Theos-Talk Archives (March 2005 Message tt00033)

March 3 2005

RE: Self

Dear Jerry:

I am following no "model" I know of. I think, and use whatever words suit
me regardless of any set system that I know of or am familiar with. 

So I try to avoid any characterizations as they are not liberal enough.

Hence, you may say I use terms derived from many systems, and I use them
because they seem to me to suit the descriptions I am trying to convey - my
own understanding of metaphysical ultimates - which at best, can only be
limited and hence faulty. Transferring thought is always difficult. Words
are impediments in many cases. 

I owe my thinking to a long study of theosophical ideas and principles,
seeking to discover if there is any system flaw therein.  

So you will notice that I do use expressions and rely for definitions
largely on "original Theosophical definitions." That is because they appear
correct to me. So please take that into account. 

For instance:

The present thinking we all do is that which depends on the "embodied
mind," and that uses a brain. 

This seems to limit its ordinary cogitations to affairs limited to our
present life -- which terminates at death. But the brain, its memories and
feelings alone, are definitely not (to me) the sole cause of thought. [What
is intuition?]

The ability to measure electrical and magnetic changes in areas of brain
activity when thinking or thought-feelings, are present, does not imply to
me, the generation of ideas, but rather records the way in which those
internal and immaterial IDEAS are impressed on the brain substance on their
way to provide physical expressions thereof. 

I make a profound distinction between "feelings" (desires) and "thoughts"
(Manasic actions)."

It, the active thinking self, however, has the ability to recognize and
aspire to virtue and rectitude in its dealings with others. I would say
this is an impersonality and universality of attitude, derived from its
"source:" The "Higher Mind. This contrasts with the selfishness of the
"Lower Mind." 

Hence, I derive the concept that all thinking is of a dual character -- and
there is an "over-seeing entity ( the SELF ?) -- so that the difference in
thinking and consideration, might be said to be a moral or ethical one,
based on the rigid and impersonal practice of honesty, fairness and
disinterested virtue in all matters without exception. 

On self-examination (by the internal SELF ?) it is found that there is an
internal "Voice Of Conscience" that operates to warn if any decision is
being considered that is less than impersonal. [The "Voice Of Conscience"
is said to be the voice of experience [Buddhi, or wisdom]. It warns,
because its memories extend back over earlier lives and cover the results of
choices made previously that resulted in "bad Karma." But it has no power to
enforce "right choice." As I see it: All decisions of choice are left
strictly to the embodied mind, and these form the tests of its independent
"spiritual (ideal, compassionate and merciful) progress."

We may say then according to my understanding that the Mind (Manas) is
triple:

1	Manasic ability in accurate, impersonal logic and reasoning

2	Thought that keep as a basis "lower-self" (or 'personal') interests,
and these may be unfair, self-serving and vicious in their proposed dealing
with others. They are influenced by personal selfish and isolationist
desire. Hence they are usually named "Kama-Manasic" thinking. "Me first !"

3	Though the is fair, generous, compassionate, and gives to others
their due share under any and all circumstances. They are influenced by
virtue -- as impersonal and uniform dealings in all cases with others. We
call them "spiritual." They are also named "Buddhi-Manasic" thinking.
"Other selves and my-self" is their basis.

HPB states, ever since she started writing in ISIS UNVEILED that the
Theosophical system antedates the Vedas and belongs to "pre-vedic Buddhism"
[BODHISM - wisdom].  

As I understand it, those expressions belong to no particular sect, creed or
system, but uniformly express the basis for our present condition in
manifestation.

I admit my approach is based on the concept of these principles and
expressions:

1	the MONAD (Atma-Buddhi) is a conscious unit in manifestation. It is
a "spark" or "ray" of the ONE ABSOLUTE [ABSOLUTENESS ? ]. 

2	Out of manifestation, it continues as a part of the ABSOLUTENESS of
which it is an indissoluble part. Time, as we know it, is not a factor

3	The Monad, whether in or out of manifestation, is immortal and
eternal, as is its source -- the ABSOLUTENESS.  

4	Universal law that demands a parity for all Monads. Virtue and
virtues are basically an expression in manifestation of universal Karma. 

5	Every Monad is related to all the rest as also to the WHOLE. This
unity is indissoluble. "Brotherhood" as a word / concept best expresses this
relationship. 

