhyāni upon the spiritual plane or “heavens” may yet be upon earth as a man or men, through the
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ray shot down by him (I:265 et seq.). One great spiritual consciousness can and does inform many souls, thus unifying these upon the higher plane. Padmapāṇi thus moves upon the manifested planes, even while he is metaphysically Avalokiteśvara, the point in the boundless circle or Logos (cf. I:429).
Kwan-yin (Chinese) on the spiritual plane is the female aspect of Padmapāṇi. These feminine Logoi or Śakti are the energies of the Logos; they “are all correlations, in their noumenal aspect, of Light, Sound, and Ether” (I:431). Kwan-yin, in her metaphysical and cosmical correlations, is the mother, wife, and daughter of the Logos, and corresponds to the Christian trinity. As Śakti, she represents the six forces of Nature in their unity, which is Daivī-prakṛiti, the seventh, the Light of the Logos. The names of these six forces are those of the six Hierarchies of Dhyāni-Chohans, synthesized by their primary, the seventh, who personify the fifth principle of Cosmic Nature, or the Mother in its mystical sense (I:293). Kwan-yin and Kwan-shi-yin are Christos-Sophia (I:473). In this philosophy, spirit and matter being eternally conjoined, we find male and female names for every Power, according to the aspect under which we regard it. There is yet more to be said. “Kwan-shi-yin and Kwan-yin are synonymous with fire and water. The two deities in their primordial manifestation are the dyadic or dual god, bi-sexual nature, Purusha and Prakṛiti ‘Kwan-shi-yin marks the places for the shining ones, the stars, and turns the upper space into a shoreless sea of fire, and the one manifested into the great waters.’ Think well over this. Fire stands here for the concealed Spirit; water is its progeny, or moisture, or the creative elements here on earth, the outer crust, and the evolving or creative principles within, or the innermost principles. Fire is the most mystic of all the five elements, as also the most divine. Fire. is a term which comprehends all. Fire is the invisible Deity, the Father, and the manifesting light is God, the Son, and also the Sun.” (This seems to refer to the 7th principle, the Auric Egg.) “Fire, in the occult sense, is aether, and aether is born of motion, and motion is the eternal, dark, invisible Fire. Light sets in motion and controls all in nature, from that highest primordial aether down to the tiniest molecule in space. Motion is eternal per se, and in the manifested Kosmos it is the Alpha and Omega of that which is called electricity, galvanism, magnetism, sensation — moral and physical — thought, and even life on this plane. Thus fire, on our plane, is simply the manifestation of motion, or life.” (H.P.B., Transactions [BCW X:378, 374-5; Secret Doctrine Commentary, TUP, II:26, 23]). Daivīprakṛiti, or Mūlaprakṛiti, is abstract, ideal matter. Metaphysically, and from the occult and cosmical standpoint, it is Fohat, the
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intellectual energy of the Logos, by which evolution is commenced, for evolution does not commence on account of the potentialities locked up in matter. Matter acquires all its attributes and powers, which, in course of time, give such wonderful results in the course of evolution, by the action of this Light (Fohat) that emanates from the Logos upon Mūlaprakṛiti (cf. Secret Doctrine I:136-7 &n, and Notes on the Bhagavad- Gītā, p. 13 [TUP, 23-4]).
We are now passing into the creative or evolutionary method, and we find that Kwan-yin resides in Kwan-yin-Tien, the melodious heaven of sound, the divine Vāch or Voice, a form of Aditi, the principle higher than ether; Ākāśa, in other words. Both Vāch and Kwanyin are the magic potency of occult sound in Nature, which voice calls forth Hsien-chan (or the illusive form of the universe) out of chaos and the seven elements (I:136-7). Now “Vāch is ‘mystic speech,’ by whom Occult Knowledge and Wisdom are communicated to man.” It is the divine voice of the soul, which speaks audibly to the Initiate (I:430 & 431n). The symbol, or bird of Kwan-yin, is Kala-Haṃsa, the bird of the Aum, or universal resonance spoken of in The Voice of the Silence. “Bestride the Bird of Life if thou wouldst know” (pp. 5 & 74 [TUP ed.]; see also Secret Doctrine I:471).
“Kwan-shi-yin is Avalokiteśvara, and both are forms of the seventh Universal Principle; while, in its highest metaphysical character this deity is the synthetic aggregation of all the planetary Spirits” (S.D. I:471). We thus find that the Logos (and Planetary Powers representing It) and the great Head, guardian of the Mahā-kalpa, have, through their fohatic energy (which subdivides into the great natural forces), a habitat or action in Ākāśa, the soniferous ether, where they manifest as and in the creative potency of sound. Brahmā produced the universe through Vāch (or speech), and words (Logoi, Verbum) synthesized by The Word and numbers (see I:430). We find the Logos dividing into two parts, male and female, Virāj and Vāch (see Diagram, Isis II:264). It creates in Vāch (sound or vibration) Virāj, who is Brahmā over again. That is to say, that Brahmā, the creator, reappears in the creative powers of Ākāśic sound (S.D. I:137). “Connecting himself through his mind with Vāch, Brahmā (the Logos) created the primordial waters” (Ākāśa) (I:431).
