Theos-Talk Archives (December 2002 Message tt00178)

PART 2

RE: GLOBES, RACES, MAN IN EVOLUTION




PART 11


==========================

Mr. Judge says that everything in nature is sevenfold.
But the
statement is not that everything in the universe has
all its
seven principles active at the same time.

It is in man alone that all the seven principles may
become
active, but in order for all seven to become active at
once, they
must be unified. How many principles has a Mahatma?
One. He has
Atman, and since Atman is the source of all the
principles, he
emits the principles as the occasion requires. How
many kinds of
lever is our body? All kinds of levers. Is our body a
lever? No,
but it can at once be used as a lever of the first,
the second,
or the third class.

Take, say, what we call. the mineral kingdom: only one
principle
is active, and that principle is active only as our
body is
active when we are asleep-it is only breathing. Take
the
vegetable kingdom; it is clear to one who studies it
from the
stand-point of consciousness that the same
consciousness which,
in the mineral kingdom, is sound asleep-
externally-is, in the
vegetable kingdom, beginning to dream. Then take the
animal
creation as a whole; it has identically the same
consciousness as
manifests in the other kingdoms. At times it is asleep
and at
times it is dreaming. Animal consciousness is mostly
dreaming;
but fitfully, under shock, it will wake for a second,
like a
flash of lightning. We know electricity can make a
flash of
lightning, or the steady glow of lights in a room.
Come to man:
he has his period of waking consciousness, that is,
self-consciousness, and his period of animal
consciousness; but,
when his human consciousness is active, his animal
consciousness
is dreaming or asleep. When his animal consciousness
is active,
his vegetative and human aspects of consciousness are
asleep or
dozing. We pass up and down the four states, mineral,
vegetable,
animal and human, and don't notice that we are doing
it.


What is meant by a Manvantara being "a period between
two men"?
To answer that question, we have but to turn back to
the first
chapter of the Ocean to where Judge says that the one
object of
these mighty waves of evolution called Manvantaras is
the
production of perfect man. So a Manvantara, the whole
vast
panorama, is soul and spirit ever evolving towards one
object,
and when that object is achieved for as many as
possible-then,
according to the second chapter, that Manvantara is
over: its
crop is perfected men or Mahatmas. Next is a period of
rest, and
again there is a new mighty wave of evolution, all
being soul and
spirit, once more evolving with the same object of
producing a
new crop. So there is a crop of men, meaning perfected
men, in
this Manvantara and a crop of perfected men in another
Manvantara-the period between one crop of men and
another being a
"Manvantara."


RACE -- WHAT IS IT ?

Mr. Judge states: "Between the end of any great race
and the
beginning of another there is a period of rest" . What
is the
nature of that rest, and are there any records of it?

Between the great races, of which there are seven in
each Globe
(and of these there are seven in each Round), there is
a period
of rest, when all the active principles of this plane
cease to be
active, and this plane goes to sleep. The analogy
between Pralaya
and this period about which the question is
asked-which H.P.B.
calls "obscuration"- is the same analogy as that
between death
and sleep.

Our Earth Chain "dies" every so often; when it dies,
it
dissolves, just as our body does, to be re-formed just
as a
reincarnating body is formed. But the earth, so far as
we know,
sleeps between the great races. What becomes of US? We
go to
another globe, just as we go to another globe or state
of
consciousness in dream, in sleep and after death. We
may go to
the globe below this or we may go to the globe above
this, as the
case may be; but the self-conscious egos leave the
globe between
races.


KAMA AND KAMA-MANAS

If we regard the universe and man as consisting in
their
perfection during manifestation of seven elements, and
all the
beings in that universe as seven-principled beings,
then it can
be seen that these seven globes relate to the seven
fundamental
elements into which everything can be reduced and to
the seven
fundamental principles - our basis of collective
action or
manifestation. The principle that is now
active-Kama-Manas-did
not exist on Globe A; Kama-Manas did not exist on
Globe B, or on
Globe C, or D, or E, or F, or G during the first three
Rounds,
and it did not exist in this Round until we reached
Globe D; Kama
was then utterly different, just as, say, the flesh of
our
bodies, although matter, is just as different as can
be from the
chemical elements from which it has been derived.