6	The interaction and cooperative aspect of this condition of unity
results in "periods of manifestation," and "evolution." [Spirit, Matter and
Mind interact].

7	The urge to evolve and grow more intelligent may be called a primal
"desire," ["Kamadeva." Glos., Pp. 170-1] -- it is impersonal and
universal.  

8	In manifestation this power to "desire" is called the individual
monadic "power to chose." Ideally, it is ever to be expressed impersonally
and universally.

9	The final and never achievable personal/individual "goal" may be
called PERFECTION. It is a state and a condition of ALL-KNOWINGNESS (from
the point of view of the manifested Monad in evolution). It is a condition
whereby an individual Monad is CONSCIOUS in manifestation of the
unmanifested potentials of the ABSOLUTE. [*]

10	In this, the UNIT (Monad) becomes a faithful agent for the UNIVERSAL
ONE SELF.


In The SECRET DOCTRINE, [ Vol. 1, pp. 207-12 ] we find this important
statement:

"In the first or earlier portion of the existence of this third race, while
it was yet in its state of purity, the "Sons of Wisdom," who, as will be
seen, incarnated in this Third Race, produced by Kriyasakti a progeny called
the "Sons of Ad" or "of the Fire-Mist," the "Sons of Will and Yoga," etc. 

They were a conscious production, as a portion of the race was already
animated with the divine spark of spiritual, superior intelligence. 

It was not a Race, this progeny. 

It was at first a wondrous Being, called the "Initiator," and after him a
group of semi-divine and semi-human beings. "Set apart" in Archaic genesis
for certain purposes, they are those in whom are said to have incarnated the
highest Dhyanis, "Munis and Rishis from previous Manvantaras"-to form the
nursery for future human adepts, on this earth and during the present cycle.


These "Sons of Will and Yoga" born, so to speak, in an immaculate way,
remained, it is explained, entirely apart from the rest of mankind. 

The "BEING" just referred to, which has to remain nameless, is the Tree from
which, in subsequent ages, all the great historically known Sages and
Hierophants, such as the Rishis ... etc., have branched off. 

As objective man, he is the mysterious... yet ever present Personage about
whom legends are rife... among the Occultists and the students of the Sacred
Science. It is he who changes form, yet remains ever the same. 

And it is he again who holds spiritual sway over the [208] initiated Adepts
throughout the whole world. He is, as said, the "Nameless One" who has so
many names, and yet whose names and whose very nature are unknown. 

He is the "INITIATOR," called the "GREAT SACRIFICE." For, sitting at the
threshold of LIGHT, he looks into it from within the circle of Darkness,
which he will not cross; nor will he quit his post till the last day of this
life-cycle. 

Why does the solitary Watcher remain at his self-chosen post? Why does he
sit by the fountain of primeval Wisdom, of which he drinks no longer, as he
has naught to learn which he does not know-aye, neither on this Earth, nor
in its heaven? 

Because the lonely, sore-footed pilgrims on their way back to their home are
never sure to the last moment of not losing their way in this limitless
desert of illusion and matter called Earth-Life. Because he would fain show
the way to that region of freedom and light, from which he is a voluntary
exile himself, to every prisoner who has succeeded in liberating himself
from the bonds of flesh and illusion. Because, in short, he has sacrificed
himself for the sake of mankind, though but a few Elect may profit by the
GREAT SACRIFICE. 

It is under the direct, silent guidance of this MAHA-(great)-GURU that all
the other less divine Teachers and instructors of mankind became, from the
first awakening of human consciousness, the guides of early Humanity...

[209] Although these matters were barely hinted at in "Isis Unveiled," it
will be well to remind the reader of what was said in Vol. I., pp. 587 to
593, concerning a certain Sacred Island in Central Asia, and to refer him
for further details to the chapter in Book II. on "The Sons of God and the
Sacred Island." 

A few more explanations, however, though thrown out in a fragmentary form,
may help the student to obtain a glimpse into the present mystery. 

To state at least one detail concerning these mysterious "Sons of God" in
plain words. It is from them, these Brahmaputras, that the high Dwijas, the
initiated Brahmins of old justly claimed descent .

That divine man dwelt in his animal-though externally human-form; and, if
there was instinct in him, no self-consciousness came to enlighten the
darkness of the latent fifth principle. 

