object:BOOK II. -- PART I. ANTHROPOGENESIS.
book class:The Secret Doctrine
class:chapter
on which to hang their one-sided theories
and opinions -- have too profound a signification, and their bearing upon our Humanity is too
important to suffer dismissal in a few words. Meanwhile, we have to consider the meaning of that
other statement which mentions (verse 48) the first divine Kings, who are said to have "redescended,"
guided and instructed our Fifth Race after the last deluge!
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 354 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
We shall consider this last claim historically in the sections that follow, but must end with a few more
details on the subject of "Serpents."
The rough commentaries on the Archaic Stanzas have to end here. Further elucidation requires proofs
obtained from ancient, mediaeval, and modern works that have treated of these subjects. All such
evidence has now to be gathered in, collated and brought together in better order, so as to compel the
attention of the reader to this wealth of historical proofs. And as the manifold meaning of the weird
symbol -- so often referred to and suggestive of the "tempter of man" in the orthodox light of the
church -- can never be too strongly insisted upon, it seems more advisable to exhaust the subject by
every available proof at this juncture, even at the risk of repetition. The Titans and Kabirs have been
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-21.htm (3 von 26) [06.05.2003 03:36:05]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, part 1, stanza 12
invariably made out by our theologians and some pious symbologists as indissolubly connected with
the grotesque personage called devil, and every proof to the contrary has been hitherto as invariably
rejected and ignored; therefore, the occultist must neglect nothing which may tend to defeat this
conspiracy of slander. It is proposed to divide the subjects involved in these three last verses into
several groups, and examine them in this final chapter as carefully and as fully as space permits. A few
more details may thus be added to the general evidences of antiquity, on the most disputed tenets of
Occultism and the Esoteric Doctrine -- the bulk of which will be found in Part II. on Symbology. ------SERPENTS AND DRAGONS UNDER DIFFERENT SYMBOLISMS.
The name of the Dragon in Chaldea was not written phonetically, but was represented by two
monograms, probably meaning, according to the Orientalists, "the scaly one." "This description," very
pertinently remarks G. Smith, "of course might apply either to a fabulous dragon, a serpent, or a fish,"
and we may add: "It applies in one case to Makara, the tenth Zodiacal sign, meaning in Sanskrit a nondescript amphibious animal, generally called Crocodile, and really signifying something else. (Vide
Part II., "The Mysteries of the Hebdomad.") This, then, is a virtual admission that the Assyriologists, at
all events, know nothing certain as to the status of the "Dragon" in ancient Chaldea, whence the
Hebrews got their symbolism, only to be afterwards robbed of it by the Christians, who made of the
"Scaly one" a living entity and a maleficent power.
A specimen of Dragons, "winged and scaled," may be seen in the British Museum. Representing the
events of the Fall according to the same authority, there are also two figures sitting on each side of a
tree, and holding out their hands to the "apple," while at the back of the "Tree"
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 355 THE NAASENIAN GNOSTICS.
is the Dragon-Serpent. Esoterically, the two figures are two "Chaldees" ready for initiation, the Serpent
symbolising the "Initiator"; while the jealous gods, who curse the three, are the exoteric profane
clergy. Not much of the literal "Biblical event" there, as any occultist can see.
"The Great Dragon has respect but for the Serpents of Wisdom," says the Stanza; thus proving the
correctness of our explanation of the two figures and the "Serpent."
"The Serpents who redescended . . . . who taught and instructed" the Fifth Race. What sane man is
capable of believing in our day that real serpents are hereby meant? Hence the rough guess, now
become almost an axiom with the men of science, that those who wrote in antiquity upon various
sacred Dragons and Serpents either were superstitious and credulous people, or were bent upon
deceiving those more ignorant than themselves. Yet, from Homer downwards, the term implied
something hidden from the profane.
"Terrible are the gods when they manifest themselves" -- those gods whom men call Dragons. And
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-21.htm (4 von 26) [06.05.2003 03:36:05]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, part 1, stanza 12
AElianus, treating in his "De Natura Animalium" of these Ophidean symbols, makes certain remarks
which show that he understood well the nature of this most ancient of symbols. Thus he most
pertinently explains with regard to the above Homeric verse -- "For the Dragon, while sacred and to be
worshipped, has within himself something still more of the divine nature of which it is better (for
others?) to remain in ignorance" (Book xi., ch. 17).
This "Dragon" having a septenary meaning, the highest and the lowest may be given. The former is
identical with the "Self-born," the Logos (the Hindu Aja). He was the second person of the Trinity, the
SON, with the Christian Gnostics called the Naasenians, or Serpent-Worshippers. His symbol was the
constellation of the Dragon.* Its seven "stars" are the seven stars held in the hand of the "Alpha and
Omega" in Revelation. In its most terrestrial meaning, the term "Dragon" was applied to the Wise men.
This portion of the religious symbolism of antiquity is very abstruse and mysterious, and may remain
incomprehensible to the profane. In our modern day it so jars on the Christian ear that it can hardly
escape, all civilization notwithstanding, being regarded as a direct denunciation of the most cherished
Christian dogmas, the subject of which required, to do it justice, the pen and genius of Milton, whose
poetical fiction has now taken root in the Church as a revealed dogma.
