Theos-Talk Archives (December 2001 Message tt00068)

Daniel,

I've been too busy for the last few days to get back to you. Just to get
the context straight, we need to keep in mind that it is Jerry who keeps
getting himself upset on a regular basis, and over many years, complaining
that Dallas especially and others in general have not really (ie LOGICALLY)
understood HPB properly. So it is good of you to offer those passages from
her writings. This enables us to reflect on what HPB actually said, rather
than looking at it through Jerry's or anyone else's interpretation of her
words.

As you rightly say, this process is called "comparison". Any one can offer
an interpretation about anything, but if we want to have some surety as to
the correctness of that interpretation we need to check it against the
source. By including many references to the same subject found therein we
will also gain an idea as to whether the context supports our understanding
of this persons (the source) view. It doesn't matter whether we are
studying HPB, Jung or Husserl, the process is the same, as Steve rightly
pointed out. If we want to clarify their meaning we do need to see what
they actually said.

Let's take Jerry's interpretation that ATMAN is a Maya and see if it fits
with the passages you have offered below

----------
1. We say that the Spirit (the "Father in secret" of Jesus), or Atman, is
no individual property of any man, but is the Divine essence which has no
body, no form, which is imponderable, invisible and
indivisible, that which does not exist and yet is, as the Buddhists say of
Nirvana. It only overshadows the mortal; that which enters into him and
pervades the whole body being only its omnipresent rays, or light, radiated
through Buddhi, its vehicle and direct emanation.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/key/key-7.htm

First of all, Spirit (in the sense of the Absolute, and therefore,
indivisible ALL), or Atma. As this can neither be located nor limited in
philosophy, being simply that which is in Eternity, and which cannot be
absent from even the tiniest geometrical or mathematical point of the
universe of matter or substance, it ought not to be called, in truth, a
"human" principle at all.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/key/key-7.htm


PETER: Should we believe that HPB is saying that this Divine essence, Atma,
which is imponderable, invisible and indivisible is a Maya? Should we apply
this same meaning to Atma when she describes it as "the Absolute, and
therefore, indivisible ALL"? Is the "absolute and indivisble ALL" a Maya?
Isn't Maya more to do with that which is ponderable, visible and divisible?
--------------------

2. Atma alone is the one real and eternal substratum of all -- the essence
and absolute knowledge -- the Kshetragna.** It is called in the Esoteric
philosophy "the One Witness,"
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd1-3-11.htm

It now becomes plain that there exists in Nature a triple evolutionary
scheme, for the formation of the three periodical Upadhis; or rather three
separate schemes of evolution, which in our system are inextricably
interwoven and interblended at every point. These are the Monadic (or
spiritual), the intellectual, and the physical evolutions. These three are
the finite aspects or the reflections on the field of Cosmic Illusion of
ATMA, the seventh, the ONE REALITY.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd1-1-09.htm

We include Atma among the human "principles" in order not to create
additional confusion. In reality it is no "human" but the universal absolute
principle of which Buddhi, the Soul-Spirit, is the carrier.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/key/key-6.htm


PETER: Does the expression "the one real eternal substratum of all" sound
like HPB is saying ATMA is a Maya? Is it correct to argue that when HPB
says ATMA is "absolute knowledge", "the ONE REALITY", "the universal
absolute principle" - what she really means is that ATMA is a MAYA?
--------------------

3. As well expressed by the translator of the "Crest-Jewel of Wisdom" --
though Iswara is "God" "unchanged in the profoundest depths of pralayas and
in the intensest activity of the manvantaras" . . ., still "beyond (him) is
'ATMA,' round whose pavilion is the darkness of eternal MAYA."
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd1-3-11.htm

PETER: This follows on from the above. Here HPB has a real opportunity to
put us out of our misery and tells us ATMA is a Maya. Yet she clearly
distinguishes the two. Atma may be surrounded by Maya during manvantara,
but it is not Maya.
-----------------------------

4. Atma neither progresses, forgets, nor remembers. It does not belong to
this plane: it is but the ray of light eternal which shines upon and through
the darkness of matter -- when the latter is willing.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd1-1-12.htm

Jerry's main contention that ATMA is Maya comes from his logical deduction
based on the premise that "Atma changes over time". He argues:

Atma changes over time.
Anything which changes over time cannot be permanent and must be a Maya.
Therefore Atma is a Maya.

