Theos-Talk Archives (September 2004 Message tt00761)

Sept 26 2004

Re Dreams.

What in us in conscious when we dream?




Some of us have offered opinions on dream experiences.

Here are some definitions offered in THEOSOPHY.



D R E A M S

===

The Dictionary classifies dreams (or imaginary visions, or a reality
suggestive of a vision - a conception of possibility), as:

1. occurring during sleep - thoughts, images, emotions, seeming
realities;

2. occurring while awake as : 	
1.	Visions -- state of mind , while awake, lost in
imagining
2.	Reverie -- day-dreaming


SLEEPING


"...it is said, the infant lives because the combination of healthy organs
is able to absorb the life all around it in space, and is put to sleep each
day by the overpowering strength of the stream of life, since the
`preservers' among the cells of the youthful body are not yet mastered by
the other class [`destroyers'].

These processes of going to sleep and waking up again are simply and solely
the restoring of the equilibrium in sleep and the action produced by
disturbing it when awake...in sleep we are again absorbing and not resisting
the Life Energy; when we wake we are throwing it off. But as it exists
around us as an ocean in which we swim, our power to resist it is
necessarily limited. Just when we wake we are in equilibrium as to our
organs and life; when we fall asleep we are yet more full of life than in
the morning; it has exhausted us; it finally kills the body. Such a
contest could not be waged forever, since the whole solar system's weight of
life is pitted against the power to resist focussed in one small human
frame."	Ocean p. 36
[ see also WQJ Art. II 563, I 294 ]



"[ on going to sleep -- Answer by HPB ] It is said by Occultism to be the
periodical and regulated exhaustion of the nervous centres, and especially
of the sensory ganglia of the brain, which refuse to act any longer on this
plane, and, if they would not become unfit for work, are compelled to
recuperate their strength on another plane or Upadhi. [vehicle] First comes
the Swapna, or dreaming state, and this leads to that of Sushupti. Now it
must be remembered that our senses are all dual, and act according to the
plane of consciousness on which the thinking entity energizes. Physical
sleep affords the greatest facility for its action on the various planes;
at the same time it is a necessity, in order that the various senses may
recuperate and obtain a new lease on life for the Jagrata, or waking state,
from the Swapna and Sushupti. According to Raja Yoga Turiya is the highest
state. As a man exhausted by one state of the life fluid seeks another;
as, for example, when exhausted by the hot air he refreshes himself with
cool water; so sleep is the shady nook in the sunlit valley of life.

"Sleep is a sign that waking life has become too strong for the physical
organism, and that the force of the life current must be broken by changing
the waking for the sleeping state.  

[ follows a description of the clairvoyant view of the atmosphere around a
person tired and one refreshed by sleep :

"...the person begins to be too strongly saturated with Life; the life
essence is too strong for his physical organs, and he must seek relief in
the shadowy side of that essence, which side is the dream element, or
physical sleep, on of the states of consciousness."	--HPB
Transactions p. 70-1	[ see also septenary nature of our senses: SD I
534 ]
	


SLEEP & DREAMS 		

"In our dreams," says Paracelsus, "we are like the plants which have also
the elementary and vital body, but possess not the spirit. In our sleep the
astral body is free and can, by the elasticity of its nature, either hover
round in proximity with its sleeping vehicle, or soar higher to hold
converse with its starry parents, or even communicate with its brothers at
great distances. Dreams of a prophetic character, prescience, and present
wants are the faculties of the astral spirit. To our elementary and grosser
body, these gifts re not imparted, for at death it descends into the bosom
of the earth and is reunited to the physical elements while the several
spirits return to the stars..."	Isis I 170



SOME GENERAL PRINCIPLES


"The true student of Raja Yoga knows that everything has its origin in the
mind; that even this universe is the passing before the Divine Mind of the
images he desires to appear."	
WQJ ART II 560


"At the commencement of a great Manvantara [ great cycle of evolution ],
Parabrahm [ the ABSOLUTE ] manifests as Mulaprakriti [ root-matter ] and
then as the Logos ["Word"-thought-plan ]. This Logos is equivalent to the
"Unconscious Universal Mind," etc., of Western Pantheists. It constitutes
the Basis of the Subject-side of manifested Being, and is the source of all
manifestations of individual consciousness.

