Theos-Talk Archives (May 2012 Message tt00016)

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Plutarch on the fate of  the three-fold 
human being [body (soma), soul or mind (psyche) and spirit (nous)] 
after physical death.

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Man is compound [soma, psyche & nous]; and they are mistaken who
think him to be compounded of two parts only. 

For they imagine that the understanding [nous] is a part of the soul
[psyche], but they err in this no less than those who make the soul
[psyche] to be a part of the body [soma].

For the understanding [nous] as far exceeds the soul [psyche], as the
soul [psyche] is better and diviner than the body [soma]. 

Now this composition of the soul [psyche] with the understanding
[nous] makes reason; and [the composition of psyche] with the body
[soma] [makes] passion [thumos].

Of these three parts [soma, psyche & nous] conjoined and compacted
together, the earth has given the body [soma], the moon [has given]
the soul [psyche], and the SUN [has given]the understanding [nous] 
to the generation [creation] of man.

Now of the [two] deaths we die, the one [the first death, the
physical death] makes man two [psyche & nous] [instead] of three 
and the other [the second death in hades ] [makes] one [nous]
[instead] of two. 

The former [the first death] is in the region of Demeter [earth].

As for the other [second] death, it is in the moon or region of
Persephone [hades].

This [first death] suddenly and with violence plucks the soul
[psyche]   from the body [soma]; but Persephone mildly and in a long
time disjoins the understanding [nous] from the soul [psyche]..

For this reason she is called Monogenes, only begotten, or rather
begetting one alone; for the better part of man [nous] becomes alone
[one] when it [nous] is separated [in Hades from psyche] by her. 

Now both the one [first death] and the other [second death] happens
thus according to nature. 

It is ordained by Fate  that every soul [psyche], whether with or
without understanding [nous] , when gone out of the body [soma],
should wander for a time, though not all for the same [time], in the 
region [of hades] lying between the earth and moon .

For those that have been unjust and dissolute suffer then [in hades]
the punishment due to their offences; but the good and virtuous are
there [in hades] detained till they are purified, and have, by
expiation, purged out of them all the infections they might have
contracted from the contagion of the body [soma], living in the
mildest part of the air, called the Meadows of Hades, where they must
remain for a certain prefixed and appointed time. 

And then, as if they were returning from a wandering pilgrimage or
long exile into their [home] country, they have a taste of joy, such
as they principally receive who are initiated into Sacred Mysteries, 
mixed with admiration, and each one's proper and peculiar hope.

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Abridged, edited and adapted from HPB's Isis Unveiled and The Key to
Theosophy.

Compare:  http://blavatskyarchives.com/mon/monwwdie.htm

Daniel
http://hpb.cc