One can't argue with the logic. The problem is that if the premises are
incorrect even good logic will give us wrong conclusions. What HPB states
is that "Atman neither progresses, forgets, nor remembers." She is clearly
starting from a different set of premises to Jerry. We find these premises
stated by HPB elsewhere:

"Metaphysically speaking, it is of course an absurdity to talk of the
'development' of a Monad . . . It stands to reason that a MONAD cannot
either progress or develop, or even be affected by the changes of states it
passes through. IT IS NOT OF THIS WORLD OR PLANE.." (SD I 175)
---------------------

5. This "Higher Self" is ATMA, and of course it is "non-materializable,"
as Mr. Sinnett says. Even more, it can never be "objective" under any
circumstances, even to the highest spiritual perception. For Atman or the
"Higher Self" is really Brahma, the ABSOLUTE, and indistinguishable from it.
In hours of Samadhi, the higher spiritual consciousness of the Initiate is
entirely absorbed in the ONE
essence, which is Atman, and therefore, being one with the whole, there can
be nothing objective for it.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/key/key-9.htm

So, if Atma is a Maya, as Jerry suggests, then in the hours of Samadhi the
highest spiritual consciousness of the Initiate is entirely absorbed in
MAYA - is that what HPB means? If Atma is a Maya and indistinguishable from
the ABSOLUTE, does HPB also mean us to believe the Absolute is really just a
Maya?

Let's keep the above in mind and look at the recent exchange between Jerry
and Steve:

STEVE: If atma is by definition never phenomena, then by definition it
cannot be "maya"

JERRY: But it is phenomena, relatively speaking. We can observe it in
meditation, for example. In the same way that we can observe our thoughts
and so observe manas, so we can observe all our principles.<<<

According to Steve, Atman is the noumenon. According to Jerry, Atman is a
phenomena something which can be observed in meditation. Now look again at
HPB's statement and ask which of these two views most accords with what she
says. She writes:

"Atma... can never be "objective" under any circumstances, even to the
highest spiritual perception."

She goes on to say why...

"For Atman or the "Higher Self" is really Brahma, the ABSOLUTE, and
indistinguishable from it. In hours of Samadhi, the higher spiritual
consciousness of the Initiate is entirely absorbed in the ONE
essence, which is Atman, and therefore, being one with the whole, there can
be nothing objective for it."

------------------

Daniel, I could go on, but anyone can look at those passages for themselves
and ask "Is HPB really saying Atma is a Maya?" and come to their own
conclusions.

Thanks,

...Peter
====================
Subject:Jerry's Response To Daniel: Concerning HPB's statements about
Atman

Jerry you wrote in part:

"You CANNOT disprove my premise by simply throwing around more
quotes. I can interpret every one of your quotes to 'prove' that atma
is maya and changing and so on. The ONLY way you or Dallas or Peter
can 'prove' me wrong is to submit an overview IN YOUR OWN WORDS that
logically shows atma is permanent (which is, I submit, purely your
own interpretation). I have challenged anyone at all to do this, and
so far no one has done so. Your avoidance of my premise, and your
continual throwing around of yet more quotes demonstrates to me a
frantic attempt to ... what?"

Jerry, I think it is important for interested persons to actually
read and study what Blavatsky wrote. That is why I tried to give
some of HPB's own words about "atman" and "monad". Whether your view
of what HPB writes is correct or not is up for each reader to decide
if they think it is important to do so. But first one must ponder on
what HPB writes instead of reading her through "your
interpretation."