Mulaprakriti or Primordial Cosmic Substance, is the foundation of the
Object-side of things--the basis of all objective evolution and
Cosmogenesis.

Force, then, does not emerge with Primordial Substance from Parabrahmic
Latency. It is the transformation into energy of the supra-conscious
thought of the Logos, infused, so to speak, into the objectivization of the
latter out of potential latency in the One Reality.  

Hence spring the wondrous laws of matter...Force succeeds Mulaprakriti;
but, minus Force, Mulaprakriti is for all practical intents and purposes
non-existent."	SD II 24-5	
(see also M L 89-91)


"...spiritual discernment, by means of which the Supreme Spirit can be
discerned in all things...To attain it, the heart--that is, every part of
the nature--must be fixed on the Spirit, meditation has to be constant, and
the Spirit made the refuge or abiding-place...No particular theosophical
classification for the divisions of nature has been given out."inferior
nature" [ to Krishna ] is only so, relatively. It is the phenomenal and
transient which disappears into the superior at the end of a kalpa.  

It is that part of God, or of the Self, which chose to assume the phenomenal
and transient position, but is, in essence, as great as the superior nature.
The inferiority is only relative; as soon as objective material, and
subjective spiritual, worlds appear, the first-named has to be denominated
inferior to the other, because the spiritual being the permanent base, it is
in that sense superior; but in an absolute whole all is equal.


[ Note: One could say that Manvantara -- manifestation is characterized by
the Sanskrit term Kamadeva -- that deity the represents in time and space
the reign of those forces peculiar to all beings which reflect the
desire-kama, and the passionate aspect of each. Those being which are
self-conscious have in this time the opportunity of seeing their own kamic
nature as an aspect of the Universal, Eternal Man, of themselves. To
perceive this desire-nature implies the fat that the Real man is separate
from the mass of his desires, can know them in detail, and can modify or
adjust them. see Light on the Path, essay on Karma ]

Included in the inferior nature are all the visible, tangible, invisible and
intangible worlds; it is what we call Nature. The invisible and intangible
are none the less actual..." Gita Notes 133


"Every atom is endowed with and moved by intelligence, and is conscious in
its own degree, on its own plane of development. This is a glimpse of the
One Life...selfishness is the curse of selfishness..."	WQJ ART I 29


"...Time...[is] the panoramic succession of our states of consciousness..."
S D I 44


"The "Absolute Consciousness,"..."behind" phenomena...is only termed
unconsciousness in the absence of any element of personality...transcends
human conception...Only the liberated Spirit is able to faintly realize the
nature of the source whence it sprung and whither it must eventually
return...we can but bow in ignorance before the awful mystery of Absolute
Being...the Finite cannot conceive the Infinite..."	S D I 51


"Every man has a god within, a direct ray from the Absolute, the celestial
ray from the One..."	TRANS 53


"Free-will can only exist in a man who has both mind and consciousness,
which act and make him perceive things both within and without himself."

"Consciousness is a condition of the monad as a result of embodiment in
matter and the dwelling in a physical form."	WQJ ART I 29


"Esoteric philosophy teaches that everything lives and is conscious, but not
that all life and consciousness are similar to those of human or even animal
beings. Life we look on as the "the one form of existence," manifesting in
what is called matter; or, as in man, what, incorrectly separating them we
name Spirit, Soul and Matter. Matter is the vehicle for the manifestation
or soul on this plane of existence, and soul is the vehicle on a higher
plane for the manifestation of spirit, and those three are a trinity
synthesized by Life, which pervades them all."	SD I 49



The PERCEIVER


"To the perceiver on any plane, perceptions are objective to him; on a
higher plane than this, would they not be his "physics," although
metaphysical to us ? From our plane, that which is metaphysical becomes
physical when embodied. " FRIENDLY PHILOS. p. 78


"Every one of us is a Perceiver, just as much a Perceiver as we ever were or
ever will be. So is every atom of our body the perceiver. But we look
directly upon ideas; the lives below man look directly upon sensation. We
say waking, dreaming, sleeping, because our attention has not been directed
to the state of nature beyond life or man ass immortal. But there are other
names for these states of consciousness. Think of the mineral kingdom as a
state of consciousness, and the forms built in that state. Think of the
animal kingdom as life in a given state of consciousness with the
appropriate forms built in them.