Did the allegory of the Dragon and his supposed conqueror in
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* As shown by H. Lizeray in the "Trinite Chretienne Devoilee" -- placed between the immutable
Father (the Pole, a fixed Point) and mutable matter, the Dragon transmits to the latter the influences
received by him from the Pole, whence his name -- the Verbum.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 356 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
Heaven originate with St. John, and in his Revelation? Emphatically we answer -- No. His "Dragon" is
Neptune, the symbol of Atlantean magic.
To demonstrate the negation the reader is asked to examine the symbolism of the Serpent or the
Dragon under its several aspects. ------THE SIDEREAL AND COSMIC GLYPHS.
Every astronomer -- besides Occultists and Astrologers -- knows that, figuratively, the astral light, the
milky way, and also the path of the Sun to the tropics of Cancer and Capricorn, as well as the circles of
the Sidereal or Tropical year, were always called "Serpents" in the allegorical and mystic phraseology
of the adepts.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-21.htm (5 von 26) [06.05.2003 03:36:05]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, part 1, stanza 12
This, cosmically, as well as metaphorically. Poseidon is a "Dragon": "Chozzar, called by the profane
Neptune" (Peratae Gnostics); the "Good and Perfect Serpent," the Messiah of the Naaseni, whose
symbol in Heaven is Draco.
But one ought to discriminate between the characters of this symbol. For instance: Zoroastrian
Esotericism is identical with that of the Secret Doctrine; and when, as an example, we read in the
Vendidad complaints uttered against the "Serpent," whose bites have transformed the beautiful, eternal
spring of Airyana-Vaego, changing it into winter, generating disease and death, at the same time as
mental and psychic consumption, every occultist knows that the Serpent alluded to is the north pole, as
also the pole of the heavens.* The latter produces the seasons according to the angle at which it
penetrates the centre of the earth. The two axes were no more parallel; hence the eternal spring of
Airyana Vaego by the good river Daitya had disappeared, and "the Aryan Magi had to emigrate to
Sagdiani" -- say the exoteric accounts. But the esoteric teaching states that the pole had passed through
the equator, and that the "land of bliss" of the Fourth Race, its inheritance from the Third, had now
become the region of desolation and woe. This alone ought to be an incontrovertible proof of the great
antiquity of the Zoroastrian Scriptures. The Neo-Aryans of the post-diluvian age could, of course,
hardly recognise the mountains, on the summits of which their forefa thers had met before the Flood,
and conversed with the pure "Yazathas" (celestial Spirits of the Elements), whose life and food they
had once shared. As shown by Eckstein (Revue Archeologique, 8th year, 1885), "the Vendidad seems
to point out a great change in the atmosphere of central Asia; strong volcanic eruptions and the
collapse of a whole range of mountains in the neighbourhood of the Kara-Korum chain."
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Symbolized by the Egyptians under the form of a Serpent with a hawk's head.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 357 THE TWO MYSTIC POLES.
The Egyptians, according to Eusebius, who for once (and for a wonder) wrote the truth, symbolised
Kosmos by a large fiery circle, representing a serpent with a hawk's head lying across its diameter.
"Here we have the pole of the earth within the plane of the ecliptic, attended with all the fiery
consequences that must arise from such a state of the heavens: when the whole Zodiac in 25,000 (odd)
years, must have reddened with the solar blaze, and each sign must have been vertical to the polar
region." (See Mackey's "Sphinxiad.")
Meru -- the abode of the gods -- was placed, as before explained, in the North Pole, while Patala, the
nether region, was supposed to lie in the South. As each symbol in esoteric philosophy has seven keys,
geographically, Meru and Patala have one significance and represent localities; while astronomically,
they have another, and mean "the two poles," which meanings ended by their being often rendered in
exoteric sectarianism -- the "Mountain" and the "Pit," or Heaven and Hell. If we hold at present only to
the astronomical and geographical significance, it may be found that the ancients knew the topography
and nature of the Arctic and Antarctic regions better than any of our modern astronomers; they had
reasons, and good ones for naming one the "Mountain" and the other the "Pit." As the author just
quoted half explains, Helion and Acheron meant nearly the same: "Heli-on is the Sun in the highest"
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-21.htm (6 von 26) [06.05.2003 03:36:05]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, part 1, stanza 12
(Helios, Heli-on, the "most high"); "and Acheron is 32 deg. above the pole, and 32 below it, the
allegorical river being thus supposed to touch the northern horizon in the latitude of 32 degrees. The
vast concave, that is for ever hidden from our sight and which surrounded the southern pole, being
therefore called the PIT, while observing, toward the Northern pole that a certain circuit in the heavens
always appeared above the horizon -- they called it the Mountain. As Meru is the high abode of the
Gods, these were said to ascend and descend periodically; by which (astronomically) the Zodiacal
gods were meant, the passing of the original North Pole of the Earth to the South Pole of the heaven."
"In that age," adds the author of that curious work, the "Sphinxiad" and of "Urania's Key to the
Revelations" -- "at noon, the ecliptic would be parallel with the meridian, and part of the Zodiac would
descend from the North Pole to the north horizon; crossing the eight coils of the Serpent (eight sidereal
years, or over 200,000 solar years), which would seem like an imaginary ladder with eight staves
reaching from the earth up to the pole, i.e., the throne of Jove. Up this ladder, then, the Gods, i.e., the
signs of the Zodiac, ascended and descended. (Jacob's ladder and the angels) . . . . It is more than
400,000 years since the Zodiac formed the sides of this ladder." . . . .
