Sketch of the Secret Doctrine of H. P. Blavatsky

  with notes by Franz Hartmann, M.D.^[1]

Bücher der     Schatzkammer

Editorial Schatzkammer Hans Fändrich

Schatzkammer-Verlag Hans Fändrich, Calw/Württemberg

Copyright by Schatzkammer-Verlag [No date]

Translation from German and comments by Robert Hutwohl^[2]

This document incorporates live notes. Click on a superscripted endnote number in the text to jump to its corresponding endnote; click on the superscripted endnote numeral in the endnotes to return to the original text reference.

Translator’s note (Robert Hutwohl):

This treatise provides an overview of H.P. Blavatsky’s “The Secret Doctrine,” emphasizing its profound insights into the secrets of nature. The teachings, derived from the ancient Book of Dzyan, are a synthesis of religion, philosophy, and science, requiring a higher level of intuition and self-knowledge to comprehend. The treatise explores the concept of eternal nature, the role of spiritual forces in evolution, and the unity of all existence within the divine.

The text explores the cyclical nature of existence, where darkness and light, spirit and matter, are interconnected manifestations of a single divine being. It delves into the concept of self-knowledge and the awakening of the divine spark within humanity, leading to the birth of the “son” or redeemer. The text also touches upon the role of the seven creative spirits, the state of paranirvana, and the importance of recognizing the unity of all things to attain true being.

The spiritual man, crucified in a world of ignorance, achieves liberation through suffering and self-knowledge, realizing the transience of earthly things and his divine nature. The universe, an embodiment of God’s thought, unfolds through the divine word, with the “Son” of the “Immaculate Virgin” representing humanity’s potential for divinity. The “Dragon of Wisdom,” or Logos, emerges from darkness, containing the divine thought and creative powers, illuminating the path to truth beyond the illusion of Maya.

The text delves into esoteric teachings about the universe’s origin and structure. It describes the interplay between light, darkness, and the life force, symbolized by fire and flame. The universe is portrayed as a living organism, expanding and contracting through cosmic cycles, with the divine will driving its eternal rhythm.

The text delves into the esoteric concepts of the Secret Doctrine, focusing on the role of Fohat, the life force and unifying principle of the universe. Fohat, emanating from the Original Seven, acts as the instrument of their will, creating and sustaining the manifested world. Through Fohat, the divine wisdom and love manifest, guiding evolution and enabling the soul to transcend the cycle of karma and attain godlike consciousness.

The text discusses the classification of spiritual entities in the universe, highlighting the role of the Lipikas and the divine intelligences. It explains the concept of the seven elements and their manifestation in the universe, drawing parallels between the human constitution and the solar system. The text emphasizes the importance of individual spiritual development and self-knowledge in attaining true understanding of the universe and one’s place within it.

The text explores the evolution of humanity, tracing its journey from ethereal beings to physical incarnations. It delves into the “Fall of Man,” explaining how divine beings, initially unwilling to incarnate in imperfect forms, eventually succumbed to the law of evolution. This “fall” led to the development of individual will and self-awareness, paving the way for humanity’s spiritual growth and the eventual realization of divine self-knowledge.

The text explores the concept of the universe as a whole, focusing on the seven worlds or planes of existence within each chain. It delves into the Seven Principles that constitute the universe and humankind, emphasizing the importance of the fourth path to knowledge, Atma-Vidya, for true understanding. The text also discusses the hierarchy of divine and spiritual intelligences, represented by the twelve signs of the zodiac and the seven planets, highlighting the role of the divine ray of light in the evolution of the universe.

The thread of life, or Sutr-atma, connects the spiritual individuality of a person to their physical body, allowing the Higher Self to unite with the ego. This spiritual essence, originating from the divine, is immortal and transcends physical existence, while the personality, formed from earthly elements, is temporary. Evolution occurs through the interaction of spirit within matter, with the spiritual force enabling the development of life from minerals to humans.

The text explores the concept of the universe’s evolution through seven rounds, each revealing a new element. It emphasizes that everything is life, and that the ultimate goal is for the individual to reunite with their divine self, achieving Nirvana and becoming a self-aware, self-knowing being. This journey involves self-sacrifice, renouncing multiplicity, and seeking truth within the unity of the greater whole.

The first seven chapters of the Book of Dzyan are examined, emphasizing the difficulty of understanding spiritual concepts in a materialistic age. Theosophy aims to reveal truth through higher worldview reflection, encouraging individuals to seek truth independently rather than relying on authority. The text delves into the origin of humankind, describing the Earth’s evolution and the creation of various life forms, culminating in the emergence of the first humans.

The text describes the origin of the first human races, emphasizing the role of spiritual beings and forces in their creation. It explains that the first humans were ethereal beings, lacking the divine intelligence (Manas) that defines true humanity. The text highlights the need for divine intervention to infuse humanity with the capacity for thought and self-awareness, ultimately leading to the evolution of the second human race.

The text describes the evolution of the second human race, the “sweat-born,” who emerged from the first race of “self-born” astral beings. This race, initially asexual, evolved into a hermaphroditic form before eventually developing into the third race with separate sexes. The text also touches on the emergence of animals during this period and the role of the “Sons of Wisdom” in guiding human evolution.

The text describes the evolution of humanity, focusing on the fourth race, which emerged from the third race’s union with animals. This led to the development of language and the loss of spiritual awareness. The fourth race, the Atlanteans, built great cities and worshipped physical forms, ultimately leading to their downfall.

The text discusses the rise and fall of ancient civilizations, specifically Lemuria and Atlantis, highlighting their spiritual and physical evolution. It explains how the Atlanteans, after a catastrophic flood, were divided into those who followed a spiritual path and those who succumbed to material desires. The text emphasizes the importance of inner enlightenment and the pursuit of truth beyond mere knowledge or theories.

End.

Preliminary remarks

            This treatise aims to provide a general overview of “The Secret Doctrine” before one undertakes the study of the original work. The words of its author, H. P. Blavatsky, are borne out by “The Secret Doctrine”: That even a brief study of the work can provide a deeper insight into the secrets of nature than is possible through many years spent at colleges and universities. Moreover, since the publication of the first edition of “The Secret Doctrine,” various discoveries have been made in the field of science, through which many of H. P. Blavatsky’s suggestions have found external confirmation, and more will follow; for the light of knowledge breaks through in all disciplines, and each day brings us closer to the knowledge of eternal truth, which is the sole foundation of all true religion, philosophy, and science.

The Author

Introduction

            The teachings published by H. P. Blavatsky in 1877 in “Isis Unveiled” and later in “The Secret Doctrine” are called “Secret Doctrine” not because they are unsuitable for public consumption, but because their understanding requires rising to a higher standpoint than that of the ignorant “materialist,” without, however, allowing free rein to the imagination. In other words, a certain degree of higher insight and intuition is required, which, however, is not to be confused with fanaticism and does not abandon the firm ground of self-knowledge of truth. The more the tree of knowledge grows within a person to spiritual heights, the more the horizon of intellectual perception expands, and facts reveal themselves to the eye of the spirit that are hidden from the “little ones in the valley” and are therefore “occult” or “secret” to them.

            The teachings contained in the “Secret Doctrine” were neither devised nor invented by H. P. Blavatsky, nor were they communicated to her by “spirits,” but are taken from one of the oldest manuscripts, the Book of Dzyan (i.e., the Book of Spiritual Knowledge), in which the results of the research of the adepts and world sages are compiled, and whose original is said to be in the possession of the “Masters of Wisdom” (in Tibet).

            The “Secret Doctrine,” as H. P. Blavatsky says, is the union of religion, philosophy, and science, and this is to be understood as follows: The only true religion, contained in all great religious systems, is religious knowledge, which springs from the self-knowledge of eternal truth, and this is conditioned by the refinement of the soul and the enlightenment of the intellect. Philosophy, in the true sense of the word, means the love of wisdom, and wisdom is the revelation and realization of the true, the good, and the beautiful within oneself. That true knowledge is impossible without the love of truth and the resulting knowledge of truth needs no proof, for it is self-evident. Through the refinement of character and the love of wisdom, a person becomes capable of higher knowledge, while conversely, a deeper engagement with the teachings of wisdom and the absorption of its spirit into the heart contribute to the refinement of character and teach one to love wisdom. Occult science is not merely a matter of memorization, but rather a result of one’s own spiritual nourishment and growth, and everyone can find proof of the truth of this assertion in the fact that, through repeated attentive reading of the writings of the sages, new facts continually become clear that initially escaped them or seemed incomprehensible.

            We perceive two elements in wisdom itself, and two paths lead to it: love and intelligence. Love elevates, and knowledge illuminates. Neither is perfect without the other. Whoever strives for the highest knowledge should have their intellect lifted to the highest through divine love, and their love should be permeated and illuminated by the knowledge of truth. Love without intellect is blind and leads to fanaticism, while intellect without divine love leads astray, into the abyss of unscrupulousness and ruin.

            The Buddhist scriptures (which also include, in a sense, the “secret doctrine”) have been criticized for not mentioning the “grace of the Holy Spirit.” However, anyone familiar with the core of Buddhist religious philosophy knows that the “Holy Spirit” is described as the fundamental condition of all higher knowledge; for the word “Buddhism” comes from Atma [ātmā] = the divine spirit and bodh = the light of divine knowledge, which no human being can attain through their own egoistic striving and pursuit. In other words, it is the Holy Spirit itself who, through its “grace” or omnipresence, enlightens everyone who is capable of this enlightenment by relinquishing error. Without this holy spirit of Self-knowledge, no one can attain true knowledge. Through its power alone do the clouds of delusion that obscure the truth vanish, just as the light of the rising sun disperses the mists of night. Thus, everyone who is earnestly concerned with investigating the esoteric doctrine should strive selflessly for the Supreme, without self-interest, just as a flower reaches for the light, and open their heart to the holy spirit of self-knowledge so that the truth may be revealed within them. Then, in the end, the words of the Bhagavad Gita [Bhagavad Gītā] will also be fulfilled within them: “Take refuge in God; then, by His grace, you will attain supreme peace, the supreme existence. By entering into Me, man attains in Me My consciousness, My essence, My truth, and when he truly knows Me completely, he is also wholly in Me.”

The Secret Doctrine.

Volume I. Cosmogenesis

Part I

The Evolution of the Universe

Stanza I. The Night of the Universe

 

Śloka 1. “Eternal nature [Parent] [Space], [wrapped] in its ever-invisible garment, was once again shrouded in slumber for seven eternities.”

            “Space,” “matter,” “force,” and “consciousness” are not inherently different things, but merely concepts or states of the Eternal One (BRAHM), which in itself transcends all human concepts and, since it encompasses everything, has no name that could distinguish it from anything else. BRAHM is the essence of everything, and what appears to exist outside of it is merely appearance (Maya) [māyā] and inherently without essence.

            Eternal nature, or the “Mother,” could be described as what we call “space” (Mulaprakriti) [mūlaprakṛti]; the “Father” within it is the creative spirit (Purusha) [puruṣa], which is contained in everything but is active only during the evolutionary period (Manvantara). The invisible garment is the world of ideas and forms contained within the universe during the period of rest (Pralaya), as it were, in a state of stasis, until nature awakens from its slumber and the day of creation begins. The quoted verse and the following verses describe the state of the world as, after the cessation of the previous creation period, once again “the earth was formless and empty” and “the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.” The seven eternities, however, are equal to the duration of the seven periods of a Manvantara, which extend through a Maha-Kalpa [mahā kalpa], a period of 311,040,000,000,000 of our years. It should be noted that these verses refer only to one universe or solar system at a time; for while one solar system is in Pralaya, evolution may be in full swing in other solar systems.

Śloka 2. “There was no time; for it was hidden in the bosom of eternity [duration].”

            Since the concept of “time” is only a concept, only a “representation,” then no time exists for one who has no representation of it. The concept of “time” arises through the change of the forms of consciousness that occur within us; in the pure, unchanging state of absolute consciousness, no concept of time is contained.

Śloka 3. “Thinking, feeling, and willing were not present; for there were no Ah-hi (heavenly beings) who possessed these abilities.”

            Just as a person during deep sleep neither thinks nor wills nor feels, yet does not cease to exist, but is the same person upon awakening as before, so it is in the whole and on a grand scale. Consciousness in the absolute sense is immortal, but it reveals itself in forms as relative consciousness, becoming relative through its relationships to created beings. The “Ah-hi” are the epitome of the spiritual forces and beings of the universe (the Elohim), whose activity in nature sets the wheel of evolution in motion and sustains it. They are the forces through which the law of spirit is revealed in nature. These spiritual forces or “angels,” however, did not exist before the “beginning.” God “first creates his holy angels in the beginning,” that is, he sets these forces in motion through the awakening of his will before he calls the world of forms into being anew through them.^[3]

Śloka 4. “The seven paths to bliss (Nirvana) [nirvāṇa] did not exist. The common causes of suffering (Nidana and Maya) [nidāna and māyā] were not present; for there was no one who had brought them forth or been subject to them.”

            Nothing distinct from the universal unity existed, because everything was itself contained within the unity of the whole and the great. The multiplicity of forms through which this unity strives to reveal itself during the evolutionary period was latent (non-existent). Since the entire unity rested in its own absolute self-consciousness, there was also nothing that did not possess this self-consciousness within itself. In truth, there is nothing but GOD: All forms, including human form, are merely appearances in which the eternal unity reveals itself as multiplicity. All living beings are, so to speak, only the shadows of the single eternal light, which never ceases to exist in itself, even though the forms in which it periodically reveals itself disappear from existence.

Śloka 5. “The infinite universe was filled with darkness; for the father, the mother, and the son were once again one, and the son had not yet awakened to begin his activity in the new cycle.”^[4]

            “The light dwells in darkness and shines into darkness, and darkness cannot comprehend the light.” Darkness is the “ground” (father and mother in one) from which the light (the son, life) is born. Just as darkness is the absence of light, so too is light the absence of darkness. They are both merely two manifestations of a single being that is neither light nor darkness in itself. Both are only relative concepts. What is darkness to the material eye is perhaps an abundance of light to the spiritual eye. When the divine spark that dwells in darkness awakens within humanity to the light of self-knowledge, then the “son,” the redeemer, is born within.

            But what takes place in the individual human being also takes place in the greater whole; the entire world is an organism in which the spiritual light strives to penetrate to divine self-knowledge through the various forms of consciousness of creatures, and this upward growth of forms cannot occur from forces created by these forms themselves, but only through the power of the divine spark of life contained within them and revealing itself. Likewise, in external nature, no tree, no plant creates life itself, but universal life is revealed in individual organisms, and the power of the sun works in all, while the sun itself does not descend from the firmament and retains its light even as the forms pass away.

            BRAHMA (the Creator) is Father, Mother, and Son in one; in other words, spirit, soul, and body. But only through the birth of the Son does the “Father” become the Father and can recognize himself as the Father through his Son (his knowledge). Likewise, man must first come into being before he can recognize himself as that which has come into being, and he comes into being by recognizing himself as what he truly is from eternity.

Śloka 6. “The seven exalted rulers and the seven revelations of truth had ceased to be, and the universe, the birth of the law of necessity, was enveloped in paranirvana [parinirvāṇa], to be exhaled again by Him who is and yet is not. Nothing was.”

            The seven rulers are the seven creative spirits or attributes of nature. Jakob Böhme calls them “source spirits,” while the Church uses the term “archangels.”^[5] Of the seven truths, only four have been revealed so far, as we are only at the fourth stage of evolution and only four Buddhas have appeared. Paranirvana [parinirvāṇa] is a state of perfection that only the perfected can comprehend, a state whose concept is foolish to argue about. It is the highest ideal that must be realized within humanity before it can be understood. The “exhalation” refers to the flow of spirit into and out of inanimate (ideal) forms, through which life manifests in creatures. But GOD is and is not, that is, HE is in Himself. He is the eternal Being of all being, nothing to us as long as we ourselves have not attained true Being in Him and exist only as illusory beings. There was nothing but unity, and unity has no existence as long as it does not relate to numerical concepts as One. Movement only exists when something moves.

Śloka 7. “The causes of existence had ceased to act; what was previously visible and also the invisible were in the stillness of eternal non-being, which is the one Being.”

            The primary cause of personal existence is the yearning for personal life and individuality, a surrender of universal self-awareness to an individual form of consciousness. True being, however, only begins when the true essence of all things, apart from the modes of its appearance, is recognized within itself. In this recognition of unity, all illusion ceases, since illusion is merely a product of the multiplicity of appearances.^[6]

Śloka 8. “Only the one Being extended without limit, infinitely, independent of other causes, in dreamless sleep, and life pulsated unconsciously in cosmic space through that omnipresence which is revealed only to the inner eye of Dangma.”^[7]

            Material science deals with the manifestations of life, the forms, while occult science deals with life itself. The former requires sensory organs to perceive these phenomena, while the latter utilizes the opened inner sense, which no one knows but the one who possesses it. This inner sense, the “Eye of Dangma,” is the perceptual faculty of the organized spiritual body of man, which can only be attained through the actual spiritual rebirth of man. The Eye of Dangma opens to the man of heaven, his divine self-consciousness. Therefore, it is said that “no one can see the kingdom of God unless he is born again.”^[8]

            The “unconsciousness” we have spoken of refers to a relative consciousness. One can be unconscious of all things and yet be supremely “self-conscious.” It is precisely the awareness of things that are not ourselves that hinders the manifestation of perfect Self-consciousness. Spiritual unconsciousness occurs when a person loses the self-awareness of their own higher nature in the whirlwind of appearances and passions.

Śloka 9. “But where was Dangma when the world soul (Alaya) [ālaya] of the universe was in Paramartha [paramārtha] (absolute being) and the wheel of evolution stood still (was orphaned)?”

            All external phenomena in nature are merely images and symbols of what is happening in the Soul of the World, or rather, in the souls of individual phenomena. As Meister Eckhart teaches us, man is, in the innermost depths of his soul, still in God and in Paradise (the divine inner realm); he simply does not recognize his heavenly origin and his eternal dwelling place because, deceived by the delusion of being separate in his physical appearance, he identifies with this appearance. Only when he has overcome this delusion can he recognize himself again for what he truly is in God, and if he has attained this realization during his life on Earth, then after death he consciously re-enters this higher existence. If, however, he dies without having attained true self-awareness in God, then his spirit is indeed in God, but his individuality is unaware of its divinity and is drawn back to the earthly realm to once again enter the school of life and be guided through experiences and disappointments to strive for true self-knowledge. While every human spirit is immortal, the individual must have arrived at the practical realization of his immortality; otherwise, all his theories of immortality are useless in experiencing it. Only the person freed from the illusion of appearances can recognize true Being in the unity within themselves and in all things. Absolute Being, however, can never end, for with the annihilation of the Eternal, it could never reveal itself again, and every further evolution of worlds would cease. Therefore, in the Bhagavad Gita, Krishna (the deity) speaks to Arjuna (the spiritual man):

“Know that HE who spread out the universe can never perish. No one can destroy the Eternal. It is never born and it never dies.”^[9]

Stanza II. The Idea of Differentiation

Śloka 1. “Where were the builders, the shining sons of the rising sun of wisdom? In the mysterious darkness, in their Ah-hi Paranishpanna [pariniṣpanna]. They, who bring forth forms [rūpa-s] from the formless [arūpa], the root of the world tree, the Devamatri [deva mātṛ] and Svābhāvat [svābhāvat, svabhāvat], rested in the bliss of non-manifestation.”

            The  “builders” are the creative life forces in the universe, symbolically represented as the “seven planets,” and which, in an esoteric sense, are the seven principles of the cosmos. Paranishpanna [pariniṣpanna] is absolute being and bliss, synonymous with Paranirvana [parinirvāṇa]. That which now only seems to exist will sooner or later attain true being in Paranishpanna by achieving Svasamvedana [svasaṃvedanā] (self-knowledge). Meister Eckhart says: “God is in everything, even in a piece of wood. But the wood has no capacity to recognize that He is in it, and therefore cannot enjoy His presence. Only humankind has the capacity to become aware of God’s presence and thereby of its own divine nature.”

Śloka 2. “Where was the silence? Where were the senses to perceive the silence? There was neither silence nor sound. Nothing but uninterrupted, eternal breath (movement) that does not know itself.”

            What is called “breath” in the spiritual sense is, in the material sense, movement. Space, primal substance, and movement are the fundamental elements of nature. They are a trinity in one, since none of them can exist without the other two. Where there is space, there is both extension (movement) and the world substance that fills it; Where there is matter, there is also movement and space, and so on. But nature creates nothing without the breath of life, whose eternal cause is the Spirit of God in the universe.

Śloka 3. “The hour had not yet struck; the ray had not yet flashed into the seed; Matri-Padma [mātṛpadma] (Mother Lotus) had not yet become fertile.”

            The divine ray of light had not yet penetrated the center of nature to awaken life and set the wheel of evolution in motion anew; nature had not yet received the fertilizing spirit, and therefore “the earth was formless and empty.” The lotus is the symbol of both the universe and humankind. Its seed contains, in miniature, the perfect image of the plant. Moreover, this plant is rooted in the earth, its stem penetrates the water, and its flower spreads into the air and sunshine. Likewise, human earthly life is rooted in the material; its inner organization permeates the world of desires and passions, but its spirit-fueled soul strives toward spiritual freedom, toward the divine light of wisdom.

