Book: Five Years Of Theosophy

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This little passage is a new instalment of occult teaching given to the
public, and opens up a vast field for thought. It suggests, in the
first instance, that the exoteric doctrine of the transmigration of the
soul through lower forms of existence--so generally believed in by the
Hindus, though incorrect as regards the soul (fifth principle)--has some
basis of truth when referred to the lower principles.

It is stated further that the mummy goes on throwing off invisible
atoms, which go through every variety of organized life-forms, and
further on it is stated that it is the life-atoms of the Jiva, the
second principle, that go through these transmigrations.

According to the esoteric teaching, the Jiva "is a form of force
indestructible, and, when disconnected with one set of atoms, becoming
attracted immediately by others."

What, then, is meant by the life-atoms, and their going through endless
transmigrations?

The invisible atoms of the mummy would mean the imperceptibly decaying
atoms of the physical body, and the life-atoms of the Jiva would be
quite distinct from the atoms of the mummy. Is it meant to imply that
both the invisible atoms of the physical body, as well as the atoms of
the Jiva, after going through various life-forms, return again to
re-form the physical body, and the Jiva of the entity that has reached
the end of its Devachanic state and is ready to be reincarnated again?

It is taught, again, that even in the worst case (the annihilation of
the Personal Ego) the atoms of the lower principles are the same as in
the previous birth. Here, does the term "lower principles" include the
Kama rupa also, or only the lower triad of body, Jiva, and Lingasarira?
It seems the Kama rupa in that particular case cannot be included, for
in the instance of the annihilation of the personal soul, the Kama rupa
would be in the eighth sphere.

Another question also suggests itself. The fourth principle (Kama rupa)
and the lower portion of the fifth, which cannot be assimilated by the
sixth, wander about as shells, and in time disperse into the elements of
which they are made. Do the atoms of these principles also reunite,
after going through various transmigrations, to constitute over again
the fourth and the lower fifth of the next incarnation?

--N.D.K.

Note

We would, to begin with, draw attention to the closing sentence of the
passage quoted above: "Such was the true occult theory of the
Egyptians," the word "true" being used there in the sense of its being
the doctrine they really believed in, as distinct from both the tenets
fathered upon them by some Orientalists, and that which the modern
occultists may be now teaching. It does not stand to reason that,
outside those occult truths that were known to, and revealed by, the
great Hierophants during the final initiation, we should accept all that
either the Egyptians or any other people may have regarded as true. The
Priests of Isis were the only true initiates, and their occult teachings
were still more veiled than those of the Chaldeans. There was the true
doctrine of the Hierophants of the inner Temple; then the half-veiled
Hieratic tenets of the Priest of the outer Temple; and, finally, the
vulgar popular religion of the great body of the ignorant, who were
allowed to reverence animals as divine. As shown correctly by Sir
Gardner Wilkinson, the initiated priests taught that "dissolution is
only the cause of reproduction .... nothing perishes which has once
existed, but things which appear to be destroyed only change their
natures and pass into another form." To the present case, however, the
Egyptian doctrine of atoms coincides with our own occult teachings. In
the above remarks the words, "The life-atoms of the Jiva," are taken in
a strictly literal sense. Without any doubt Jiva or Prana is quite
distinct from the atoms it animates. The latter belong to the lowest or
grossest state of matter--the objectively conditioned; the former, to a
higher state--that state which the uninitiated, ignorant of its nature,
would call the "objectively finite," but which, to avoid any future
misunderstanding, we may, perhaps, be permitted to call the subjectively
eternal, though, at the same time and in one sense, the subsistent
existence, however paradoxical and unscientific the term may appear.*
Life, the occultist says, is the eternal uncreated energy, and it alone
represents in the infinite universe, that which the physicists have
agreed to name the principle, or the law of continuity, though they
apply it only to the endless development of the conditioned.

But since modern science admits, through her most learned professors,
that "energy has as much claim to be regarded as an objective reality as
matter itself"** and as life, according to the occult doctrine, is the
one energy acting, Proteus-like, under the most varied forms, the
occultists have a certain right to use such phraseology. Life is ever
present in the atom or matter, whether organic or inorganic--a
difference that the occultists do not accept. Their doctrine is that
life is as much present in the inorganic as in the organic matter: when
life-energy is active in the atom, that atom is organic; when dormant
or latent, then the atom is inorganic.