This is an ingenious explanation, even if it is not altogether free from occult heresy. Yet it is nearer the
truth than many of a more scientific
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 358 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
and especially theological character. As just said, the Christian trinity was purely astronomical from its
beginning, which made Rutilius say -- of those who euhemerized it -- "Judaea gens, radix stultorum."
But the profane, and especially the Christian fanatics, ever in search of scientific corroboration for
their dead-letter texts, will persist in seeing in the celestial pole the true Serpent of Genesis, Satan, the
Enemy of mankind, instead of what it is -- a cosmic metaphor. When the gods are said to forsake the
earth, it does not only mean the gods, protectors and instructors, but also the minor gods -- the regents
of the Zodiacal signs. Yet, the former, as actual and existing Entities which gave birth to, nursed, and
instructed mankind in its early youth, appear in every Scripture, in that of the Zoroastrians as much as
in the Hindu Gospels. Ormazd, or Ahura-Mazda, the "Lord of Wisdom," is the synthesis of the
Amshaspends (or Amesha-Spenta -- "Immortal Benefactors"),* the "Word," however, or the Logos and
its six highest aspects in Mazdyanism. These "Immortal Benefactors" are described in Zamyad yasht as
the "Amesha-Spentas, the shining, having efficacious eyes, great, helpful . . . . imperishable and pure
which are all seven of like mind, like speech, all seven doing alike . . . . which are the creators and
destroyers of the creatures of Ahura-Mazda, their creators and overseers, their protectors and rulers . .
. ."
These few lines alone indicate the dual and even the triple character of the Amshaspends, our DhyanChohans or the "Serpents of Wisdom." They are identical with, and yet separate from Ormazd (AhuraMazda). They are also the Angels of the Stars of the Christians -- the Stary-azatas of the Zoroastrians -or again the seven planets (including the sun) of every religion.** The epithet -- "the shining having
efficacious eyes" -- proves it. This on the physical and sidereal planes. On the spiritual, they are the
divine powers of Ahura-Mazda; but on the astral or psychic plane again, they are the "Builders," the
"watchers," the Pitar (fathers), and the first Preceptors of mankind.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-21.htm (7 von 26) [06.05.2003 03:36:05]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, part 1, stanza 12
When mortals shall have become sufficiently spiritualised, there will be no more need of forcing them
into a correct comprehension of ancient Wisdom. Men will know then, that there never yet was a great
World-reformer, whose name has passed into our generation, who (a) was not a direct emanation of
the LOGOS (under whatever name known to us), i.e., an essential incarnation of one of "the seven," of
the "divine Spirit who is sevenfold"; and (b) who had not appeared before, during the
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Also translated as "blissful Immortals" by Dr. W. Geiger; but the first is more correct.
** These "seven" became the eight, the Ogdoad, of the later materialized religions, the seventh, or the
highest principle, being no longer the pervading Spirit, the Synthesis, but becoming an
anthropomorphic number, or additional unit.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 359 GOD AND NATURE ANTHROPOMORPHIZED.
past Cycles. They will recognise, then, the cause which produces in history and chronology certain
riddles of the ages; the reason why, for instance, it is impossible for them to assign any reliable date to
Zoroaster, who is found multiplied by twelve and fourteen in the Dabistan; why the Rishis and Manus
are so mixed up in their numbers and individualities; why Krishna and Buddha speak of themselves as
re-incarnations, i.e., Krishna is identified with the Rishi Narayana, and Gautama gives a series of his
previous births; and why the former, especially, being "the very supreme Brahma," is yet called
Amsamsavatara -- "a part of a part" only of the Supreme on Earth. Finally, why Osiris is a great God,
and at the same time a "prince on Earth," who reappears in Thoth-Hermes, and why Jesus (in Hebrew,
Joshua) of Nazareth is recognised, cabalistically, in Joshua, the Son of Nun, as well as in other
personages. The esoteric doctrine explains it by saying that each of these (as many others) had first
appeared on earth as one of the seven powers of the LOGOS, individualized as a God or "Angel"
(messenger); then, mixed with matter, they had re-appeared in turn as great sages and instructors who
"taught the Fifth Race," after having instructed the two preceding races, had ruled during the Divine
Dynasties, and had finally sacrificed themselves, to be reborn under various circumstances for the
good of mankind, and for its salvation at certain critical periods; until in their last incarnations they had
become truly only "the parts of a part" on earth, though de facto the One Supreme in Nature.
This is the metaphysics of Theogony. And, as every "Power" among the SEVEN has (once
individualized) in his charge one of the elements of creation, and rules over it,* hence the many
meanings in every symbol, which, unless interpreted according to the esoteric methods, generally lead
to an inextricable confusion.
Does the Western Kabalist -- generally an opponent of the Eastern Occultist -- require a proof? Let
him open Eliphas Levi's Histoire de la Magic," p. 53, and carefully examine his "Grand Symbole
Kabalistique" of the Zohar. He will find, on the engraving given, a white man standing erect and a
black woman upside down, i.e., standing on her head, her legs passing under the extended arms of the
male figure, and protruding behind his shoulders, while their hands join at an angle on each side.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-21.htm (8 von 26) [06.05.2003 03:36:05]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, part 1, stanza 12
Eliphas Levi makes of it, God and Nature; or God, "light," mirrored inversely in "Nature and Matter,"
darkness. Kabalistically and symbolically he is right; but only so far as emblematical cosmogony goes.