I am not throwing around quotes. I'm just giving quotes so
interested readers can easily read and compare them and ponder on
them and then compare them with what you are writing. It's called
COMPARISON. Hopefully you're not afraid of that, are you? :)

BELOW are the quotes again from HPB's pen.

Daniel

Subject: What Blavatsky writes on the subject of "Atman"

We say that the Spirit (the "Father in secret" of Jesus), or Atman,
is no individual property of any man, but is the Divine essence which
has no body, no form, which is imponderable, invisible and
indivisible, that which does not exist and yet is, as the Buddhists
say of Nirvana. It only overshadows the mortal; that which enters
into him and pervades the whole body being only its omnipresent rays,
or light, radiated through Buddhi, its vehicle and direct emanation.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/key/key-7.htm

Add to this Atma, the impersonal divine principle or the immortal
element in Man, undistinguished from the Universal Spirit, and you
have the same seven again.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/key/key-7.htm

First of all, Spirit (in the sense of the Absolute, and therefore,
indivisible ALL), or Atma. As this can neither be located nor limited
in philosophy, being simply that which is in Eternity, and which
cannot be absent from even the tiniest geometrical or mathematical
point of the universe of matter or substance, it ought not to be
called, in truth, a "human" principle at all. Rather, and at best, it
is in Metaphysics, that point in space which the human Monad and its
vehicle man occupy for the period of every life. Now that point is as
imaginary as man himself, and in reality is an illusion, a maya; but
then for ourselves, as for other personal Egos, we are a reality
during that fit of illusion called life, and we have to take
ourselves into account, in our own fancy at any rate, if no one else
does. To make it more conceivable to the human intellect, when first
attempting the study of Occultism, and to solve the A B C of the
mystery of man, Occultism calls this seventh principle the synthesis
of the sixth, and gives it for vehicle the Spiritual Soul, Buddhi.
Now the latter conceals a mystery, which is never given to any one,
with the exception of irrevocably pledged chelas, or those, at any
rate, who can be safely trusted. Of course, there would be less
confusion, could it only be told; but, as this is directly concerned
with the power of projecting one's double consciously and at will,
and as this gift, like the "ring of Gyges," would prove very fatal to
man at large and to the possessor of that faculty in particular, it
is carefully guarded. But let us proceed with the "principles." This
divine soul, or Buddhi, then, is the vehicle of the Spirit. In
conjunction, these two are one, impersonal and without any attributes
(on this plane, of course), and make two spiritual "principles
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/key/key-7.htm

Atma // Spirit // One with the Absolute, as its radiation
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/key/key-6.htm


We include Atma among the human "principles" in order not to create
additional confusion. In reality it is no "human" but the universal
absolute principle of which Buddhi, the Soul-Spirit, is the carrier.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/key/key-6.htm

This "Higher Self" is ATMA, and of course it is "non-materializable,"
as Mr. Sinnett says. Even more, it can never be "objective" under any
circumstances, even to the highest spiritual perception. For Atman or
the "Higher Self" is really Brahma, the ABSOLUTE, and
indistinguishable from it. In hours of Samadhi, the higher spiritual
consciousness of the Initiate is entirely absorbed in the ONE
essence, which is Atman, and therefore, being one with the whole,
there can be nothing objective for it.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/key/key-9.htm

THE HIGHER SELF is Atma the inseparable ray of the Universal and ONE
SELF. It is the God above, more than within, us. Happy the man who
succeeds in saturating his inner Ego with it!
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/key/key-9.htm

Atma, the "Higher Self," is neither your Spirit nor mine, but like
sunlight shines on all. It is the universally diffused "divine
principle," and is inseparable from its one and absolute Meta-Spirit,
as the sunbeam is inseparable from sunlight.
Buddhi (the spiritual soul) is only its vehicle. Neither each
separately, nor the two collectively, are of any more use to the body
of man, than sunlight and its beams are for a mass of granite buried
in the earth, unless the divine Duad is assimilated by, and reflected
in, some consciousness. Neither Atma nor Buddhi are ever reached by
Karma, because the former is the highest aspect of Karma, its working
agent of ITSELF in one aspect, and the other is unconscious on this
plane.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/key/key-8.htm