Śloka 4. “Her heart had not yet opened to the single ray, to let it fall as a triad into the quaternary in Maya’s womb.”

            When the Trinity (Father, Mother, and Son) brings individual consciousness into being in matter, the addition of Form transforms the Three into a Four. The emergence of Form is an absolute necessity for the unfolding of individual self-activity, the goal of which is the attainment of individual self-knowledge. Without spiritual organization, man would indeed be a spiritual being, but would have no individual existence, no self-consciousness, no personal knowledge based on experience. At the same time, however, the appearance of Form is the cause of illusion (Maya) [māyā]; for the soul, seeing itself enclosed by a limited body, falls prey to the delusion that it is a separate, distinct whole. Form is the reason why man forgets his universal divine existence, and why, to quote Goethe, “the petty world of fools believes itself to be a whole.”

            In this world of fools, the spiritual man is crucified. He must, however, rise again, and he is liberated by attaining, through suffering and experience, the conviction of the transience of all earthly things and the self-knowledge of his divine existence. A single life on Earth is far too short to gather the necessary experiences; the individual human spirit therefore repeatedly appears in a new personal manifestation on this Earth or on another planet, with the sum of experiences imprinted on his character in previous lives forming the basis of his spiritual understanding. Only when he no longer possesses any personal desires does he have nothing more to do with earthly things. But this only happens when, selflessly like the lotus flower opening its chalice to the light of the sun, he opens his heart to the light of divine wisdom.

            Thus, on Earth, the great mystery is dramatically enacted, revealing itself to the seer as a living spectacle within the eternal whole of existence. The “Son” of the “Immaculate Virgin,” who is the one, undivided world soul as primordial matter, becomes earthly “Eve,” our Mother Earth, anew each morning of creation, representing humanity in its entirety, from which divinity is born, unfolding individually through the power of the Divine WORD within humankind.

            This teaching is “secret” because it can only be perfectly clear to him in whom the “Son” himself is born. A theory that serves only to satisfy scientific curiosity is not yet true Self-knowledge; all knowledge without becoming is an illusion. “High words alone do not make one holy and righteous.”^[10]

Śloka 5. “The seven sons of light were not yet born from the fabric of light. Darkness alone was father and mother, Svābhāvat, and Svābhāvat was in night.”

            Svābhāvat is “space” or rather the spiritual basis of the material world that is revealed to us as “matter”.

            The seven “sons of light” are the seven classes of heavenly powers or entities through which “creation” takes place. They will be discussed later.

Śloka 6. “These two (father and mother) were the seed, and the seed is One. The universe was still hidden in the thought of God and in the Divine Heart.”

            That the world is an embodied thought of GOD has been emphasized by various poets, although few of them have likely formed a clear idea of ​​how this “thinking” occurs. GOD is the unity of all. In this unity, thought, will, and word are one and undivided. What GOD wills, HE thinks, and what HE thinks, HE expresses through action. By thinking, HE creates a world in its material nature, which is his own “body.” BRAHMA is not a being standing outside his world, even though he is in himself transcending all nature and beyond all human comprehension and reach. “GOD,” says Jacob Böhme, “is the will of eternal wisdom.” We recognize this wisdom only when it is revealed within us. Meister Eckhart says: “In the clear mirror of eternity, the eternal self-knowledge, the FATHER forms an image of himself, his ‘Son.’ ” In this mirror all things are reflected, and one recognizes them in it, not as creatures, of course, but as God in GOD. The FATHER created all things from nothing; the Son is the archetype of all becoming, the Spirit is the master craftsman and organizer of becoming in eternity and in temporality. The Son involves the ideas of all things, the Spirit encompasses the eternal world order.

            Therefore, as Böhme also says, God does not have many thoughts, but only one single thought and will: to give birth to his Son. This thought, moved by the will, finds expression in the reawakening of nature (creation) and the evolution of forms that begins with it.

            The “thought of GOD” therefore does not presuppose a “thinker” separate from the world, but rather the universe itself is an external expression of the omnipresent eternal wisdom called Sat, the absolute Being, the highest ideal and at the same time the only reality. Of it the Bhagavad Gita says:

“Exalted above all beings, He nevertheless dwells in all; unmoved within Himself, He moves in His nature. He is distant and yet near. He is not distributed among beings and yet He acts within all.”^[11]

            And Meister Eckhart teaches: “What all creatures have in themselves, GOD has in himself.”

Stanza III. The Awakening of Kosmos

Śloka 1. “The final vibration of the seventh eternity permeates infinity. The mother swells and expands from within to without like the blossom of the lotus.”

            The word “eternity” does not mean an endless time, but rather a period in which no concept of time exists, or, perhaps to put it better, a state of bliss that transcends all notions of time. Jakob Böhme says: “For whom time is like eternity, and eternity like time, he is freed from all conflict.” Johann Scheffler teaches similarly: “I myself am eternity when I leave time behind and unite myself in God and God in myself.”

Śloka 2. “The vibration spreads; the breath flies through the universe and also fills the seed that is in the darkness, the darkness that moves over the slumbering waters of life.”

            The “seed” is everywhere. The expression “over the waters” is to be taken in a spiritual sense.

Śloka 3. “Out of the darkness shines a light, and the light sends a ray into the waters, into the maternal depths. The ray penetrates the virgin egg and makes it tremble. From it falls the imperishable germ, through whose condensation the world egg is created.”

            The ray of light that pierces the waters is the divine thought that fills chaos. The “virgin egg” represents fertility in its fullness, and the “non-eternal germ” contains the potential for the evolution of the coming world epoch. The “world egg” is the symbol of existence and development in external, internal, and spiritual terms—the finite nature that underlies all existence, from the smallest to the large whole.

Śloka 4. “The trinity falls into the quaternary, the radiant essence becomes the heptality inwardly and outwardly. The luminous egg (Hiranyagarbha) [hiraṇyagarbha], which in itself represents the trinity, coagulates and spreads its milky-white flakes through the depths of the mother, the root from which the ocean of life springs.”

            Everything in the world is based on a specific number, the determinacy of a thought, a divine breath or word; nothing is without number. GOD is the unity that only becomes self-consciousness within us when it reveals itself to us in its trinity as the Knower, the Known, and the Spirit of Knowledge. But when this occurs in a form, the form is added as a fourth element, that is, the trinity falls into the quaternary. However, this does not turn the infinite trinity into a finite quaternary, but rather the three exists in, with, and alongside the four: as a sevenfold inward and outward. The “milky-white flakes,” however, encompass many things: World matter and the host of stars, as well as everything that is contained in space and destined to appear within it.

Śloka 5. “The root is there, the light is there, the flakes are there, and yet Oeaohoo is One.”

            The “root” is Sat, absolute Being, the light of the Logos; the “flakes” or the “coagulated” is revelation. Despite all the multiplicity of appearances, the eternal essence does not emerge from its unity. The worlds arise from the “congealed” of primordial matter, but not from Parabrahm itself. This is why the Bible also speaks of Him who spread out the universe and is in everything. The Bhagavad Gita also states: “I am the source from which the entire universe springs and to which it returns. Deceived by the changes of Prakriti [prakṛti] (the nature of things), the world does not recognize Me, who am above all change and eternal.” (Chapter VII, 6 and 13)

Śloka 6. “The root of life was contained in every drop of the ocean of immortality, and this ocean was radiant light, namely fire, warmth, and movement. The darkness vanished and was no more. It vanished into its own essence, the body of fire and water, of the father and the mother.”

            Here we are not speaking of external things, but of spiritual things or states from which external phenomena arise. The entire universe is based on absolute all-self-consciousness (Amrita, the Sea of ​​Immortality), and immortality is therefore contained in every thing, even if not every thing is conscious of the immortality it contains.

“Light” and “darkness” are two states of one and the same entity. Where there is light, the state of darkness no longer exists, and therefore darkness cannot comprehend light.^[12]

            Śloka 7. “Behold, O Lanoo, the radiant child of the Two, the incomparable fullness of glory; the world of light, the son of dark space, who rose from the depths of the great dark waters. It is Oeaohoo, the newborn, who . . . (whom you now know as Kwan-Shai-Jin) [Kwan-shih-yin]. He shines like the sun. He is the fiery Divine Dragon of Wisdom. The Eka [eka] (One) is Chatur [catur] (Four), and Chatur [catur] takes Three to Himself. The union of Chatur and Three forms Sapta [sapta] (Seven), and within it are the Seven, from which the Tridasa [tridaśa] (3 x 10 + 3 = 33) is created, the hosts and legions. See how he lifts the veil and unfolds it from east to west. He conceals the upper from view, and the lower reveals itself as the great illusion (the world of appearances). He gives the radiant stars their designated places, makes the upper a boundless sea of ​​fire, and the one revealed element the great waters.”

            The world of light is the child of dark space. The ray of light that, at the dawn of creation, pierces the depths of the universe to rise as Oeaohoo (“the Younger” [the new life]), is destined to become the “seed” or “germ” of all things during the coming evolutionary period. Within it is contained the Divine Thought; it is the physical human being, the creator of light and life, and is called the “Dragon of Wisdom” or the Logos. It contains the seven creative powers (Sephiroth). “Whoever bathes in the light of Oeaohoo will no longer be deceived by the veil of Maya [māyā] (the illusion of appearance).” It is Kwan-Shai-Yin [Kwan-shih-yin], the Divine Word.

            The “dragon” is astral light. The “Dragon of Wisdom,” however, is higher than astral light: it is the divine light, the Holy Spirit (and therefore the serpent is the symbol of wisdom), while astral light, the “ether,” is merely “spiritual matter,”  which in its eventual condensation represents the physical world. The “upper” realm, which moves the world, is its underlying intelligence, the “fire” or the “spirit”; the “lower” realm is thought in its manifestation.

Śloka 8. “Where was the seed [germ], and where is the darkness now? Where is the spirit of the flame that burns in your lamp, O disciple [Lanoo]? The seed is That (existence), and That is the light, the white glorious child of the dark father who dwells in secret.”

            “That” (Tibetan)^[13] is everything that was, is, or will be. Everything is contained in “light,” and through light it is revealed. Darkness, however, is the essence or physicality without which light cannot be revealed.

Śloka 9. “Light is a cold flame, but flame is fire. Fire gives the heat that forms water: The water of life in the great mother (Chaos).”

            Light, flame, fire, heat are terms for states of something for which we have no name, but which, to gain some understanding, we might call “electricity” or life force. “Fire” is the symbol of the one giving birth, “light” the symbol of the born, “flame” the symbol of the soul in everything. Perhaps we can form an idea of ​​the process described above if we imagine the various elements as being composed of different electrical potentials of a primordial substance that is, for now, incomprehensible.

Śloka 10. “Father and mother spin a net, the upper part of which is attached to the spirit (Purusha) [puruṣa], the light that comes out of darkness, and the lower part to matter (Prakriti) [prakṛti], the shadow of the spirit. This was the universe, spun from two substances and joined into one, which is Svābhāvat.”

Śloka 11. “The net [web] expands when the breath of fire (the Father) clings to it; it contracts when the breath of the mother (the ‘root of Matter’) touches it. Then the sons (the elements with their powers and intelligences) separate and divide, only to return to the mother’s womb at the end of the great day and become one with her again. But when the net cools, it becomes radiant; the sons expand and contract through their own being and heart; they embrace infinity.”

            The net, or “fire nebula,” spreads as heat permeates the cosmos. The heat decomposes the composite elements and returns the worlds to their fundamental element, from which, under the influence of Fohat, new planetary nebulae and worlds develop. This periodic heating and cooling, expansion and contraction, represents the movement of life pulsating in infinite space (Svābhāvat). The entire universe, therefore, represents an organism whose heart periodically contracts and expands, causing an outflow and return of life in all parts of the great whole. But if one asks what it is that sets the heart of the universe in motion, the esoteric doctrine answers that it is the all-creating Eternal Power, the manifestation of absolute intelligence, or, in other words, the will of Eternal Wisdom, which is the spiritual sun of the cosmos.

Śloka 12. “Then Svābhāvat sends Fohat to harden the atoms. Each of them is a part of the network. Each unfolds into a world, reflecting within it the image of the self-existing (uncreated) master as in a glass.”

            Fohat is the generative force in nature (life-electricity): That which imprints the ideas contained in the universal spirit onto matter.

Stanza IV. The Septenary Hierarchies

Śloka 1. “Listen, O children of the earth, to what the sons of fire teach you. Know that there is neither first nor last; for all is one number, which came from that which is no number.”

            Counting begins with one; time passes, but there remains time for the awareness that humankind is a thinker: that is, it can conceive of one. That which is aware of its capacity to think—even if it does not think—is not limited, it is not a number; but from the single fundamental thought it creates within itself, all other sequences of thoughts, numbers, and creations arise. The children of the earth are earthly humans, the earthly intellect that sprang from the goddess of the moon (of imagination); the sons of fire are the celestial children of the sun god, the divine consciousness within humankind.

Śloka 2. “Listen to what we, the descendants of the original seven, born from the primordial flame, have learned from our fathers.”

            Those born from the primordial flame correspond to the highest beings in the universe, the “archangels” of Christians, and those born from the spirit of Brahma. However, “learning” here should not be understood as external learning, but rather as an inner understanding. One spirit communicates with another by allowing its light to flow towards it. Wisdom is not imparted to humankind through empty words, but through inner enlightenment.

Śloka 3. “From the glory of the light that shone forth from eternal darkness, the reawakened intelligences (Dhyan-Chohans) [dhyān chohan-s] sprang forth in cosmic space: the One from the Egg, the Six and the Five, then the Three, the One, the Four, the One, the Five; the Two Times Seven, the Total Sum; and these are: the essences, the flames, the elements, the builders, the numbers, the formless, the embodied, and the power of the God-Man, which is the Total Sum. And from the God-Man radiated forth the forms, the sparks, the sacred animals, and the messengers of the holy fathers (Patriarchs or Pitris [pitṛ-s]) within the holy four.”

            Hiranyagarbha [hiraṇyagarbha] is BRAHMA, “the shining egg that radiates like the sun.” The Kumaras [kumāra-s] are the Seven who sprang from the Fourfold Mystery. Four is the number of truth, and its essence corresponds to Jane Leade’s “New Jerusalem.” The Prajapatis [prajāpati-s], like the Sephiroth, are seven. The same numbers are also found in Kabbalah. The One, who came from the egg, the Six, and the Five together make 1065. This is the number of the “Firstborn” and also the number of Jehovah: namely Yod 10, Vau 6, and twice He 5, which together gives 21 = 3 x 7. The Three, the One, the Four, the One, and the Five (together 14 = 2 x 7) make 31415, the number of the hierarchy of the Dhyan-Chohans (heavenly hosts), i.e., The sphere of consciousness of immortality in the mystical sense. Externally, the number 3.1415 (rediscovered by Ludolph and therefore called the “Ludolphian number”) represents the ratio of a circle’s diameter to its periphery. According to Kabbalistic calculation, we obtain the sum 311,040,000,000,000. This is the number of individual world periods.

            All our explanations can only hint at the mysteries, not fully explain them. The Devas, Pitris []pitṛ-s, Rishis [ṛṣi-s], Suras [sūra-s], Asuras [asūra-s], Daityas and Adityas [āditya-s], Danavas [dānava-s], Gandharvas, and so on, have corresponding names in Kabbalah and are referred to in Christian doctrine as thrones, dominions, virtues, cherubim and seraphim, angels and archangels, demons, and so forth. The “sacred animals,” however, are another mystery: The twelve signs of the zodiac.

Śloka 4. “This was the host of the voice, the divine number seven. The sparks of fire of the seven are subservient to the One, the Second, the Third, the Fourth, the Fifth, the Sixth, and the Seventh of the Seven; they are their servants. These (sparks) are called spheres, triangles, cubes, lines, and shapers; for thus stands the eternal Nidana [nidāna], the Oi-Ha-Hou.”

            These statements refer to the classification of the various intelligences in the universe, according to which the different types of humanity on Earth can also be classified, since ultimately everything that visibly exists in the world is merely a symbol of what exists within it (invisibly to us). Everything originated through the WORD; the word is the expression of thought. The resulting thing is only the expression of its inner meaning; the hidden power lies in the meaning. Whoever utters a word thereby calls a thought into existence. Things are for us what we imagine them to be; the names we hear evoke the corresponding ideas within us. What a person speaks can become a blessing or a curse, even without their knowledge or intention; ignorance of the occult forces in nature is often the misfortune of humankind. Words in themselves, however, are merely sounds, neither harmful nor beneficial; they only gain power through the meaning they contain and through the spirit in which they are spoken. The Divine WORD is the ground of everything. But the word arises through breath, and breath is a revelation of life. In this sense, the entire universe is also a breath of the spirit of God, or His spoken word, and He Himself is the meaning of it all.

 Śloka 5. “. . . that is: ‘Darkness,’ the boundless, or that which is without number; Adi-Nidana [ādi-nidāna], Svabhāvat [svābhāvat], the unknown.

1. Adi-Sanat [ādi-sanat], the number; for it is One.
2. The voice of the word: Shâbhâvat [svābhāvat], the numbers; for it is One and Nine.

III. The ‘formless square’.” 

            And these three, enclosed in the infinite circle, are the sacred four, and the sacred ten corresponds to the formless (Arupa) [arūpa] universe. Then come the ‘sons,’ the seven warriors; the One, the eighth, is omitted, and his Breath is the generator of light.

            In Ario-Indian, there are many expressions for which we in English only have the word “GOTT” (God), but these represent entirely different concepts, each pertaining to certain particular aspects of the deity, spirit, and nature, and different ways of viewing the greater whole. Adi-Sanat [ādi-sanat] denotes the “Ancient of Days,” BRAHMA the creator. Svābhāvat refers to the mystical substance of cosmic space, the primordial source of nature. Numbers arise from the number of unity. One and nine make ten. Ten is the number of perfection. This reminds us that zero (the creature) has no value when placed before one (God). But placed after one, it becomes perfect through it and forms ten. The “formless square” signifies the Trinity revealed in the infinite universe (the squaring of the circle).

            The one thing that has been omitted or cast out is the sun of our solar system. The Rig Veda states: “Eight sons were born of Aditi, the mother of the gods (the substance of cosmic space). She approached the gods with seven, but the eighth, Marttanda [mārt-āṇḍa] (our sun), was cast out.” This allegory suggests that our sun is merely the reflection of another central sun in the universe, and furthermore, that the “seven planets,” along with the sun, share a common origin.

Śloka 6. “. . . Then the Second Seven, the Lipikas, who are brought forth by the Three (Word, Voice, and Spirit). The outcast Son is one, the Sons of the Sun are countless.”

            Lipika means divine entities (divine thoughts) on which the order in the universe (the law of karma) is based — the ideas according to which the “builders” rebuild the cosmos at the beginning of each day of creation, after the idea or image of everything that has ever existed has been stored in the “astral light” (“memory of nature”, Akasa [ākāśa], the reflecting ether).

            Thus, both past and future are present in the omnipresent Eternity. What happens is imprinted on the world’s memory, and what is present in memory gives rise to the repetition of what has already happened. The “Astral Light” is the Book of Life [Nature], in which the Lipikas record the deeds of humankind. The Lipikas^[14] are the forces that execute the law of eternal justice, and what is recorded in each person’s Book of Life determines their position and destiny in their next reappearance on Earth. Thus, humankind would have to be eternally the fool of fate, eternally moving in circles, if there were not something higher and eternal within them, something exalted above all laws because it is itself the law. And the more humankind, through its striving for knowledge, draws nearer to the Eternal, the more its cycle becomes a spiral, the more its will is freed.

Stanza V. Fohat: The Child of the Septenary Hierarchies

Śloka 1. “The Original Seven, the first seven Breaths of the Dragon of Wisdom, create the Fiery Whirlwind through their circulating breath.”

            This verse is one of the most difficult in this book. The “Builders,” “Lipikas,” “Sons of Wisdom,” and so forth, are not fantastical allegories, but personified forces and entities, forms of consciousness that underlie the true essence of the inner human being. The Secret Doctrine states that, in order to bring forth a godlike, self-aware human being, the original spiritual intelligences^[15] must incarnate and pass through the stages of human development. This development takes place not only on our Earth, but also on other planets and in other solar systems. The present human race on planet Earth, in its entirety and greatness, is itself such an intelligence or entity that, in the course of its evolution, has reached but not yet transcended the balance of attraction between spirit and matter. Hegel says that the (relatively) unconscious brought forth the universe in the hope of thereby attaining clear self-consciousness. Brahma has possessed within him from eternity the urge to create, or, as Jakob Boehme puts it, “God created the world for no other reason than out of love for himself.”

            According to the esoteric doctrine, all of creation is an emanation of the breath of the Godhead. The Bible also agrees with this view, if we understand it correctly. The Psalmist says (Psalm 104): “When you breathe forth your breath, they are created, and you renew the face of the earth. He makes the winds his angels, and blazing fire his servants.” This “fiery whirlwind” is cosmic matter. Every atom of this matter possesses the capacity for self-awareness. Thus, the world did not arise by “blind chance,” but was built by inherent intelligent forces that are emanations of divine wisdom. This divine wisdom is unique. Therefore, we find, at the core of everything, only one omnipresent law that determines the order of the whole.