So Kama, the principle of action, in the kingdoms
below man, is
just as different from that same Kama in man, as our
flesh is
different from the chemical elements. Until the two
lines of
evolution, the physical and the spiritual, were
conjoined in the
same form, we had no Kama-Manas; we had the active
principle,
memory, in the form of impulse, desire and habit in
the three
lower kingdoms; the Monad, Atma-Buddhi, represents the
spiritual
line of evolution; the two lines conjoined by the
descent of the
reincarnating Ego - Manas - into a form of matter, and
we have
the universe as it is now.


How can such a process be a matter of knowledge to us?
Several
statements are made suggestively in The Secret
Doctrine as that
the collective consciousness of the Manus-or call it
Universal
Mind, which is the same thing-embraces the
interminable
eternities of all the past; also that there must be
beings so
high that they can view in retrospect, that is, from
the stand
point of what we would call memory, the whole period
of evolution
of a given solar system.


MATTER -- WHAT IS IT ?

What is meant by Mulaprakriti? Literally, it means
the root of
matter. Oftentimes, you know, you can get at the truth
by a
process of elimination as well as by a process of
addition. Now
consider the universe; it is enormously compound,
whether
regarded physically or metaphysically; it is highly
complex.
Suppose we begin dissolving it just as we dissolve
things
chemically. Into how many elements can we dissolve it?
According
to the teachings of Theosophy, the whole universe and
everything
in it can be finally dissolved into seven elements.
How about
those seven elements? Can they be dissolved? Yes, they
also can
all be dissolved or resolved; into what? Into one
element only.
If this is the case at dissolution, reverse the
process, and we
have manifestation.


MATTER IN EVOLUTION

>From the One Element proceed successively seven
modifications of
that Element, and we, looking at it from this side and
not seeing
what is on the other side of the seven elements, call
the
modifications "seven elements." It is seven different
modifications within, or aspects of, one and the same
Element.
Then what? Then we begin making combinations of those
same
elements, and finally we have what we have-a great
series of
"elements."

We can get at the problem decimally very easily, and
in truth
that is the right way. But view it, if we want to view
it, both
physically and metaphysically or spiritually. Suppose
we use
mathematics on the universe, and not any other system
of
mathematics than the decimal system. (You know some
ancient
peoples used to have 7 as the basis for their
arithmetic, and
others have had 9 as the basis. A great many people
have had 11,
and 12, and 16, and a few have had 13 - of which one
of the
survivals is our idea of unlucky numbers.) We now
generally use
10

Let's take the universe as a decimal system. Would
anybody object
to this statement? "It makes no difference to me
whatever what
number you give me; it can consist of ten digits
variously
combined and variously repeated." No matter how big
the number
is--it is made up of ten simple elements or digits.
And what did
all those digits proceed from? From zero, which is no
number they
all return into zero. The ten elements of arithmetic,
0, 1, 2, 3,
4,5, 6, 7, 8, 9. When we come to examine the digits,
we find that
the digits are not actually simple integers; 9 is a
combination
of 8 and 1; also of 7 and 2; also of 6 and 3; also of
5 and 4; 8
is not a simple indissoluble number; 8 is a compound
of 7 and 1,
6 and 2, and 3, 4 and 4. So we can treat every one of
our
so-called digits. There is only one number and that
which is no
number; but the combination of no number and one
number gives us
the digits and the combinations of digits, gives us,
in fact, all
the field of mathematics.

Apply the same thing precisely to our universe: the
One Element
never was, never will be anything but the One Element.
But seven
forms of perception are possible in every part of that
One
Element; seven forms of action are possible;
therefore, seven
forms of results are possible. While we cannot define
the
Absolute, yet, if we apply this same process and
reverse the
Three Fundamentals, we shall not find it difficult to
realize
that, no matter what we do, behind our doing is That.

No matter what we think, behind our thinking are three
things-ourselves, what we know, and what we assume.
There is the
eternal trinity in us. Many people assume that the
source of
Nature is different from the source of themselves, and
they act
on that basis; they do not know it; they believe it.
Many people
think there is no source to Nature, and they act on
that basis.
So there is themselves, what they know, and what they
believe or
assume to know, or not know. Very well. How are we to
know the
First Fundamental? How are we to realize it? Through
the Second;
how else? What is the Second Fundamental? It is
Nature's law of
equilibrium. If I act in equilibrium with Nature, if,
in the
words of The Voice of the Silence then, I -- "help
Nature and
work on with her," I will understand the First
Fundamental; I
will know the First Fundamental; I will realize the
First
Fundamental, because I will consciously be the First
Fundamental.