The student must not confuse this Spiritual Ego with the "HIGHER
SELF" which is Atma, the God within us, and inseparable from the
Universal Spirit.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/key/key-8.htm

Atman, or Atma (Sans.) The Universal Spirit, the divine monad, "the
seventh Principle," so called, in the exoteric "septenary"
classification of man. The Supreme Soul.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/key/key-glos.htm

Atma neither progresses, forgets, nor remembers. It does not belong
to this plane: it is but the ray of light eternal which shines upon
and through the darkness of matter -- when the latter is willing.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd1-1-12.htm

Its Primary, the Spirit (Atman) is one, of course, with Paramatma
(the one Universal Spirit), but the vehicle (Vahan) it is enshrined
in, the Buddhi, is part and parcel of that Dhyan-Chohanic Essence;
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd1-1-12.htm

The monad -- a truly "indivisible thing," as defined by Good, who did
not give it the sense we now do -- is here rendered as the Atma in
conjunction with Buddhi and the higher Manas. This trinity is one and
eternal, the latter being absorbed in the former at the termination
of all conditioned and illusive life.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd1-3-11.htm

Atma alone is the one real and eternal substratum of all -- the
essence and absolute knowledge -- the Kshetragna.** It is called in
the Esoteric philosophy "the One Witness,"
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd1-3-11.htm

Atma (our seventh principle) being identical with the universal
Spirit, and man being one with it in his essence, what is then the
Monad proper? It is that homogeneous spark which radiates in millions
of rays from the primeval "Seven;" -- of which seven further on. It
is the EMANATING spark from the UNCREATED Ray -- a mystery. In the
esoteric, and even exoteric Buddhism of the North, Adi Buddha (Chogi
dangpoi sangye), the One unknown, without beginning or end, identical
with Parabrahm and Ain-Soph, emits a bright ray from its darkness.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd1-3-11.htm

"Oh, wise man, remove the conception that not-Spirit is Spirit," says
Sankaracharya. Atma is not-Spirit in its final Parabrahmic state,
Iswara or Logos is Spirit; or, as Occultism explains, it is a
compound unity of manifested living Spirits, the parent-source and
nursery of all the mundane and terrestrial monads, plus their divine
reflection, which emanate from, and return into, the Logos, each in
the culmination of its time. There are seven chief groups of such
Dhyan Chohans, which groups will be found and recognised in every
religion, for they are the primeval SEVEN Rays. Humanity, occultism
teaches us, is divided into seven distinct groups and their sub-
divisions, mental, spiritual, and physical.* The monad, then, viewed
as ONE, is above the seventh principle (in Kosmos and man), and as a
triad, it is the direct radiant progeny of the said compound UNIT,
not the breath (and special creation out of nihil) of "God," as that
unit is called; for such an idea is quite unphilosophical, and
degrades Deity, dragging it down to a finite, attributive condition.
As well expressed by the translator of the "Crest-Jewel of Wisdom" --
though Iswara is "God" "unchanged in the profoundest depths of
pralayas and in the intensest activity of the manvantaras" . . .,
still "beyond (him) is 'ATMA,' round whose pavilion is the darkness
of eternal MAYA."
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd1-3-11.htm

It is at this point that the Cosmic Monad (Buddhi) will be wedded to
and become the vehicle of the Atmic Ray, i.e., it (Buddhi) will
awaken to an apperception of it (Atman); and thus enter on the first
step of a new septenary ladder of evolution, which will lead it
eventually to the tenth (counting from the lowest upwards) of the
Sephirothal tree, the Crown.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd1-1-09.htm