Nor has he invented the symbol any more
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* These elements are: -- The cosmic, the terrene, the mineral, the vegetable, the animal, the aqueous,
and finally the human -- in their physical, spiritual, and psychic aspects.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 360 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
than the Kabalists have: the two figures in white and black stone have existed in the temples of Egypt
from time immemorial -- agreeably to tradition; and historically -- ever since the day of King
Cambyses, who personally saw them. Therefore the symbol must have been in existence since nearly
2,500 years ago. This, at the very least, for that Persian sovereign, who was a son of Cyrus the Great,
succeeded his father in the year 529 B.C. These figures were the two Kabiri personifying the opposite
poles. Herodotus (Thalia, No. 77) tells posterity that when Cambyses entered the temple of the
Kabirim, he went into an inextinguishable fit of laughter, on perceiving what he thought a man erect
and a woman standing on the top of her head before him. These were the poles, however, whose
symbol was intended to commemorate "the passing of the original North Pole of the Earth to the South
Pole of the Heaven," as perceived by Mackey.* But they represented also the poles inverted, in
consequence of the great inclination of the axis, bringing each time as a result the displacement of the
Oceans, the submersion of the polar lands, and the consequent upheaval of new continents in the
equatorial regions, and vice versa. These Kabirim were the "Deluge" gods.
This may help us to get at the key of the seemingly hopeless confusion among the numbers of names
and titles given to one and the same gods, and classes of gods. Faber showed already, at the beginning
of this century, the identity of the Corybantes, Curetes, Dioscuri, Anactes, Dii Magni, Idei Dactyli,
Lares, Penates, Manes,** Titans, and Aletae with the KABIRI. And we have shown that the latter
were the same as the Manus, the Rishis and our Dhyan Chohans, who incarnated in the Elect of the
Third and Fourth Races. Thus, while in Theogony the Kabiri-Titans were seven great gods: cosmically
and astronomically the Titans were called Atlantes, because, perhaps, as Faber says, they were
connected
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Who adds that the Egyptians had various ways of representing the angles of the Poles. Also in
Perry's View of the Levant there is "a figure representing the South Pole of the Earth in the
constellation of the Harp," in which the poles appear like two straight rods, surmounted with hawks'
wings, but they were also often represented as serpents with heads of hawks, one at each end.
** Faber and Bishop Cumberl and would make them all the later pagan personifications, as the former
writer has it, of "the Noetic Ark, and no other than the Patriarch (Noah) and his family" (!) See his
"Kabiri," Vol. I., 136; because, we are told, "after the Deluge in commemoration of the event, the
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-21.htm (9 von 26) [06.05.2003 03:36:05]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, part 1, stanza 12
pious Noachidae had established a religious festival, which was, later on, corrupted by their impious
descendants; demons or hero-gods; and at length unblushing obscenity usurped the name and garb of
religion" (Vol. I., p. 10.). Now this is indeed putting an extinguisher upon the human reasoning powers,
not only of antiquity, but even of our present generations. Reverse the statement, and explain after the
words "Noah and his family" that what is meant by that patriarch and family is simply the Jewish
version of a Samothracian mystery, of Saturn, or Kronos-Sadic and his Sons, and then we may say
Amen.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 361 WHO WERE ENOCH AND THE OTHERS?
(a) with At-al-as "the divine Sun," and (b) with tit "the deluge." But this, if true, is only the exoteric
version. Esoterically, the meaning of their symbols depends on the appellation, or title, used. The
seven mysterious, awe-inspiring great gods -- the Dioscuri,* the deities surrounded with the darkness
of occult nature -- become the Idei (or Idaeic finger) with the adept-healer by metals. The true
etymology of the name lares (now signifying "ghosts") must be sought in the Etruscan word "lars,"
"conductor," "leader." Sanchoniathon translates the word Aletae as fire worshippers, and Tabor
believes it derived from Al-Orit, "the god of fire." Both are right, as in both cases it is a reference to
the Sun (the highest God), toward whom the planetary gods "gravitate" (astronomically and
allegorically) and whom they worship. As Lares, they are truly the Solar Deities, though Faber's
etymology, who says that "lar" is a contraction of "El-Ar," the solar deity, is not very correct. They are
the "lares," the conductors and leaders of men. As Aletae, they were the seven planets -astronomically; and as Lares, the regents of the same, our protectors and rulers -- mystically. For
purposes of exoteric or phallic worship, as also cosmically, they were the Kabiri, their attri butes being
recognised in these two capacities by the name of the temples to which they respectively belonged, and
those of their priests. They all belonged, however, to the Septenary creative and informing groups of
Dhyan Chohans. The Sabeans, who worshipped the "regents of the Seven planets" as the Hindus do
their Rishis, held Seth and his son Hermes (Enoch or Enos) as the highest among the planetary gods.
