DIVINE THOUGHT, DIVINE THINKERS

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Svabhâvat, the "Plastic Essence" that fills the Universe, is the root of all things. Svabhâvat is, so to say, the Buddhistic concrete aspect of the abstraction called in Hindû philosophy Mûlaprakriti. It is the body of the Soul, and that which Ether would be to Âkâśa, the latter being the informing principle of the former. Chinese mystics have made of it the synonym of "being." In the Ekaśloka-Sâstra of Nâgârjuna (the Lung-shu of China) called by the Chinese the Yih-shu-lu-kia-lun, it is said that the original word of Yeu is "Being" or "Subhâva," "the Substance giving substance to itself," also explained by him as meaning "without action and with action," "the nature which has no nature of its own." Subhâva, from which Svabhâvat, is composed of two words: Su," fair," "handsome," "good"; Sva, "self"; and bhâva, "being or states of being."

STANZA II - Continued.

6. THESE TWO ARE THE GERM, AND THE GERM IS-ONE. THE UNIVERSE WAS STILL CONCEALED IN THE DIVINE THOUGHT AND THE DIVINE BOSOM.

The "Divine Thought" does not imply the idea of a Divine thinker. The Universe, not only past, present, and future - which is a human and finite idea expressed by finite thought - but in its totality, the Sat (an untranslatable term), the absolute being, with the Past and Future crystallized in an eternal Present, is that Thought itself reflected in a secondary or manifest cause. Brahma (neuter) as the Mysterium Magnum of Paracelsus is an absolute mystery to the human mind. Brahmâ, the male-female, its aspect and anthropomorphic reflection, is conceivable to the perceptions of blind faith, though rejected by human intellect when it attains its majority.00

Hence the statement that during the prolog, so to say, of the drama of Creation, or the beginning of cosmic evolution, the Universe or the "Son" lies still concealed "in the Divine Thought," which had not yet penetrated "into the Divine Bosom." This idea, note well, is at the root, and forms the origin of all the allegories about the "Sons of God" born of immaculate virgins.

90. See Part II, § 111, "Primordial Substance and Divine Thought."

1. THE LAST VIBRATION

THROUGH INFINITUDE (a).

STANZA III

COMMENTARY

OF THE SEVENTH ETERNITY THRILLS

THE MOTHER SWELLS, EXPANDING FROM

WITHIN WITHOUT LIKE THE BUD OF THE LOTUS (b).

(a) The seemingly paradoxical use of the sentence "Seventh Eternity," thus dividing the indivisible, is sanctified in esoteric philosophy. The latter divides boundless duration into unconditionally eternal and universal Time and a conditioned one (Khandakâla). One is the abstraction or noumenon of infinite time (Kâla); the other its phenomenon appearing periodically, as the effect of Mahat (the Universal Intelligence limited by Manvantaric duration). With some schools, Mahat is "the first-born" of Pradhâna (undifferentiated substance, or the periodical aspect of Mûlaprakriti, the root of Nature), which (Pradhâna) is called Mâyâ, the Illusion. In this respect, I believe, esoteric teaching differs from the Vedântin doctrines of both the Advaita and the Viśishtadvaita schools. For it says that, while Mûlaprakriti, the noumenon, is self-existing and without any originis, in short, parentless, Anupâdaka (as one with Brahmam) — - Prakriti, its phenomenon, is periodical and no better than a phantasm of the former, so Mahat, with the Occultists, the first-born of Jñâna (or gnosis) knowledge, wisdom or the Logos is a phantasm reflected from the Absolute NIRGUNA (Parabrahm, the one reality, "devoid of attributes and qualities"; see Upanishads); while with some Vedântins Mahat is a manifestation of Prakriti, or Matter.

-

(b) Therefore, the "last vibration of the Seventh Eternity" was foreordained" - by no God in particular, but occurred in virtue of the eternal and changeless LAW which causes the great periods of Activity and Rest, called so graphically, and at the same time so poetically, the "Days and Nights of Brahmâ." The expansion " from within without" of the Mother, called elsewhere the "Waters of Space," "Universal Matrix," etc., does not allude to an expansion from a small center or focus, but, without reference to size or limitation or area, means the development of limitless subjectivity into as limitless. objectivity. “The ever (to us) invisible and immaterial Substance present in eternity, threw its periodical shadow from its own plane into the

THE UNIVERSE, A FLITTING SHADOW

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lap of Mâyâ." It implies that this expansion, not being an increase in size for infinite extension admits of no enlargement was a change of condition. It "expanded like the bud of the Lotus"; for the Lotus plant exists not only as a miniature embryo in its seed (a physical characteristic), but its prototype is present in an ideal form in the Astral Light from "Dawn" to "Night" during the Manvantaric period, like everything else, as a matter of fact, in this objective Universe; from man down to mite, from giant trees down to the tiniest blades of grass. All this, teaches the hidden Science, is but the temporary reflection, the shadow of the eternal ideal prototype in Divine Thought; the word "Eternal," note well again, standing here only in the sense of "Aeon," as lasting throughout the seemingly interminable, but still limited cycle of activity, called by us Manvantara. For what is the real esoteric meaning of Manvantara, or rather a Manu-Antara? It means, esoterically, "between two Manus," of whom there are fourteen in every "Day of Brahmâ," such a "Day" consisting of 1000 aggregates of four ages, or 1000 "Great Ages," Mahâyugas. Let us now analyse the word or name Manu. Orientalists and their Dictionaries tell us that the term Manu" is from the root Man, "to think "; hence 'the thinking man." But, esoterically, every Manu, as an anthropomorphized patron of his special cycle (or Round), is but the personified idea of the "Thought Divine" (as the Hermetic "Pymander "); each of the Manus, therefore, being the special god, the creator and fashioner of all that appears during his own respective cycle of being or Manvantara. Fohat runs the Manus' (or Dhyân-Chohans') errands, and causes the ideal prototypes to expand from within without — viz., to cross gradually, on a descending scale, all the planes from the noumenon to the lowest phenomenon, to bloom finally on the last into full objectivity - the acme of illusion, or the grossest matter.