MAHATMAS ARE UNIVERSAL -- SO IS ATMAN

In the first letter of the second volume of Letters
That Have
Helped Me, Judge makes a truly wonderful statement. He
speaks
about the Masters, out the natural desire of everyone
to have
some consciousness of contact with the Masters, and of
our way of
going about it. He discusses that; then he turns
around and says,
The fact is that the Masters are active all the time;
they are
"in every phase of our changing days and years." He
says they are
"the very law of Karma, because they are Atman
itself;" they are
Atman, and realize it.

We are Atman and talk about it, believe about it, hope
about it,
fear about it, discuss about it, and-to use H.P.B.'s
own word-"
wrestle" about it, but all the time the only way that
we can ever
realize the "First Fundamental" is through the Second.
Manifestly, our actions, which is what the Second
Fundamental is
concerned with, have led us further and further from
the
realization of the Self, until finally we are at the
point where
our realization of Self is that we are separate from
all other
selves Masters have reversed that. On the basis of the
unity of
all in Nature, they work for Nature; they live for
Nature, and so
they realize in themselves all there is in Nature


PERFECTION

In the middle paragraph on p. 27 is the statement that
there
comes a time of perfection; that is, when progress
stops in that
particular cycle spoken of, and then the earth
disappears as a
tangible thing. It isn't annihilated, we know that,
but the
statement is made that it disappears as a tangible
thing. What is
meant by that? Let's go on in the greater cycle until
the same
stage is reached again. What will happen to this earth
that will
have disappeared as a tangible thing? What will become
of it?
Will it not once more reappear as a tangible thing,
going through
its again on this plane, and then once more-having
achieved as
much perfection as possible what will it do? Disappear
as a
tangible thing, and once more reappear. It is nothing
but the Law
of Reincarnation. "Cycle" means reincarnation, only
this word is
used to show that it means the reincarnation of a mass
of Monads
or egos, whereas we use the word "reincarnation" as
applied to
one single individual. Yet we say that there is a
cycle of
reincarnation. For the man of today we know that the
average
duration of that cycle is 1,500 years.


WHAT AND HOW DO WE PERCEIVE? [ PLANES AND
STATES ]

Now, after we have seen that the Ocean says the world,
or our
earth, disappears as a tangible thing, the question
is, "How do
you account for the moon still being visible?" Suppose
we change
that word "still" to the word "now." How do you
account for the
moon now being visible? Well, one way we can
understand it is
this: When the old moon chain disappeared as a
tangible thing it
disappeared, but when the same stage was reached in
the new
evolution, its ghost or Kama-Rupa materialized. Any
Kama-Rupa is
on the fourth plane of evolution, is in the fourth
stage of
existence. Remember that the fourth stage is the stage
of
formation, or re-formation, and it is also, of
necessity, the
opposite-the stage of disintegration. When this earth
had once
more reached the fourth stage, its effect on the moon
may well
have been such as to precipitate the kamic moon onto
our plane.
H.P.B. says in The Secret Doctrine-and Mr. Judge says
the same
thing on p. 26 (p. 2 Am. Ed.) that the reason we can
see the moon
is that it is on the same plane of perception as
ourselves.

Venus is said to be in the Seventh Round, but we can
see Venus.
How can we do that when we are in the Fourth Round?
Because Venus
is in the fourth stage of her Seventh Round. We are in
the Fourth
Round and Venus in the fourth stage, so both are on
the same
plane of perception. The statement is made that both
Mercury and
Mars have been in obscuration- that is in Pralaya-and
that
Mercury is only beginning to come out of obscuration,
yet both
are visible. How explain that? Why, they are
fourth-plane globes,
which, during a minor Pralaya remain intact, though
dead. Being
on the fourth plane of perception, they are visible to
us. We do
not see the moon, say, of the Third Round; why not?
Because that
moon is on the third plane of perception. If we could
transfer
our consciousness to the centre of the Third Race or
the centre
of the Third Round, then, says Mr. Judge, we would see
the
corresponding moon, that is, the moon in her third
stage, and so
on endlessly.