Seth and Enos were borrowed from the Sabeans and then disfigured by the Jews (exoterically); but the
truth can still be traced about them even in Genesis.** Seth is the "progenitor" of those early men of
the Third Race in whom the "Planetary" angels had incarnated -- a Dhyan Chohan himself, who
belonged to the informing gods; and Enos (Hanoch or Enoch) or Hermes, was said to be his son -because it was a generic name for all the early Seers ("Enoichion"). Thence the worship. The Arabic
writer Soyuti says that the earliest records mention Seth, or Set, as the founder of Sabeanism; and
therefore that the pyramids which embody the planetary system were regarded as the place of
sepulchre of both Seth and Idris (Hermes or Enoch), (See Vyse, "Operations," Vol. II., p. 358); that
thither Sabeans proceeded
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Who became later on, with the Greeks, limited only to Castor and Pollux. But in the days of
Lemuria, the Dioscuri, the "Egg-born," were the Seven Dhyan Chohans (Agnishwatta-Kumara) who
incarnated in the Seven Elect of the Third Race.
** Clement of Alexandria recognized the astronomical significance of chapter xxv. et seq. of Exodus.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-21.htm (10 von 26) [06.05.2003 03:36:05]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, part 1, stanza 12
According to the Mosaic doctrine, he says that the seven planets help in the generation of terrestrial
things. The two cherubs standing on the two sides of the sacred tetragrammaton represent the Ursa
Major and Ursa Minor.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 362 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
on pilgrimage, and chanted prayers seven times a day, turning to the North (the Mount Meru, Kaph,
Olympus, etc., etc.) (See Palgrave, Vol. II., p. 264). Abd Allatif says curious things about the Sabeans
and their books. So does Eddin Ahmed Ben Yahya, who wrote 200 years later. While the latter
maintains "that each pyramid was consecrated to a star" (a star regent rather), Abd Allatif assures us
"that he had read in Sabean books that one pyramid was the tomb of Agathodaemon and the other of
Hermes" (Vyse, Vol. II., p. 342). "Agathodaemon was none other than Seth, and, according to some
writers, Hermes was his son," adds Mr. Stanil and Wake in "The Great Pyramid," p. 57.
Thus, while in Samothrace and the oldest Egyptian temples they were the great Cosmic Gods (the
seven and the forty-nine Sacred Fires), in the Grecian fanes their rites became mostly phallic, therefore
to the profane, obscene. In the latter case they were 3 and 4, or 7 -- the male and female principles -(the crux ansata); this division showing why some classical writers held that they were only three,
while others named four. And these were -- the Kabiri -- Axieros (in his female aspect, Demeter); AxioKersa (Persephone)*; Axiokersos (Pluto or Hades); and Kadmos or Kadmilos (Hermes -- not the
ithyphallic Hermes mentioned by Herodotus (II. 51) but "he of the sacred legend," explained only
during the Samothracian mysteries). This identification, due, according to the Scholiast Apollon (Rh. I.
217), to an indiscretion of Mnaseas, is none at all, as names alone do not reveal much. There were still
others again who maintained, being as right in their way, that there were only two Kabiri. These were,
esoterically, the two Dioscuri, Castor and Pollux, and exoterically, Jupiter and Bacchus. The two
personified the terrestrial poles, geodesically; the terrestrial, and the pole of the heavens -astronomically, as also the physical and the spiritual man. The story of Semele and Jupiter and the
birth of Bacchus, the Bimater, with all the circumstances attending it, needs only to be read
esoterically to understand the allegory. The parts played in the event by the fire, water, earth, etc., in
the many versions, will show how "the father of the gods"
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* It is a curious idea -- yet one not very far from the truth, perhaps -- that speculation of Mackey, the
self-made Adept of Norwich, found in his "Mythological Astronomy." He says that the Kabiri named
Axieros and Axiokersa derived their names (a) from Kab or Cab, a measure, and from Urim, the
heavens: the Kabirim being thus "a measure of the heavens"; and (b) that their distinctive names,
implying the principle of generation, referred to the sexes. For, "the word sex was formerly understood
by aix; which has now settled . . . . into sex." And he refers to "Encyclopaedia Londinus" at the word
"aspiration." Now if we give the aspirated sound to Axieros, it would be Saxieros; and the other pole
would be Saxiokersa. The two poles would thus become the generators of the other powers of nature -they would be the parents: therefore the most powerful gods.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-21.htm (11 von 26) [06.05.2003 03:36:05]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, part 1, stanza 12
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 363 THE POLES, THE "HEAVENLY MEASURE."
and the "merry God of the wine" were also made to personify the two terrestrial Poles. The telluric,
metalline, magnetic, electric and the fiery elements are all so many allusions and references to the
cosmic and astronomic character of the diluvian tragedy. In astronomy, the poles are indeed the
"heavenly measure" (vide note supra); and so are the Kabiri Dioscuri, as will be shown, and the KabiriTitans, to whom Diodorus ascribes the invention of fire* and the art of manufacturing iron. Moreover,
Pausanias shows that the original Kabiric deity was Prometheus. (I. ix. p. 751.)
