Theos-Talk Archives (February 2000 Message tt00046)

Dear Eugene,

The Swastika has little to do with the workings of the Theosophical Publishing company, as such.  If you wish to find out more about this symbol have a look as H.P.Blavatsky's +ACI-Secret Doctrine+ACI-, especially volume 2, pages 98 onwards.  Here is a an extract from it below.

...Peter

THE SWASTIKA, from SD II pages 98 onwards:

The Svastica, the most sacred and mystic symbol in India, the +ACI-Jaina-Cross+ACI- as it is now called by the Masons, notwithstanding its direct connection, and even identity with the Christian Cross, has become dishonoured in the same manner. It is the +ACI-devil's sign,+ACI- we are told by the Indian missionaries. +ACI-Does it not shine on the head of the great Serpent of Vishnu, on the thousand headed Sesha-Ananta, in the depths of Patala, the Hindu Naraka or Hell+ACI-? It does: but what is Ananta? As Sesha, it is the almost endless Manvantaric cycle of time, and becomes infinite Time itself, when called Ananta, the great seven-headed Serpent, on which rests Vishnu, the eternal Deity, during Pralayic inactivity. What has Satan to do with this highly metaphysical symbol? The Svastica is the most philosophically scientific of all symbols, as also the most comprehensible. It is the summary in a few lines of the whole work of creation, or evolution, as one should rather say, from Cosmo-theogony down to Anthro-pogony, from the indivisible unknown Parabrahm to the humble moneron of materialistic science, whose genesis is as unknown to that science as is that of the All-Deity itself. The Svastica is found heading the religious symbols of every old nation. It is the +ACI-Worker's Hammer+ACI- in the Chaldean Book of Numbers, the +ACI-Hammer+ACI- just referred to in the +ACI-Book of Concealed Mystery+ACI- (Ch. I., +AKcApw- 1, 2, 3, 4, etc.), +ACI-which striketh sparks from the flint+ACI- (Space), those sparks becoming worlds. It is +ACI-Thor's Hammer,+ACI- the magic weapon forged by the dwarfs against the Giants, or the pre-cosmic Titanic forces of Nature, which rebel and, while alive in the region of matter, will not be subdued by the Gods, the Agents of Universal Harmony, but have first to be destroyed. This is why the world is formed out of the relics of the murdered Ymir. The Svastica is the Miolnir, the +ACI-storm-hammer+ACIAOw- and therefore it is said that when the Ases, the holy gods, after having been purified
and suffering in their life-incarnations), become fit to dwell in Ida in eternal peace, then Miolnir will become useless. This will be when the bonds of Hel (the goddess-queen of the region of the Dead) will bind them no longer, for the kingdom of evil will have passed away. +ACI-Surtur's flames had not destroyed them, nor yet had the raging waters+ACI- of the several deluges. . . . . +ACI-Then came the sons of Thor. They brought Miolnir with them, no longer as a weapon of war, but as the hammer with which to consecrate the new heaven and the new Earth. . . . . +ACIAKg-

Verily many are its meanings+ACE- In the Macrocosmic work, the +ACI-HAMMER OF CREATION,+ACI- with its four arms bent at right angles, refers to the continual motion and revolution of the invisible Kosmos of Forces. In that of the manifested Kosmos and our Earth, it points to the rotation in the cycles of Time of the world's axes and their equatorial belts+ADs- the two lines forming the Svastica +AFsAWw-diagram+AF0AXQ- meaning Spirit and Matter, the four hooks suggesting the motion in the revolving cycles. Applied to the Microcosm, Man, it shows him to be a link between heaven and Earth: the right hand being raised at the end of a horizontal arm, the left pointing to the Earth. In the Smaragdine Tablet of Hermes, the uplifted right hand is inscribed with the word +ACI-Solve,+ACI- the left with the word +ACI-Coagula.+ACI- It is at one and the same time an Alchemical, Cosmogonical, Anthropological, and Magical sign, with seven keys to its inner meaning. It is not too much to say that the compound symbolism of this universal and most suggestive of signs contains the key to the seven great mysteries of Kosmos. Born in the mystical conceptions of the early Aryans, and by them placed at the very threshold of eternity, on the head of the serpent Ananta, it found its spiritual death in the scholastic interpretations of mediaeval Anthropomorphists. It is the Alpha and the Omega of universal creative Force, evolving from pure Spirit and ending in gross Matter. It is also the key to the cycle of Science, divine and human+ADs- and he who comprehends its full meaning is for ever liberated from the toils of Mahamaya, the great Illusion and Deceiver. The light that shines from under the divine hammer, now degraded into the mallet or gavel of the Grand Masters of Masonic Lodges, is sufficient to dissipate the darkness of any human schemes or fictions.
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