If one saw the moon in a dream, what globe of the moon
would that
be? How many remember the eighth Chapter of the Gita
It says
that those dying in the fortnight of the waning moon
and while
the Sun is in the path of his southern journey, return
again to
mortal birth. Now, when we go to sleep, we go through
the same
process that a man goes through when he dies-up to a
certain
point, at least. We pass through the same steps. If we
had an
atavistic dream, and descended in our dream, let us
say, to the
Fourth Race of this Round or to the Third Race of this
Round
(instead of remaining in the Fifth to which we
belong), we should
be, in our dream, on the plane of nature that was
tangible in the
Third Race or in the Fourth Race.

The corresponding moon would be there, and we would
see the
astral moon in one of its stages; we would see its
astral
photograph, certainly. Why, the air around us is full
of
elementals and of Kama-Rupas, all forming and
disintegrating
stages of anything and every-thing that has been in
existence on
this plane, both that which has died and is therefore
on its way
out, and also that which is on its way back here. If
we, then,
awake or asleep, get on to the astral or kamic plane,
we shall
see the corresponding moon, or-what is the same
thing-the
reflection of the moon, in her astral envelope instead
of in her
physical envelope.

That raises a most interesting question, one that each
student is
at liberty to think about for himself. First, the
statement is
made in the Transactions of the Blavatsky Lodge that
the sun is
older than any of the planets in this solar system,
and yet
H.P.B. turns around in the same sentence and says that
the moon
is older than the sun. That can mean only one thing,
that this
moon which we see is a relic of a former solar system,
of a
planetary chain in a former solar system, because any
and every
planetary chain is but a portion of the mass of matter
and of the
monads engaged in any solar system.

H.P.B. makes a number of curious statements in various
foot-notes
of the S.D. For example, she says that, when the end
of a solar
system comes, there is what is called a universal
Pralaya; that
is, absolutely every thing is disintegrated and
returns to the
primordial condition.

Naturally, no lives or Monads are lost. Once there is
a new
evolution of the solar system, it must be that those
Monads which
were in the former solar system or planetary chain
once more
reassume their ancient place.

She says that nought remains during a solar pralaya
but the
Akasic photographs of all that have been. Now, if we
were on the
seventh globe or the sixth globe of this chain,
according to Mr.
Judge, we should see the corresponding moon. What moon
would we
see? We should see its Akasic photograph, shouldn't
we?
Successively, as evolution goes on in this Solar
System or in
this planetary chain, condensation and expansion and
re-condensation, without a complete dissolution, goes
on, because
there are minor Pralaya and minor Manvantaras within
the greater
cycles.

Finally, in a footnote on another subject, (p. 68 of
the Second
Volume) and again on page 730 of the same 2nd volume,
H.P.B.
solves the puzzle of the scientists, explaining how it
was that
man came first in this Round, and yet there are relics
of flora
and fauna reaching back for hundreds of millions of
years and no
relics of man beyond a certain period. What is the
explanation?


PERCEPTION IN EARLIER ROUNDS AND GLOBES

This is H.P.B. answer: That innumerable forms which
were alive in
the Third Round left their etheric photographs when
they died
and, when the stage of condensation was reached in
this Round,
those photographs were precipitated into our matter,
and that is
why we find the fossil remnants in our matter of
beings that
never lived in our matter.

If we applied that same reasoning to planets and
planetary
chains, bearing in mind the statements that after a
solar system
there is an absolute dissociation and return to the
primeval
condition, and the other statement that the moon is
older than
the sun and that the sun is older than any of the
planets-the
only logical explanation is that those degraded lives,
those
forms which took the back road that made the degraded
part of the
former moon chain, when the precipitating stage is
reached,
condense, coalesce, or precipitate on this plane.

There is still another way to look at this question.
Every one of
us has heard of spiritualistic seances where they
materialize
spirits. We are familiar with the Theosophical
teaching that the
materialized form is not the dead man at all, but is
his
discarded astral body, his Kama-Rupa, in short; and
that, because
of the nature of the thoughts and feelings of the
sitters and of
the medium, the Kama-Rupa, or dead astral body, is
coated with
matter of this plane so that it reflects the light of
this plane
and appears to be just as much physical matter as the
bodies of
the medium and of the men and women at the seance But
in a few
minutes this materialized ghost will disappear,
dissolve and go
back to its own place, whereas the sitters don't
dissolve. Yet
the statement is made that it is possible, through a
process of
precipitation, to fix those images.