Now we--in the state called the Thinker, which is our natural state--are not
any the less the Perceiver, because we are also at the same time the Thinker
and the being which feels. But neither are we the Thinker pure and simple,
nor are we the creature that is the experiencer of effects pure and
simple--nor are we the Perceiver pure and simple. It is impossible to
dissociate the three. If a man were in the state called the Perceiver, and
if he were in that state pure and simple, all this that is a mystery to us
would be just as objective in the spiritual sense as we here and now are
objective to each other in the "sense use" of the term." [J. G.]
"QUESTIONS ANSWERED AT AN INFORMAL OCEAN CLASS"  
T. MVT., Nov. 1952.


"As to the "we," there is but one "we," or perceiver, who perceives on any
plane through the sheaths evolved by him on each plane; his perceptions on
any plane will depend on the quality of the sheath or vehicle. Atma
(spirit) or consciousness alone, is what remains after the subtraction of
the sheaths. It is the ONLY witness--a synthesizing unity. On this
plane--and this means during waking consciousness or its dream effects--the
perceiver knows only what it knows on this plane (generally speaking), and
through the ignorance of the Real, involves itself in the cause and effect
of physical nature, identifying itself with body and sensations, and looking
at other human beings in the same light. This is a wrong attitude of mind.
The "we," at this end, is the identification of the perceiver with this
plane's perceptions--a misconception of the perceiver, a dream--a play--in
which the perceiver is so involved as to have lost sight and memory of his
real life.

The mind is both "carrier" and "translator" of both lower and higher self;
the attitude determines the quality and kind of action, for one will act
according to the attitude of mind firmly held. The great and incalculable
value of acting for and as the Supreme is that there is nothing higher in
the way of attitude, and this endeavor must by its very nature bring about
the best results.

What moves the "mind" this way or that is usually desire for the attractions
of matter, and self-interest in them; these then move and control the mind
through the brain. "We," the Perceiver, do not perceive anything but the
"ideas" which the senses and organs present. He is not fully awake on this
plane; sometimes he gets partly wakened, but drops off to sleep again,
lulled by the sounds and memories of his dream; sometimes "bad dreams"
awake him; sometimes he is awakened by the voices of those who are awake.

The "Real" and the "unreal," the "fleeting" and the "ever-lasting" are terms
which will be more fully understood if looked at from the point of view of
the Perceiver. This is the attitude of mind we should hold."
Friendly Philosopher, 48-8



The MIND


"Mind is a name given to the sum of the states of Consciousness grouped
under Thought, Will, and Feeling. During deep sleep, ideation ceases of the
physical plane, and memory is in abeyance; thus for the time-being "Mind is
not," because the organ through which the Ego manifests ideation and memory
on the material plane has temporarily ceased to function. A noumenon can
become a phenomenon on any plane of existence only by manifesting on that
plane through an appropriate basis or vehicle...The Ah-hi (Dhyan-Chohans)
are the collective hosts of spiritual beings--the Angelic Hosts of
Christianity...--who are the vehicle for the manifestation of the divine or
universal though and will. They are the Intelligent Forces that give to and
enact in Nature her "laws," while themselves acting according to laws
imposed upon them in a similar manner by still higher Powers...This
hierarchy of spiritual Beings, through which the Universal Mind comes into
action, is like an army--a "Host,"	SD I 38  	

ANTASKARANA (Sk.) or Antah'karana..."understanding"..."the internal
instrument, the Soul, formed by the thinking principle and egoism" ... the
Occultists explain it as the path or bridge between the Higher and the Lower
Manas, the divine Ego, and the personal Soul of man. It serves as a medium
of communication between the two, and conveys from the Lower to the Higher
Ego all those personal impressions and thoughts of men which can, by their
nature, be assimilated and stored by the undying Entity, and be thus made
immortal with its, these being the only elements of the evanescent
Personality that survive the death and time. It thus stands to reason that
only that which is noble spiritual and divine in man can testify in Eternity
to his having lived." T. GLOSSARY, p. 23-4



"Every living creature, of whatever description, was, is, or will become a
human being in one or another Manvantara." HPB-- Trans. 23