66

66

STANZA III- Continued.

2. THE VIBRATION SWEEPS ALONG, TOUCHING WITH ITS SWIFT WING (simultaneously) THE WHOLE UNIVERSE, AND THE GERM THAT DWwellETH IN DARKNESS: THE DARKNESS THAT BREATHES (moves) OVER THE SLUMBERING WATERS OF LIFE (a).

(a) The Pythagorean Monad is also said to dwell in solitude and darkness like the "germ." The idea of the "breath" of Darkness moving over "the slumbering Waters of life," which is primordial matter with the latent Spirit in it, recalls the first chapter of Genesis. Its original is the Brâhmanical Nârâyana (the mover on the Waters), who is the personification of the eternal Breath of the unconscious All (or Parabrahm) of the Eastern Occultists. The Waters of Life, or Chaos the female principle in symbolism are the vacuum (to our mental sight) in which lie the latent Spirit and Matter. This it was that made Demokritos assert, after his instructor Leukippos, that the primordial principles of all were atoms and a vacuum, in the sense of space, but not of empty space, as Nature abhors a vacuum" according to the Peripatetics, and every ancient philosopher.

In all Cosmogonies "Water" plays the same important part. It is the base and source of material existence. Scientists, mistaking the word for the thing, understood by water the definite chemical combination of oxygen and hydrogen, thus giving a specific meaning to a term used by Occultists in a generic sense, and which is used in Cosmogony with a metaphysical and mystical meaning. Ice is not water, neither is steam, although all three have precisely the same chemical composition.

STANZA III Continued.

3. "DARKNESS" RADIATES LIGht, and light DROPS ONE SOLITARY RAY INTO THE WATERS, INTO THE MOTHER DEEP. THE RAY SHOOTS THROUGH THE VIRGIN-EGG; THE RAY CAUSES THE ETERNAL EGG TO THRILL, AND DROP THE NON-ETERNAL (periodical) GERM, WHICH CONDENSES INTO THE WORLD EGG (a).

(a) The solitary ray dropping into the mother deep may be taken as meaning Divine Thought or Intelligence, impregnating chaos. This, however, occurs on the plane of metaphysical abstraction, or rather the plane whereon that which we call a metaphysical abstraction is a reality. The Virgin-egg being in one sense abstract Egg-ness, or the power of becoming developed through fecundation, is eternal and for ever the same. And just as the fecundation of an egg takes place before it is dropped; so the non-eternal periodical germ which becomes later in symbolism the mundane egg, contains in itself, when it emerges.

from the said symbol, "the promise and potency" of all the Universe. Though the idea per se is, of course, an abstraction, a symbolical mode of expression, it is a symbol truly, as it suggests the idea of infinity as an endless circle. It brings before the mind's eye the picture of Kosmos emerging from and in boundless space, a Universe as shoreless in magnitude if not as endless in its objective manifestation. The simile of an egg also expresses the fact taught in Occultism that the primordial form of everything manifested, from atom to globe, from man to angel, is spheroidal, the sphere having been with all nations the emblem of eternity and infinity-a serpent swallowing its tail. To realize the meaning, however, the sphere must be thought of as seen from its center. The field of vision or of thought is like a sphere whose radii proceed from one's self in every direction, and extend out into space, opening up boundless vistas all around. It is the symbolical circle of Pascal and the Kabalists, "whose center is everywhere and circumference nowhere," a conception which enters into the compound idea of this emblem.

91

The "Mundane Egg" is, perhaps, one of the most universally adopted symbols, highly suggestive as it is, equally in the spiritual, physiological, and cosmological sense. Therefore, it is found in every world-theogony, where it is largely associated with the serpent symbol; the latter being everywhere, in philosophy as in religious symbolism, an emblem of eternity, infinitude, regeneration, and rejuvenation, as well as of wisdom. The mystery of apparent self-generation and evolution through its own creative power repeating in miniature the process of Cosmic evolution in the egg, both being due to heat and moisture under the efflux of the unseen creative spirit, justified fully the selection of this graphic symbol. The "Virgin Egg" is the microcosmic symbol of the macrocosmic prototype- the "Virgin Mother"- Chaos or the Primeval Deep. The male Creator (under whatever name) springs forth from the Virgin female, the immaculate root fructified by the Ray. Who, if versed in astronomy and natural sciences, can fail to see its suggestiveness? Cosmos as receptive Nature is an Egg fructified yet left immaculate; once regarded as boundless, it could have no other representation than a spheroid. The Golden Egg was surrounded by seven natural elements (ether, fire, air, water), "four

91. See Part II, § x, "Tree and Serpent and Crocodile Worship."