Theos-Talk Archives (December 2001 Message tt00100)

At 07:57 AM 12/8/01 -0800, you wrote:

> Jerry you also write:
>
> > HPB discusses two "absolutes" (which are
> > both relative, ie, absolute relative to our human
> > perspective). The first is the upper three cosmic
> > planes, or nirvana, where atma is located. The
> > second is outside the 7-plane solar system, where
> > the Monad is located. The first is maya. The second
> > is non-dual and ineffable. According to G de
> > Purucker, both of these are relative, and there are
> > no upper limits or true absolutes anywhere. I agree
> > with him.
>
> You and GdeP may agree that there are only relative
> absolutes but since Peter was discussing HPB's views,
> where do we find Blavatsky in agreement with this
> idea?
Daniel:

Here's one mention of the general idea of two Absolutes.
One way to put the general idea is that there's an
unattainable, unknowable universal, which forms the
matrix in which all things of the multiverse may be,
and the localized or relative Absolutes.

To a particular scheme of existence, it has its
Absolute Being, ultimate perfection, end of time
and destruction of all things, reachable goal of
evolution, Silent Watcher sitting on the threshold
of a higher scheme yet looking back, etc.

It's mentioned early on in the SD that even the
Dhyan Chohans do not know what exists beyond our
solar system. Their knowledge, fragments of which
constitute our highest mystery teachings, deal with
the coming into being of this "relative Absolute".

Most of the confusion I see when people are
involved in the study of the deeper aspects of
Theosophy, dealing with how things come into being,
rise from their not keeping this distinction clearly
in mind.

The question "how did all things come into being
at the start of a Manvantara?" needs the further
clause "in this particular world system" or "in this
particular solar system". Without the clause, perhaps
thinking one is pondering the question with the
impossible clause "for all things, everywhere, of
all time, throughout the multiverse, dealing with
the ultimate, knowable infinite," then confusion
enters.

The problem arises when someone asks themselves
a trick question, with a built in contradiction,
unable to be answered unless one first recognizes
the trick. Such questions include:

* Which came first, the chicken or the egg?

* What happens when an irresistible force meets
an immovable object?

* What is the sound of one hand clapping?

In this case, the trick question is when one is
considering what happens at the origination of
a particular world scheme, coming into manifestation
at the end of its Pralaya. One is talking about
a particular system and its relative Absolutes
and mixing it up with the ultimate Absolute, which
goes way beyond comparison to whatever biggest
scheme of existence that any being whatsoever
could conceive of.

The two Absolutes that Jerry mentions sound like
two relative Absolutes, one for our current scheme
of existence, and a second, further-removed one.

In a truly infinite multiverse, there are really
an infinite number of increasingly higher relative
Absolutes. One system with its Absolute exists
within a bigger system that also has its Absolute.
That bigger system exists in yet a bigger scheme.
Going bigger and bigger in scale, there is no
biggest, no top. There is always a higher scheme
of things giving birth to the one that we would
consider topmost.

-- Eldon

---- cut here for quote from SD, I, 130 ----

Moreover, in Occult metaphysics there are, properly speaking, two
"ONES" -- the One on the unreachable plane of Absoluteness and
Infinity, on which no speculation is possible, and the Second
"One" on the plane of Emanations. The former can neither emanate
nor be divided, as it is eternal, absolute, and immutable. The
Second, being, so to speak, the reflection of the first One (for
it is the Logos, or Eswara, in the Universe of Illusion), can do
all this.† It emanates from itself—as the upper sephirothal Triad
emanates the lower seven Sephiroth—the seven Rays or Dhyan
Chohans; in other words, the Homogeneous becomes the
Heterogeneous, the "Protyle" differentiates into the Elements.
But these, unless they return into their primal Element, can
never cross beyond the Laya, or zero-point.