"..."Mind" is manas, or rather its lower reflection, which whenever it
disconnects itself, for the time being, with kama, becomes the guide of the
highest mental faculties, and is the organ of the free-will in physical
man...." 
HPB Art., Vol. II, p. 13


"The matter-moving Nous, the animating Soul, immanent in every atom,
manifested in man, latent in the stone, has different degrees of power; and
this pantheistic idea of a general spirit-Soul pervading all Nature is the
oldest of all the philosophical notions."	S D I 51	


There is a dual element in the mind of man. HPB wrote on this as follows:

"this means that he would have to admit a lower (animal), and a higher (or
divine) mind in man, of what is known in Occultism as the "personal" and the
"impersonal" Egos. For, between the psychic and the noetic, between the
personality and the individuality there exists the same abyss as between a
"Jack the Ripper," and a holy Buddha...These two we distinguish as the
Higher Manas (Mind or Ego) and the Kama-Manas, i.e., the rational, but
earthy or physical intellect of man, encased in, and bound by. matter,
therefore subject to the influence of the latter: the all-conscious Self,
that which reincarnates periodically--verily the Word made flesh--and which
is always the same, while its reflected "Double," changing with every new
incarnation and personality, is, therefore, conscious but for a life-period.
The latter "principle," is the Lower Self, or that which manifesting through
our organic system, acting on this plane of illusion, imagines itself the
Ego Sum, and thus falls into what Buddhist philosophy brands as the "heresy
of separateness." The former, we term Individuality, the latter
Personality." HPB	"Psychic and Noetic Action"  
HPB Articles II pp , 9-10, 20-1



"..."Mind" is manas, or rather its lower reflection, which whenever it
disconnects itself, for the time being, with kama, becomes the guide of the
highest mental faculties, and is the organ of the free-will in physical
man...." HPB ARTICLES, Vol. II, p. 13


"the one free force acts, helped in this by that portion of its essence
which we call imprisoned force, or material molecules. The worker within,
the inherent force, ever tends to unite with its parent essence without;
and thus, the Mother acting within, causes the Web to contract; and the
Father acting without, to expand. Science calls this gravitation;
Occultists, the work of the universal Life-Force, which radiates from that
Absolute and Unknowable FORCE which is outside of all Space and Time. This
is the work of eternal Evolution and involution, or expansion and
contraction. [ Web cooling ]...it begins when the imprisoned force and
intelligence inherent in every atom of differentiated as well as of
homogeneous matter arrives at a point when both become the slaves of a
higher intelligent Force whose mission is to guide and shape it.

It is the Force which we call the divine Free-Will, represented by the
Dhyani-Buddhas. When the centrepetal and centrifugal forces of life and
being are subjected by the one nameless Force which brings order in
disorder, and establishes harmony in Chaos--then it begins cooling...Every
form, we are told, is built in accordance with the model traced for it in
the Eternity and reflected in the DIVINE MIND. There are hierarchies of
"Builders of form," and series of forms and degrees, from the highest to the
lowest. While the former are shaped under the guidance of the "Builders,"
the gods, "Cosmocratores;" the latter are fashioned by the Elementals or
Nature Spirits."	TRANS 128-9


"...Buddhi and Atma...These higher principles are entirely inactive on our
plane, and the higher Ego (Manas) itself is more or less dormant during the
waking of the physical man....So dormant are the Spiritual faculties,
because the Ego is so trammeled by matter, that It can hardly give all its
attention to man's actions, even should the latter commit sins for which
that Ego--when reunited with its lower Manas--will have to suffer conjointly
in the future. It is...the impressions projected into the physical man by
this Ego which constitute what we call "conscience;" and in proportion as
the personality, the lower Soul (or Manas), unites itself to its higher
consciousness, or EGO, does the action of the latter upon the life of mortal
man become more marked."	TRANS 62-3


"...it is the higher Manas illuminated by Buddhi; the principle of
self-consciousness, the "I-am-I"...It is the Karana-Sarira, the immortal
man, which passes from one incarnation to another." TRANS 63


"There is a sort of conscious telegraphic communication going on
incessantly, day and night, between the physical brain and the inner
man...the consciousness of the sleeper is not active but passive. The
inner man, however, the real Ego, acts independently during the sleep of the
body...Read "Karmic Visions" [ HPB ART I, 382 ]...and note the description
of the real Ego, sitting as a spectator of the life of the hero..."
TRANS 64-5	