--------
* Though there is a distinct term for it in the language of the adepts,
how can one translate it into a European language? What name can be
given to that which is objective yet immaterial in its finite
manifestations, subjective yet substantive (though not in our sense of
substance) in its eternal existence? Having explained it the best we
can, we leave the task of finding a more appropriate term for it to our
learned English occultists.

** "Unseen Universe."
----------

Therefore, the expression "life-atom," though apt in one sense to
mislead the reader, is not incorrect after all, since occultists do not
recognize that anything in Nature can be inorganic, and know of no "dead
atoms," whatever meaning science may give to the adjective. The law of
biogenesis, as ordinarily understood, is the result of the ignorance of
the man of science of occult physics. It is accepted because the man of
science is unable to find the necessary means to awaken into activity
the dormant life inherent in what he terms an inorganic atom; hence the
fallacy that a living thing can only be produced from a living thing, as
though there ever was such a thing as dead matter in Nature! At this
rate, and to be consistent, a mule ought to be also classed with
inorganic matter, since it is unable to reproduce itself and generate
life. We dwell so much upon the above as it meets at once all future
opposition to the idea that a mummy, several thousand years old, can be
throwing off atoms. Nevertheless, the sentence would perhaps have
gained in clearness if we had said, instead of the "life-atoms of jiva,"
the atoms "animated by dormant Jiva or life-energy." Again, the
definition of Jiva quoted above, though quite correct on the whole,
might be more fully, if not more clearly, expressed. The "jiva," or
life, principle, which animates man, beast, plant, and even a mineral,
certainly is "a form of force indestructible," since this force is the
one life, or anima mundi, the universal living soul, and that the
various modes in which objective things appear to us in Nature in their
atomic aggregations, such as minerals, plants, animals, &c., are all the
different forms or states in which this force manifests itself. Were it
to become--we will not say absent, for this is impossible, since it is
omnipresent--but for one single instant inactive, say in a stone, the
particles of the latter would lose instantly their cohesive property,
and disintegrate as suddenly, though the force would still remain in
each of its particles, but in a dormant state. Then the continuation of
the definition, which states that when this indestructible force is
"disconnected with one set of atoms, it becomes attracted immediately by
others," does not imply that it abandons entirely the first set, but
only that it transfers its vis viva, or living power--the energy of
motion--to another set. But because it manifests itself in the next set
as what is called kinetic energy, it does not follow that the first set
is deprived of it altogether; for it is still in it, as potential
energy, or life latent.* This is a cardinal and basic truth of
occultism, on the perfect knowledge of which depends the production of
every phenomenon. Unless we admit this point, we should have to give up
all the other truths of occultism. Thus what is "meant by the life-atom
going through endless transmigration" is simply this: we regard and
call, in our occult phraseology, those atoms that are moved by kinetic
energy as "life-atoms," while those that are for the time being passive,
containing but imperceptible potential energy, we call "sleeping atoms;"
regarding, at the same time, these two forms of energy as produced by
one and the same force or life.

-------
* We feel constrained to make use of terms that have become technical in
modern science--though they do not always fully express the idea to be
conveyed--for want of better words. It is useless to hope that the
occult doctrine may be ever thoroughly understood, even the few tenets
that can be safely given to the world at large, unless a glossary of
such words is edited; and, what is of a still greater importance, until
the full and correct meaning of the terms therein taught is thoroughly
mastered.
---------