“Ākaśa, the first tattva, the soniferous ether. This is a very important tattva. All the other tattvas come out of this, and live and work in this. All the forms and ideas of the universe live in this. There is no living thing in the world which is not preceded by Ākāśa or followed by it. This is that state from which we may expect every other substance and every other tattva to immediately come out, or, more strictly, in which
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everything is, but is not seen Tattva 1. A mode of motion. 2. The central impulse which keeps matter in a certain vibratory state. 3. A distinct form of vibration” (Nature’s Finer Forces, pp. 237, 249). This “central impulse” we have already seen as the noetic force working from within the atoms; the whole fact of evolution through the vibratory impulse of spirit = motion, in matter, which vibration is sound, occult and otherwise, and is Ākāśa as herein shown. There are said to be four kinds of Vāch, and these correspond with the four basic principles as given in our Instructions, and will form the subject of another paper. As the Fourth Race developed speech, and mind is the basis of speech, it acquired mind also. “Language is certainly coeval with reason, and could never have been developed before men became one with the informing principles in them. The fact that Vāch is the spouse of the eternal celibate Kumāra, unveils a suggestive, though veiled, reference to the Kumāras, ‘who refused to create,’ but who were compelled later on to complete divine Man by incarnating in him” (Secret Doctrine II:199n). Vāch is the daughter of Dakṣa (“the god who lives in all the Kalpas”) which shows her māyāvic character. In Pralaya she disappears in the pulsing ocean of the Great Breath, the One (I:430-1). It is the soniferous Ākāśa which so disappears. In others, the resonance of Auṃ is silent. Under the legend of Padmapāṇi is concealed a whole cosmological history. The “Virgins Dolma” [Tārā in Skt.] represent the dual quality of Manas “enlightening the mind of humanity,” which Manas was his endowment of humanity. The rosy, fiery ray appears to be Buddhi, active. The ten heads represent the seven sounds, notes, colors, principles, forces of nature and Hierarchies of force, with the synthetic three from which all things proceed [cf. BCW XII:518]. No authority is claimed for any paper of this series.
Suggestions and Aids 361 [Since the questions for Examination Paper No. 2 are repeated before the answers, we have decided not to repeat them separately as a group. Judge indicated earlier that future questions would only be sent out to students ready for them, as some had not yet mastered the questions from Examination Paper No. 1. — Compiler]
E. S. T.
CORRECT ANSWERS TO THE QUESTIONS
Examination Paper No. 1 was sent out by H.P.B., and all replies were returned with notes thereon, together with criticisms and remarks on said replies. But the School since then has grown so much larger that the plan followed with the first examination cannot be pursued. Therefore only the grossly incorrect replies will now be returned with corrective notes.
1. What do you understand by the Mānasa-Putra? Ans. — The Mānasa-Putras constitute a Hierarchy of the Arūpa Pitṛis. In the triple evolutionary scheme of nature — the Monadic, the Intellectual, and the Physical — they are concerned with the intellectual and it is to them that men are indebted for the gift of Intelligence and Consciousness. The Mānasa-Putras are identical with the Mānasa Dhyānis, the Solar Devas and Agnishvātta Pitṛis, and from the identity of function as described in The Secret Doctrine would also appear to be identical with that third part of the Kumāras, who, when commanded to “create,” refused to obey (I:181-5). Briefly considering the three lines of evolution, it may be said that as regards the earth, the Monadic evolution commences with the appearance of the Monads passing over from the Lunar Chain, these being also called Lunar Pitṛis, Devas or Ancestors, and also Barhiṣad Pitṛis, and it would also appear that they are closely connected if not identical with the classes of Kumāras who obeyed the command to create. In the passage of these Lunar Monads round the terrestrial chain of globes there is reached at the close of the Third Round what is called the human period. The Monads at the commencement of the Fourth Round “ooze out” their astral doubles, and it is around these that the physical “Builders” mold the human
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physical form, which, from being originally ethereal and gigantic, gradually consolidates. It is during the Third Race that the Law of Karmic Evolution caused these “Chāyās” to receive the “incarnation” of the Mānasa-Putras, some of these latter being Nirmāṇakāyas from preceding Manvantaras. But it is expressly stated that some incarnated fully and became the seed of the future Adepts, a race set apart and continuing to “create” by the power of Kriyāśakti. Others only “breathed of their essence” or “projected a spark,” while another part “deferred” until the Fourth Race. Under Karma the vehicles were not ready for them and they asserted the power of choice. It would appear from The Secret Doctrine that the Mānasa-Putras who incarnated fully and who continued to create through Kriyāśakti, refusing to follow the general line of evolution, are really the saviors of humanity through the sacrifice of their own evolution. But the essential act of the Mānasa-Putras was to furnish for the coming man the essence of their being, the acquired result of previous evolution, the “fire of intelligence” which becomes “through the exertion of individual man the human Higher Self.” It should be understood that the Putras or others who “endowed man,” etc., are not beings different from him, but constitute himself. We refer to man as being this body and also other parts, so that it would be more correct to say that the Mānasa-Putras constitute now the higher part of man. Just as some students are confused about prior races — say, the Atlanteans — looking at them as being inwardly another set of beings and not ourselves, so the same error is made about the Mānasa-Putras and other “Putras” and about the Pitṛis, whether human or otherwise.
The Atlantean bodies were different ones from ours, but the informing men therein, the real men, were and are ourselves (Secret Doctrine II:289 et seq. on Karma and the Third Eye).
In the same way the Pitṛis of various sorts are us also, and also the Mānasa-Putras are those Egos who waited while others went on with certain evolutionary work until the time came to endow the body and psychical nature of that which was to be man, with his higher portion. So until the Mānasa-Putras incarnated there was no real man within as we now figure ourselves to be. Hence when it is said that the Mānasa-Putras “gave to man,” etc., it is meant to convey that they constitute the higher and better portion of the man that now is. The Mānasa-Putras are also called the Sons of Mahat. They would appear from the Instructions to be mystically connected with the Hierarchy of the planet Venus which corresponds with Manas, and also with that of Mercury, this corresponding with Buddhi and with Mahat on the Cosmic Plane. Again, in The Secret Doctrine the Mānasa-Putras