SWAPNA -- PSYCHIC -- DREAMS


"In the dream state we lose all knowledge of the objects which while awake
we thought real and proceed to suffer and enjoy in that new state. [ see SD
I 47 ] In this we find the consciousness applying itself to objects
partaking of course of the nature of experiences of the waking condition,
but at the same time producing the sensations of pleasure and pain while
they last. [ see SD I 56 ] Let us imagine a person's body plunged in a
lethargy extending over twenty years and the mind undergoing a pleasant or
unpleasant dream, and we have a life just of that sort, altogether different
from the life of one awake. For the consciousness of this dreamer the
reality of objects known during the waking state is destroyed. But as
material existence is a necessary evil and the one is which alone
emancipation or salvation can be obtained, it is of the greatest importance
and hence Karma which governs it...must be well understood and then be
accepted and obeyed."	Echoes. pp. 41-42


"Dreams are sometimes the result of brain action automatically proceeding,
and are also produced by the transmission into the brain by the real inner
person of those senses or ideas high or low which the real person has seen
while the body slept. They are then strained into the brain as if floating
on the soul as it sinks into the body. These dreams may be of great use,
but generally the resumption of bodily activity destroys the meaning,
perverts the image, and reduces all to confusion. 

But the great fact of all dreaming is that some one perceives and feels
therein and this is one of the arguments for the inner person's existence.

In sleep the inner man communes with higher intelligences, and sometimes
succeeds in impressing the brain with what is gained, either a high idea or
a prophetic vision, or else fails in consequence of the resistance of the
brain fiber. The karma of the person also determines the meaning of a
dream, for a kind may dream that which relates to his kingdom, which the
same thing dreamed by a citizen relates to nothing of temporal consequence.
But, as said by Job: "In dreams and visions of the night man is
instructed."	Ocean, p. 143-4


"When one says "I dreamed," he is in the waking state and is surrounded by
the external conditions that go to make up that state of consciousness; he
is therefore comparing the state in which he finds himself with another
state whose surroundings are not then present or evident...in the dreaming
state, all that made up his waking state is absent from his perceptions and
he is surrounded by a world of his own creation, which for the time being is
objective and real to him; his perceptions are "awake" to the dream and
immersed in it, so he has nothing before him to compare the states of waking
and dreaming with. Should he be able to make comparisons , the dream state
would cease and he would be awake."
Answers to Questions, p. 94-5


SUSHUPTI -- DEEP SLEEP -- "DREAMS"


"Dreamless sleep is one of the seven states of consciousness known in
Oriental esotericism. In each of these states a different portion of the
mind comes into action; or as a Vedantin would express it, the individual
is conscious in a different plane of his being. The term "dreamless sleep,"
in this case is applied allegorically to the Universe to express a condition
somewhat analogous to that state of consciousness in man, which, not being
remembered is a waking state, seems a blank, just as the sleep of the
mesmerized subject seems to him an unconscious blank when he returns to his
normal condition, although he has been talking and acting as a conscious
individual would."	SD I 47


"...dreamless sleep--one that leaves no impression on the physical memory
and brain, because the sleeper's Higher Self is in its original state of
absolute unconsciousness during those hours...re-absorption is by no means
such a "dreamless sleep," but, on the contrary, absolute existence, an
unconditioned unity, or a state, to describe which human language is
absolutely hopelessly inadequate...it can be attempted solely in the
panoramic visions of the soul, through spiritual ideations of the divine
monad."	[ see also SD I 429 top ]	SD I 266


"Buddhi the Spiritual soul...because it is the direct cause of Sushupti
[deep sleep]...leading to Turiya...the highest state of Samadhi [ Meditation
]...Buddhi becomes a "causal body" in conjunction with Manas the incarnation
of the Entity or Ego..." 
Glossary, p. 74


"There are many kinds of "dreams"...the highest of them being recollections
of the activity and real awakens of the Inner Man, but these are not
ordinarily translatable into terms of bodily consciousness."	Ans.
to Quest. p. 95


"As a rule, all that we experience of a dream from the inner man is a
feeling, for the dream being strained through the brain is all broken and
confused. A dream that makes a profound impression...cannot be a mere
surface dream."	Ans. to Quest. 220