Śloka 2. “They make him the messenger of their will. The Dgyu becomes Fohat; the Swift-footed Son of the Divine Sons, whose sons are the Lipikas, moves in a circle. He is the horse and the Thought of the riders. He goes like lightning through the fiery clouds; he takes three, five, and seven paces through the seven upper and the seven lower regions. He raises his voice; he calls together the countless sparks of fire and unites them.”

            The Original Seven use “Fohat” (which could perhaps be translated as “life-electricity”) as their physical body and make it the instrument of their will. The Secret Doctrine recognizes seven Dhyāni Buddhas or “Heavenly Buddhas” (enlightened spiritual intelligences), whose manifestations in the material world are the Buddhas who have appeared on Earth. However, only five of these have revealed themselves in this way so far^[16]; the sixth and seventh will appear only in distant generations.^[17] These “free” beings are, so to speak, the spiritual models of the Buddhas who appear on Earth, born from the divine essence and free from all that is earthly.

            Fohat is the life force of the Creative Word, the generator of forms in manifest nature. In an abstract sense, Fohat is that which, in the original, non-manifest unity, generates the multiplicity of appearances; the force through which the One manifests itself as Two and Three. The Trinity manifests itself as a multiplicity of forms, and Fohat is the unifying force of unity that holds the atoms together, the attraction that binds them to one another. By communicating itself to the seven principles of Akasa [ākāśa], Fohat acts upon the manifested primordial matter (the one element); and by thereby dividing itself into different centers of energy, it sets in motion the law of evolution, which, in obedience to the divine thought, brings into being all the different states of existence in the manifest solar system.

            The solar system, which is revealed in this way, like everything that originates from these centers, also consists of Seven Principles. Therefore, the constitution of humankind, like the world on a grand scale, is also composed of these Seven Principles, whose classification was known to the ancient Aryan Indians and Egyptians, as well as to the Kabbalists, whereas modern philosophy has so completely lost sight of them that it no longer even has names or designations for them. Fohat is the personified electric life force, the transcendental energy that holds and connects all cosmic forces. Viewed in another way, Fohat is the energy of the sun, the electric life fluid, and the fourth principle, so to speak, the “animal soul of nature.”^[18]

            The “three and seven steps” refer to the Seven spheres inhabited by humans and also to the seven regions of the Earth. The “three steps”^[19] refer to spirit, soul, and body and signify the descent of a ray of light from the Logos into matter, that is, into the spirit, then into the soul, then into the human body, whose life it becomes. As this ray of light becomes active within the human being, the inner person is spiritually “reborn,” that is, they become a godlike being again through the “Word made flesh.” The Seven Worlds (Lokas) will be discussed further below.

Śloka 3. “He is their guide and guiding star. When he begins his work, he separates the fiery sparks of the lower kingdom (the mineral kingdom), which dwell joyfully in their radiant abodes (“patches of fog”), and from these he forms the seeds of that which moves in the cycle. He places them in the six directions of space: But one, the main wheel, in the center.”

            The “wheels that move in circles” are the centers of force around which cosmic matter spreads; matter that becomes spheroidal and finally spherical by passing through all six stages of condensation. The motion that pulsates in every slumbering atom during periods of rest has an ever-increasing tendency to take a circular direction during the kalpas (aeons) of life. “The deity becomes a whirlwind.” The cause of the motion is therefore not matter itself, but the animating principle within it, the opharim [Ōphannīm] of the stars and planets, the “angels of the spheres,” the souls of the revolving celestial bodies.^[20]

            The “six directions of space” refer to the double triangle, which is the symbol of the descent of spirit into matter and the ascent of matter to spirit.

Śloka 4. “Fohat draws the spiral lines to unite the six with the seventh; a Host of Sons of Light stands at each angle, the Lipika in the middle wheel. They say: ‘This is good!’ The first divine world is ready; the first (is now) the second; then appears in the divine formless (the world of Divine Thought) Chhayaloka [chāyāloka] (the shadow world of the original forms, i.e., the intellectual world), the first garment of Anapadaka.”^[21]

            The evolution of both the individual human being and all of nature moves in spiral lines. Material nature always moves in a circle, according to the law of karma, whose representatives are the Lipikas [lipika-s]. Were there nothing higher, the whole world, as well as the life of the individual, would resemble a treadmill in which what has already happened is endlessly repeated. But as it is, the divine soul lies hidden within material nature, through whose power the turning wheel is raised a step higher with each revolution. Fohat represents this power of divine wisdom and love, or the living attraction to the higher, the “elective affinity” between the divine principle in the microcosm and the divine law in all of nature.

            The host of the Sons of Light consists of spiritual intelligences (angels or Dhyan Chohans [“planetary spirits”]) ^[22]. They are the mystical guardians through whose minds evolution^[23] is guided from the beginning to the end of a Manvantara.

            “The first is the second,” that is, it is the first world revealed; but it is the second because the unmanifested (subjective) world, from which it sprang, precedes it. The thought is there; but it only becomes reality when it is revealed through action.^[24] The underlying principle is Sat.^[25]

            The formless world of the concept of God could perhaps best be described as the divine self-consciousness of the soul, which transcends all thought, the light of divine self-knowledge, as that “light of thought” whose existence makes thinking possible; the region of the “mind” that illuminates the world of thoughts and is comparable to the light of a sun that breaks into seven rays, each of which appears again divided into seven colors.^[26]

Śloka 5. “Fohat takes five more steps [having already taken the first three] and erects a winged wheel in each corner of the square for the four anointed ones and their hosts.”

            The “five steps” refer to the five higher spheres of consciousness. In total, there are seven such spheres, the two lowest of which belong to the astral plane and the earthly world. The Four Anointed Ones, however, are the four rulers or archangels who govern the four cardinal directions; they are (spiritual) powers, each with its own particular qualities that distinguish it from the others. The “winged wheel” is the symbol of the soul, which needs wings to rise to spiritual heights. In the Catholic Church, these four spiritual powers are represented by the symbols of a dragon (Raphael), lion (Michael), ox (Uriel), and eagle (Gabriel). (These symbols are assigned to the four Evangelists.)

Śloka 6. “The Lipikas circumscribe the triangle, the first, the cube, the second, and the five-pointed star within the egg (the circle). It is the ring called ‘do not overstep me’ for those ascending and descending, and also for those who, during the Kalpa, proceed toward the Great Day, which is called ‘Be with us.’ Thus, Arupa [arūpa] and Rupa [rūpa] (the formless and the world of forms) were formed from one light into seven; from each of the seven, seven times seven lights. The wheels guard the circle.”

            This verse refers to the classification of the “heavenly hosts” or spiritual entities in the universe. The Lipikas, the guardians of karma, draw an insurmountable boundary between the personality and the Higher Self.^[27] The material world with its various forms is merely a symbol or a revelation of a Single, Nameless One, who presents himself to us as a multiplicity of appearances. Those who descend and ascend are the spiritual individualities, the incarnating monads, who can only cross the circle on the day called “Be with us,” that is, when they have overcome ignorance, delusion, and passion and have attained true self-knowledge, and know that they possess no separateness, but are one with humanity and, through humanity, with the divine within humanity.

            It hardly needs to be mentioned that the insurmountable circle does not refer to a specific location; for in infinity that is being discussed here, there are no limits.

            In the higher realms of consciousness of the universe, there are beings so immeasurably superior to humankind (in its animal nature) that they can only be conceived of as gods, and collectively as God. The magnitude of their existence, compared to ours, could be likened to the difference between a human being and an ant. The fact that modern philosophy is unaware of the existence of these higher beings does not alter this reality. When earthly humans, in their arrogance, deny the existence of these higher intelligences, they merely demonstrate their own shortsightedness.

            Among the highest classes of these beings (who have passed through human evolution) are seven orders of divine intelligences; among the six lower classes are those connected to humanity on this earth. They are comparable to seven rays of light, each of which further breaks down into seven shades of color, and in every human being, one or the other shade predominates, thus connecting them to this spiritual world and specifically to the class to which they belong. Every human individuality therefore has its true origin in one of these spiritual entities. Academic science may strive to speculate about how feeling and consciousness, intellectual and spiritual activity, can be generated from inanimate matter through mechanical movement; it will never reach a conclusion. It can certainly analyze and dissect the shell that man inhabits on Earth, but life itself, which is a function of the spirit, will always remain a mystery to those who cannot or will not intellectually comprehend the spirit that is in everything.

            Beyond all individual existence lies Paranirvana [parinirvāṇa], the absolute unity that we can only reach when individuality has passed through all stages of development. We attain Paranirvana [parinirvāṇa] by allowing this unity to be rooted in the deepest recesses of each person’s heart, so that the divine part of humanity rests constantly in God, even while inhabiting lower worlds in its outward appearance.

Stanza VI. Our World, its Growth and Development

Śloka 1. “Through the power of the Mother of Grace and Knowledge, Kuan-Yin, the ‘Trinity’ of Kuan-Shih-Yin, who dwells in Kwan-Yin-T’ien, Fohat, the breath of their descent, the son of sons, who brought forth from the lower abyss (chaos) the illusory form of Sien-Tschan [Hsien-chan] (the universe) and the seven elements.”

            Kuan-Yin (Chinese) corresponds to the Divine Logos, or rather, the “eternal feminine,” which is the “mother, wife, and daughter” of the Divine Word. In other words, it corresponds to the light of the Holy Spirit, which manifests itself through the Logos (Iswara) [īśvara].^[28] Kuan-Yin-Tien corresponds to the concept of “heavenly harmony,” the abode of Kuan-Yin; it is the verb (Vach) [vāk] of the heavenly human being, or the Sephira of the Kabbalists. This power is the magical (creative) element of sound (in the occult sense) in the ether and in nature, through which the world and the seven elements emerge from the non-manifest into manifestation.

Śloka 2. “The Swift-Footed and Radiant One brings forth the seven Laya Centers, which are insurmountable until the great day, ‘Be with us’; he sets the universe upon these eternal foundations and surrounds them with the seeds of life.”

            The seven “Laya Centers” are the seven centers of force where the division of the elements that enter the constitution of our solar system begins. The entire cosmos originates from a single source of force; but this force manifests in nature in seven different forms. Just as the constitution of man consists of seven principles, so too does the matter that appears divided in our solar system exist under seven different conditions. Fohat, considered in itself, is the One Life in the universe. This One Life, however, manifests itself on seven different levels, from the nameless One Primordial Source down to the life that is (albeit latently) contained in every atom in nature.

            The “germs of life” are the “atoms” of matter; what Leibniz calls “monads”.

Śloka 3. “Of the seven elements, first one is revealed and six are hidden; then two are revealed and five are hidden, three are revealed and four are hidden, four come forth and three are secret. Then four and one are partially revealed, and two and a half are hidden; six are revealed and one is removed. Finally, seven small wheels turn, one of which gives birth to another.”

            This verse refers not only to the renewal of the entire universe, but also specifically to the development and formation of the original seven elements of our Earth. Of these seven elements, four are now revealed: the elements of earth, water, air, and fire.^[29] The fifth, the ether of space, is only partially revealed and will only be fully revealed in the fifth round.^[30]

            All worlds, including our own, originally arose from the One Element (Akasa [ākāśa], Invisible Primordial Matter, Astral Light, World Soul, or whatever one may call it). These worlds—and their inhabitants—were originally in a state that, due to their physical delicacy, can be called a “spiritual” state. Only gradually did condensation occur, and with it a transformation of matter: the aforementioned elements developed. Indeed, they are still unfolding, until at the end of the aeons all seven elements will be manifest: that is, they will emerge from the subjective state into objective existence; just as a thought hidden in the heart only becomes manifest when it enters consciousness, that is, when it is thought. There was therefore a time when even what is now solid matter for us existed in an undeveloped state, which one might imagine as a nebula. However, the fact that matter does not exist on all other celestial bodies in the same degree of density as on our Earth is also evidenced, among other things, by the spectroscope.

            The small “seven wheels” refer to the seven planets of our solar system.^[31]

Śloka 4. “He builds them as replicas of older wheels (worlds) and fixes them on imperishable centers.”

            How are they built by Fohat? He gathers the fiery dust, makes balls of fire, walks through and around them, and imbues them with life, then he sets them in motion, this one in this direction, that one in that direction. They are cold, but he makes them hot; they are dry, he gives them moisture, they glow, he fans and cools them.

            Thus Fohat works from one twilight to the next through seven eternities.”

            The worlds are built according to the model of earlier worlds, that is, based on the ideas of worlds that existed in earlier Manvantaras (days of creation).^[32] The one Fohat becomes male and female, that is, it acquires a positive and a negative polarity. Occult science knows no dead matter. Every atom is a form in which life manifests itself; every force is an activity of life. Everything originates from a living force, which in turn is the outflow of Divine Wisdom; But the emanating forces can express less consciousness and intelligence the more they distance themselves from the throne of wisdom through condensation. The spiritual intelligences are the fundamental causes of phenomena. From their will and essence arise the elementals, the countless psychic seeds contained in all forms, the “souls of things.” Fohat directs the transmission of principles from one planet to another. When a planet dies, its “spiritual” principle enters a Laya center, that is, a latent state, and when it awakens from this state, it animates a new planetary body, which it constructs.^[33]

            Conventional wisdom sees all natural forces merely as “forms of motion”; however, it should be clear that “dead” matter cannot initiate any form of motion. Even a person’s breath is a form of motion, but behind it lies a living being that brings this breath forth. According to the esoteric doctrine, all natural forces are the ultimate manifestations of a power underlying intelligence, even if no intelligence is apparent in the forces themselves. Thus, there is no intelligence in human breath itself, but it arises from the organic activity of an intelligent being, whether this activity is consciously or unconsciously stimulated. So it is with the great organism of the world, in which the breath of the omnipresent spirit sets all of nature in motion.

            The “Laya centers” are the points of transition from a lower to a higher level of existence, and since there are seven such levels, there are also seven such “points” or “boundaries”.

            Here ends the part of the Book of Dzyan that deals with the structure of the universe as a whole. The following part deals specifically with our solar system and its planets. As before, it is still not possible for us to delve into a detailed discussion of all the questions that might arise in these considerations; for here only a brief, cursory overview of the contents of this book Dzyan is to be given. Nor will anyone imagine that we require the reader to blindly believe all the information; for blind belief is not knowledge and therefore not Theosophy. A philosophical work does not seek to render one’s own thinking superfluous, but rather to provide the reader with material for their own thinking and to show the path to knowledge. The path to knowledge, to a higher life, must be walked by each individual if they wish to attain it. Just as folly, which blindly believes everything and then imagines itself to know it, does not lead to knowledge, so too is arrogance, which rejects everything that does not agree with its opinions, not the path to the knowledge of truth. True Self-knowledge consists in being what one wishes to know, and thus recognizing oneself in all one’s aspects. Whoever wishes to know the spiritual spiritually must themselves be spiritual; they must be able to rise to the spirit in its entirety and awaken to spiritual life within its consciousness.

            Some will ask how it is possible for someone to attain this state of divine self-knowledge! We have stated in a footnote that this godlikeness will only occur after many millions of years, in the seventh cycle. But what nature accomplishes in millions of years, God’s grace can accomplish in an instant, provided that the individual opens themselves to Him and does not resist Him. Eternity is not bound by time; its gate is always open. Every day is the Sabbath as soon as it is celebrated as such. Theosophical training serves the purpose of helping people learn to free themselves from the illusion of sensory deception and become receptive to the light of knowledge.

Śloka 5. “In the fourth planetary round, the ‘sons’ are commanded to create their own likenesses. The third part of them refuses, the other two obey.”

            Eons have passed since the conditions described in the preceding verse came to pass. The Earth was comparable to a ball of fire, and “man” a sphere of light. Three times the wave of life traversed the circle of planets on its journey, moving from one to the next.^[34]

            The mineral, plant, and animal kingdoms came into being, but the evolution of forms had not yet reached that degree of perfection to make them desirable to divine beings as a dwelling place or as a site for embodiment.

            “The holy gods refused to reproduce and propagate their kind. (They said:) These organisms are not suitable for us; they must first evolve. They refused to enter into the chayas [chāyā-s] (shadows, material manifestations) of beings so far below them. Thus, even then, selfishness reigned among the gods, and they fell under the law of the Lipikas, who enforce the karma of humans.”

            This refusal backfired, as described in the second part of the book; but two-thirds of the celestial intelligences obeyed the command of wisdom and incarnated in the existing forms, even though these organisms were still imperfect and unsuitable for allowing the intelligence working within them to be revealed.^[35]

            Every form on Earth and every atom in space strives in its efforts toward becoming toward the ideal, whose model is the celestial human being. Involution and evolution, inner and outer growth, and the development of every thing all have the one goal of becoming human (- “human” insofar as its form is the crown of creation on this Earth, the realization of the ideal in a state of (divine) self-awareness, the pinnacle of divine incarnations on Earth).

            The Pitris (the “spiritual” ancestors of humanity) multiplied and incarnated in the still imperfect human forms.

            The Dhyanis [dhyāni-s] (Pitris) [pitṛ-s] gave birth to their Bhuta [bhūta] (etheric image) from within themselves. This Rupa [rūpa] (form) became the vessel for the Monads that had completed their cycle of wandering in the three preceding Kalpas (rounds). Then these (etheric images or “doppelgangers”) became the humans of the first race of this round. These humans were still without intellect.

            The etheric image, the “doppelganger” or etheric body (life body), is the “invisible” organism whose outward expression is the “visible” physical body. Up to our fifth race, the physical bodies that clothed these celestial astral bodies were subject to constant material change, corresponding to the geological changes of the planet they inhabited; they will continue to change until, finally, in the seventh round, every human form will be the true expression of its indwelling (divine) soul.

            The inner, now hidden, human being was then the outer human being; he was the offspring of the Dhyanis (Pitris) [pitṛ-s] and like them, as a son resembles his father. Like the lotus, whose outer form gradually assumes the shape of the type contained within, so the form of man initially unfolded from the inside out. But when the time came for man to begin to reproduce according to the animal form that now exists, the opposite occurred. The germ of the human body now undergoes all the transformations that this form experienced in the three preceding kalpas [kalpa-s] (rounds), when uncomprehending, because imperfect, matter, in its blind wandering, strove to condense around the monad. In the present age, the embryo of the human shell resembles first a plant, then a reptile, then an animal, until it finally assumes human form and develops within it a similar etheric image. In the beginning, this image (the astral human) was there first. Because it was uncomprehending, it became trapped in the web of matter.

            This is the story of the “Fall of Man,” which is allegorically depicted in all religious systems. The “Monad” that is to become human is not human. Animals also have souls, and the Monads (souls) of humans, as noted above, traversed the four kingdoms of nature (the elemental, mineral, plant, and animal kingdoms) before becoming human monads. This occurs sooner or later, depending on favorable or unfavorable conditions, from the first and third rounds, when humankind was an ethereal being, to the fifth race of the fourth round. In this latter round, no further transition from animal souls to human forms takes place.^[36] What still lives on Earth in animal form can only ascend to the human kingdom in the next Manvantara [manvantara].^[37]

            The successive stages of human development are described as follows:

1. The human being of the first generation and first race on our Earth was an ethereal being, not intellectual, but of a highly spiritual nature. In each subsequent race, this being becomes more and more condensed and embodied, but is still ethereal, gigantic, and genderless (male and female in one).

1. The human of the second round is still ethereal and gigantic, but more densely packed than before. He is less intelligent than spiritual, since his intellectual development progresses more slowly than the evolution of his physical organism.

            III. In the third round, the human body is what can be called “material”; it resembles a gigantic ape. It is now less spiritual, but possesses more cunning and perspicacity. On the descending ladder, it has reached the point where original spiritual consciousness is overshadowed and obscured by brooding (selfish) “reason.” In the second half of this round, its physical size decreases, its organism becomes tougher, it becomes increasingly rational, and it resembles an ape more than a god.

1. In this round, an extraordinary development of intellectual activity takes place, while his capacity for intellectual understanding diminishes. In this (our) round, he attains the ability of human language. The Earth, which in this round has also reached the lowest stage of material existence (condensation), is filled with the results of thought and science, while most lose their awareness of their higher nature.

            These are, in general terms, the outlines of human evolution from the beginning of the Manvantaras to the present day. It should be noted, however, that in every single generation and race, in every age, every period, every nation, every system, and in the life of every individual, an apparent regression alternates with progress. Everything in nature moves in cycles, which only over the course of millennia are elevated to a spiral. This elevation, however, does not occur through a force created by the cycles of nature themselves, but through the divine power coming “from above”; in other words, through the action of divine law in nature, the origin of which is divine wisdom itself.

            Thus the earth spirit surges up and down and blows back and forth “in the floods of life, in the storm of action”; empires, civilizations, continents, worlds pass away and re-emerge into existence, as day and night alternate.

            Perhaps the time is not far off when even our historians will have to admit that the civilizations of Lemuria at the time of the third race, as well as that of the Atlanteans perhaps 50,000 years ago, were more advanced than ours, just as the architecture of the ancient Egyptians and the visual arts of the ancient Greeks are still superior to our art.

            [5 paragraph 2nd.] 6.^[38] “The curse has been pronounced. They will be born into the fourth (race). They will suffer and cause suffering. This is the first battle [war].”

