Theos-Talk Archives (November 2002 Message tt00110)

Nov 8 2002

Dear Friends :

In recent weeks we have been discussing the subject of Man's evolution
and the 7-fold nature of our Earth as represented in the "Globes"
( see S D I 200 diagram ).

This subject was discussed at length in the "OCEAN OF THEOSOPHY".


Here are some answers that were published on this subject in ANSWERS
TO QUESTIONS AT AN INFORMAL "OCEAN OF THEOSOPHY" CLASS -- by R.
Crosbie.

Perhaps this might help us

D T B

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CHAPTER III

THE EARTH CHAIN ( OCEAN OF THEOSOPHY ) p. 50 A to Q.

Summary

THE doctrine respecting the Earth.
It is seven fold also.
It is one of a chain of seven corresponding to man.
The whole seven are not in a chain separated as to members, but they
inter penetrate each other.
The Earth chain is the rein carnation of a former old and now dead
chain.
This old chain was one of which our Moon is the visible
representative.
Moon now dead and contracting.
Venus, Mars, etc., are living members of other similar chains to ours.
A mass of Egos for each chain.
The number, though incalculable, is definite.
Their course of evolution through the seven globes.
In each a certain part of our nature is developed.
At the fourth globe (OUR POSITION NOW) the process of condensation is
be gun and reaches its limit.

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INTRODUCTORY REMARKS

In our study of the "Ocean", we must ever bear in mind the sequence of
its chapters.

The First Chapter presents the fact, as well as evidence of, the
existence of Masters of Wisdom, the results of evolution of past
civilizations. It is from this body of perfected human beings that all
Divine Teachers and Reformers have come; all great religions of the
world have sprung from teachings of one or more of Their number. What
They have given out to Their disciples and to the people of any
period, was necessarily limited to the power of assimilation and use
by the minds of the time, but the basic ideas and principles have ever
been the same.

That which is now given out by Them is known as "Theosophy," and has
been recorded in books accessible to every one, and is in fact a more
complete revelation than the world has any record of. Because of the
general intelligence of this present .period, it was possible to so
present the knowledge the Masters desired to convey to humanity-in
books, a fact which avoids the danger of intermediaries and
interpreters, with their assumed authoritative statements and
perversions, and places, the enquirer face to face with the "message"
itself.


The Second Chapter, as we have seen, deals with the general laws
governing the universe as a whole; and the present Third Chapter deals
particularly with our Earth, its nature and formation; its relation to
other planets, its present stage of development, and that of the human
egos who people it and are definitely connected with it, as well as
the sever al stages yet before us and it.


Under the general laws governing all manifestation on Earth is shown
to be of a seven-fold nature, its evolution or unfolding proceeding
from within- from the finest substance by successive stages to the
most dense and concrete forms of matter. We will therefore understand
that all forms and all beings unfold in a similar way, and that in,
each case all the stages of densification, are present and intermingle
at every point; in other words, the first state of substance is not
destroyed or changed by the formation of the more concrete stages; the
second stage is contained within the first, the third stage within the
first and second and soon; at the same tine these stages must not be
conceived of as being separate like the layers of an onion, but as
being ever, present one within the other at every point, intermingled
and interblended.

And we have further to remember that IT IS CONSCIOUSNESS AND
INTELLIGENCE that are the producers of every form and state of
substance or matter; from the smallest atom to the most highly evolved
being, EVERY FORM IS AN EXPRESSION OF THE DEGREE OF INTELLIGENCE
WITHIN.

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Questions & Answers


Q. The chapter speaks of "Egos" coming from the Moon chain, should we
not rather call them "Monads"?

A. Why should we call them monads when the Teacher says "Egos"? Ego
means a self-conscious being, the triad Atma-Buddhi-Manas, and "Monad"
refers to Atma-Buddhi, the universal spirit and the consciousness
unfolded in every kingdom and every class of being. "Monad" applies to
the mineral, vegetable, animal and human-as well as other kingdoms not
under consideration.


Q. What is meant by the Earth "is an entity and not a mere lump of
gross matter"?

A. There is no such thing as gross matter existing of itself. All
forms of matter are the productions of different degrees of
intelligence. The earth is an entity because it is a combination of
many degrees of intelligence in their evolved forms. Our bodies are
entities; they are composed of many small lives, all working
co-ordinately for the benefit and use of the greater intelligence
which brought them together-the ego-and who has trained them in their
separate modes of co-ordinate action.