When, moved by the law of Evolution, the Lords of Wisdom infused into him
the spark of consciousness, the first feeling it awoke to life and activity
was a sense of solidarity, of one-ness with his spiritual creators. 

As the child's first feeling is for its mother and nurse, so the first
aspirations of the awakening consciousness in primitive man were for those
whose element he felt within himself, and who yet were outside, and
independent of him. 

DEVOTION arose out of that feeling, and became the first and foremost motor
in his nature; for it is the only one which is natural in our heart, which
is innate in us, and which we find alike in human babe and the young of the
animal. 

This feeling of irrepressible, instinctive aspiration in primitive man is
beautifully, and one may say intuitionally, described by Carlyle. "The great
antique heart," he exclaims, "how like a child's in its simplicity, like a
man's in its earnest solemnity and depth! heaven lies over him wheresoever
he goes or stands on the earth; making all the earth a mystic temple to him,
the earth's business all a kind of worship. Glimpses of bright creatures
flash in the common sunlight; angels yet hover, doing God's messages among
men . . . . . Wonder, miracle, encompass the man; he lives in an element of
miracle * . . . . A great law of duty, high as these two infinitudes (heaven
and hell), dwarfing all else, annihilating all else-it was a reality, and it
is one: the garment . the essence of it lives through all times and all
eternity!" 

It lives undeniably, and has settled in all its ineradicable strength and
power in the Asiatic Aryan heart from the Third Race direct through its
first "mind-born" sons,-the fruits of Kriyasakti. 

As time rolled on the holy caste of Initiates produced but rarely, and from
age to age, such perfect creatures: beings apart, inwardly, though the same
as those who produced them, outwardly. 

While in the infancy of the third primitive race:-

"A creature of a more exalted kind
Was wanting yet, and therefore was designed;
Conscious of thought, of more capacious breast
For empire formed and fit to rule the rest. . . . ." 

It was called into being, a ready and perfect vehicle for the incarnating
denizens of higher spheres, who took forthwith their abodes in these forms
born of Spiritual WILL and the natural divine power in man. 

It was a child of pure Spirit, mentally unalloyed with any tincture of
earthly element. Its physical frame alone was of time and of life, as it
drew its intelligence direct from above. 

It was the living tree of divine wisdom; and may therefore be likened to the
Mundane Tree of the Norse Legend, which cannot wither and die until the last
battle of life shall be fought, while its roots are gnawed all the time by
the dragon Nidhogg; for even so, the first and holy Son of Kriyasakti had
his body gnawed by the tooth of time, but the roots of his inner being
remained for ever undecaying and strong, because they grew and expanded in
heaven not on earth. 

He was the first of the FIRST, and he was the seed of all the others.

There were other "Sons of Kriyasakti" produced by a second Spiritual effort,
but the first one has remained to this day the Seed of divine Knowledge, the
One and the Supreme among the terrestrial "Sons of Wisdom." Of this subject
we can say no more, except to add that in every age-aye, even in our
own-there have been great intellects who have understood the problem
correctly.
 
How comes our physical body to the state of perfection it is found in now? 

Through millions of years of evolution, of course, yet never through, or
from, animals, as taught by materialism. 

For, as Carlyle says:-". . . The essence of our being, the mystery in us
that calls itself 'I,'-what words have we for such things?-it is a breath of
Heaven, [212] the highest Being reveals himself in man. This body, these
faculties, this life of ours, is it not all as a vesture for the UNNAMED?" 

The breath of heaven, or rather the breath of life, called in the Bible
Nephesh, is in every animal, in every animate speck as in every mineral
atom. 

But none of these has, like man, the consciousness of the nature of that
highest Being,* as none has that divine harmony in its form which man
possesses. 

It is, as Novalis said, and no one since has said it better, as repeated by
Carlyle:-

"There is but one temple in the universe, and that is the body of man.
Nothing is holier than that high form . . . . We touch heaven when we lay
our hand on a human body!" 

"This sounds like a mere flourish of rhetoric," adds Carlyle, "but it is not
so. If well meditated it will turn out to be a scientific fact; the
expression . . . of the actual truth of the thing. We are the miracle of
miracles,-the great inscrutable Mystery." S D I 207-212
-----

I hope this explains my meaning.