            The angelic beings of that creation period, destined to become human, refused to obey, to multiply, and to propagate their species. They said, “There are no suitable bodies for us.” Their [The angelic beings] own well-being mattered more to them than obedience to the law of evolution. Through this selfish refusal, they fell prey to the effects of karma, and therein lay the “curse” they brought upon themselves. Their resistance did not prevent the action of the natural law; it only delayed it, and the situation worsened as a result. For they were compelled by this law to assimilate into the Atlantean race at a time when the civilization of that continent had reached a high level and a struggle with magical forces was taking place, ultimately leading to the downfall of that race.

            The fall of the angels

            The “fall of the angels” thus consisted in the fact that these angels, instead of blindly obeying the will of the law, began to judge independently and claimed the right to self-determination. With this, however, began their responsibility and a source of suffering, but at the same time, it also paved the way for the individualization of character and self-knowledge.

            “And there was war in heaven. Michael and his angels fought against the dragon, and the dragon and his angels fought back, but they were not victorious, and there was no longer any room for them in heaven. So the dragon was driven out—that ancient serpent called the devil, or Satan, who deceives the whole world.”^[39]

            Without this “fall,” there would be no individual knowledge, no autonomy of one’s own will, but only a single, all-guiding universal will, and humanity would be a blind instrument of this universal will, incapable of becoming a self-aware and self-knowing participant in this power. However, the birth of individual will also created the illusion of separateness and selfishness, which is the mother of the “devil” and all temptations and evils. The capacity to sin alone is necessary to overcome sin. Without darkness, there would be no recognition of the advantages of light; without struggle, no victory. Lucifer^[40] is therefore not merely the symbol of the angel who fell from unity into multiplicity, but he is also the “bringer of light” and has nothing to do with the “devil” of orthodox dogma.^[41]

Śloka 6. 7. “The older wheels turned up and down. The Mother-spawn filled the whole (our solar system). Battles took place between the Creative and the Destructive (forces) and battles for space. The seeds (for the formation of new celestial bodies) arose and reappeared again and again.”

            Having examined the processes within our solar system, we return to considering the universe as a whole. The “older wheels” refer to the worlds in our chain as they existed in previous cycles. Each chain consists of seven worlds or planes of existence, and each corresponds in its essence to one of the Seven Principles that constitute the constitution of both the universe and humankind.^[42]

            The “germs”, however, are of a “spiritual nature”, i.e. matter in a transcendental state, “etheric” organisms in which everything necessary for their evolution is latently contained.

            Direct quote from H. P. Blavatsky, The Secret Doctrine I Cosmogenesis (Adyar, Madras, India: The Theosophical Publishing House, 1979, 1993, 2014), 201:

            “The Central Sun causes Fohat to collect primordial dust in the form of balls, to impel them to move in converging lines and finally to approach each other and aggregate.” (Book of Dzyan) . . . . . “ Being scattered in Space, without order or system, the world-germs come into frequent collision until their final aggregation, after which they become wanderers ( Comets ). Then the battles and struggles begin. The older (bodies) attract the younger, while others repel them. Many perish, devoured by their stronger companions. Those that escape become worlds.”

            Dr. Hartmann’s paraphrased quote from the previous:

            “The central sun moved Fohat to form spheres from cosmic dust, to set them in motion, and to bring them closer together. As long as these spheres are scattered without order in space and move within it without a system, collisions occur until they finally gather in groups, whereupon they become wanderers (comets). Then the struggles for existence begin. The older (celestial bodies) attract the younger ones, others repel them. Many of the weak are swallowed by the stronger. Those who escape become worlds.”^[43]

Śloka 7. Take up your abacus, O Lanu [Lanoo], if you wish to know the age of your little wheel (our planetary chain). The fourth Spoke is our Mother (the Earth). Attain the fourth Fruit on the fourth Path of knowledge, which leads to Nirvana [nirvāṇa], then you will understand; for you will see for yourself.

            In all these occult-mathematical calculations, the number seven plays a significant role. Not only are there seven worlds on seven levels of existence, but each of these worlds also has seven  [world] periods of existence.

1. The homogeneous state, in which the whole is a uniform mass;
2. The gaseous or radiant state;
3. The congealed or nebulous state;
4. The atomic or etheric state;
5. The germinal or fiery state;
6. The elemental or vaporous state, in which the elements separate;
7. The cold state, in which the planet receives its light and heat from the sun

            There are four paths to knowledge (Vidya): Yajna-Vidya [yajña-vidyā], Maha-Vidya [mahā-vidyā], Guhya-Vidya [guhya-vidyā], and Atma-Vidya [ātma-vidyā]. Only the fourth path, Atma-Vidya, is the true path to knowledge; without this path, no (true) knowledge can be attained through the other three paths (of intellectual speculation, etc.).^[44]

            Only when a person has attained this spiritual capacity for knowledge can they know what they themselves, and what humanity in general, truly are in their essence. We cannot achieve this knowledge through external research, neither through the study of the body’s anatomy nor through that of physiology, nor through any other kind of external research, since all such investigations necessarily focus on only a single part of the person—their physical form—and completely disregard the most important components of their constitution.

            We have already referred to the classification of the Seven Principles of Man and the Universe several times. For the sake of completeness, we list the Seven Principles again:

1. Sthula Sharira [sthūla śarīra], the physical body.
2. Prana [prāṇa], the life principle.

            III. Linga Sharira [liṅga śarīra], the etheric body, the seat of vital force.

1. Astral body and Kama Rupa [kāma rūpa] (Anima), the “animal soul,” the seat of desires and passions.
2. Manas (Mens), the seat of volition and intellectual activity. (Often incorrectly referred to as “mind.”)
3. Buddha, the spiritual soul (seat of knowledge).

            VII. Atma [ātmā] (Spiritus), the spirit.

            Of these seven principles, Buddhi is the seat of Atma [ātmā]; the astral body the foundation of Manas; the etheric body the vessel of Prana [prāṇa]. Furthermore, not all beings in the universe are quantitatively identical in their constitution; for in some, only one principle is active, and in others, different principles. Human beings, however, are the crown of creation because all seven principles are contained within their material bodies and can be activated there. Therefore, the Bible says of humankind: “Do you not know that you are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwells in you? You are that.” Few know or believe this; but among poets, there have been those who seem to have grasped the secret meaning of these words. For example, Carlyle says:

            “There is only one true temple in the universe, namely the human body. Nothing is more sacred than this sublime form. When we place our hands on a human body, we touch heaven.”^[45]

            If everyone heeded this truth, morality in the world would be in a better state, apart from all occultism and secret doctrines.

Stanza VII. The Parents of Man on Earth.

Śloka 1. “Behold the beginning of sentient formless life.”

            First the divine (vessel), the One from the Mother Spirit (Atman), then the spiritual (Atma-Buddhi [ātmā buddhi], the spiritual world soul), the Three from the One, the Four from the One, and the Five, from whom the Three, the Five, and the Seven (radiate or originate). These are the threefold and the fourfold descending ones; the spirit-born sons of the first Lord (Avaloketiswara) [avalokiteśvara], the radiant Seven (Rishis) [ṛṣi-s]. They are the ones who are: You, I, He, O Lanu [Lanoo]!—they watch over you and your Mother Bhumi [bhūmi] (the Earth).

            This verse deals with the hierarchy of divine and spiritual intelligences or creative forces in the universe, represented by the twelve signs of the zodiac, the seven of which on the descending side correspond to the seven planets. All of these are further subdivided into countless groups of divine, spiritual, and etheric beings. Since space does not permit us a detailed treatment of this subject, we must content ourselves with a brief overview.

            The highest group consists of the so-called divine flames; they are the formless breath of fire, in a certain respect identical to the upper triad of the Sephiroth. The One ignites the three descending groups, which thereby become distinct, self-contained entities.

            The first [group] after the One is divine fire, the second fire and ether, the third consists of fire, ether, and water, the fourth of fire, ether, water, and air (i.e., of the spiritual forces representing them). The One has nothing to do with the planets that bring forth human beings, but rather with the invisible inner spheres. The firstborn is life, the heart, and the pulse of the universe; the second is its Manas (mens), or consciousness.

            The second group of celestial beings of fire and ether, corresponding to Atma-Buddhi [ātmā buddhi], the spiritual soul, and extraordinarily numerous, still lack a definite form but are already more substantial. They constitute the transition from the unity of being to the multiplicity of manifestation. They are the prototypes of the incarnating Jivas [jīva-s] or Monads and consist of the fiery spirit of life. Through them flows the pure divine ray, and they endow it with its future body, the divine soul (Buddhi). They are in direct communion with the hosts of the Higher Worlds in our system. From these twofold entities, the threefold entities emanate.^[46]

            The third order [group] corresponds to Atma-Buddhi-Manas (mind, soul and intellect).

            The fourth consists of substantial entities, the highest among the forms (Rupas) [rūpa-s].^[47] This is the nursery of human, conscious, spiritual souls. They are called the “imperishable Jivas” and, in the order that follows them, constitute the first group of the first sevenfold hierarchy, the great mystery of human self-aware and intellectual existence; for here lie hidden the seeds that will be born. These seeds become, in the physical germ cell, the spiritual force that guides the development of the human embryo and is the cause of the hereditary transmission of the qualities and talents inherent in human beings. Here, therefore, we find the evolution of the body arising from a spiritual, intellectual, and physical cause. (This is precisely the reversal of the usual theory.)

            The fifth group is very mysterious: The group of Dhyanis [dhyāni-s]. The Dhyanis represent Manas (mind, mens, the human soul), the fifth principle that constitutes true humanity and enables thought. It is through the activity of Manas that humans differ from other beings in the universe.^[48]

            The sixth and seventh groups share in the qualities of the lower four principles. They consist of conscious etheric beings, as invisible as the ether itself, and have many classes and orders. The lowest are the “nature spirits” or “elementals,” of which there are countless types: From formless creations of thought down to atomically constituted creatures invisible to human eyes.

            All these beings have their own worlds, and therefore there are “higher” and “lower” worlds. This does not mean, however, that these worlds are geographically distinct from one another, nor that “heaven” is above our heads, but rather the difference refers to the characteristics of the prevailing conditions and circumstances of existence within them.

            These beings are all symbols and representatives of forces; each has its karma and must ascend from the lower to the higher through evolution. The sole exception is the divine ray of light, which comes directly from above and dwells eternally and immutably in the heart of all. It is the power from the Supreme, the star of hope, whose presence gives creatures the impulse to strive ever higher, to reach the Supreme. It conditions the workings of the law of evolution and is thus the redeemer of the world.

Śloka 2. “The single ray multiplies the smaller rays. Life exists before the physical form and outlives its last atom. Through the countless rays, the one, the ray of life, runs like a thread through many pearls.”

            The thread of life (Sutr-atma) [sūtra-ātman] extends through many generations. This thread of life is the “spirit,” that is, the spiritual individuality that, in repeated reincarnations, creates a new personality, imprinting its individual spiritual character upon it. However, the newborn human being receives its lower basic elements (the elemental body, the astral body, the animal nature with its instincts, and the lower [kama-manasic] [kāma-manāsa] intellectual powers) from its parents; without the fertilization by the Higher Light (Sutratma) [sūtra-ātma], the human being on Earth would be merely an animal or an idiot. The personality inherits what it possesses from the Earth. That is, through her parents, she receives it from earthly nature. However, the (spiritual) individuality of humankind has a higher, spiritual origin: the divine human being has their home in the realm of light. Therefore, when the fundamental parts separate at death, that which belongs to the earth returns to the earth, and that which belongs to “heaven” returns to heaven. But what holds the two natures together during life is the “thread of life,” which the German mystics call “faith.”^[49]

            Humanity, in its original nebulous form, originates from the Elohim (Pitris) [pitṛ-s]: In its physical constitution, it has its origin from the earth spirits, while its psychic, moral, and spiritual powers spring from a group of divine beings, which will be discussed later. [Volume II]^[50] In our age (the fifth race), the earthly spirit of the preceding one (the fourth race) is still strongly active within us; but we are approaching an age in which a spiritual transformation and progress will take place.

            The physical human being, with all its lower forms of consciousness and powers, is a tabernacle for a higher spiritual being: individuality, the ego. To unite with this Higher Self and to come to know it as the Eternal Self is the purpose of its existence.^[51]

Śloka 3. “When the one becomes two, then the trinity appears. The three are one, and that is our thread, O Lanu [Lanoo], the heart of the human plant, called Saptaparna [Sanskrit, sapta = seven, parṇa = wing, feather].”

            When the one, eternal ray of life is reflected in the plane of appearances, this reflection divides “the waters of space” or, as it says “in the Book of the Dead” of the Egyptians: “As a result of the outpouring of the ray of eternal light, which disperses the darkness through the magic power of the word of the (spiritual) sun, chaos ceases, and the Triune Being emerges from it as the firstborn.”

            The heart of the human being is the immortality dwelling within, that is, the invisible essence from which the consciousness of one’s Higher Self springs. This essence can be present in the earthly human being without leaving the celestial realms and without ceasing to live and work there. That is to say, the consciousness, the will, the power, which is also the substance of the spiritual guide, can work and unfold within the earthly student without the spiritual human being thereby abandoning their divine perspective.^[52]

            From a philosophical standpoint, man, in his outward appearance, is an animal-like thing, a living body, but not a living being, since true and essential existence also includes the knowledge of this existence, true self-consciousness, whereas the animal possesses only objective consciousness, which is constantly changing and is the result of the conscious awareness of changing natural forces within the animal organism. Therefore, the soul (true self-consciousness), whose seat is Buddhi-Manas, can separate from the body during the lifetime of life if, as a result of moral depravity, its sojourn within it becomes too impure. A person thus “forsaken by God” does not cease to live and think, and outwardly remains the same as before. This is the spiritual death a person can die without losing any of their intellectual abilities (logic, scholarly pursuits) or other qualities that might make them shine in the eyes of the world; even a certain degree of so-called morality need not be lost in the process; for ordinary morality is not based on inner knowledge of truth, but merely on an inherited habit of conforming to certain customs and practices that are fashionable in one’s surroundings, and also of seemingly wanting to be something one is not.

Śloka 4. “The root is what never dies, the three-tongued flame of the four wicks. The wicks are the sparks that receive their flame from the three-tongued flame that springs from the number seven, the rays and sparks of one moon that are reflected in the surging waves of all the rivers of the earth.”

            The “three-tongued flame” that never dies is the immortal spiritual trinity, Ātma-Buddhi-Manas; the four wicks that go out and disappear are the four lower principles including the body, i.e., personality and animal nature.

            Like thousands of shimmering sparks, created by moonlight, dancing on the ocean waves, so our personal existences, the deceptive shells of the immortal ego, move on the waves of Maya. They last, like pearls shimmering in moonlight, only as long as the Queen of the Night sends her light upon the streams of life. Only the rays themselves endure, by returning to the source of light from which they came. These rays are the symbol of the immortal soul, while the personalities, the masks under which the soul has revealed itself, perish.^[53]

Śloka 5. “The spark hangs from the flame by a fine thread of Fohat. It traverses the seven worlds of Maya [māyā]. It lingers in the first realm and becomes stone and metal; it travels to the second, and behold, it has become a plant. The plant whirls through seven forms and becomes a sacred animal (the first shadow of the coming physical human).”^[54]

            From the combined qualities of these, Manu, the thinker, is formed.

            Who forms it? – The seven lives and the one life. – Who completes it? – The fivefold Lha. – And who perfects the final body? – Fish, sin, and Soma (the moon).

            (a) The “seven worlds of Maya” are the seven spheres of the planetary chain and the “seven rounds,” namely the 49 stages that the “spark” or the “spiritual Monad” must traverse on the plane of existence from the beginning of a Manvantara. The “thread of Fohat” is the spiritual thread of life mentioned earlier. All of this relates to the greatest of all philosophical riddles: the substantial essence of life, the existence of which is denied by those who mistake the revelation of life for life itself and are incapable of comprehending a non-physical existence. This eternal life, from which the phenomenon of temporal life activity arises, can only be grasped by that which transcends all conceptions in time, that is, only by itself.^[55]

            The “spark that hangs on the flame” is Jiva [jīva], the Monad in connection with the spiritual elements of Manas, i.e., those sacred thoughts and feelings that constitute the only thing that survives the personality of man and that is connected to Atma-Buddhi [ātma buddhi] through the thread of life.

            The divine immortal spark therefore represents what the Kabbalists call the^[56]]

7. Neshamah (spirit)^[57], 6. Ruach^[58] [Ruaḥ] (soul), and 5. Nephesh^[59] (eternal life). However, the personality of a person includes:

4. Samael (Kama) [kāma], 3. Michael [Mikael] (Prana) [prāṇa], 2. the etheric image (etheric body) [liṅga śarīra] and 1. The material body [sthūla śarīra].

            When it was stated above that the “spark” first appears in the mineral kingdom, then in the plant kingdom, then in the animal kingdom, generating forms before bringing forth and animating the human form, this refers to the evolution of nature, in which development from the lower to the higher is only possible through the presence of this “spark” originating from the highest. To assume that nature improves itself, or, in other words, that something higher can develop from something without the necessary force acting within it, is tantamount to the theory of something arising from nothing and is based not on scientific knowledge, but on ignorance. Evolution is only possible through the spiritual force inherent in and active within nature, which enables nature to bring forth first minerals and metals, then lower and higher plants, then subordinate and superior animals, and finally the human form. This does not happen all at once on a single planet, but rather as the life-wave cycle winds its way through the planetary system.^[60] Neither matter nor spirit, but only forms, require evolution, and this evolution occurs through the activity of spirit within matter.

            A ray of the Absolute (Jiva) [jīva] enters matter and unfolds the lowest forms, the mineral kingdom. After a sevenfold cycle, it brings forth plant life, and once this cycle is also complete, it gives rise to animal life. But to form a thinking human being, the life of the soul is essential, which matter cannot provide. “Adam,” the son of Earth, requires a higher principle than the Earth spirit can provide, and this principle of thought, the rational soul, he receives from the godlike powers called “Elohim” (Pitris [pitṛ-s] or Dhyan-Chohans [dhyān-chohans]). Only when form has attained a certain degree of perfection can the spirit reveal itself within it in its greatness and enable human beings to think rationally.

            “Adam” needs “Eve”, the spirit needs the rational soul, man needs woman, the positive needs the negative, the “daughters” (forms) of the earth need the “sons of the gods”, and the bodies, capable only of a lower consciousness, need the influence of a higher life in order to enter a higher state of consciousness. Through this entry, matter is elevated, but the soul is degraded, insofar as it appears bound to matter with its lower powers.

            Who forms Manu? – (Manu here represents the spiritual, heavenly human being. Not the principle of thought, but the immortal human being who can both think and refrain from thinking.) – Who forms his body? – Life and living beings; sin (self-will) and the moon (imagination).

            According to the Secret Doctrine,^[61] the whole world is a manifestation of life, and there is nothing dead in it and nothing that is truly disorganized. Every atom is in itself a living being in which the One Life reveals itself; the entire macro-organism is composed of micro-organisms, and each organism forms a world unto itself, which has its inhabitants, even if not all of these inhabitants are perceptible under the microscope.

            “The layman views the worlds as compositions of the known elements. The initiate sees in the sum of these elements a divine life active in countless living beings (each according to its nature). Fire alone is a singular entity on the plane of the One true Being; but on the level of appearances (which are only appearances and therefore not reality), its components are fiery manifestations of life that live at the expense of every other life they consume and derive their existence from it.” They are therefore called the consumers. Every visible thing in the universe was built up by such life, from the conscious and divine primordial human being down to the unconscious creators of material forms. From the One Life in the formless and uncreated arises the universe of living beings. First, from the depths (chaos), cold, luminous fire (light) manifested, causing coagulation in space (patches of mist?). The struggle (for existence) began, and great heat developed as a result of the encounter and collision (of the forming matter). Then came the first manifest material fire, the hot flames that traverse space; the heat generates moist vapors that form material water; then follows the dry, moist, and watery mist, which makes the luminous clarity of the celestial wanderers disappear and forms matter, solid watery spheres (world bodies). Bhumi [bhūmi] (the Earth) appears with six sisters.^[62] These, through their continuous movement, bring forth the inner fire, heat, and a watery mist from which the third world element, water, arises, and from the breath of the three elements, air is born. These four are the four lives of the first four periods (rounds) of the Manvantara. The fifth (of the ether) will be revealed in the following.” (Commentary on the Book of Dzyan.)”^[63]

            In each new “round,” a new one of the composite elements, currently accessible to science, is revealed. It goes without saying that conventional wisdom, based solely on the observation of external phenomena, knows nothing of the original elements and cannot know anything about them, and those involved in practical occultism need not concern themselves with this further.

            In the first round, there was only one element, only one nature, only one “humanity,” called “fire” or “light” (radiant matter). In the second round, “fire and earth” appeared, that is, two different kinds of life; in the third, “water”; in the fourth, “air”; and in the next round, the ether (the astral light?^[64]) will become apparent, or, in other words, the human organization will have attained a higher degree of development and perceptual ability to comprehend this fifth element.^[65] It should be noted that what we know as our (visible) “Earth,” on which we live, although it has existed for many millions of years, nevertheless has only a short existence in relation to the duration of the evolution of the whole.

            Everything is life, whether active or inert. Had there ever been a time when no life existed, then existence itself would not have been possible.