Now to the Hindu doctrine of Metempsychosis. It has a basis of truth;
and, in fact, it is an axiomatic truth, but only in reference to human
atoms and emanations, and that not only after a man's death, but during
the whole period of his life. The esoteric meaning of the Laws of Manu
(sec. XII. 3, and XII. 54 and ), of the verses asserting that "every
act, either mental, verbal or corporeal, bears good or evil fruit
(Karma)," that "the various transmigrations of men (not souls) through
the highest, middle and lowest stages, are produced by their actions,"
and again that "a Brahman-killer enters the body of a dog, bear, ass,
camel, goat, sheep, bird, &c.," bears no reference to the human Ego, but
only to the atoms of his body, his lower triad and his fluidic
emanations. It is all very well for the Brahmans to distort, in their
own interest, the real meaning contained in these laws, but the words as
quoted never meant what they were made to yield later on. The Brahmans
applied them selfishly to themselves, whereas by "Brahman," man's
seventh principle, his immortal monad and the essence of the personal
Ego were allegorically meant. He who kills or extinguishes in himself
the light of Parabrahm--i.e., severs his personal Ego from the Atman,
and thus kills the future Devachanee, becomes a "Brahman killer."
Instead of facilitating, through a virtuous life and spiritual
aspirations, the union of the Buddhi and the Manas, he condemns, by his
own evil acts, every atom of his lower principles to become attracted
and drawn in virtue of the magnetic affinity, thus created by his
passions, into the bodies of lower animals. This is the real meaning of
the doctrine of Metempsychosis. It is not that such amalgamation of
human particles with animal or even vegetable atoms can carry in it any
idea of personal punishment per se, for of course it does not. But it
is a cause, the effects of which may manifest themselves throughout
succeeding re-births, unless the personality is annihilated. Otherwise,
from cause to effect, every effect becoming in its turn a cause, they
will run along the cycle of re-births, the once given impulse expending
itself only at the threshold of Pralaya. But of this anon.
Notwithstanding their esoteric meaning, even the words of the grandest
and noblest of all the adepts, Gautama Buddha, are misunderstood,
distorted and ridiculed in the same way. The Hina-yana, the lowest form
of transmigration of the Buddhist, is as little comprehended as the
Maha-yana, its highest form; and, because Sakya Muni is shown to have
once remarked to his Bhikkhus, while pointing out to them a broom, that
"it had formerly been a novice who neglected to sweep out" the
Council-room, hence was re-born as a broom (!), therefore, the wisest of
all the world's sages stands accused of idiotic superstition. Why not
try and find out, before condemning, the true meaning of the figurative
statement? Why should we scoff before we understand? Is or is not that
which is called magnetic effluvium a something, a stuff, or a substance,
invisible, and imponderable though it be? If the learned authors of
"The Unseen Universe" object to light, heat and electricity being
regarded merely as imponderables, and show that each of these phenomena
has as much claim to be recognized as an objective reality as matter
itself, our right to regard the mesmeric or magnetic fluid which
emanates from man to man, or even from man to what is termed an
inanimate object, is far greater. It is not enough to say that this
fluid is a species of molecular energy like heat, for instance, though
of much greater potency. Heat is produced when ever kinetic energy is
transformed into molecular energy, we are told, and it may be thrown out
by any material composed of sleeping atoms, or inorganic matter as it is
called; whereas the magnetic fluid projected by a living human body is
life itself. Indeed it is "life-atoms" that a man in a blind passion
throws off unconsciously, though he does it quite as effectively as a
mesmeriser who transfers them from himself to any object consciously and
under the guidance of his will. Let any man give way to any intense
feeling, such as anger, grief, &c., under or near a tree, or in direct
contact with a stone, and after many thousands of years any tolerable
psychometer will see the man, and perceive his feelings from one single
fragment of that tree or stone that he had touched. Hold any object in
your hand, and it will become impregnated with your life-atoms, indrawn
and outdrawn, changed and transferred in us at every instant of our
lives. Animal heat is but so many life atoms in molecular motion. It
requires no adept knowledge, but simply the natural gift of a good
clairvoyant subject to see them passing to and fro, from man to objects
and vice versa like a bluish lambent flame. Why, then, should not a
broom, made of a shrub, which grew most likely in the vicinity of the
building where the lazy novice lived, a shrub, perhaps, repeatedly
touched by him while in a state of anger provoked by his laziness and
distaste for his duty--why should not a quantity of his life-atoms have
passed into the materials of the future besom, and therein have been
recognized by Buddha, owing to his superhuman (not supernatural) powers?
The processes of Nature are acts of incessant borrowing and giving back.
The materialistic sceptic, however, will not take anything in any other
way than in a literal, dead-letter sense.

To conclude our too long answer, the "lower principles" mentioned before
are the first, second and the third. They cannot include the Kama rupa,
for this "rupa" belongs to the middle, not the lower principles. And,
to our correspondent's further query, "Do the atoms of these (the fourth
and the fifth) also re-form, after going through various
transmigrations, to constitute over again the fourth and the lower fifth
of the next incarnation?" we answer, "They do." The reason why we have
tried to explain the doctrine of the "life-atoms" at such length, is
precisely in connection with this last question, and with the object of
throwing out one more fertile hint. We do not feel at liberty at
present, however, to give any further details.