Dallas

PS	see some notes below please

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-----Original Message-----
From: Gerald Schueler 
Sent: Wednesday, March 02, 2005 5:50 PM

To: dalval14

Subject: Re: Self

<<You, the SELF, lives in a "body." As we all do. >>


Dallas, 

this is the old "the Body is a Temple" Model. 

It is a model of reality that is based on the false assumption of a subtle
self inside a physical body. Basically this is the Christian model in which
this self or
soul leaves the body and continues on after death into purgatory or heaven
or whatever. 

This is not a Theosophical model. Blavatsky taught principles and bodies and
skandhas, not a single self. 

In the Theosophical model, the lower principles slowly decay on the physical
and etheric planes, kama undergoes purification in kamaloka on the astral
plane, manas sleeps and dreams in devachan on the mental plane, and
atma-buddhi travels the Outer Rounds on the causal plane, and all of this is
simultaneous with no "self" anywhere.

Jerry
==============================

DTB	Jerry: I can't find such an expression anywhere in the original
Theosophical literature.

Kamaloka is an after-death effect-state not one of purification.

Buddhi-Manas is an active state of "mediation" -- but not "dreaming" in
Devachan.

Atma-Buddhi goes nowhere - 

And what are the "Outer Rounds?"  

HPB never detailed those in any place I ever saw - of what ? where ? 

Have you any references to your concepts? Can you share them?

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

I can quote you exactly what HPB says in regard to all these and they are
not in the mode you summarize. 

Would you like to see them? 

Dal

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

[ In THE KEY TO THEOSOPHY Mme. Blavatsky gives general facts relating to
Kama-loca and to Devachan, and traces the progress of the principles of man
after the death of the body.  

Skandhas are considered by her as the "carriers" of man's karma.  

She proceeds in the next chapters (x, xi) to explain the nature of the Mind
- "Thinking Principle" - and Reincarnation as a universal process of
progression. KEY pp. 143 - 226 ]

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


KAMA-LOKA


KAMARUPA	(Sk.).	Metaphysically...in esoteric philosophy, it is the
subjective form created through the mental and physical desires and thoughts
in connection with things of matter, by all sentient beings, a form which
survives the death of their bodies. After death 3 of the 7 "principles"--or
let us say planes of senses and consciousness on which the human instincts
and ideation act in turn--viz., the body, its astral prototype and physical
vitality,--being of no further use, remain on earth; the 3 higher
principles [Atma-Buddhi-Manas], grouped into one, merge into the state of
Devachan, in which state the Higher Ego [Higher Manas] will remain until the
hour for a new incarnation arrives; and the eidolon (spook) of the
ex-Personality is left alone in its new abode.  

Here the pale copy of the man that was, (an astral spook) vegetates for a
period of time, the duration of which is variable and according to the
element of materiality which is left in it, and which is determined by the
past life of the defunct. Bereft as it is of its higher mind, spirit and
physical senses, if left alone to its own senseless devices, it will
gradually fade out and disintegrate.  

But, if forcibly drawn back into the terrestrial sphere whether by the
passionate desires and appeals of the surviving friends or by regular
necromantic practices--one of the most pernicious of which is
mediumship--the "spook" may prevail for a period greatly exceeding the span
of the natural life of its body. One the Kamarupa has learnt the way back
to living human bodies, it becomes a vampire, feeding on the vitality of
those who are so anxious for its company..."
GLOS 172 (see KEY p. 143-4; M L, pp. 108-9 112 118 198;
A to Q: pp. 65, 240; SD I pp, 334, 260, 337fn; VOICE 12fn)


"...the brute in us is made of the passions (Kama) and the astral body.  

The development of the germs of Mind made man because it constituted the
great differentiation. The God within begins with Manas or Mind, and it is
the struggle between this God and the brute below (Kama) which Theosophy
speaks of and warns about.  

The lower principle (Kama) is called "bad" because by comparison with the
higher it is so, but still, it is the basis for action. We cannot rise
unless self first asserts itself in the desire to do better. In this aspect
it is called rajas or the active and "bad" quality, as distinguished from
tamas, or the quality of darkness and indifference...rajas [gives] the
impulse, and by the use of this principle of passion all the higher
qualities are brought to at last so refine and elevate our desires that they
may be continually placed upon truth and spirit...