Q. Has the Earth a synthetic consciousness, a ruling intelligence?

A. Not in the sense of any particular being. The so-called Rulers of
the earth and the seven planets most directly connected with the
earth-such as Venus, Mars, Mercury, etc.,-are classes of beings, each
class constituting a hierarchy, the influence of which acts as a whole
upon other classes. Each hierarchy has its own specific quality and
kind of influence. The synthetic or binding power is that of the
spiritually self-conscious beings; the universe is ruled and guided
from within.
p.52


Q. In the Secret Doctrine (Vol. II, page 87) it says: "There was a
spiritual, a psychic, an intellectual, and an animal evolution, from
the highest to the lowest, as well as a physical development-from the
simple and homogeneous, up to the more complex and heterogeneous . . .
" Then the physical and animal are not the same?

A. Evidently not. The word "animal" in this case means the evolution
from below, from the mineral and vegetable kingdoms to the animal;
whereas "physical" here means a form evolved from the matter (lives)
of the three lower kingdoms by self conscious beings (egos) for their
occupation, use, and as instruments on the terrestrial plane. The
physical evolution is the link which affords contact for
self-conscious entities with the lower world.


Q. What is a Round?

A. As the Secret Doctrine discloses, there are seven states or
conditions of our Earth united in one mass. Evolution begins in the
highest state of substance and works downward upon and through three
further more condensed stages, making four in all; having reached the
fourth or lowest stage, evolution works upward through the stages
produced and worked in during the descent, all the experience gained
in the descent being carried into the higher stages. Each time the
evolution begins in the highest stage and returns to it again is
called a "Round".


Q. What does each Round produce?

A. To give the Sanscrit 'words which designate the elements produced
would not be useful at present, but we can understand the significance
of such words as Fire, Air, Water, Earth as correspondences. Each
Round develops One Element and a nature and humanity corresponding to
it. The Earth, such as we know it now, had no existence before the
Fourth Round. The earth was fiery, cool and radiant, as were its
ethereal men and animals during the First Round; luminous and more
dense and heavy during the Second Round; watery during the Third;
earthy during the Fourth Round. With the evolution of the elements
comes the development of the senses. Each element adds to its own
characteristics those of its predecessor-thus: ( from S D II 107 )

1. Ether Hearing Sound

2. Air Touch Sound and Touch

3. Fire Sight Sound, Touch and Color

4. Water Taste Sound, Touch, Color, Taste

5. Earth Smell Sound, Touch, Color, Taste, Smell

Ether corresponds to Sound-vibration, and precedes the differentiated
elements. Air properly comes next, for it is everywhere felt; the
others follow in natural sequence.


Q. Why is it that while we are in the Fourth Round only we have Five
Senses?

A. We are past the middle point of the Fourth Round, but we are in the
Fifth Sub-Race of the Fifth Root Race. Animals have five senses as
well as Men.


Q. Why is it that animals have keener senses than Men?

A. Animals depend upon their senses for selecting food, avoiding
dangers, etc. In their wild state these senses are very keen because
of that dependence; domesticated animals lose much of that keen ness.
Man depends upon mind and desire, the senses being largely auxiliaries
to desire, and also being dulled by excessive and abnormal variety of
usage.


Q. What is a Round? Would circling around the seven centers of
consciousness on one plane of sub stance be a Round?

A. The answer to, "What does a Round pro duce?", in a previous
question should be thought over. The latter part of the question is
ambiguous. Each unit is a center of consciousness. All units pass
through seven states of substance, beginning with the most ethereal to
the most concrete (the fourth stage, the physical) then ascending from
that stage through and back to the most ethereal again plus the
experience gained. Each Round repeats this "circling" in a more
condensed way until the middle point of the Fourth Round, when the
process tends towards an etherealization in each succeeding Round,
until at the end of the Seventh Round all units have arrived again at
the starting point plus the experience gained. (See Diagram, page 153,
S. D. Vol. I.)


Q. What is the "Fourth Dimension"?

A. The term is a mistaken one: there are not "four dimensions," but
"three"-viz., length, breadth and thickness. What scientists are
endeavoring to postulate in the use of such a term is a perception of
the characteristics of matter beyond the generally recognized
three-dimensional one. The following from the Secret Doctrine is on
this subject :-"Matter has extension, colour, motion (molecular
motion), taste, and smell, corresponding to the existing senses of
man, and by the time that it fully develops the next
characteristic-let us call it for the moment PERMEABILITY-this will
correspond to the next sense of man-let us call it 'NORMAL
CLAIRVOYANCE'; thus, when some bold thinkers have been thirsting for a
fourth dimension to ex plain the passage of matter through matter, and
the production of knots upon an endless cord, what they were really in
want of, was a sixth characteristic of matter. The three dimensions
belong really but to one at tribute or characteristic of
matter-extension; and popular common sense justly rebels against the
idea that under any condition of things there can be more than three
of such dimensions as length, breadth, and thick ness. These terms,
and the term 'dimension' itself, all belong to one plane of thought,
to one stage of evolution, to one characteristic of matter . . . from
the time the idea of measurement first occupied a place in the human
understanding, it has been possible to apply measurement in three
directions and no more. But these considerations do not militate in
any way against the certainty that in the progress of time-as the
faculties of humanity are multiplied-so will the characteristics of
matter be multiplied also." (S. D. Vol. I, pages 251, 252.)