But the fact that, astronomically, the Titans-Kabirim were also the generators and regulators of the
seasons, and cosmically the great Volcanic Energies, the gods presiding over all the metals and
terrestrial works, does not prevent them from being, in their original divine characters, the beneficent
Entities who, symbolized in Prometheus, brought light to the world, and endowed humanity with
intellect and reason. They are pre-eminently in every theogony -- especially in the Hindu -- the sacred
divine fires, 3, 7, or 49, according as the allegory demands it. Their very names prove it, as they are the
Agni-putra (Sons of the Fire) in India, and the genii of the fire under numerous names in Greece and
elsewhere. Welcker, Maury, and now Decharme, show the name Kabeiron meaning "the powerful
through fire," from the Greek word [[kaio]] "to burn." The Semitic Kabirim, "the powerful, the
mighty, and the great," answering to the Greek [[megaloi dunatoi]], are later epithets. They were
universally worshipped, and their origin is lost in the night of time. Yet whether propitiated in Phrygia,
Phoenicia, the Troad, Thrace, Egypt, Lemnos or Sicily, their cult was always connected with fire; their
temples ever built in the most volcanic localities, and in exoteric worship they belonged to Chthonian
divinities. Therefore Christianity has made of them infernal gods.
They are truly "the great, beneficent and powerful Gods," as Cassius Hermone calls them (See
Macrob. Sat. I., iii., c. 4, p. 376). At Thebes, Kore and Demeter, the Kabirim, had a sanctuary (Pausan.
IX. 22; 5), and at Memphis, the Kabiri had a temple so sacred, that none, excepting the priests, were
suffered to enter their holy precincts (Herodotus I. ii., c. 37). But we must not lose sight, at the same
time, of the fact that the title of Kabiri was a generic one; that the Kabiri (the mighty gods as well as
mortals), were of both sexes, as also terrestrial, celestial and kosmic. That, while in their later capacity
of the Rulers of sidereal and terrestrial powers, a purely geological phenomenon (as it is now
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* The word "guebra" comes from Kabiri, gabiri, and means Persian ancient fire-worshippers, or Parsis.
Kabiri became gabiri and then remained as an appellation of the Zoroastrians in Persia. (See Hyde's
"De Religio Persarum," cap. 29.)
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 364 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
regarded) was symbolized in the persons of those rulers, they were also, in the beginning of times, the
rulers of mankind. When incarnated as Kings of the "divine Dynasties," they gave the first impulse to
civilizations, and directed the mind with which they had endued men to the invention and perfection of
all the arts and sciences. Thus the Kabiri are said to have appeared as the benefactors of men, and as
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-21.htm (12 von 26) [06.05.2003 03:36:05]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, part 1, stanza 12
such they lived for ages in the memory of nations. To them -- the Kabiri or Titans -- is ascribed the
invention of letters (the Devanagari, or the alphabet and language of the gods), of laws and legislature;
of architecture, as of the various modes of magic, so-called; and of the medical use of plants. Hermes,
Orpheus, Cadmus, Asclepius, all those demi-gods and heroes, to whom is ascribed the revelation of
sciences to men, and in whom Bryant, Faber, Bishop Cumberland, and so many other Christian writers
-- too zealous for plain truth --would force posterity to see only pagan copies of one and sole
prototype, named Noah -- are all generic names.
It is the Kabiri who are credited with having revealed, by producing corn or wheat, the great boon of
agriculture. What Isis-Osiris, the once living Kabiria, has done in Egypt, that Ceres is said to have
done in Sicily; they all belong to one class.
That the Serpents were ever the emblems of wisdom and prudence is again shown by the caduceus of
Mercury, one with Thot, the god of wisdom, with Hermes, and so on. The two serpents, entwined
around the rod, are phallic symbols of Jupiter and other gods who transformed themselves into snakes
for purposes of seducing goddesses -- but only in the unclean fancies of profane symbologists. The
serpent has ever been the symbol of the adept, and of his powers of immortality and divine knowledge.
Mercury in his psychopompic character, conducting and guiding with the caduceus the souls of the
dead to Hades and even raising the dead to life with it, is simply a very transparent allegory. It shows
the dual power of the Secret Wisdom: the black and the white magic. It shows this personified Wisdom
guiding the Soul after death, and its power to call to life that which is dead -- a very deep metaphor if
one thinks over its meaning. Every people of antiquity reverenced this symbol, with the exception of
Christians, who chose to forget the brazen Serpent of Moses, and even the implied acknowledgment of
the great wisdom and prudence of the Serpent by Jesus himself, "Be ye wise as serpents and harmless
as doves." The Chinese, one of the oldest nations of our Fifth Race, made of it the emblem of their
Emperors, who are thus the degenerate successors of the "Serpents" or Initiates, who ruled the early
races of the Fifth Humanity. The Emperor's throne is the "Dragon's Seat," and his dresses of State are
embroidered with the likeness of the
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 365 THE VARIOUS NOAHS.
Dragon. The aphorisms in the oldest books of China, moreover, say plainly that the "Dragon" is a
human, albeit divine, Being. Speaking of the "Yellow Dragon," the chief of the others, the Twan-yingt'u, says: "His wisdom and virtue are unfathomable . . . he does not go in company and does not live in
herds (he is an ascetic). He wanders in the wilds beyond the heavens. He goes and comes, fulfilling the
decree (Karma); at the proper seasons if there is perfection he comes forth, if not he remains
(invisible).". . . And Kon-fu-tyu is made to say by Lu-lan, "The Dragon feeds in the pure water of
Wisdom and sports in the clear waters of Life." ------OUR DIVINE INSTRUCTORS.