            “Everything that leaves the state of laya (latency) becomes active life. It is drawn into the vortex of motion. Spirit and matter are two states of the One that is neither spirit nor matter; both are absolute, bound life. Spirit is the first manifestation of the divisible in space, matter is the first manifestation of spirit. That which is neither spirit nor matter is Being, the self-existing eternal cause from which spirit and matter spring to bring the cosmos into being. And this (THAT) we call the One Life or the Breath (of God) in the universe.”^[66]

            Like begets like. Consciousness cannot create matter, nor can matter create consciousness. Matter becomes conscious when the latent consciousness contained within it becomes active and manifest.

            “Through the emanations of the seven bodies of the seven orders of the Dhyan-Chohans, and also from the Dhyan-Chohans themselves, the seven qualities (magnitudes or elements) arose, from whose movement and harmonious union the manifest material universe is born. In the second round, the Earth, which until then had only existed as a seed in the matter of space, began its existence; through the development of its second principle (Prana) [prāṇa], it had attained individual sentient existence. The second corresponds to the sixth (principle); one is eternal, the other temporal life.”

            The second principle is spiritual air, which brings eternal life to those who breathe it. The third is spiritual water. In our fourth age, the fourth element, the animal element of the Earth Spirit, is at its most highly developed. The Earth will only attain its highest state, its true form and perfection, in the seventh round.^[67]

Śloka 6. “From the firstborn (the original human being), the connection between the silent guardian and his shadow becomes stronger and brighter with each change (reincarnation). [(a)] The dawn transforms into the full radiance of the midday sun[ . . . . .]”^[68]

            (a) The “silent watcher” is the individuality, the higher self, the “Father in Heaven,” with whom the son on Earth is to become one: a self-contained divine being whose spirit (Atma) [ātmā] is one with GOD (Paramatma) [paramātman], whose “garment” is the glorified body, the spiritual soul (Buddhi), and whose “shadow” is the personality walking on Earth, as long as this shadow has not turned away from this source of its divine light and life and broken the “thread” through which the spiritual knowledge dawning within it can become the full consciousness of inner enlightenment.

Śloka 7. “This is your present sphere of influence,” the Flame says to the Spark. “You are my own self, my image and my shadow. I have clothed myself in your form and you are my vessel [vāhana] until the day ‘Be-with-us,’ when you will again become I and others, yourself and I; Then the builders, who have put on their first garment again, will descend to the radiant earth and rule over the people[—]who are themselves.”

            (a) The day when “the spark becomes a flame again,” that is, when man is reunited with his divine Son (Dhyan-Chohan [dhyāni-chohan] or “Angel”), when “I, you, and others” will be and encompass everything, is Paranirvana [parinirvāṇa], namely when everything that belongs to time—physical, mental, and spiritual forms—disappears at the onset of Pralaya, and only pure divine self-consciousness remains; when, in other words, everything that is divine in nature has entered into BRAHMA, the divine unity.

            The misunderstanding of this teaching has often led to the erroneous opinion that Nirvana [nirvāṇa] means “annihilation,” and this is just as incorrect as claiming that a person is annihilated during a deep sleep of their body, in which their Divine Self is in the original state of absolute consciousness (all-Self consciousness). However, during this state, that which is not the person themselves, but merely the instrument for their manifestation, is in a state of rest; only the person who has entered into true Being has no need to play a role as a phenomenon in the world of phenomena. For those who identify solely with their personal appearance, who are entirely preoccupied with themselves and their deceptive “selfhood,” and who are full of selfish delusions and desires, their person is their everything, and the destruction of their egoism is the downfall of their world. But those who live transcending the limitations of the infinite are also transcendent of their nature and its needs, and capable of grasping that Nirvana is the highest self-aware peace, the “glorification.” Such people will themselves be “suns” in the next Manvantara, having been illuminated by their “suns” in this Manvantara. That is to say, they will then no longer need to be guided by angels, but will themselves be the angels, teachers, leaders, and gods of the humanity that follows ours, whose monads are perhaps now trapped in the forms that occupy a certain level of intelligence in the animal kingdom.

            All of this is based on the law of evolution, which does not originate from mechanical movements, nor does it owe its existence to the “struggle for existence,” but rather arises from the influence of the divine spirit in nature.^[69] This leads us back to the seven evolutionary periods, which correspond to the seven principles of the macrocosm and microcosm, namely (to begin with the highest):

The divine nature,

the spiritual,

the intellectual,

the passionate,

the instinctive or perceiving,

the semi-corporeal (astral) and

the material or physical (sensory) nature.

            This is the “ladder to heaven” upon which the creative angels ascend and descend; forms come and go, the spirit disappears and reappears in a higher and nobler form, and just as every human body has its time of activity and its period of rest, just as day and night alternate and the manifestations of life occur periodically, so it is, as in the microcosm, also in the macrocosm, in individual nature as in the universe. As a selfless and therefore pure being, man lives his heavenly home in order to eat the fruit from the bridle of knowledge and to return as a self-aware, self-knowing being—not as a will-less instrument of God, but as a self-acting force that, through self-overcoming in obedience, has become identical with the will of God. This is the beginning and the end, the Alpha and the Omega. But between them lies a thorny path. Deeper and deeper the monad descends into matter, where sin and suffering reign, in order to attain knowledge through experience. Having reached the lowest level, it ascends again. Self-sacrifice is man’s path to God; only by renouncing multiplicity can man return to unity. But this is precisely the most difficult of all; for human nature is a composite thing, and the multiplicity of the environment affects the multiplicity within. The abundance of the phenomenal world, with its countless stimuli, penetrates the mind through the senses, capturing the thoughts and preventing the individual from focusing all their mind on attaining the eternal truth, which is, after all, one and only. Even among those who wish to know the truth, most seek to find it through objective observation, not through introspection. They seek the truth for some selfish purpose, not for its own sake; They would like to know, but do not strive for being, and that is why there are so many who are always learning and never attain the knowledge of truth; for mere contemplation is not yet possession, and the satisfaction of curiosity is not knowledge. Whoever wants to make truth serve them does not love truth, but their own egoism. Whoever wants to attain true self-knowledge must seek it in the unity of the greater whole and find their true self in the heart of all; for the true human being lives in the whole. That which makes us appear separate from the whole is merely an illusion: “What lives in the hearts of others is our truest and deepest self.”

            Thus ends our examination of the first seven chapters of the Book of Dzyan.^[70] We need not assure you that these observations can in no way replace the study of the original work. If it is already extremely difficult to find words to describe things that must be grasped spiritually before they can be intellectually understood, this difficulty is considerably increased by the fact that, in an age dominated by rationalism and materialism, not only have the concepts for spiritual forces and beings been lost, but the words that formerly described these things are now generally misunderstood and misinterpreted. Everyone interprets a word according to their own understanding, and whoever misunderstands the teachings of religion and esoteric doctrine will also judge them incorrectly: that is, they form a distorted view and then criticize their own creation as if it were someone else’s.

            Those who wish to know the truth can find it only through love for truth and therefore have no need for arguments; those who cannot or will not recognize it cannot be taught it by any arguments. Truth is not a product of logic; logic can only serve to dispel the errors that stand in the way of the knowledge of truth. Truth is eternal, and its own knowledge is perfectly sufficient unto itself. What prevents people from recognizing this eternal truth are the false ideas they have about God, nature, and their own being, ideas which are all the more difficult to eradicate the more widespread they become.

            The revelation of truth within humanity itself is Theosophy, and the publication of the Secret Doctrine aims to pave the way for this revelation. This is not about replacing the old with a series of theories or “scientific” articles of faith and blindly accepting them as true, but rather about providing the reader with material for their own reflection from a higher worldview, so that they themselves may find their way to the realization of truth, mindful of the Buddha’s words: “Do not cling to any authority, but neither reject anything; rather, strive to become ripe for the realization of truth.”

The Secret Doctrine.

Volume II. Anthropogenesis

Part II

The Origin of Humankind^[71]

Stanza I. The Beginning of Sentient Life

Śloka 1. “The Lha (angel) who moves the fourth world (our globe) is the servant of Lha of the Seven (planetary Angels) who move in circles around their Lord, the one all-eye [loka-cakṣuḥ] of our world, on their triumphal chariots. His breath gives life to the Seven. It gave life to the first. They are the dragons of Wisdom.”

            The word “Lha” signifies a celestial or otherworldly being, whether one refers to it as “angel,” “devil,” “spirit,” etc., or as “intelligences.”*^[72] The lower intelligences are subordinate to the higher ones, just as the planets of a solar system are subordinate to the sun of that system, and just as the physical sun gives life to all planets, so the spiritual sun of the universe is the source of consciousness for all beings in the universe.

Śloka 2. The Earth spoke: “Lord with the Shining Face (Sun), my house is empty. Send your sons to populate this globe. You sent your seven sons to the Lord of Wisdom; He sees you seven times closer and feels your presence seven times more. You forbade Your servants, the little rings, from catching your light and warmth and from hindering your great Goodness in their way. Send them now to Your servant.”

            This verse expresses the longing of the Earth Spirit to receive the power of the sun of the higher intelligence (Mercury)^[73]; however, he was not yet ready for this, and the existing earthly human bodies were not yet suitable to serve as dwellings for the sons of light.^[74]

Śloka 3. “Then the Lord with the radiant countenance spoke: I will send you a fire when the work has begun. Raise your voice to other Lokas; turn to the Father, the Lord of the Lotus; for his Sons, Your people, shall be under the rule of the Fathers (Pitri-pati) [pitṛ-pati]. Your people will be mortal.^[75] The people of the Lord of Wisdom (Buddha) [Budha, Mercury], not the sons of Soma (the moon),^[76] are immortal. Cease your lamenting. Your seven garments still cling to you. You are not yet ready, your people are not yet ripe.”

            The Pitars or Pitris [pitṛ-s] (fathers) are these sons of God or sons of light, the progenitors of humankind. Only the heavenly “Adam” [solar pitṛ] was created in the image of GOD; the earthly Adam [lunar pitṛ] is made from the “dust of the earth.”

            During every age, the human organism is shaped in a way that suits the environment. The first race of humans was as ethereal as we are material, and their organism corresponded to the prevailing conditions of that time. The evolution of physical (material) humans, the “Lemurians,” only took place 18 million years ago.

            At the beginning of each kalpa (round), the Earth is reborn. Just as the jiva [jīva] (Monad) of a person clothes itself with a new body at each incarnation, so too does the jiva of the Earth unfold a new garment at the beginning of each “creation period,” stepping once again from a subjective state into an objective existence in space.^[77]

Śloka 4. “And after great woes, she (the earth) cast off her old three garments, clothed herself in seven new ones, and stood there in her first (garment).”

The Earth shed its three “skins” or “garments” after surviving the first three evolutionary periods (rounds). We are now in the fourth of seven, which comprises the great world period.

Stanza II. Nature alone, without help from above, will not be perfect.

Śloka 5. “The Wheel whirled for thirty crores (300,000,000 years) and brought forth rupas [rūpa-s] (forms); soft rocks that hardened, and hard plants that softened, the visible from the invisible, insects, and small creatures. When these forms pressed upon the mother, the earth shook them from her back. After thirty crores of years, the Earth turned over. (The tilt of the earth’s axis changed.) She lay on her back, on her side. She called for no sons of Heaven, nor did she ask for any sons of Wisdom. She created from her own breast; she brought forth water-people, who were of terrible form and evil.”

            [Paraphased] This verse refers to changes in the tilt of the Earth’s axis and the associated “floods” and chaotic conditions in which monstrosities, half-human, half-animal in nature, arose. The water people spoken of here were a failed attempt by nature to create human forms suitable to serve as dwellings for the gods.^[78]

            [Paraphased] After the “Puranas” [purāṇa-s], various failed creations took place as BRAHMA [brahmā] “amused himself” by creating worlds, until finally the world came into being which “GOD saw that it was good” (Moses [Genesis] I, 31).

            “From the depths of the waters and darkness sprang ugly creatures; men with wings, four- and two-faced men, those who had the legs and horns of a goat, centaurs, oxen with human heads, dogs with fish tails, etc. All possible combinations of animal and human limbs, fish, reptiles, and vermin of every kind.”^[79]

Śloka 6. “The terrible and evil Water people were created by her (the Earth) herself. She formed them from the remnants (the types) of others, from the first, second, and third periods. The Dhyanis [dhyāni-s] (angels) came and saw. The Dhyanis came from the radiant parents (Father and Mother in one); from the white (Sun and moon) regions they came; from the dwellings of the Immortal mortals.”

            The mythologies of various peoples refer to this period of evolution; the “Puranas,” the “Zohar,” Chaldean cuneiform texts, the Cutha Tablets, etc., speak of it. These animal-humans, as described by Berosus, were possible at a time when nature was not yet sufficiently permeated by the spirit of higher intelligence to produce its creatures in the now prevailing order.^[80]

            The Dhyanis, however, are the “sons of wisdom,” mortals who sprang from a previous creation and attained immortality.^[81]

Śloka 7. “They (the sons of light) found no favor. ‘Our flesh is not here,’ (they said). These are not suitable forms for our brothers of the fifth (race); no dwellings for their lives. Pure, unpolluted water they must drink. Let us dry up the water forms.”

            The Tibetan commentary^[82] states the following:

            “It is from material Worlds that those descend who form the physical human being in each new Manvantara. They are the subordinate Lha (Angels or Spirits) who have a dual nature (an astral body within their etheric form). They are the creators and shapers of our illusory body (which is a product of will and delusion).”

            Before the light revealed itself, there was darkness with the spawn of gloom, the products of lightless nature. Therefore, in the Babylonian story of creation, we find “in the first days the evil gods; then the angels who were in rebellion (who refused to incarnate in such ugly forms) in the lower part of heaven”; and Christian theogony, when freed from the common misconception, teaches something similar. For the “fall of Lucifer” actually signifies the descent of the “light-bringer” into matter, through which alone matter can be illuminated and permeated by spiritual consciousness. Without the “fall” of an angel, there would be no salvation of mankind; without individualization in human forms, no spiritual individuality.

Śloka 8. “The flames came, the fires with their sparks, the fires of night and those of day. They dried up the murky, dark waters; with their heat they destroyed them. The Lhas from above and the Lhamayin from below came. They annihilated the two- and four-faced forms, they fought the goat-footed and dog-headed people and the people with the body of a fish.”

            The “flames” are the “Seraphim [serāphīm]”; the Lhas and Lhamayin are the angels of the different spheres of the heavenly regions.^[83]

Śloka 9. “The Mother sea, the great ocean, wept. She rose up and disappeared into the moon that had raised her up and from which she had been born.”

            According to the secret doctrine, the moon is much older than the earth, and indeed, the earth was born from the moon, not the moon from the earth. The fact that the moon attracts water is evidenced by the phenomena of ebb and flow.^[84]

Śloka 10. “When the Rupas [rūpa-s] (creatures) were destroyed, Mother Earth remained empty. She demanded to be dried.”

            This was the beginning of a new and higher life on our planet. Only after the Earth had been emptied of its self-generated imaginary products could the “Spirit of GOD,” hovering above the abyss, penetrate the darkness and illuminate the depths with its light. Then the dawn of wisdom began, and the Redeemer was born.^[85]

           III. Attempts to create man

Śloka 11. “The Lord of all Masters came. From the body he separated the waters, and that was the upper Heaven, the first heaven.”^[86]

            After evolution had progressed to a certain degree in the preceding Kalpa, the time had now come when bodies could develop that were suitable to dwell in the human spirit. God revealed Himself anew in a new form.^[87]

Śloka 12. “The great Chohans (Masters) summoned the Lords of the Moon, whose bodies were airy (etheric): ‘Bring forth human beings, human beings in your own nature (images). Give them their inner form; nature will build the outer bodies. They will be man and woman (in one) and also the Lords of the Flame (of Light).’ ”

            The Chohans or Elohim of the Bible are the creative spiritual forces (beings) in nature. The “moon” is the symbol of fertile, body-creating matter, which is fertilized by the Spirit.^[88]

Śloka 13. “They (the gods of the moon) each went to their assigned area.^[89] There were seven of them, each in his district. But the Lords of the Flame remained behind; they did not want to be born.”

            The esoteric doctrine speaks of twelve classes of creative beings, of whom four have attained perfection (freedom), the fifth is on the path to it, and seven are still under the direct influence of the law of karma. Only the lower-order “spirits” could unite with the lower-order human forms; for the “Lords of the Flame,” nature had not yet created a suitable dwelling place.

            The primitive human being, as brought forth by nature, was therefore a human-like creature, but one that lacked precisely what is peculiar to humans: Manas, the light of higher intelligence, the capacity for intuition. He possessed an “animal” soul, but not a divine one. The divine soul cannot develop from the animal one without the presence of a divine seed. Only after this light had been “breathed” into the human being could it manifest itself within him.

Stanza IV. The Origin of the First Human Races

Śloka 14. The Lords born of the Will (the Spirit), driven by the Spirit of the Life-giver (Fohat), separate people from themselves, each in his own Zone.”

            Of course, one should not imagine the “Adam” of that creation period to be a human being of today’s type; rather, these beings were of an ethereal nature, unisexual, and reproduced in a different way than is known today.

            According to this view, we are not dealing with the creation of man from “nothing” (in the commonly assumed sense), nor with the development of man from a “Darwinian ape,” but rather with a spiritual, a psychological, an intellectual, and an animal evolution—a growing manifestation of the spirit and a progressive improvement in the organization of matter over periods whose duration surpasses our comprehension. This involves a descent of spirit into matter and an upward development of matter’s suitability as a tool for the manifestation of the spirit’s activity.

            The Pitris (Elohim) are the creators of our bodies with their lower essence; they are ourselves, and we are them. They created or revealed themselves as earthly beings; but our self-aware, immortal essence does not come from these “spirits of the moon,” [barhiṣad-s] but from the “sun-angels,” [agniṣhvātta-s] the “Lords of the Flame.” The “angel” within humanity has a different origin than the earthly being, even though both originally spring from the same source.^[90] That within us capable of thought is distinct from the instrument that mediates this thought.^[91]

Śloka 15. “Thus, seven times seven shadows (Chhayas) [chāyā-s] of future humans were born, each class according to its own nature and character, and each was less perfect than its Progenitor. The Boneless Fathers could not give Life to the Beings that had Bones. Their ancestors were Bhuta [bhūta-s] (phantoms) without Form or Intellect. Therefore, this (first) human Race was called a Chhaya [chāyā-s] (image, apparition, or shadow).”

            [Paraphrased] “Manu” (human being) comes from “man” (to think). This first race, however, did not yet have a principle of thought (Manas or mens) and was therefore called “amanasa” [amānasa].^[92]

Śloka 16. “How are true Manushyas [mānuṣya-s] (thinking people) born? How are manus [manu-s] made with the power of thought? – The fathers use their own fire (Kavyavāhana) [kavyavāhana] to help them; it is the fire that burns in earth (matter). The spirit of the earth called upon the solar fire (Suchi) [śuchi] for help. These together (the Pitris [pitṛ-s] and the fires) brought forth good forms through their combined activity. These could stand, walk, run, lie down, and fly; but were still nothing but Chhaya [chāyā] (images), shadows without intellect.”

            Here, the inability of material nature to produce a perfect animal, let alone a human being, without spiritual assistance is demonstrated. The “fathers” or “lower angels”^[93] are the spirits (conscious forces) in nature and elemental beings; but since they themselves do not yet possess a higher intelligence, they cannot produce a rationally thinking human being. For this, the “living fire” (Lucifer, Prometheus) and the “animal fire” (the will) were necessary. The capacity for instinct comes from nature, divine intelligence from Mahat. The commentary states:

[Paraphrase] “The sons of Mahat enliven the human plant. They are the Waters that fall upon the dry ground in which life is bound, and the Spark that animates the human animal. They are the Masters of eternal Spiritual Life. In the beginning (of the Second Race), some of them breathed only a part of their being into the Manushya [mānuṣya] (humans), while others took up residence within them.”^[94]

            Thus, the “rebellious angels” (who refused to incarnate in half-animal bodies) became our saviors; for if they had not waited until humanity was capable of receiving them, they themselves would have been so degraded that humanity would never have been able to use their power to rise up. All of this is symbolically represented in various allegories in the religions of the Indians, Egyptians, Greeks and Romans, Jews and Christians, but these cannot be understood without knowledge of the esoteric doctrine and are therefore incomprehensible to our modern scholars and theologians, indeed considered meaningless fables.^[95]

Śloka 17. “The breath [human Monad] needed a form; the Fathers gave it to him. The breath needed a material body; the Earth formed it. The breath needed the Spirit of Life; the Lhas of the Sun breathed into its form. The breath needed a mirror of the body (an astral body); the Dhyanis [dhyāni-s] said, ‘We will give him ours.’ The breath needed a substance for its desires (Kama Rupa) [kāma rūpa], and the water spirits (Suchi [śuchi], the fire of passion) said, ‘He shall have it.’ The breath needed a mind (Manas) to encompass the universe. ‘We cannot give that,’ said the Fathers. ‘I never had it,’ said the Earth Spirit. ‘The form would burn up if I gave him mine,’ said the Great (solar) Fire. Man remained empty, a meaningless Bhuta [bhūta]. Thus, the Boneless gave life to those who (later, in the third race) became humans with bones.”