"In every night he enters that spiritual state, his own true nature.
Connection between the Lower and the Higher Manas must be made during life
in a body; it cannot be made at any other time."	Ans to Quest. 175


"Good resolutions are mind-painted pictures of good deeds, fancies,
day-dreams, whisperings of the Buddhi to the Manas..."	Letters from the
Masters of Wisdom (I) p 60-1

 

"TURIYA (Sk.) A state of the deepest trance--the 4th state of the Taraka
Raja Yoga, on the corresponds with Atma, and on this earth within dreamless
sleep--a causal condition...almost a Nirvanic state if Samadhi, which is
itself a beatific state of the contemplative Yoga beyond this plane. A
condition of the higher Triad, quite distinct (though still inseparable)
from the conditions of Jagrat (waking), Swapna (dreaming), and Sushupti
[dreamless] (sleeping)" Glos. 345-6

	

"...the "Ego" in man is a monad that has gathered to itself innumerable
experiences through aeons of time, slowly unfolding its latent potencies
through plane after plane of matter. It is hence called the "eternal
pilgrim."

The Manasic, or mind principle, is cosmic and universal. It is the creator
of all forms, and the basis of all law in nature. Not so with
consciousness. Consciousness is a condition of the monad as a result of
embodiment in matter and the dwelling in a physical form.
Self-consciousness, which from the animal plane looking upward is the
beginning of perfection, from the divine plane looking downwards is the
perfection of selfishness and the curse of separateness. it is the "world
of illusion" that man has created for himself. "Maya is the perceptive
faculty of every Ego which considers itself a Unit, separate from and
independent of the One Infinite and Eternal Sat or 'be-ness'," (SD I 329)
The "eternal pilgrim" must therefore mount higher, and flee from the plane
of self-consciousness it has struggled so hard to reach."	WQJ ART I
29


"The "Absolute Consciousness,"..."behind" phenomena...is only termed
unconsciousness in the absence of any element of personality...transcends
human conception...Only the liberated Spirit is able to faintly realize the
nature of the source whence it sprung and whither it must eventually
return...we can but bow in ignorance before the awful mystery of Absolute
Being...the Finite cannot conceive the Infinite..."	S D I 51


"the one free force acts, helped in this by that portion of its essence
which we call imprisoned force, or material molecules. The worker within,
the inherent force, ever tends to unite with its parent essence without;
and thus, the Mother acting within, causes the Web to contract; and the
Father acting without, to expand. Science calls this gravitation;
Occultists, the work of the universal Life-Force, which radiates from that
Absolute and Unknowable FORCE which is outside of all Space and Time. This
is the work of eternal Evolution and involution, or expansion and
contraction. [ Web cooling ]...it begins when the imprisoned force and
intelligence inherent in every atom of differentiated as well as of
homogeneous matter arrives at a point when both become the slaves of a
higher intelligent Force whose mission is to guide and shape it.

It is the Force which we call the divine Free-Will, represented by the
Dhyani-Buddhas. When the centrepetal and centrifugal forces of life and
being are subjected by the one nameless Force which brings order in
disorder, and establishes harmony in Chaos--then it begins cooling...Every
form, we are told, is built in accordance with the model traced for it in
the Eternity and reflected in the DIVINE MIND. There are hierarchies of
"Builders of form," and series of forms and degrees, from the highest to the
lowest. While the former are shaped under the guidance of the "Builders,"
the gods, "Cosmocratores;" the latter are fashioned by the Elementals or
Nature Spirits."	Trans 128-9


"The universal force cannot be regarded as a conscious force as we
understand the word consciousness, because it would immediately become a
personal god. It is only that which is enclosed in a form, a limitation of
matter, which is conscious of itself on this plane. This Free Force or
Will, which is limitless and absolute, cannot be said to act
understandingly, but it is the one and sole immutable Law of Life and Being.
Fohat, therefore, is spoken of as the synthetic motor power of all
imprisoned life-forces and the medium between the absolute and conditioned
Force. It is a link, just as Manas is the connecting link between the gross
matter of the physical body and the divine Monad which animates it, but is
powerless to act upon the former directly."	Trans 134



	
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Best wishes,

Dallas



 
Dallas