Theosophy does not teach that the passions are to be pandered to or
satiated, for a more pernicious doctrine was never taught, but the
injunction is to make use of the activity given by the 4th principle (Kama)
so as to rise and not to fall under the dominion of the dark quality that
ends with annihilation, after having begun is selfishness and
indifference..."	OCEAN 49-50


"The astral man in kama loca is a mere shell devoid of soul [Higher Mind]
and mind [Kama- Manas or Lower-Manas], without conscience and also unable to
act unless vivified by forces outside of itself. It has that which seems
like an animal or automatic consciousness due wholly to the very recent
association with the human Ego...every atom...has a memory of its own which
is capable of lasting a length of time in proportion to the force given it. 

In the case of a very material and gross or selfish person the force lasts
longer than in any other, and hence in that case the automatic consciousness
will be more definite and bewildering to one who without knowledge dabbles
with necromancy. Its purely astral portion contains and carries the record
of all that ever passed before the person when living, for one of the
qualities of the astral substance is to absorb all scenes and pictures and
the impressions of all thoughts, to keep them, and to throw them forth by
reflection when the conditions permit.

This astral shell, cast off by every man at death, would be a menace to all
men were it not in every case, except one...devoid of all the higher guiding
principles which are the directors. But those guiding principles being
disjoined from the shell, it wavers and floats about from place to place
without any will of its own, but governed wholly by attractions in the
astral and magnetic fields...Soulless and conscienceless, these in no sense
are the spirits of our deceased ones. They are the clothing thrown off by
the inner man, the brutal earthly portion discarded in the flight to
devachan, and so have always been considered by the ancients as
devils...because essentially astral earthy and passional...[they] retain an
automatic memory and consciousness [after being for so long the vehicle of
the real man on earth]..."	OCEAN 103-104


SHELLS	A Kabalistic name for the phantoms of the dead, the spirits of the
Spiritualists, figuring in physical phenomena; so named on account of their
being simply illusive forms, empty of their higher principles."	GLOS 297
(see ML 109-110 GLOS 187 204 210)		


[Low desires] the constant placing of the consciousness entirely below in
the body or astral body... [High desires] the influence of and aspiration
to the trinity above, of Mind, Buddhi and Spirit...

[During life] the emplacement of the desires and passions is...throughout
the entire lower man...it may be added to or diminished, made weak or
increased in strength, debased or purified.

[After death] it (Kama) informs the astral body, which then becomes a mere
shell; for when a man dies his astral body and principle of passion and
desire leave the physical in company and coalesce, It is then that the term
Kamarupa may be applied, as Kamarupa is really made of astral body and Kama
in conjunction, and this joining of the two makes a shape or form which
though ordinarily invisible is material and may be brought into visibility.


Although it is empty of mind and conscience, it has powers of its own that
can be exercised whenever the conditions permit. These conditions are
furnished by the medium of the spiritualists, and in every seance room the
astral shells of deceased persons are always present to delude the
sitters... For the astral spook--or Kamarupa--is but the mass of the desires
and passions abandoned by the real person who has fled to "heaven and has no
concern with the people left behind, least of all with seances and mediums.

Hence, being devoid of the nobler soul, these desires and passions work only
on the very lowest part of the medium's nature and stir up no good elements,
but always the lower leanings of the being...

The Kamarupa spook is the enemy of our civilization, which permits us to
execute men for crimes committed and thus throws out into the ether the mass
of passion and desire free from the weight of the body and liable at any
moment to be attracted to any sensitive person. Being thus attracted, the
deplorable images of crimes committed and also the picture of the execution
and all the accompanying curses and wishes for revenge are implanted in
living persons, who, not seeing the evil, are unable to throw it off. Thus
crimes and new ideas of crimes are willfully propagated every day by those
countries where capital punishment prevails."	OCEAN 47-48

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



DEVACHAN


HOW IS DEVACHAN CREATED ?