            The “father” of the original physical human being, who builds his body, is the living “electrical” force of the Sun. The moon is his mother^[96]; for from it comes a mysterious force that also promotes the growth of plants and animals. The “wind” (“cosmic ether”) is the conducting substance between the celestial bodies that allows the described influences to reach Earth. But all this cannot yet bring about a true human being: That can only happen through the “divine fire.”^[97]

            The first human race possessed three rudimentary elements but no “fire” because human evolution was dependent on the parallel evolution of the Earth, and Earth’s evolution was not yet advanced enough to form a human being capable of serving as a dwelling place for the “gods.” The “elements” and the senses develop in parallel, so that the manifestation of a new element unfolds or necessitates a new sense, as the following table illustrates:

1. Ether. – Hearing. – Sound.
2. Air. – Sensation. – Sound and Sensation.
3. Light. – (Fire). – Sight. – Sound, Sensation, and Color.
4. Water. – Taste. – Sound, Sensation, Color, and Taste.
5. Earth. – Smell. – Sound, Sensation, Color, Smell, and Taste.

            Each newly emerging element has added the properties of the preceding ones to its own.^[98]

            The humans of the first and second races were not physical beings like us, but ethereal apparitions (Bhutas) [bhūta-s], “ghostly” types of future humanity. GOD (the Universal Cause) created Himself: That is, within the Universal Cause, a first cause arose, which, in a descending (material) direction, manifested itself successively in the following manner:

1. Mahapurusha [mahāpuruṣa] or Paramatma [paramātmā]. The supreme world spirit.
2. Atman [ātmā] or Pūrvaja [pūrvaja]. The living spirit of nature.
3. Indriyatman [indriyātman] or Hrischikesa [hṛṣīkēśa]. The spiritual, intellectual soul. (Mind.)
4. Bhutatman [bhutātman]. The vegetative soul, life.
5. Kshetrachna [kṣetrajña]. The embodied soul; the universe as mind and matter.
6. Bhrantidarsanatah [bhrāntidarśana]. The material world of appearances. (Illusion, Maya.)^[99]

Stanza V. The Origin of the Second Race

1. Die Entstehung der zweiten Rasse

Śloka 18. “The first were the Sons of Yoga. Their sons (the second race) were the children of the sun and the moon, nourished by the wind (ether).

            They were the shadows of the shadows of the lords. The shadows expanded. The Spirits of the earth clothed them, the Lhas (angels) of the sun warmed them. The Breaths had life, but no knowledge. They possessed neither fire nor water.

            During this earthly life, the higher, spiritual nature of man is in the power of his lower material nature (Christ, the God-man, is crucified in the animal man), but the divine fire (the divine love) enables man to take refuge in the light (Atma-Buddhi) [ātmā buddhi] and find salvation.^[100]

            Just as a plant cannot thrive without light, so too can the personal self of a person, without the influence of divine light, neither attain knowledge of truth nor awareness of its inherent immortality. Immortality without self-awareness is inconceivable and would be worthless. Therefore, a person can only be immortal when they become spiritually Self-aware of their indwelling divine essence, or, in other words, when they feel and recognize the Redeemer in their heart—not as a “historical and alien personality,” but as the divine power and deity inherent within them.

            The “shadows of shadows,” however, are the astral bodies of humans, upon which the physical, visible bodies are built and which were born from the transfigured bodies of the originally godlike beings (Devas). These bodies had no (spiritual) fire of their own, i.e., no power of self-knowledge, and no “water,” i.e., no soul “breathed in by God.” The shadows (i.e., the human forms) could only attain a divine nature and the knowledge of this nature through the incarnation of the divine light. Within this divine nature, however, all divine powers are also contained and can develop within the human being, not through the strivings of their animalistic self-will, but through the power of the divine light within them, when they submit to this power.

            The first human race thus consisted of the astral images or “doppelgangers” of the “Fathers,” who were the “sons of Yoga,” that is, “those connected with God.” At the end of the third round, through the progress of evolution, they were able to produce human forms suitable for their incarnation.

Śloka 19. “The second race began to bloom and spread. The asexual form arose from the sexless shadow. Thus, O Lanu [Lanoo], the second race emerged.”

            Since the second race “blossomed” from the first, there can be no talk of a “sexual” process involved; however, a scientific description of this “blossoming” is, of course, impossible, as human science has no experience in this area and scientific language lacks the words to describe it. As long as the human mind is not at a spiritual level, spiritual truths can only be perceived and understood intuitively. We must therefore content ourselves with symbols and allegories and imagine this process as a phenomenon arising from an appearance. Gautama Buddha says: “It is as if one light were kindled by another light.”

Śloka 20. “Their Fathers were born of themselves; the natives, the Chhaya [chāyā] of the shining bodies of the Lords, the Fathers, the Sons of Twilight.”

            The “self-born” are the “shadows” of their own being, born from the will of the essence. The “fathers” (Pitris) [pitṛ-s] are the sons of the dawning light, sprung from the womb of the deity.

Śloka 21. “As the race grew old, the old waters mingled with the fresh waters; as the drops became murky, they disappeared and perished in the newly formed stream, in the warm stream of life. The outer ones of the former became the inner ones of the latter. The wing became the shadow and the shadow the wing.”

            The first race merged into the second and became one with it. The etheric and spiritual bodies, in which a material core had formed, merged into this core and became its inhabitants. The divine essence is and remains what it has been from eternity, but the “shadows” (humans) it brings forth change. These shadows became more and more material and corporeal. Humans reproduced by the indwelling spirit creating a new shadow of itself and taking up residence within it. There was no “death,” only a change of form, and the new form emerged from the old. When the etheric body develops the physical body, it disappears within it. What was previously the shadow now becomes the body, and the former body becomes the “shadow.” This process is allegorically depicted in the mythologies of various peoples, including the fable of Leda and the Swan, the relationship between Psyche and Cupid, and so on.

Stanza VI. Developmental History of the Second Race [“sweat-born]

Śloka 22. “Then the second race brought forth the third, those born of sweat. The sweat increased, its drops multiplied, and these drops became hard and round. The Sun warmed it; the Moon cooled it and formed it; the Wind nourished it until it ripened. The white swan from the starry sky (the Moon) overshadowed the great drop, the egg of the future race, the Human-Swan (Hamsa) [haṃsa] of the last third. First man-woman, then man and woman.”

            Here, too, it is more a matter of intuitive perception than objective understanding, although the original text strives to make the process comprehensible to external reason. Even in the human embryo, some processes occur that are not yet sufficiently scientifically explained, but are nevertheless facts. For our purposes, it suffices to state that at the time of the third race, a division of the sexes into male and female took place because human forms had become too material to reproduce further in the earlier “spiritual” way. In other words, “Adam fell into a deep sleep,” he lost the knowledge of his divine nature, and from his side (not “rib”) arose the earthly Eve. Like all religious allegories, this fable is nonsense where there is no meaning to comprehend it, but profound for the one who does. (Aristophanes expresses this more clearly in Plato’s “Symposium.”)

Śloka 23. “The self-born were Chhayas [chāyā-s], the shadows of the bodies of the sons of twilight. Neither fire nor water could destroy them. Their sons were not like that.”

            Fire and water could not harm the ethereal beings of the earlier race, but their material descendants perished in them. Four such catastrophes are known to the secret doctrine^[101]; the fifth is yet to come. The last “flood,” in which the continent of Atlantis was destroyed, took place approximately 869,000 years ago.^[102]

            Stanza VII. Seven periods from the demigods to the first human races

Śloka 24. “The Sons of Wisdom, the Sons of Night, descended, ready for rebirth. They saw the^[103] ugly forms of the third race. ‘We can choose,’ said the Lords, ‘we possess wisdom.’ Some entered the Chhayas [chāyā-s], others allowed a spark to penetrate them, and still others hesitated to incorporate themselves until the fourth Race had arisen. With their own essence, they filled the greedy forms (Kamarupas) [kāma rūpa-s]. Those who had received only a spark (of knowledge) lacked (higher) wisdom. The spark shone dimly. A third remained without intellect; their Jivas [jīva-s] (Monads) were not yet ready (to receive the divine spark). These were set aside among the seven (types). They became the feeble-minded. The Third were ready, and the Lords of the Flame and Dark Wisdom said, ‘In them we will dwell.’ ”

            This verse contains the key to explaining the origin of evil, the so-called “Fall of the Angels,” and many other things. It sheds light on the inequality of different peoples in their intellectual abilities and on the workings of the law of karma in human history.

            The commentary highlights the following points:

            First come the Self-existent beings to this earth. They are the spiritual beings, brought forth by Absolute Will and Law, who awaken at dawn on each day of creation. They are the divine Sishta [śiṣta].

            These result in:

            [Paraphrase] 1. The first race, the “Self-born,” were the astral images of their creators. The body was without any intellect or will. The inner being (the divine essence) was not yet connected to the earthly body, even though it took root within it. The connecting link (Manas) was not yet present.

            [Paraphrase] 2. From the first race arose the second, the so-called “sweat-born” and “boneless.” This race was endowed by the preservers (Rakshasas) [rākṣasa-s] and incarnate gods (Asuras and Kumaras) [kumāra-s] with the first faint spark of intelligence, and from these arose the following:

            [Paraphrase] 3. The third race of the “Double” (man and woman in one). The first subdivisions of these were soulless shells until they were “inhabited” by the Dhyanis [dhyāni-s], i.e., enlightened.

            Our current fourth race, with separate sexes, emerged from the third.

Śloka 25. “What did the Manasa [mānasa], the Sons of Wisdom, do? They rejected the Self-born. They are not yet ready. They refused entry to the Sweat-born. They are not yet fully ready. They would not enter into those born from the egg.”

            Not all human organisms were yet sufficiently evolved to serve as dwelling places for the demigods. The beings striving for assimilation selected the most suitable for this purpose.

Śloka 26. “When the Sweat-born brought forth the Egg-born, the Hermaphroditic, the Mighty, the Strong, endowed with Bones; then the Masters of Wisdom spoke: Now let us create!”

Śloka 27. “Then the Third race became the vessel (Vahan) of the angels of wisdom. This brought forth the Sons of Will and Yoga. Through the power of Kriyasakti [kriyāśakti], it created them, the holy fathers, the ancestors of the Arhats. [. . .]”

            [Paraphrase] [kriyāśakti] is the mysterious power of thought, through which, when developed through practice, outwardly visible and physical phenomena can be brought forth. The reason this power is almost unknown today lies in the general effeminacy, hedonism, lack of energy, and partial animalistic nature of the current generation. “Creation” is the action of will and thought on the phenomenon we call “matter,” through which new images and forms (bodies) appear. However, the more a person distances themselves from their divine origins, the more they lose the divine power residing within them.^[104]

Stanza VIII. The Evolution of Mammals – The First “Fall from Grace”

Śloka 28. “From the sweat drops, from the remains of the substance, the matter of dead bodies of humans and animals of the previous period, and from the excreted dust, the first animals (of our period) arose.”

            According to the secret doctrine, mammals arose later than humans in this cycle. The great manvantaric cycle of seven rounds, which begins in the first round with the mineral, the vegetal, and the animal, brings its work of evolution to a standstill during the downward movement in the middle of the fourth race and at the end of the first half of the fourth cycle. After the human monad has passed through the preparatory stages to reach material embodiment, it appears on our Earth (the lowest and most material stage) as the first result of this stage of evolution, in order to begin its ascent, so to speak, after the completion of the descent.

            At this stage, spirit and matter are in balance, and the struggle of spirit over matter begins here on Earth. Only in the seventh round will the victory of humanity as a whole over matter be complete.^[105] Then man will be what he was before his “Fall,” namely a spiritual being, free from the imperfections of “matter,” but he will also possess what he did not possess before the “Fall”: the wisdom and self-knowledge gained through his “sins” and experiences.^[106]

Śloka 29. “Bone-clad creatures, dragons of the deep, and flying snakes were added to the crawling things. Those that crawled on the ground gained wings. The long-necked creatures in the water became the creators of the flying animals of the air.”

Śloka 30. “During the Τhird (Race), the boneless animals grew and changed. They became animals with bones; their Chhayas [chāyā-s] (images) became dense.”

Śloka 31. “The animals first separated (into male and female sexes). They began to reproduce (through copulation). Then the two-sexed human also separated. He said (to his female half): Let us do as the animals do. Let us unite (our bodies) and create creatures. And they did.”

Śloka 32. “But those who had no spark (of spiritual self-awareness)^[107] took female beastly creatures into their care, and from their intercourse the mute races were born. They themselves were mute. But their tongues were bound. The tongues of their ancestors remained speechless. They produced monsters, a race of misshapen, red-haired beasts that walked on all fours.^[108] A race that was mute so that the shame would not be revealed.”

            The human-like creatures, in whom the true self-awareness of their human dignity was not awakened by the divine spark, degraded themselves to cattle by intermingling with cattle.

            The term “man” in the true sense of the word refers neither to his visible body nor to his capacity for thought, but to the mind from which spiritual self-consciousness springs when it is awakened by the divine spark; in other words, that within him which is capable of divine self-knowledge and is therefore, according to human concepts one has of GOD, GOD himself.

            Although everything in the world originally arose from a single source, man has a different origin in spiritual terms than the animal body he inhabits, and the creation of the mind by a mindless body is a nonsensical theory that contradicts both common sense and experience.

Stanza IX. The Final Evolution of Man

Śloka 33. “When the Lhas saw this (the mixing with the animals), those (Sons of light) who had not created humans (had refused to do so) grieved and said:

Śloka 34. “The Amanasa [amānasa] (emotional foes) have defiled our future dwelling. That is karma. Let us seek other dwellings. Let us teach them a lesson; otherwise, something even worse might result.” They did.

Śloka 35. Then all were endowed with Manas (mind). They saw the sin of the mindless.”^[109]

            The senseless ones had sinned because, as a result of their unnatural fornication, they had become unnatural, that is, they had acted against the will of their nature and thereby degraded themselves. This occurred, however, unknowingly, before the ray of divine reason had penetrated their minds. But just as the other races were led to the path of knowledge by the influence of the power coming from above, so too will this degenerate race pass into a higher state “on the last day.” The Tibetan commentary states the following:

            At the beginning of the fourth evolutionary period, the human realm branched out in various directions. The external forms it produced were not all of the same kind; for these vessels, before they had hardened, came into contact with monstrous creatures of a genus unknown today, creatures that had sprung from nature’s earliest attempts at form development. From this arose monstrosities that were half-human, half-animal. These failed creatures did not breathe or live long, although the “born” sons united with various female monstrosities of these females and produced human monstrosities. This occurred because the psychic power over the physical being was still very weak and underdeveloped. Gradually, a balance was established between the human-like and animal forms; they separated and no longer merged. Humans no longer created forms but produced them; but as before, they still produced animal forms. Therefore, the sages speak in truth when they recount the tales of male beings who were no longer capable of procreation through will, but instead united with the daughters of other races, procreating various animals or hybrid species with them, in addition to the Danavas [dānava-s] (giants), and that later these male beings refused to be considered the fathers of the mute races. Consequently, the kings and fathers of the last races (III and IV) decreed a prohibition against this sinful association. This prevented the effects of karma and thereby created new karma. The (divine) kings punished the guilty with infertility. They destroyed the red and blue races.^[110]

Śloka 36. “The fourth race developed language.”

            The commentary says:

            The first race was speechless; they were ethereal beings without human analytical reason. The second had a tonal language consisting only of vowels. The third improved these natural sounds, and from them human language developed in its beginnings, only to be perfected in the fourth race.

Śloka 37. “The One became Two, likewise all living and crawling things that were still One: the giant fish, birds and snakes with shell heads”

            In this way, “Eve” was created from “Adam’s side,” and man received his wife, while both were still based on the genderless “human being,” as they remain today. Both are essentially one. Woman, the symbol of femininity, also has masculinity within her being, and man needs femininity in his character.

            Regarding the antediluvian creatures among whom man dwelt, albeit not in the form in which he now exists, the Tibetan commentary says:

            When the third race separated and fell into sin through the procreation of humans and animals, the animals became wild, and humans and animals sought to destroy each other. Until then, there had been no sin or murder. After this separation (into two races), the Satya Yuga came to an end. Eternal spring became perpetual change, and the seasons followed one another. The cold compelled people to build dwellings and invent clothing. Then humanity turned to the higher fathers (gods or angels). The Nirmanakāya [nirmānakāya] of the Nagas [nāgas],^[111] the wise serpents and dragons of light, came; also the forerunners of the enlightened ones (Buddhas). Divine kings descended and taught people sciences and arts; for humanity could no longer live in the first land (Adi-Varsha [ādi-varṣa] or Paradise), as it had become a cold corpse.

Stanza X. The History of the Fourth Human Race

Śloka 38 “Thus, from the third race, the fourth human race was born within the seven regions. The gods (Suras) [sūras] became non-gods (A-Suras) [asūra-s].”

            As has been described, (bisexual) humans arose from (genderless) humanity. From the brown and yellow giant race of what modern terms could be called “spiritual” beings, who inhabited the continent of the ancient continent of “Atlantis” (mentioned by Plato), the human race as it exists today—male and female—was born. In the so-called “scientific” sense, one can only speak of the development of “humankind” from the beginning of the fourth race onward; the preceding period of development was more metaphysical than physical, since it was only through the “Fall of Man” that humankind attained a perfection of its organism, in which the divine forces embodied within it could develop and unfold. However, this caused the original godlike beings to lose their spiritual and sublime nature, but at the same time, it created the foundation for the development of their individuality and self-knowledge.

Śloka 39. “The first (race) in each of the (seven) zones was moon-colored (whitish-yellow), the second yellow like gold, the third red, the fourth brown, and it became black through sin. The first seven offshoots (of humanity) were all the same color at the beginning; the next (divisions of the same) began to mix their colors.”

            The prehistory of humankind, like everything based on natural laws, is simple and would be easy to understand if modern theology, for centuries, had not, due to a complete lack of knowledge of the processes that took place, given a false interpretation to the allegories of the “Fall of Man,” etc., thereby distorting and complicating the simple truth and rendering the natural unnatural and unnatural. Without penetration into matter, the spirit would have had no opportunity to learn its relationship to matter and to gain mastery over it; without the emergence of the illusion of separateness, humankind would still have no way of overcoming this illusion and becoming aware of the divine power active within. For humankind, divinity would have remained a dream, an unrecognized ideal. Only through the elimination of the resistance of matter can the ideal within it become reality and be understood as reality; “Lucifer”, the “light-bringer” (Phosphorus), the intellectual principle in man, is, however, when it is misused, the enemy of the divine; but by not ignoring this enemy, but overcoming it, he becomes the basis of the knowledge of the divine and the redeemer of man.^[112]

Śloka 40. “Then the third and the fourth (races) grew up in pride: ‘We are the kings, we are the gods!’ (they thought to themselves).”

            These were the ancient Atlanteans, the first physically developed and, by today’s standards, “material” humans. Here began the struggle between the spirit, striving for divine self-awareness, and matter. Those types in whom the spirit conquered matter separated from those in whom the material gained dominance, and thus arose the struggle that led to the downfall of Atlantis.

Śloka 41. “They took wives who were beautiful to look at; women from the tribe of the uncomprehending and ‘narrow-minded’. They gave birth to monsters, malevolent demons, of male and female nature, also Khado (Dakini) [dākinī] with little reason.”

Śloka 42. “They built temples for the physical body and worshipped the male and the female. Then the third eye lost its sight.”

            The loss of perception of the inner ideal led to the search for external ideals, and the idealization of the external led to the disappearance of inner knowledge. Both were mutually dependent, like the egg and the hen, and the hen and the egg. Thousands who refuse to believe that Adam lost his mind by biting into the apple Eve gave him have themselves bitten into that apple and thereby lost their minds. Woman is the symbol of beauty, but as a mere symbol, she has no value other than the allure of appearance; only he who possesses this ideal within himself recognizes the true essence.

            However, as inner worship faded and outward veneration took hold, the power of inner, i.e., spiritual, vision also diminished. The stimulus exerted by the sensory world brought the outer senses to their fullest expression, and the spiritual eye closed.^[113] People saw only the form and could no longer recognize the essence it represented. The phallus (lingam)^[114] and the yoni (ketis)^[115] were, and still are, publicly and secretly worshipped by many throughout the world as the highest ideal.

Stanza XI. The Civilization and Annihilation of the Fourth and Fifth Races

Śloka 43. “They (the Lemurians and Atlanteans) built great cities. They built them from select earths and metals. The fires (volcanoes) erupted (lava). From the white stone (marble) of the mountains and the black stone (of the underground fires) they crafted their own life-size images (statues) and worshipped them.”

            Naturally, many millennia passed between the first division of humanity into two sexes and the time when they began to build large cities. When this culture was at its peak, a high degree of civilization existed, especially in what is now Madagascar, and also in Peru. Then, just as now, there were civilized peoples and “savages.” The original inhabitants of Australia were the descendants of those who had misused the divine fire bestowed upon them for bestiality; the nobler race of the Aryans descends from the spiritual lineage of the Sons of Wisdom.