Now Atlantis and the Phlegyan isle are not the only record that is left of the deluge. China has also her
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-21.htm (13 von 26) [06.05.2003 03:36:05]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, part 1, stanza 12
tradition and the story of an island or continent, which it calls Ma-li-ga-si-ma, and which Kaempfer
and Faber spell "Maurigosima," for some mysterious phonetic reasons of their own. Kaempfer, in his
"Japan" (Appendix, p. 13), gives the tradition: The island, owing to the iniquity of its giants, sinks to
the bottom of the ocean, and Peiru-un, the king, the Chinese Noah, escapes alone with his family
owing to a warning of the gods through two idols. It is that pious prince and his descendants who have
peopled China. The Chinese traditions speak of the divine dynasties of Kings as much as those of any
other nations.
At the same time there is not an old fragment but shows belief in a multiform and even multigeneric
evolution -- spiritual, psychic, intellectual and physical -- of human beings, just as given in the present
work. A few of these claims have now to be considered.
Our races -- they all show -- have sprung from divine races, by whatever name they are called.
Whether we deal with the Indian Rishis or Pitris; with the Chinese Chim-nang and Tchan-gy -- their
"divine man" and demi-gods; with the Akkadian Dingir and Mul-lil -- the creative god and the "Gods
of the ghost-world"; with the Egyptian Isis-Osiris and Thot; with the Hebrew Elohim, or again with
Manco Capac and his Peruvian progeny -- the story varies nowhere. Every nation has Amshaspends*
(six exoterically), ten and seven Chaldean Anedots,
[[Footnote continued]]--------------------------------* The Amshaspends are six -- if Ormazd, their chief and Logos, is excluded. But in the secret doctrine
he is the seventh and highest, just as Phtah is the seventh Kabir among the Kabiri.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 366 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
ten and seven Sephiroth, etc., etc. One and all have been derived from the primitive Dhyan-Chohans of
the Esoteric doctrine, or the "Builders" of the Stanzas (Book I.). From Manu, Thot-Hermes, OannesDagon, and Edris-Enoch, down to Plato and Panadores, all tell us of seven divine Dynasties, of seven
Lemurian, and seven Atlantean divisions of the Earth; of the seven primitive and dual gods who
descend from their celestial abode* and reign on Earth, teaching mankind Astronomy, Architecture,
and all the other sciences that have come down to us. These Beings appear first as "gods" and
Creators; then they merge in nascent man, to finally emerge as "divine-Kings and Rulers." But this fact
has been gradually forgotten. As Bosuage shows, the Egyptians themselves confessed that science
flourished in their country only since Isis-Osiris, whom they continue to adore as gods, "though they
had become Princes in human form." And he adds of Osiris-Isis (the divine androgyne: -- "It is said
that this Prince (Isis-Osiris) built cities in Egypt, stopped the overflowing of the Nile; invented
agriculture, the use of the vine, music, astronomy, and geometry."
When Abul-Feda says in his "Historia Anteislamitica" (Fleisher, p. 16) that the Sabean language was
established by Seth and Edris (Enoch) -- he means by "Sabean language" astronomy. In the "Melelwa
Nohil" (MS. 47 in Nic. Cat.) Hermes is called the disciple of Agathodaemon. And in another account
(See Col. Vyse's 2nd Vol. of the "Pyramids of Ghizeh," p. 364, MS. 785, Uri's Cat.) Agathodaemon is
mentioned as a "King of Egypt." Celepas Geraldinus gives curious traditions about Henoch. He calls
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-21.htm (14 von 26) [06.05.2003 03:36:05]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, part 1, stanza 12
him the "divine giant." In the "Book of the various names of the Nile," the same author (the historian
Ahmed-Ben-Yusouf Eltiphas) tells us of the belief among the Semitic Arabs that Seth (become later
the Egyptian Typhon, Set), had been one of the seven angels (or Patriarchs in the Bible): then he
became a mortal and Adam's son, after which he communicated the gift of prophecy and astronomical
science to Jared, who passed it to his son Henoch. But Henoch (Idris) "the author of thirty books, was
Sabaean by origin" (i.e., belonging to the Saba, "a Host"); "having established the rites and ceremonies
of primitive worship, he went to the East, where he constructed 140 cities, of which Edessa was the
least important, then returned to Egypt where he became its King." Thus, he is identified with Hermes.
But there were five Hermes -- or rather one, who appeared -- as some Manus and Rishis did -- in
several different characters. In the Burham-i-Kati he is mentioned as "Hormig," a name of the planet
Mercury or Budha; and Wednes[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* In the Purana it is identified with Vishnu's or Brahma's Sveta Dwipa of Mount Meru.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 367 HERMES IN ASTRONOMY AND ELSEWHERE.
day was sacred both to Hermes and Thot. The Hermes of Oriental tradition, worshipped at Phineata
and said to have fled after the death of Argus into Egypt, civilized it under the name of Thoth. But
under whichever of these characters, he is always credited with having transferred all the sciences from
latent to active potency, i.e., with having been the first to teach magic to Egypt and to Greece, before
the days of Magna Graecia, and when the Greeks were not even Hellenes.
Not only Herodotus -- the "father of History" -- tells us of the marvellous dynasties of gods that
preceded the reign of mortals, followed by the dynasties of demi-gods, Heroes, and finally men, but
the whole series of classics support him; Diodorus, Eratos thenes, Plato, Manetho, etc., etc., repeat the
same, and never vary the order given.