--H.P. Blavatsky




"OM," And Its Practical Significance


I shall begin with a definition of Om, as given by the late Professor
Theodore Goldstucker:--

"Om is a Sanskrit word which, on account of the mystical notions that
even at an early date of Hindu civilization were connected with it,
acquired much importance in the development of Hindu religion. Its
original sense is that of emphatic or solemn affirmation or assent.
Thus, when in the White Yajur Veda the sacrificer invites the gods to
rejoice in his sacrifice, the goddess Savitri assents to his summons by
saying, 'Om' (i.e., be it so); proceed!"

Or, when in the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad, Prajapati, the father of gods,
men and demons, asks the gods whether they have understood his
instructions, he expresses his satisfaction with their affirmative reply
in these words, "Om, you have fully comprehended it;" and in the same
Upanishad, Pravahana answers the question of Swetaketu, as to whether
his father has instructed him, by uttering the word "Om"--i.e.,
"forsooth (I am)."

A portion of the Rig Veda called the Aitareya Brahmana, where,
describing a religious ceremony at which verses from the Rig Veda, as
well as songs called Gathas, were recited by the priest called Hotri,
and responses given by another priest, the Adhwaryu, says: Om is the
response of the Adhwaryu to the Rig Veda verses (recited by the Hotri),
and likewise tatha (i.e., thus) his response to the Gathas, for Om is
(the term of assent) used by the gods, whereas tatha is (the term of
assent) used by men (the Rig Veda verses being, to the orthodox Hindu,
of divine and the Gathas of human authorship).

In this, the original sense of the word, it is little doubtful that Om
is but an older and contracted form of the common Sanskrit word evam
("thus"), which, coming from the pronominal base "a," in some
derivations changed to "e," may have at one time occurred in the form
avam, when, by the elision of the vowel following a, for which there are
numerous analogies in Sanskrit, vum would become aum, and hence,
according to the ordinary phonetic laws of the language, Om. This
etymology of the word, however, seems to have been lost even at an early
period of Sanskrit literature; for another is met with in the ancient
grammarians, enabling us to account for the mysticism which many
religious and theological works of ancient and medieval India suppose to
inhere in it. According to this latter etymology, Om would come from a
radical av; by means of an affix man, when Om would be a curtailed form
of avman or oman, and as av implies the notion of "protect, preserve,
save," Om would be a term implying "protection or salvation," its
mystical properties and its sanctity being inferred from its occurrence
in the Vedic writings and in connection with sacrificial acts, such as
are alluded to before.

Hence Om became the auspicious word with which the spiritual teacher had
to begin and the pupil to end each lesson of his reading of the Veda.

"Let this syllable," the existing Prati-sakhya, or a grammar of the Rig
Veda, enjoins, "be the head of the reading of the Veda; for alike to the
teacher and the pupil it is the supreme Brahman, the gate of heaven."
And Manu ordains: "A Brahman at the beginning and end (of a lesson on
the Veda) must always pronounce the syllable Om; for unless Om precede,
his learning will slip away from him; and unless it follows, nothing
will be long retained."

At the time when another class of writings (the Puranas) were added to
the inspired code of Hinduism, for a similar reason Om is their
introductory word.

That the mysterious power which, as the foregoing quotation from the
law-book of Manu shows, was attributed to this word must have been the
subject of early speculation, is obvious enough. A reason assigned for
it is given by Manu himself. "Brahma," he says, "extracted from the
three Vedas the letter a, the letter u, and the letter m (which combined
result in Om), together with the (mysterious) words Bhuh (earth), Bhuva
(sky), and Swah (heaven);" and in another verse: "These three great
immutable words, preceded by the syllable Om, and (the sacred Rig Veda
verse called) Gayatri, consisting of three lines, must be considered as
the mouth (or entrance) of Brahman (the Veda)," or, as the commentators
observe, the means of attaining final emancipation; and "The syllable Om
is the supreme Brahman. (Three) regulated breathings, accompanied with
the mental recitation of Om, the three mysterious words Bhuh, Bhuvah,
Swah and the Gayatri, are the highest devotion."