            Gradually, the Lemurians disappeared, and the Atlanteans spread. The Tibetan commentary says the following about this:

            [Paraphrase] “The last survivors of the noble child of the White Isle had long since vanished. Their chosen ones had found refuge on the Sacred Isle (Shamballah), and some of the rejected tribes (after their separation from the others) lived in the wilderness and in caves, when the golden-yellow race (the fourth) was stained black by sin. From pole to pole, the earth had changed its appearance for the third time and was no longer inhabited by the sons of Sveta-dwipa [śveta-dvīpa], the Anointed One, and Adbhitanya, the East and West, the First, the One, and the Pure, was corrupted. The demigods of the third (race) gave way to the demigods of Dervlerten. Sveta-dwipa [śveta-dvīpa], whose northern parts of the Togambadhi had been visited by the seven Kumaras [kumāra-s], the ‘White Isle,’ veiled its face. Their children now inhabited the ‘Black Land’, where later Daityas of the seventh Dwīpa and Rākshasas took the place of the Sadhu who had descended from the higher regions during the third period.^[116]

            The third race had passed the midpoint of its development when a shift in the Earth’s axis occurred, ushering in the Ice Age. The commentary states the following:

            [Paraphrase] “The axis of the wheel changed. The sun and moon no longer shone directly overhead; they experienced snow, ice, and cold, and humans, plants, and animals became dwarfed. Those who survived remained like half-grown children, in child size and intellectual development. This was the third Pralaya of the races (in Lemuria).”

            All this did not occur through the “blind and random” workings of the laws of nature, but because the development of the planet itself goes hand in hand with the development of its inhabitants, and both progress simultaneously according to the law of karma. Behind every “blind” law of nature lies a non-blind intelligence, which does not act according to its own discretion, but fulfills the will of the primordial spirit, which is called “God”, since in him the concepts of absolute wisdom, love, intelligence and justice merge into one, but which even the greatest mind cannot comprehend if it is not capable of feeling it.

            “People became significantly smaller in stature, and their lifespans were short. Having lost their godlike qualities, they interbred with animal races and with the giants and pygmies (the dwarves of the polar lands). Many acquired spiritual and even more unlawful (diabolical) knowledge and knowingly walked the left path (of black magic).”^[117]

Śloka 44. “They (the Atlanteans) made large images, nine jatis (meters) high, corresponding to the size of their bodies. Moonfires had destroyed the land of their fathers (the Lemurians). The water threatened the fourth race.”

            The statues discovered in Ronororaka average nine meters in height. From this natural height, humanity as we know it has shrunk to approximately two meters over millions of years; indeed, some races are generally even smaller. The great “flood” that ended the existence of most of the world, or rather the sinking of this continent, occurred, according to the Aryan-Indian chronology, approximately 850,000 years ago. Remnants of it still exist as the island of Java and its surrounding area. Similar upheavals have occurred before and will occur again in the future. According to Aryan-Indian teachings, “the world” is alternately destroyed or transformed by fire and water.

Śloka 45. “The first great waters came. They swallowed the seven great islands.”

            This was the fourth major flood on our Earth in the current cycle.

Śloka 46. “All the wise were saved, the unwise perished. With them disappeared the majority of the great beasts that had sprung from the sweat of the earth.”

            The wise or saints were not saved by being warned by God (as popular theology tells of Noah) as a reward for their virtue and thus saving their lives in time, but they owed their salvation to the purity of their nature, which enabled them to foresee the coming catastrophe through the “third eye” (the pineal gland), consequently an effect of the law of karma. Regarding our fifth race, the commentary says:

“Only the few chosen ones, whose divine (invisible) teachers inhabited the sacred island (the Adepts) from which the final savior will come, prevented one half of humanity from destroying the other. Humanity was divided. Two-thirds were (and are now) ruled by dynasties of lower, material earth spirits who took possession of the minds easily accessible to them; one-third remained true to its own divine nature and united with the firstborn of the fifth race, the divinely rooted incorporated ones. When the poles shifted (for the fourth time), it did no harm to those who were thus protected and had separated themselves from the fourth race. Like the Lemurians, the godless part of the Atlanteans also disappeared and was never seen again.”

Stanza XII. The Fifth Race and its Leaders

Śloka 47. “Few remained. Some of them were yellow, some brown and black, and some red. The moon-colored ones were gone forever.”

            The commentary adds:

            “No one paid any attention to the great dragon; except for the snakes of Welshness, the snakes whose dwelling places are now under the triangular stones.”^[118]

Śloka 48. “The fifth race of sacred lineage remained. It was led by its first divine kings.”

Śloka 49. “(They were) the ‘snakes’ that descended again, who made peace with the fifth (race), taught and guided them.”

            The “dragon” or the “serpent” signifies a living, moving intelligent force and entity and is therefore the symbol of spiritual (“superhuman”) intelligences or “spirit people”, regardless of whether these intelligences and spirit people manifest their powers through a visible material body or are in the state of Nirmanakayas [nirmānakāya-s].^[119]

            We have now arrived at the period in the developmental history of mankind that is rightly called the “post-diluvian” period, in which, under the influence and guidance of higher spirits, not only intellectual progress but also a development of the spiritual light of true knowledge, which springs from the divine spark hidden in the soul, or in other words, a “rebirth in spirit and in truth,” could take place, through which man came to the consciousness of his immortal existence. This awareness of existence in spirit, indeed even its premonition, is precisely what distinguishes real humans from animals and from animal-human hybrids; for even in animals there is an intellectual principle at work which, depending on the organization of the animal’s body, is capable of a certain development; but only in humans is that higher principle (Buddhi) effective which bestows the power to rise above the personality, to perceive the infinity of Divine Love that encompasses everything, and to recognize the omnipresence of the Divine Spirit in one’s own soul and in all creatures.

            All forms, appearances, and creatures are transient instruments in which eternal principles create. When the inwardly active principle ceases to act and returns to its origin, dissolution occurs; that is, the death and decay of form. Human beings, subject to the senses and conscious only of their sensory, material existence, identify with their transient appearance and, in this state, cannot attain consciousness of their higher being. Instead, they remain subject to the ever-turning wheel of the temporal and transient, to birth with death and rebirth. Thus, the struggle between spirit and matter continues; it lasts until humanity attains full knowledge of the eternal principles, lives and acts in harmony with these principles, so that these principles are, as it were, embodied within them, and they themselves attain consciousness of immortal existence within them.

Concluding remarks

            It may be helpful to note that whoever does not understand the secret doctrine need not rack their brains over it, for that would be of no use to them, since inner enlightenment does not depend on human brooding. No one’s salvation depends on their knowledge and theories, but on the revelation of truth through the power of wisdom within them. Therefore, this treatise of ours does not aim merely to satisfy scientific curiosity or to add to existing theories about world history, but rather, through a rational exposition of the subject, to eliminate the erroneous views that stand in the way of the knowledge of truth.

            Outward words, even those spoken by the highest adepts, are nothing more than guides on the path each individual must walk. Words are not truth itself, but symbols; they can awaken the truth hidden in the human heart, but they are not truth itself. Outward teachings can certainly direct us to seek the path of truth. But we must find it ourselves, and once we have found it, we need no further proof; the knowledge of truth rests on nothing other than itself. In other words, the proof of truth is there as soon as one truly recognizes the truth.

Notes:

^[1] Sketch of the Secret Doctrine of H. P. Blavatsky. Summarized by Franz Hartmann, M.D. Shatszkammer-Verlag Hans Fändrich, Calw/Württ. n.d. [Translation from the German by Robert Hutwohl, ©2025]

^[2] [R. H. —I have inserted, where applicable, Sanskrit words with diacritics, to follow Dr. Hartmann’s Sanskrit words found in The Secret Doctrine by Blavatsky. This will help some readers to be given better clarity. Those Sanskrit words, are neither italicized nor capitalized (as they are not found in the language as such). A note to the reader, the intertextual comments following The Secret Doctrine entries, which are usually paraphrased by Dr. Hartmann, are numbered with larger point size and the text following The Secret Doctrine entries and the endnotes are usually exclusively by Dr. Hartmann, were often tailored for the Germanic reader at the time when Dr. Hartmann composed the text, and may not be from The Secret Doctrine at all. Dr. Hartmann has noted in particular, the limitations of the Germanic language to express metaphysical ideas which are easily expressed in the Sanskrit and English languages, especially, as he says, different manifestations of GOD, that is why use of the Sanskrit is of the highest benefit to the reasearher. The font which the Publisher used has made it extremely difficult to determine which text was take from The Secret Doctrine.]

^[3] “In the beginning were the E l o h i m”, i.e. the creative intelligences (Moses I).

^[4] “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was in God” (John 1).

^[5] Source-spirits, principles, or primal forces.

^[6] “Everything transient is but a parable” (Goethe, “Faust”).

^[7] [R. H.—Tibetan, Dwangs-ma, དྭངས་མ་. Pronounced, Dang-ma or Daṅg-ma. In the Tibetan-Sanskrit-Dictionary, p. 338. The Uma Institute for Tibetan Studies, is དྭངས་མ་, dwangs ma, meaning main or clear.]

^[8] John III, 3.

^[9] Bhagavad Gita. Chap. II, verses 12, 16, 20.

^[10] Thomas von Kempis, I, 3.

^[11] Chap. XIII, 15.

^[12] John I.

^[13] [R. H.—Not a Tibetan word as Dr. Hartmann indicates, but  Sanskrit = tad, tat. The Secret Doctrine says as such, commenting two paragraphs after the verse. If Tibetan were meant, the Tibetan word would have been That = དེ་ = te; written: de.  Sans., tat, saḥ]

^[14] [R. H. —The lipikas are the agents responsible for the distribution of karma and are the caretakers of the three permanent atoms i.e., the triple chord of the reincarnating soul, and are responsible for placing them into the new-born human at birth, with the help of devic-agencies.]

^[15] [R. H. —For the proper formation of a thinking human being, there are two components which come together or join, a lower (the lunar fathers or pitṛ-s) and a higher (the solar fathers or deities or pitṛ-s) collective: For the higher, Ātmā, Buddhi, Manas. For the lower or lunar, a quaternary of principles need to be present and the joining is due to the function of the son of mind (mānasa-putra) and is the key behind the Greek “myth” of prometheus. Without the Son of Mind, a human is not a complete human. This is told in certain ancient books of Hindu literature such as the purāṇas, but their esoteric significance is not revealed by them, as it has been jealously guarded. This is why the apes are mindless, as they do not have the key component, mānasa-putra and are called the “mindless races.” It is bona fide humans who were the progenitors of the anthropoids or apes, the manas-less or amānasa, not the other way around as proposed by them since Charles Darwin.]

^[16] [R. H. —As we are in the fifth or Āryan root-race, even though the majority of humanity is still reflective of the 4th or Atlantean root-race.]

^[17] [R. H.—One Buddha per root-race during a world period.]

^[18] After the transference of will (Imaginatio) described in detail by Paracelsus has been rediscovered [R. H.—from its use during Atlantis] under the name “Hypnotism”, it is to be hoped that Fohat, Akasa [ākāśa], Prana [prāṇa] and other natural forces still unknown to modern science, but which are universal, will soon also be rediscovered, albeit under modern names.

^[19] [R. H.—i.e., the three strides of Viṣṇu. The Sanskrit root, viś, means “to pervade.” And, as The Secret Doctrine text says, “Fohat is called the ‘Pervade’ and the Manufacturer, because he shapes  the atoms from crude material.” And the footnote on the same page says: “It is well known that sand, when placed on a metal plate in vibration assumes a series of regular curved figures of various descriptions (R. H.—or geometric shapes)” This indicates that Fohat is always pervading atoms or shaping them.]

^[20] To the question of how one can know all this, since before the beginning of creation there was no one to observe it [R. H.—As observed in the Ṛg-veda], the answer is that humankind is a complete world in miniature, and that the spiritual person who understands how to observe themselves, through self-knowledge, also attains knowledge of all nature and its mysteries. Jane Leade says in “Revelation of Revelations”: “Thus, the spirit who receives this gift of God gains royal freedom, and clothed in Christ’s life-giving body, feels free from the burden of sin. Easily, it moves in the realm of light and, like it, penetrates the unknown spaces and crystal-clear realms. There, it beholds other worlds with all their glorious things, stages, and orders.”

^[21] [R. H.—This Sanskrit word, although it is found in The Secret Doctrine, spelled as such, was changed by the Editor, Boris de Zirkoff, from Anupādaka (in the original The Secret Doctrine) to Anupapādaka. The word is also found in The Theosophical Glossary. Among the notes at the front of the Glossary owned by Zirkoff (1952 edition of the original 1892 edition), he writes that Mrs. Lee Kassoldt counted 2767 distinct terms entered, among which 469 were supposedly by H. P. Blavatsky. On page 25 of the Glossary, is also found the Sanskrit word Aupapāduka. In the margin, Zirkoff inserted two sources: Schlagintweit, p. 51 and Eitel, p. 14. David Reigle has gone over this:

“aupapāduka; or better, they should adopt the more common upapāduka, [meaning “parentless”] found throughout the Sanskrit Buddhist texts (see the many references in Edgerton), aupapāduka and upapāduka. These are used interchangeably, and have the same meaning as that given by H. P. Blavatsky, “parentless.” It is this spelling which should now be adopted by Theosophists wishing to use a form given by Blavatsky: aupapāduka; or better, they should adopt the more common upapāduka. Technical Terms in Stanza I, p. 7, Book of Dzyan Research Report.]

^[22] The modern German language possesses only the word “Geist” (spirit/spirit) for many diverse principles and states for which Sanskrit has numerous terms. This circumstance gives rise to endless misunderstandings in the treatment of mystical subjects and makes a clear discussion almost impossible. “Geist” itself, in contrast to “matter,” is an insubstantial nothingness. This nothingness only becomes something when it manifests in substance. Meister Eckhart says: “The soul is spirit according to its highest functions, soul according to its lowest, and thus there is a boundary between soul and spirit in the single being. The soul is called spirit when it is elevated above all creaturely things.” The “Dhyan Chohans” could therefore perhaps best be described as the higher spiritual functions of the souls of the planets or, as Cornelius Agrippa calls them, as their “intelligences”.

^[23] Here, the word “spirit” signifies the unity of will and thought, which are separate in imperfect beings. For example, humans think this or that and will something else, or they make their decisions dependent on the changing impressions of their imagination. In spiritual beings, will and thought are one with action. “What God wills, he thinks, and what he thinks, happens.”

^[24] “In the beginning was the deed” (Goethe, “Faust”).

^[25] Yet another word [Sanskrit = Sat] for which German lacks a suitable equivalent. Perhaps it could be described as “absolute being” or the truth underlying all existence; it is the eternal, self-contained reality whose revelation is the world of forms and appearances, and which can only be recognized by those who possess and feel it within themselves.

^[26] In the Book of Revelation they are called “the seven lamp stands” that “stand before the throne of God”.

^[27] Human beings as individuals can never rise above their animal nature; they cannot become gods and yet continue to exist under the illusion of separateness. However, the consciousness of the individual disappears when the spirit within the human being awakens to its divine self-awareness and thereby recognizes itself as one with the Godhead in its entirety. Likewise, darkness can never become light; rather, when it becomes light, darkness ceases to exist.

^[28] See T. Subba Row, “Lectures on the Bhagavad Gita”.

^[29] The term “elements” does not refer to material forms; it is to be understood in a spiritual sense.

^[30] See: A. P. Sinnett, “The Secret Teachings of Buddhism.” We are now in the second half of the fourth cycle, which the life cycle passes through from planet to planet. During the first three cycles, our Earth forms and condenses; during the fourth, it hardens; and during the next three, it “spiritualizes” again, that is, it becomes increasingly ethereal. Likewise, humanity also goes through various stages of evolution during the first three cycles, which would be difficult to describe. Only in the fourth cycle does humanity appear as what we know it to be—from animal-like savages to the “pride of modern civilization.” In the following three cycles, humanity will also become increasingly spiritualized until it consists of godlike beings who ultimately merge into the divine. Since humanity, divided into genders, has only existed for 18,618,732 years in this cycle, some patience is still required to wait until this godlike state is achieved for humanity as a whole.

^[31] The number of planets in our solar system and their nature are discussed elsewhere in the book. Whether the external appearances of these planets are known or unknown to astronomers is irrelevant; for we are not dealing here with physical manifestations, but with the principles and essences that underlie these appearances.

^[32] According to the Brahmins’ reckoning, such a “day of creation” encompasses a period of 311,040,000,000,000 of our years.

^[33] Our moon is such a dead, or rather dying, planet, since spiritual life has fled from it, and it showers the earth, which is its child, with the “magnetic emanations” of its carcass.

^[34] As the “Secret Doctrine” describes in detail, the life wave travels through the seven planets [in a chain of planets] of the solar system in each cycle. However, these planets are not all in the state of material condensation in which we see our Earth; rather, they exist in different states, depending on whether they represent one or another of the seven principles, so that we consider one planet as “thought substance,” another as “astral matter,” and a third as the “magnetic sphere.” As the life wave passes from one planet to another, the elemental kingdom develops successively on each one, followed by the mineral kingdom, the plant kingdom, the animal kingdom, and finally human forms, which are still too crude and animalistic to serve as embodiments and means of expression for spirits from higher worlds.

Each such cycle brings forth in human forms a new unfolding of intellectual, psychological, spiritual, and also physical qualities, as each planet imparts its characteristic qualities to its inhabitants (whose forms are its products). While the life cycle is active on a planet (for millions of years), the planet’s own realm of phenomena unfolds; the races of its inhabitants arise and pass away. When the planet is exhausted and in need of rest, a pralaya takes its place, and the life cycle moves on to the next planet, returning again after eons of years in its cycle.

To avoid misunderstandings, it should be noted that the seven planets discussed here are not the visible planets known to astronomers and belonging to our solar system (but not to our Earth system). Of this inner ring in our solar system, only the Earth and the Moon are visible to the naked eye; Mars, Venus, Mercury, Jupiter, etc., belong to other planetary orbits in our solar system and are visible because, within their respective orbits, they are at a stage of development approximately similar to that of the Earth within its orbit. Practical occultism should not be compared with mainstream science. Mainstream science deals only with what is perceptible to our external senses. However, this perceptible reality is a vanishingly small part of what truly exists. Therefore, before criticizing or rejecting the secret teachings of the ancients, one should first strive to understand them thoroughly.

^[35] The greatest thinker of our century would be in a dire situation if, in order to exercise his intellectual capacity, he had at his disposal only the brain of a baboon or orangutan, or even that of a Hottentot. The human form, however, belongs to the animal kingdom, but not the incarnate human being (Manas), whose origin is to be sought in the realm of light. Essential to the human organism is the animating spiritual “monad.” Without it, even the most learned person would be merely an animal and not immortal; he would be a creature like Goethe presents as “Mephistopheles” in “Faust”:

“Has the spirit of a human being,

in its lofty striving,

ever been grasped by your kind?”

The form (personality) of a person, their “spiritual” organization, requires evolution; the person themselves (the “Monad,” the individuality, the ego) does not; they are what they have been from eternity and will always remain so. They do not progress or develop further; they are not even touched by the conditions under which the form in which they are embodied lives. The soul does not belong to this world or this plane of existence. It can be compared to a star that stands in eternal rest in the spiritual firmament, whose light shines and acts as a star of hope within earthly humanity. The more the personality is “spiritually” nourished by it, the sooner the person can be enlightened by the “monad” and become a partaker of its immortality. The “monad,” however, which would be better described as “God,” does not cling to any personality. In other words, “God abandons those who abandon Him and want nothing to do with Him.”

“God abandons those who want to abandon Him and know nothing of Him.”

(Compare Bhagavad Gita II, 12.)

^[36] The reasons for this are convincingly presented in H. P. Blavatsky’s Secret Doctrine. We can only note here that the main point is that this part of the creation period represents the turning point between the spiritual and the material. The earth we now inhabit is the scales on which everyone is measured according to their worth, whether they are fit to progress or not; it is the place where the law of karma manifests its power and everyone receives what is due to them. However, at the time of this test, no new candidates will be admitted.

^[37] This in no way endorses the ape theory; for it is not man, but the organism he inhabits, who originates from the animal kingdom. According to the secret doctrine, apes themselves are not the forerunners, but rather degenerate varieties of humankind. They arose when, at the dawn of the third race, the forms intended for human dwellings were still imperfect and lacked intellect. The inner human being is one thing; the outer, living human organism another, as every rational person instinctively knows. It has been left to the arrogance of modern anthropologists to confuse the essence of man with his earthly appearance and to spread the myth that his divine spirit is the product of an ape’s intelligence.

^[38] [This is incorrectly numbered. This is the paragraph which immediately follows śloka 5, above: 5. “In the fourth planetary round, the ‘sons’ are commanded to create their own likenesses. The third part of them refuses, the other two obey.” śloka 6 will follow.

^[39] [R. H.—Hence, a very ancient, occult doctrine as to Satan, became part of the earliest Catholic church. Whether the Church knows where it came from is uncertain. It is probable it is detailed in a document within its vast library. But it becomes mixed in early Gnostic doctrine as well.]