Thus it may be wrong on strictly metaphysical lines to call Atma-
Buddhi a MONAD, since in the materialistic view it is dual and
therefore compound. But as Matter is Spirit, and vice versa; and
since the Universe and the Deity which informs it are unthinkable
apart from each other; so in the case of Atma-Buddhi. The latter
being the vehicle of the former, Buddhi stands in the same relation
to Atma, as Adam-Kadmon, the Kabalistic Logos, does to En-Soph, or
Mulaprakriti to Parabrahm.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd1-1-09.htm

It now becomes plain that there exists in Nature a triple
evolutionary scheme, for the formation of the three periodical
Upadhis; or rather three separate schemes of evolution, which in our
system are inextricably interwoven and interblended at every point.
These are the Monadic (or spiritual), the intellectual, and the
physical evolutions. These three are the finite aspects or the
reflections on the field of Cosmic Illusion of ATMA, the seventh, the
ONE REALITY.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd1-1-09.htm

The Sixth principle in Man (Buddhi, the Divine Soul) though a mere
breath, in our conceptions, is still something material when compared
with divine "Spirit" (Atma) of which it is the carrier or vehicle.
Fohat, in his capacity of DIVINE LOVE (Eros), the electric Power of
affinity and sympathy, is shown allegorically as trying to bring the
pure Spirit, the Ray inseparable from the ONE absolute, into union
with the Soul, the two constituting in Man the MONAD, and in Nature
the first link between the ever unconditioned and the manifested.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd1-1-06.htm

Parabraham is not this or that, it is not even consciousness, as it
cannot be related to matter or anything conditioned. It is not Ego
nor is it Non-ego, not even Atma, but verily the one source of all
manifestations and modes of existence.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd1-1-06.htm

on the psychic and spiritual plane, it is equally true that the Atman
alone warms the inner man; i.e., it enlightens it with the ray of
divine life and alone is able to impart to the inner man, or the
reincarnating Ego, its immortality.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-06.htm

Spirit per se is an unconscious negative ABSTRACTION. Its purity is
inherent, not acquired by merit; hence, as already shown, to become
the highest Dhyan Chohan it is necessary for each Ego to attain to
full self-consciousness as a human, i.e., conscious Being, which is
synthesized for us in Man. The Jewish Kabalists arguing that no
Spirit could belong to the divine hierarchy unless Ruach (Spirit) was
united to Nephesh (living Soul), only repeat the Eastern Esoteric
teaching. "A Dhyani has to be an Atma-Buddhi; once the Buddhi-Manas
breaks loose from its immortal Atma of which it (Buddhi) is the
vehicle, Atman passes into NON-BEING, which is absolute Being." This
means that the purely Nirvanic state is a passage of Spirit back to
the ideal abstraction of Be-ness which has no relation to the plane
on which our Universe is accomplishing its cycle.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd1-1-10.htm

One of your letters begins with a quotation from one of my
own . . . "Remember that there is within man no abiding principle" --
which sentence I find followed by a remark of yours "How about the
sixth and seventh principles?" To this I answer, neither Atma nor
Buddhi ever were within man, -- a little metaphysical axiom that you
can study with advantage in Plutarch and Anaxagoras. The latter made
his -- nous autochrates -- the spirit self-potent, the nous that
alone recognised noumena while the former taught on the authority of
Plato and Pythagoras that the semomnius or this nous always remained
without the body; that it floated and overshadowed so to say the
extreme part of the man's head, it is only the vulgar who think it is
within them . . . Says Buddha "you have to get rid entirely of all
the subjects of impermanence composing the body that your body should
become permanent. The permanent never merges with the impermanent
although the two are one. But it is only when all outward appearances
are gone that there is left that one principle of life which exists
independently of all external phenomena. It is the fire that burns in
the eternal light, when the fuel is expended and the flame is
extinguished; for that fire is neither in the flame nor in the fuel,
nor yet inside either of the two but above beneath and everywhere --
(Parinirvana Sutra kwnen XXXIX).
KH in the Mahatma Letters
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/mahatma/ml-127.htm

Compiled by Daniel H. Caldwell
BLAVATSKY ARCHIVES
http://hpb.cc