Now, if that occurs in the case of Third Round flora
and fauna
which never existed in this Round on this earth,
although we have
their physical "remnants if that kind of precipitation
is
possible, isn't it possible that the moon we see is,
in fact, not
a physical thing, as, say, the sun or this earth is?
That it is
some kind of Kama-Rupa brought to life again, so to
speak, by the
thoughts and feelings of men?

The statements are, first, that the moon is older than
the sun,
which means that it is a relic of a former solar
system;
secondly, that it is on the same plane of perception
as our
earth; thirdly, that the Moon Chain is the parent of
the Earth
Chain. H.P.B. states over and over again that there
are great
mysteries connected with the subject of the moon. Mr.
Sinnett and
Mr. Hume were literally wild to find out all about the
moon-why?
They never asked themselves why they should be so
interested in
the moon. But H.P.B. says that the Adepts would not
give out any
other information than that which is contained in the
S.D. on the
subject.

In view of what was said regarding Mars, is there any
hope of
success in the efforts of scientists to get in touch
with Mars?
Science is just as much in touch with Mars as it is
with the
earth; that is to say, with the physical appearance of
it. And
all that science is in touch with, anywhere, at any
time, is the
physical appearance of things. This recalls a peculiar
thing in
regard to the moon. We can't get a spectrum of the
moon as we can
get a spectrum of the sun, or of any other
self-luminous body. We
never see the moon except by reflected light; it
doesn't shine of
itself. Without the light of the sun and of the earth
and the
sidereal light falling on it, we should never know
there was a
moon-and that itself might tell us something.

When we evolve to the fifth globe, will our state be
one of the
following: (1) illusionary, in the same way as in deep
sleep or
in Devachan; (2) a subjective state; or (3) Manasic?
Let us
first make a correction. The first alternative given
is: will we
be in an illusionary state "in the same way as deep
sleep"? Man
is in an illusionary state when he is in Devachan, if
he does not
know it is Devachan, and when he is in Nirvana and
doesn't know
it for what it is, is he not still in an illusionary
state?

But remember, what we call "deep sleep" merely means
that the Ego
drops the four lower vestures; it is once more
Atma-Buddhi-Manas
outside of incarnation. That state is the only chance
it has of
being free from illusion. But that doesn't do the Ego
any more
good than the intervals of sobriety do good to a
drunkard if he
gets drunk again. Every time Atma-Buddhi comes down
into matter
once more-whether at waking up in the morning, or at
birth-we
know that we are all overcome by the illusion of
matter. This is
an illusionary world, because how many people in the
world today
regard matter for what it is, or human life for what
it is?
Scarcely one.

To answer the question, we may say that on the fifth
globe we
shall be in the three states, an illusionary state, a
subjective
state and a Manasic state, just as we are now-unless
what? Unless
we overcome the illusions of matter, and none of us
have
succeeded in doing that. The teaching is that the
fifth globe of
any Round, the Fifth Race on any globe, and the Fifth
Round of
the whole period of evolution, is the final
precipitant. Then the
ego either is completely overcome by the illusions of
matter, no
matter on what plane or in what state he may be, or he
is on the
way to complete emancipation from illusion.

We might put it this way: here we are, spiritual
beings of the
same nature as the Masters of Wisdom. The Master of
Wisdom is
Atma-Buddhi-Manas, but he is nothing but
Atma-Buddhi-Manas,
asleep or awake. On this globe or any other globe,
this plane or
on any other plane, he is Atma-Buddhi-Manas. We are
Atma-Buddhi-Manas, but when we are on this plane or
any other
plane, on this globe or any other globe except the
highest, we
think we are something else than Atma--Buddhi--Manas.
Our sense
of reality does not reside in Atma- Buddhi-Manas ---
it is
outside of us, in the world, in the state, in the
condition. We
find the term "centre of consciousness" in this
chapter. That
centre is shifted up and down. Have we given thought
to what that
means? Where is our sense of reality located? If it is
located in
this body, we know where we are; if it is located in
our desires,
we know where we are; if it is located in our
feelings, we know
where we are; if it is located purely on the plane of
thought,
that is, in pure ratiocination, we know where our
sense of
reality is.