Q. Are the preceding Globes contained in the ones that follow?

A. Neither the primordial substance from which all other grades are
produced, nor these other grades themselves disappear during the
concretion of matter. All that has been accomplished in the way of
manifestation remains as lines of communication, step by step from the
highest to lowest. The globes are united in one mass of septenary
substances, interpenetrated and interblended All substances and forms
of matter are produced by the "Soul" and exist for Its purpose, and
are parts of a continuous process. Just as the elements "fire, air,
water and earth" are interblended in our bodies and constitute them,
so with the earth we live on.


Q. You spoke of the internal power being all the power there is. Is
there not an external power between the planets in their rotary
motion?

A. The external power of anything springs from and is maintained by
the internal power at the center of everything. 1 speak of the
centrifugal and centripetal forces as being those which maintain the
equipoise, but forces do not exist of themselves, they are the
exhibitions of "energy" and energy is always produced by beings,
either singly or in mass. Consciousness is at the root of all beings.


Q. What is meant (page 23) by "The earth is one of seven globes, in
respect to man's consciousness only"?

A. As before explained, the earth is composed of seven states or
degrees of substance. Man also has seven principles or "sheaths of the
soul", corresponding to and in relation with the substances of which
the earth is composed; in other words, the various embodiments or
principles of Man are drawn from the various sub stances which compose
the earth as a septenary mass. When Man is functioning through the
physical body, he is conscious of the physical plane, or physical
state of the globe. The others not being perceived are non existent as
far as his physical perceptions are concerned. When he functions on a
higher plane of consciousness and substance, he sees that e state of
the globe and not the physical, and so on with all the rest. He does
not go anywhere in order to function on higher states of the globe,
but uses a higher principle within "himself". So, while there are
seven states of our globe, they are only existent for Man when he
perceives them. In the S. D., pages 604, 605, Vol. I, the following
statement is made: "When, therefore, the Secret Doctrine-postulating
that conditioned or limited space (location) has no real being except
in this world of illusion, or, in other words, in our perceptive
faculties- teaches that every one of the higher, as of the lower
worlds, is interblended with our own objective world; that millions of
things and beings are, in point of localization, around and in us, as
we are around, with, and in them; it is no metaphysical figure of
speech, but a sober fact in Nature, however incomprehensible to our
senses."


Q. Can Man be conscious on more than one plane at a time?

A. He cannot be fully conscious on more than one plane at a time;
attention divided between two planes would give a mixed and divided
perception of both.


Q. How could a perfected man, being conscious ness itself, be
unconscious on any plane?

A. There is some confusion in this question. "Consciousness itself"
indicates the power, or ability to perceive, regardless of its
application to any particular plane or thing. Being conscious on any
plane means the applying of one's power to perceive, to the objects of
that plane.


Q. We speak of the Lunar Pitris as our physical progenitors. Does that
mean that they were devoid of intelligence?

A. Intelligence is at the root of all forms, but there are many
degrees of intelligence. The Lunar Pitris are that form of physical
embodiment which was evolved on the Moon and used by incarnating egos
on that planet. They represent and are the Physical line of evolution;
as the Secret Doctrine says, they are our physical progenitors; our
bodies are the continuance of that line.


Q. The moon is said to be a dead planet, and the statement made that
it affects the earth. How can a dead planet affect the earth or its
organisms?

A. The Moon is the former habitation of the stream of evolution now
going on this earth. As a congeries of progressive beings, it is
disintegrating; its higher beings and principles are now proceeding on
this planet and constitute it as it now is. Yet the Moon as a decaying
world still exists, as a corpse exists after the departure of the
living person who inhabited it. The corpse decays and the lives which
compose it tend to separate and enter into their respective kingdoms.
In this separation of lives and elements, an effect is produced, some
of which is beneficial to the living organisms and some deleterious.
If we remember that the Moon represents the Kama Rupa, as well as the
physical body of that planet, and apply what we know of the Human
corpses and Kama Rupas to it, we may obtain a better conception of the
effects.


Q. What sets limits to the number of Monads that enter the human
kingdom?

A. Simply the number of monads that have progressed far enough to
enter it. The middle point of this stream of evolution being passed,
and incipient humans having to begin as such on the highest plane of
substance, and human evolution having reached its Fourth stage in this
Round, and also the middle point of the Seven Rounds, monads from the
animal kingdom cannot-in the nature of time and opportunity-reach the
incipient human stage until the Seventh Round. This is no detriment to
them, for their intelligence has not reached that point where they are
sensible of the difference, and their progress towards the human point
of entrance is not barred in the meantime.



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DTB