"All rites ordained in the Veda, such as burnt and other sacrifices,
pass away, but the syllable Om must be considered as imperishable; for
it is (a symbol of) Brahman (the supreme spirit) himself, the Lord of
Creation." In these speculations Manu bears out, and is borne out by,
several Upanishads. In the Katha-Upanishad for instance, Yama, the god
of death, in replying to a question of Nachiketas, says: "The word
which all the Vedas record, which all the modes of penance proclaim,
desirous of which religious students perform their duties, this word I
will briefly tell thee--it is Om. This syllable means the (inferior)
Brahman and the supreme (Brahman). Whoever knows this syllable obtains
whatever he wishes." And in the Pras'na-Upanishad the saint Pippalada
says to Satyakama: "The supreme and the inferior Brahman are both the
word Om; hence the wise follow by this support the one or the other of
the two. If he meditates upon its one letter (a) only, he is quickly
born on the earth; is carried by the verses of the Rig Veda to the
world of man; and, if he is devoted there to austerity, the duties of a
religious student and faith, he enjoys greatness. But if he meditates
in his mind on its two letters (a and u), he is elevated by the verses
of the Yajur Veda to the intermediate region; comes to the world of the
moon and, having enjoyed there power, returns again (to the world of
man). If, however, he meditates on the supreme spirit by means of its
three letters (a, u, and m) he is produced in light in the sun; as the
snake is liberated from its skin, so is he liberated from sin."
According to the Mandukya-Upanishad the nature of the soul is
summarized in the three letters a, u, and m in their isolated and
combined form--a being Vaiswanara, or that form of Brahman which
represents the soul in its waking condition; a, Taijasa, or that form
of Brahman which represents it in its dreaming state; and m, Piajna, or
that form of Brahman which represents it in its state of profound sleep
(or that state in which it is temporarily united with the supreme
spirit); while a, u, m combined (i.e., Om), represent the fourth or
highest condition of Brahman, "which is unaccountable, in which all
manifestations have ceased, which is blissful and without duality. Om
therefore, is soul, and by this soul, he who knows it, enters into (the
supreme) soul." Passages like these may be considered as the key to the
more enigmatic expressions used; for instance, by the author of the
Yoga philosophy where, in three short sentences, he says his (the
supreme lord's) name is Pranava (i.e., Om); its muttering (should be
made) and reflection on its signification; thence comes the knowledge
of the transcendental spirit and the absence of the obstacles (such as
sickness, languor, doubt, &c., which obstruct the mind of an ascetic).
But they indicate, at the same time, the further course which
superstition took in enlarging upon the mysticism of the doctrine of the
Upanishads. For, as soon as every letter of which the word Om consists
was fancied to embody a separate idea, it is intelligible that other
sectarian explanations were grafted on them to serve special purposes.
Thus, while Sankara, the great theologian and commentator on the
Upanishads, is still contented with an etymological punning by means of
which he transforms a into an abbreviation of apti (pervading), since
speech is pervaded by Vaiswanara; u into an abbreviation of utkartha
(superiority), since Taijasa is superior to Vaiswanara; and m into an
abbreviation of miti (destruction), Vaiswanara and Taijasa, at the
destruction and regeneration of the world, being, as it were, absorbed
into Prajna--the Puranas make of a, a name of Vishnu; of u, a name of
his consort "Sri;" and of m, a designation of their joint worshipper;
or they see in a, u, m, the Triad--Brahm, Vishnu, and Siva; the first
being represented by a, the second by u, and the third by m--each sect,
of course, identifying the combination of these letters, or Om with
their supreme deity. Thus, also, in the Bhagavadgita, which is devoted
to the worship of Vishnu in his incarnation as Krishna, though it is
essentially a poem of philosophical tendencies based on the doctrine of
the Yoga, Krishna in one passage says of himself that he is Om; while
in another passage he qualifies the latter as the supreme spirit. A
common designation of the word Om--for instance, in the last-named
passages of the Bhagavadgita is the word Pranava, which comes from a
so-called radical nu, "praise," with the prefix pra amongst other
meanings implying emphasis, and, therefore, literally means "eulogium,
emphatic praise." Although Om, in its original sense as a word of solemn
or emphatic assent, is, properly speaking, restricted to the Vedic
literature, it deserves notice that it is now-a-days often used by the
natives of India in the sense of "yes," without, of course, any allusion
to the mystic properties which are ascribed to it in the religious
works. Monier Williams gives the following account of the mystic
syllable Om: "When by means of repeating the syllable Om, which
originally seems to have meant 'that' or 'yes,' they had arrived at a
certain degree of mental tranquillity, the question arose what was meant
by this Om, and to this various answers were given according as the mind
was to be led up to higher and higher objects. Thus, in one passage, we
are told at first that Om is the beginning of the Veda, or as we have to
deal with an Upanishad of the Shama Veda, the beginning of the Shama
Veda; so that he who meditates on Om may be supposed to be meditating
on the whole of the Shama Veda.

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