There are seven conceptions of reality-that's what the
seven
planes are-and not one of those conceptions is true.
There never
was anything real but Self; there is not now any-thing
real but
Self. There could not be two Absolutes. Anybody can
see that. So,
how could there be two realities? Yet the S.D. tells
us whatever
plane our consciousness is functioning on, both we and
the things
of that plane appear to us to be for the time being
the only
realities.

Always we are afflicted with a double or triple sense
of reality,
whereas reality never could be but one thing.
According to the
teachings, Self is the reality, no matter what the
globe, what
the solar system, what the world, what the round, what
the race,
what the condition. The Self is the real; all else is
Maya and
illusion; yet self thinks that something else than the
Self is
the real.


FIFTH ROUND PERCEPTION -- REALITY

The Fifth Round closes the gates, so to speak. After
the middle
of the Fourth Round, no more Monads come from below
into the
human kingdom. So, after the middle of the Fifth Race
of the
Fifth Round, no more human beings can return to the
divine
kingdom as self-conscious entities.

Sometimes we fail to realize the force of
accumulation-momentum
it is called in physics, mass multiplied by motion.
There is
momentum or accumulated force, moral or spiritual,
also. How
difficult it is for us to energize ourselves, and keep
ourselves
continuously energized, on the plane of the higher
mind Yet
Masters live in spirit and work in matter. That is
what we ought
to do, but we both live and work in matter, and all
our past, the
momentum of the race, tends more and more, as the
increasing
acceleration of the vast cycles goes on, to make us
choose
between spirit and matter. When the great time of
choice comes in
the Fifth Round, many people will have lost all belief
in the
reality of Spirit, they will be so absolutely
convinced that life
in matter is the only life-the only life they know, or
care for,
or are interested in. When the time of choice comes,
what will
they choose? They will choose the old familiar road,
and, instead
of their becoming one of the new crop of Mahatmas, all
their work
and suffering for that Manvantara will go for nought.
They have
to begin all over again, from the beginning, in a new
Manvantara,
after a Pralaya of complete individual
unconsciousness.

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

I hope this may be of help. It is a different and
more
penetrating point of view. It suggests we sand aside
fro our
usual filter focus of the Kama-Manasic view of things.
Best wishes,

Dallas

==========================

-----Original Message-----
From: Eldon B Tucker [mailto:eldon@theosophy.com]
Sent: Saturday, November 30, 2002 9:05 AM
To: study@blavatsky.net
Subject: [bn-study] Re: Rounds, Globes, Races and
Sub-Races

Blavatsky speaks of the first Root Races as being
astral or
semi-astral, and becoming physical around the time of
the middle
of the Third Root Race. During the process of becoming
increasingly physical, the physical senses are
developed at the
expense of the astral. She says, "The ancients divided
the senses
into five, simply because their teachers (the
Initiates) stopped
at the HEARING, as being that sense which developed in
the
PHYSICAL PLANE (got dwarfed rather, limited to this
plane) only
at the beginning of the Fifth Race." (SD I 535 fn)

My thinking is that we start out with all seven senses
in the
First Root Race. We and all our senses are astral. We
eventually
get physical forms. With each Root Race, one of our
astral senses
is lost as it is superceded by a corresponding
physical sense
being developed.

-- Eldon

-----Original Message-----
From: Cuttersail@aol.com [mailto:Cuttersail@aol.com]
Sent: Saturday, November 30, 2002 4:09 AM
To: study@blavatsky.net
Subject: [bn-study] Re: Rounds, Globes, Races and
Sub-Races

In a message dated 11/30/02 6:55:17 AM Eastern
Standard Time,
dalval14@earthlink.net writes:


Ans. -We are in the Fifth Sub-race of the fourth
state;
therefore we
have four of the senses complete and one of the senses
very, very
little developed


May I ask, which of the senses is not developed as
yet? With
another sense, the Sixth I think, to come, in what
timeframe is
that to happen.
Best wishes, Klaus ---






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