"...we ourselves create our Devachan...while yet on earth, and mostly during
the latter days and even moments of our intellectual sentient lives. That
feeling which is strongest in us at that supreme hour, when as in a dream,
the events of a long life to their minutest detail are marshaled in the
greatest order in a few seconds in our vision, (Fn.:--That vision takes
place when a person is already proclaimed dead. The brain is the last organ
that dies.) that feeling will become the fashioner of our bliss or woe, the
life-principle of our future existence...The real full remembrance of our
lives will come but at the end of the minor cycle,--not before..."
Theos. Articles & Notes, p. 246


"Life in Devachan is the function of the aspirations of earth life; not the
indefinite prolongation of that "single instant," but its infinite
developments, the various incidents and events based upon and outflowing
from that one "single moment" or moments."	Key 162	



WHO GOES TO DEVACHAN

"...the Higher Triad, Manas, Buddhi, and Atma,--the real man, immediately go
into [the state] of Devachan...they are the immortal part of us; they, in
fact, and no other are we. This should be firmly grasped by the mind, for
upon its clear understanding depends the comprehension of the entire
doctrine."
Ocean, p. 65


"The personal Ego, of course, but beatified, purified, holy. Every Ego--the
combination of the 6th and 7th principles [Buddhi & Atma] --which after the
period of unconscious gestation is reborn into the Devachan, is of necessity
as innocent as a new born babe. The fact of his being reborn at all shows
the preponderance of good over evil in his old personality...he brings along
with him but the Karma of his good deeds, words, and thoughts into this
Devachan...all those who have not slipped down into the mire of unredeemable
sin and bestiality go to the Devachan...Meanwhile they are rewarded;
receive the effects of the causes produced by them."	Theos. Art. & Notes,
p. 244-5


REASON FOR DEVACHANIC EXPERIENCE


"The 'dream of Devachan' lasts until Karma is satisfied in that direction.
In Devachan there is a gradual exhaustion of force..."The stay in D- is
proportionate to the unexhausted psychic [ spiritual and of the nature of
the soul ] impulses originating in earth life. Those whose attractions were
preponderatingly material will be sooner brought back into rebirth by the
force of Tanha...In such a case the average rule has no application, since
the whole effect either way is due to a balancing of forces and is the
outcome of action and reaction." T. A. & N. p.249


"As many varieties of bliss on Earth there are of perception and of
capability to appreciate such reward. It is an ideal paradise; in each
case of the Ego's own making, and by him filled with the scenery, crowded
with the incidents, and thronged with the people he would expect to find in
such a sphere of compensative bliss. And it is that variety which guides
the temporary personal Ego into the current which will lead him to be reborn
in a lower or higher condition in the next world of causes. Everything is
so harmoniously arranged in nature--especially in the subjective world--
that no mistake can be ever committed by the Tathagatos who guide the
impulses.  

Devachan is a "spiritual condition" only as contrasted with our own grossly
material condition...[follows examples of various instinctive and moral
effects on the next incarnation] The savage in being reborn would simply
take a low place in the scale, by reason of his imperfect moral development;
while the Karma of the other [wanton killer of animals] would be tainted
with moral delinquency..."
THEOS. ART. & NOTES, p. 245-6


WHAT IS CONSCIOUS IN DEVACHAN ?


"As to the personal Soul--by which we mean the spark of consciousness that
preserves in the Spiritual Ego the idea of the personal "I" of the last
incarnation--this lasts, as a separate distinct recollection, only
throughout the Devachanic period; after which time it is added to the
innumerable incarnations of the Ego...(108) Immortality is but one's
unbroken consciousness; and the personal consciousness can hardly last
longer than the personality itself...and such consciousness...survives only
throughout Devachan, after which it is reabsorbed, first, in the individual,
and then in the universal consciousness."	Key 107-8


["Manas...the Ego"] ..."It has not forgotten them [deeds in past lives]
...it knows and remembers its misdeeds as well as you remember what you have
done yesterday."	Key 136


"The stay in Devachan is proportionate to the unexhausted psychic impulses
originating in earth life. Those whose attractions were preponderatingly
material will sooner be drawn back into rebirth by the force of Tanha."
T. A. & N., p. 243-4


"The reward provided by nature for men who are benevolent in a large,
systematic way, and who have not focused their affections on an individual
or specialty, is that if pure they pass the quicker for that thro' the Kama
and Rupa lokas into the higher sphere of Tribuvana, since it is one where
the formulation of abstract ideas and the consideration of general
principles fill the thought of its occupant."	THEOS. A. & N., p. 244	

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