^[40] [R. H.—The name Lucifer is found only once, in the old Testament and it is incorrectly applied by the Biblical translator. Hence, My paraphrase for those who confuse Lucifer as Satan:

Fundamentalists excluded, only open-minded Christians know that Jesus refers to himself as the morning star in, Revelation 22:16. Who is the morning star? Lucifer, that is who. Lucifer is the Light Bringer, or Venus, in pagan terminology. Keep in mind Jesus was not constrained by terms. It was only the church or crutch, which constrained its followers. Lucifer is the Latin term “lucem ferre,” “bringer, or bearer, of light, a Roman astronomical term. The Isaiah 14:12 verse, “How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! How art thou cut down to the ground, which didst weaken the nations!” refers to a fallen Babylonian king who tormented the children of Israel. Before his death, this king was described as Helal, son of Shahar, which can best be translated as “Day star, son of the Dawn.” This was misinterpreted and misused in the verse applied in the King James version, a book which is replete with errors. Because Lucifer is a Latin term, how could it have gotten into the Hebrew old testament long before Latin came into usage by the Romans? Later it was Jerome who mistranslated “Day star, son of the Dawn” as Lucifer (the classical Roman name for the Morning Star) and this was passed into the King James version, which has since been corrected in the The New English Bible, 1969, 1970.

^[41] “The Secret Doctrine” discusses the allegory of the “Fall of Man” in detail. But even the above explanations are an exposition of the origin of “evil,” which so many theologians and philosophers have racked their brains over in vain.

^[42] In Hebrew, the Seven Worlds correspond to the following names:

Geburah. Chesed.

1. — — — — — — — — — the archetypal world.

Tephireth.

1. — — Hod. Netzach — — the intellectual world.

Yesod.

III. — — — — the creative or substantial world.

Malkuth.

1. — — — — — the material (physical) world.

Above these, however, stands the formless, the three highest Sephirot, or the Trinity of Kether (the Crown, the Nameless), Chokmah (Wisdom), and Binah (Knowledge).

^[43] The realization that the Earth and other celestial bodies are spherical and that the stars are not lights nailed to the firmament is not a new achievement of science; all of this was already known thousands of years ago.

^[44] Atma-Vidya [ātma vidyā] refers to spiritual faith in the truest sense of the word. However, since this true faith is extremely rare in our age, the modern understanding of this word has been lost; it only recognizes a shadow of it, namely, the acceptance of some opinion as true, but not the living force of faith, the soul’s knowledge of things that the intellect does not yet comprehend. What a person truly believes is themselves; intellectual faith, however, belongs to the realm of fantasy.

^[45] [R. H.—Footnote from Blavatsky, The Secret Doctrine I, p. 212: On Heroes, Hero-Worship and the Heroic in History (1874), p. 9.]

^[46] The Christian mystic Eckhart says something very similar: “God (the Unity) is the father of all things; for He is their cause. He gives everything to nature, form and matter. God is the center of all things; the Godhead has all things within Himself, but in one being, undivided. Insofar as God is in all things, He is the soul of all souls. He is the light of lights, the life of the living, the being of those who exist, the reason of the rational. He is one being who has within Himself the essence of all creatures. The equality that unites the creature and the divine being is called the preceding image, and there must be as many images in God as there are gradations in nature, but in all the multiplicity of images, He sees only the reflection of His own being. The world of preceding images is nature, which is of God, simply in itself without form or shape” (333, 4.).

^[47] Since only one fundamental law of order prevails in nature, we also find a similar classification of “mono-atomic, di-atomic, tetr-atomic” groups in material chemistry and a similar order among the elemental beings of the astral world.

^[48] Eckhart says of man: “Man, in the highest part of his inner being, is closer to GOD than to creatures, and if one asks how great his soul is, one should know that its greatness cannot fill heaven and earth, but only GOD himself, whom the heavens of all heavens cannot encompass. What the soul is at its core has never been known” (89.23). “Memory resembles the Father, reason the Son, the will the Holy Spirit. But the highest form of the soul, the spark, corresponds to the non-manifest Godhead, which is the soul’s highest object” (318, 1).

^[49] See: Jakob Böhme, “On the Three Principles”. XIX. 44.

^[50] A sevenfold group of “heavenly people” or “angels”. (The “seven sheaves”.) (Moses 37:7.)

^[51] In these words, a truth of far-reaching importance is expressed: A general understanding of this truth alone would suffice to bring the world to its senses. Human beings, with all their earthly functions, are not immortal. Only the divine essence within them is immortal. This divine essence, however, is not the personality, unless it has united with this divine essence through perfect sanctification, which is likely to be rare nowadays.

^[52] This “descent” and penetration of the divine nature of this being into earthly, mortal human nature, through which the animal nature receives its divine nourishment that leads it to immortality, was already symbolically represented by the ancient Egyptians in a ceremony similar to those we find today among Buddhists in Tibet and in Christianity as “communion” or the “Lord’s Supper.” Eckhart says: “God (the divine essence) draws the soul up to Himself through the great gift of His holy body. Whoever rightly receives this food becomes one with it, as flesh and blood are one with my soul. It is the spark of spirit (within the human being) that truly partakes of this food and in which its effect is revealed.”

The Bible says, “Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me, and I in him” (John 6:57), and the Bhagavad Gita expresses it in other words, saying, “Whoever receives into himself the immortal part of the sacrifice he offers enters into Brahma, the Eternal. Brahma himself is the sacrifice; he is the fire (of love) and the fire’s food (the will), and he sacrifices himself” (Chapter 4, 24).

^[53] The Catholic Church depicts Mary, Queen of Heaven, standing on the moon. This symbolizes the soul that has transcended the “moon” (the realm of illusion and fantasy). Only those spiritual forces that have outgrown the four lower principles and entered into the Trinity [ātma-buddhi-manas] attain immortality.

^[54] [R. H.—Boris de Zirkoff, The Secret Doctrine I, 238 and page 42 of German text by Franz Hartmann.]

^[55] The human soul is the human being itself, in its innermost essence. It has been compared above to a fish that swims alternately in the sea of ​​eternity and in the stream of transience. In the eternal it finds rest, in the temporal the unrest (sin) that provides it with the experience it needs to recognize evil and, through its overcoming, to achieve self-aware existence in the eternal.

^[56] [R. H.—Thus are the Kabbalistic seven principles which correspond to the esoteric seven principles. See de Zirkoff edition, page 242. and page 42 of German text by Franz Hartmann.

The higher Triad: 7. Neshamah, [ātma] 6. Ruach, [buddhi] 5. Nephesh, [manas].

 

The lower Quaternary: 4. Samael [kāma], 3. Michael [Mikael], [prāṇa], 2. image of man, astral body, etheric body or liṅga śarīra, 1. physical body [sthūla śarīra].

^[57] R. H.—Page 242 of de Zirkoff edition. Pure Spirit, Ātman]

^[58] [R. H.—Spiritual Soul, Buddhi]

^[59] [R. H.—Plastic Mediator, Manas]

^[60] [R. H.—of world periods, rounds and globes]

^[61] [R. H.—What is meant here, is not the Blavatsky book, but the Ageless Wisdom teachings being called the Secret Doctrine. That is why it is not italicized as being a specific text.]

^[62] The “six sisters” of Earth are not visible planets, but rather the six etheric and spiritual embodiments of the principles that constitute the Earth system. Unfortunately, due to space constraints, these excerpts do not allow us to do more than hint at the work’s detailed explanations. Therefore, we must refer critically inclined readers to the original text itself for a better understanding, where objections are also addressed in advance.

^[63] [R. H.—Paraphrase of mid page 249-250 italicized paragraph from: “The worlds, to the profane [says a Commentary], . . . The three last will follow.” Here, Dr. Hartmann identifies as (Commentary on the Book of Dzyan), what is only stated in The Secret Doctrine as “says a Commentary” as being identical. I mention this in order to help the reader follow along because it is easy to get lost.]

^[64] Where words are lacking, a word appears at the right moment.

(Goethe, “Faust”)

^[65] This is linked to the development of a sixth sense, which H. P. Blavatsky calls “penetrability”.

^[66] [R. H.—Page 258, Boris de Zirkoff edition.]

^[67] As Eugenius Phllalethes says, no human being has yet seen the Earth (its true essence). What we see is only the outward form of matter in its various manifestations, and the Earth is now in its Kama-rupa [kāma-rūpa] state, the lowest of all, from which it will rise through the influence of higher spiritual power. Therefore, the air that humans breathe is raw, animal air, not the spiritual air that, when inhaled, brings immortality to the soul. (Everything on our planet is permeated by animal life, the symbol of desire and egoism; the air is filled with infusoria, and bodies are composed of animal microorganisms.) [R. H.—This also applies to our Sun. There are three levels to our Sun. The outer Sun, is what is called the Sun of fire-by-friction]

^[68] [R. H.—Page 264, Boris de Zirkoff edition.]

^[69] See: Dr. Franz Hartmann, “White and Black Magic or the Law of the Spirit in Nature”.

^[70] [R. H.—The Secret Doctrine I Cosmogenesis.]

^[71] Just as two things must be distinguished in human beings—namely, their material body and the consciousness that animates this body—so too must a distinction be made between the evolution of the animal-like body and the development of the human intelligence that inhabits it. Neither one nor the other, but both together, constitute the human being. No one is so unreasonable as to mistake a plant in a field for the sunlight that gives it life. Likewise, the spirit that manifests itself in human beings is not a product of the human body, but a universal principle that becomes manifest in the human organism and through which the animal-human being becomes truly human. The manifestation of the spirit and the development of the material organism are therefore two distinct things.

^[72] This does not mean that the terms personality or egoism could be applied to these spiritual forces or forms of consciousness. They are functions of what Schopenhauer calls the “will” in nature, for which the term “spirit” seems more appropriate, since it is not a blind will but a willing, intelligent conception. Everything is indeed spirit, formless or formed, not manifest or manifest in matter. A human being is spirit in the form of a human being, an ox is spirit in the form of an ox; but spirits are different in their nature. The consciousness of a human being cannot manifest itself in an ox, but only in a human being, and even then only when the human organization has attained the necessary maturity. Therefore, I wedded the “sons of the gods” to the “daughters of men” only when they saw that they were “beautiful,” that is, fit for incarnation. (Cf. Genesis 6:2)

^[73] “Mercury” represents Buddhi, the spiritual intelligence that must illuminate Manas before man can become what he is naturally destined to be.

^[74] As in the large, so it is in the small. In humans, too, the premonition and with it the longing for higher knowledge arises before they are sufficiently purified to receive it.

^[75] The earthly “human being” refers not only to the sensually perceptible body, but to the whole person with their thoughts, feelings, and will. They are the son of the “moon” (soma – sleep), and their life, however real it may appear, is nothing but a dream life, and their self-awareness an illusion. True life and true self-awareness can only be possessed by the one who lives in truth, namely the God-man, who, by uniting with earthly humanity, awakens them to true life and brings them to the consciousness of immortality. Therefore, the God-man is called the Redeemer and Lord (Christ).

^[76] [R. H.—The sons of Soma (moon) comprise the Lower Quaternary and are the mortal principles within man but absolutely essential for the complete human being. This combines with the higher Triad, the immortal principles within the human being.]

^[77] Space does not permit us to address all the questions that arise here, nor to answer all the learned objections that might be raised. This, insofar as it was possible, has been done in H. P. Blavatsky’s original work, “The Secret Doctrine.” Such digressions would only cause us to lose sight of our objective. The purpose here is simply to give the reader a clear picture of what “The Secret Doctrine” is about. The details of this doctrine can only be discussed once the whole is understood.

^[78] And God regretted that he had created human beings on the earth, etc. (Moses VI:6). Perhaps the above serves as a key to explaining enigmatic passages; for mythology becomes history when it is properly understood.

^[79] At that time, Cannes was ruled by the fish avatar.

^[80] And God regretted that he had created human beings on the earth, etc. (Moses VI:6). Perhaps the above serves as a key to explaining enigmatic passages; for mythology becomes history when it is properly understood.

^[81] [R. H.—By evolving through the lower kingdoms prior to the human and succeeding beyond.]

^[82] [R. H.—The Secret Doctrine II, on page 57 states: “Says the Catechism (Commentaries)” It does not state Tibetan commentary, as Dr. Hartmann indicates. There is no evidence, as I can see that these Stanzas are Tibetan. Or, at least, they have never been found. Copies may be stored in Tibet, such as probably at what is called the Occult Archives but that does not make them written in the Tibetan language. In all probability, they are written in the Senzar or Initiate language.]

^[83] There are many people who can see nothing in the mythologies of peoples but figments of the imagination and superstition; but the battle of the gods with the titans is still taking place throughout humanity today, and the overcoming and destruction of the “goat-footed and dog-headed self” by the power of the Divine Self is still the highest goal of man and the purpose of his existence on earth.

^[84] Here, too, we find the key to explanation within ourselves through self-reflection. What the moon is to our solar system, imagination is to humankind. From our imagination, our earthly and animalistic ideas and desires are born, and through the light of knowledge, they vanish like dreams into the realm of fantasy.

^[85] One of the proofs of this is that the same phenomenon takes place within each individual person. Eckhart says: “By ridding itself of all its own content, the soul returns to its own ground, which is at the same time the absolute ground of GOD. Boldly cling to your pure nature and to the needless nothingness, and seek no other dwelling place than this. GOD, who created you from nothing, should Himself be your dwelling place according to His needless nothingness and His immobility. In whomever GOD finds His own will, He pours Himself out and gives Himself to him with all that He is. The person who wants to see GOD must be dead; for no one can live (in their own self) and see HIM. If the soul is to know GOD, it must also forget and lose itself; for in seeing and knowing itself, it does not see or know HIM. If GOD is to enter into you, the creature must necessarily go out of you. At any moment, light and brightness can dawn within a person as soon as we become masters of our free will, which until then has been a slave to sin.” (395, 20.)

^[86] Sky = atmosphere, firmament.

^[87] Compare Moses I, 6-9.

^[88] Compare Moses I, 26.

^[89] [R. H.—This is the otherwise unclear statement from The Secret Doctrine (here: Volume II, p. 77): “The Secret teachings show the divine Progenitors creating men on seven portions of the globe “ each on his lot ” — i.e., each a different race of men externally and internally, and on different zones.”

^[90] [R. H.—Different according to one, the higher having evolved earlier and the lower having not evolved as long.]

^[91] That goes without saying, but precisely for that reason it receives the least attention.

^[92] Neither the space nor the purpose of these pages permits us to follow the commentary of the original and delve into the labyrinth of gods, angels, and demons, with their various classes and subdivisions. Furthermore, attempting to answer the pressing questions would cause us to lose sight of the stated goal of this book, which is to present to the reader the fundamentals of this scientific doctrine of religion.

^[93] [R. H.—barhiṣad-s]

^[94] Thus, the light entered human hearts long before time immemorial, and only in this way did humanity attain its divine, immortal nature. Many spirits are involved in creating a perfect human being, and each spirit can contribute only what it possesses. Just as no life can arise from a dead piece of wood, no intelligence from mere vegetative life, so too can no human being arise from an animal, no spiritual self-knowledge from mere intellectual life. Kerning says: “Nothing rises to heaven except that which has come down from heaven.”

^[95] Everything is meaningless to someone who has no sense of it.

^[96] Compare the tablet of Hermes: “His father is the sun, his mother the moon; the wind carried him in his womb and his body is made up of the human races.”

^[97] This “divine fire” is called “divine love.” It is the essential power and substance without which a person can be merely a phenomenon, not a truly human being. It is therefore not empty sentimentality, but a scientifically grounded fact that Paul speaks of when he says: “If I have the gift of prophecy and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing.” (1 Corinthians 13:2) Knowledge and scholarship alone do not make a person, but rather the possession of the power of self-knowledge, which is called “divine (i.e., enlightened and creative) love.”

^[98] See: F. Hartmann, “The Essence of Alchemy”, The Tattvas.

^[99] This does not mean that the world as a world is an illusion and does not exist, but rather that whoever merely sees and judges its outward, sensually perceptible appearance, mistaking themselves and the world for something they are not, is unaware of its true nature and deceives themselves, and precisely for that reason cannot recognize what it is. On this superficial and deceptive observation of outward appearances, without knowledge of the true essence of things, most of the modern “scientific” and theological views of our age are based, and it would be a futile effort to attempt to reconcile the doctrine of truth with the distorted concepts that arise from sensory deception. Comparison, inference, and so forth are functions of the lower intellectual activities of the soul; the self-knowledge of truth springs from inner enlightenment, which can only occur when the spiritual organ necessary for its revelation is sufficiently developed. It cannot therefore be our intention to make the teachings of the Book of Dzyan palatable to the limited understanding of those who seek only external proofs and possess no independent knowledge. These revelations aim to replace the hitherto petty and limited conceptions with a sublime, comprehensive worldview, enabling humanity to awaken to the consciousness of its own divine origin and to move from the realm of merely external, speculative research to inner, spiritual self-knowledge.

^[100] All of this is also symbolically represented in Christian doctrine. An objective explanation of these religious mysteries is therefore unnecessary as long as a person is capable of inwardly feeling the truth underlying these symbols. However, since nowadays the brooding intellect rejects everything it cannot explain, and in this way all too often suppresses the feeling for truth (faith), these revelations serve to aid faith and to bring feeling and intellect into harmony.

^[101] [R. H.—The designation of these floods are counted collectively. Thus, for the 4th root-race, Atlantis, there were several, down to the latest, the Noachian or Poseidian flood which Plato mentions in his Timaeus and the unfinished Critias. Thus, these several floods count as one. Blavatsky’s The Secret Doctrine goes into detail in both volumes far more than any other source. The Hindu Purāṇas do too, but these texts were deliberately mixed and confused in order to hide the secret doctrine contained within them and it would take a researcher a lifetime to sort it all out. See, for instan’, The Secret Doctrine I, 138 under: “A Few Words about “Deluges” and “Noahs.”]

^[102] [R. H.—Unless we count the minor floods pertaining to Atlantis.]

^[103] [R. H.—The Secret Doctrine page 161 has: “saw the (intellectually) vile forms . . .,” here.]

^[104] This intellectual degeneration, too, is based on “exactly scientific” grounds. The current generation lives less within itself than outside of it; most people live merely in their imagination (in their heads), while their hearts are empty. “Knowledge” is considered the highest form of understanding, while insight through the soul is dismissed as mere fanaticism. Everyone lives in the thoughts of others, and only a few possess the strength or the will to think for themselves and generate their own original thoughts. Such “scientific” progress can only have one goal: That ultimately, one knows everything purely theoretically and possesses nothing practically.

^[105] That doesn’t stop anyone from fighting for this victory right now. The “seventh day” is eternity; in it there is neither past nor future.

^[106] The same teaching is found in the Bible. The first book of Moses contains allusions to the history of the first three generations and the three races of the fourth, up to the creation of humankind by the Elohim. In the first book, the animals appear before humankind. In the second book, Adam, the sexless human, comes first, followed by the animals. Adam’s “sleep,” however, signifies his spiritual inactivity. The same allegory is found in other forms in the religious systems of the East.

^[107]See verse 24.

^[108] Not the modern ape species, but rather an ape-like race, similar to the one that anthropologists imagine as the “missing link” and that certain naturalists like to consider their family tree. The modern ape is the direct descendant of that senseless and mindless human-like race that never possessed intellectual intelligence and therefore could not develop any. There may well be sharp thinkers among apes, but the power of thought alone is not the mind, and mindless thinkers are not uncommon.

^[109] The German term “Gemüt” only very imperfectly conveys the meaning of “Manas”. Manas is the principle from which the feeling for the nobel arises, which underlies higher knowledge. Without this feeling, there is no knowledge of the divine (see J. Fährmann, “Die siebenfache Natur von Mensch und Weltall” “The Sevenfold Nature of Man and Universe”).

^[110] All of this is symbolically represented in various mythologies and fables. If reproduction between humans and other animals is no longer possible today, that is no reason to assume that it was not possible in the past under different circumstances. [R. H.—Nature has, since those ver early times modified the genetics which prevents this from happening. This sinful acts (1million per year) does occur between low grade humans and horses and dogs but no progeny result. Humans having sex with toddles is allowed in Francs. From The Secret Doctrine II, 193: “The orang-outang, the gorilla, the chimpanzee and cynocephalus are the latest and purely physical evolutions from lower anthropoid mammalians. They have a spark of the purely human essence in them ; man on the other hand, has not one drop of pithecoid blood in his veins. Thus saith old Wisdom and universal tradition. ]

^[111] See: “The Voice of Silence. Excerpts from the Book of Golden Precepts”.

^[112] While the modern theological view of the creation story is a slap in the face to reason, science, logic and common sense, the truth underlying all these religious allegories, as explained in the Book of Dzyan, perfectly corresponds to sound reason and the requirements of an unbiased science.

^[113] Just as there is a visual organ for external sight, so too is there an organ for mental perception, which, however, has become atrophied in modern humans through disuse and is further paralyzed and rendered ineffective by the widespread consumption of alcoholic beverages. This organ is the pineal gland (epiphysis, coronarium), which the ancients already claimed to be the “seat of the soul,” that is, of mental perception.

^[114] Phallus = male genitalia.

^[115] Yoni = female genitale.

^[116] Due to lack of space, we must refer all those who demand a further discussion of what has been said to the original: “The Secret Doctrine” by H. P. Blavatsky, 3 volumes, plus 1 index volume.

^[117] “Magic,” in the true sense of the word, is the science of using mental powers. When these powers are used for good, it is “white magic”; when they are used for evil or selfish purposes, it is “black magic.” Of course, one must first possess a power before one can learn to use it, and for someone who has no magical power, no magical powers exist, and neither white nor black magic.

^[118] For the mystical meaning of triangle Δ, see: F. Hartmann, “The Symbols of the Bible and the Church”.

^[119] See “The Voice of Silence”, Part III: “The Seven Gates”.