"It is, indeed," as Creuzer shows: -"From the spheres of the stars wherein dwell the gods of light that wisdom descends to the inferior
spheres." "In the system of the ancient priests (Hierophants and Adepts) all things without exception,
gods, the genii, manes (souls), the whole world, are conjointly developed in Space and duration. The
pyramid may be considered as the symbol of this magnificent hierarchy of Spirits. . . . "*
There were more efforts made by the modern historians (French Academicians, like Renan, chiefly) to
suppress truth by ignoring the ancient annals of divine Kings, than is strictly consistent with honesty.
But M. Renan could never be more unwilling than was Eratos thenes 260 years B.C. to accept the
unpalatable fact; and yet the latter found himself obliged to recognise its truth. For this, the great
astronomer is treated with great contempt by his colleagues 2,000 years later. Manetho became with
them "a superstitious priest born and bred in the atmosphere of other lying priests of Heliopolis"
(Freret). "All those historians and priests," justly remarks the demonologist, de Mirville, "so veracious
when repeating stories of human kings and men, suddenly become extremely suspicious no sooner do
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-21.htm (15 von 26) [06.05.2003 03:36:05]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, part 1, stanza 12
they go back to their gods." . . . But there is the synchronistic table of Abydos, which, thanks to the
genius of Champollion, has now vindicated the good faith of the priests of Egypt (Manetho's above
all), and that of Ptolemy. In the Turin papyrus, the most remarkable of all, in the words of the
Egyptologist, de Rouge: -". . . Champollion, struck with amazement, found that he had under his own eyes the whole truth. . . . It
was the remains of a list of dynasties embracing the furthest mythoic times, or the REIGN OF THE
GODS AND HEROES. . . . At the very outset of this curious
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Ch. iv. of "Egypt," p. 441.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 368 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
papyrus we have to arrive at the conviction that so far back already as the period of Ramses, those
mythic and heroical traditions were just as Manetho had transmitted them to us; we see figuring in
them, as Kings of Egypt, the gods Seb, Osiris, Horus, Thoth-Hermes, and the goddess Ma, a long
period of centuries being assigned to the reign of each of these." (Ann. de Philologie Chretienne, Vol.
XXXII., p. 442).
The synchronistic tables of Manetho, besides the fact that they were disfigured by Eusebius for
dishonest purposes, had never gone beyond Manetho. The chronology of the divine Kings and
Dynasties, like that of the age of humanity, has ever been in the hands of the priests, and was kept
secret from the profane multitudes.
Africa, as a continent, it is said, appeared before Europe did; nevertheless it appeared later than
Lemuria and even the earliest Atlantis. That the whole region of what is now Egypt and the deserts
was once upon a time covered with the sea, was known firstly through Herodotus, Strabo, Pliny, and
all the Greeks; and, secondly, through geology. Abyssinia was once upon a time an island; and the
Delta was the first country occupied by the pioneer emigrants who came with their gods from the
North-east.
When was it? History is silent upon the subject. Fortunately we have the Dendera Zodiac, the
planisphere on the ceiling of one of the oldest Egyptian temples, which records the fact. This Zodiac,
with its mysterious three Virgos between the Lion and Libra, has found its OEdipus, who understood
the riddle of these signs, and justified the truthfulness of those priests who told Herodotus that: -- (a)
The poles of the Earth and the Ecliptic had formerly coincided; and (b) That even since their first
Zodiacal records were commenced, the Poles have been three times within the plane of the Ecliptic, as
the Initiates taught.
Bailly had not sufficient words at his comm and to express his surprise at the sameness of all such
traditions about the divine races. "What are finally," he exclaims, "all those reigns of Indian Devas and
Persian Peris? . . . . Or, those reigns and dynasties of the Chinese legends; those Tien-hoang or the
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-21.htm (16 von 26) [06.05.2003 03:36:05]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, part 1, stanza 12
Kings of Heaven, quite distinct from the Ti-hoang, the Kings on Earth, and the Gin-hoang the King's
men, a distinction which is in perfect accord with that other one made by the Greeks and the
Egyptians, in enumerating their dynasties of Gods, of demi-gods, and of mortals."*
"Now," says Panadoras, "it is before that time (Menes), that the reign of the seven gods who rule the
world took place. It was during that period that those benefactors of humanity descended on Earth and
taught
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Histoire de l'Astronomie Ancienne.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 369 WHAT THE PRIESTS TOLD HERODOTUS.
men to calculate the course of the sun and moon by the twelve signs of the Ecliptic."
Nearly five hundred years before the actual era, Herodotus was shown by the priests of Egypt the
statues of their human Kings and Pontiffs-piromis (the archi-prophets or Maha-Chohans of the
temples), born one from the other (without the intervention of woman) who had reigned before Menes,
their first human King. These statues, he says, were enormous colossi in wood, three hundred and fortyfive in number, each of which had his name, his history and his annals. And they assured Herodotus*
(unless the most truthful of historians, the "Father of History," is now accused of fibbing, just in this
instance) that no historian could ever understand or write an account of these superhuman Kings,
unless he had studied and learned the history of the three dynasties that preceded the human -- namely,
the DYNASTIES OF THE GODS, that of demi-gods, and of the Heroes, or giants. These "three
dynasties" are the three Races.**
Translated into the language of the Esoteric doctrine, these three dynasties would also be those of the
Devas, of Kimpurushas, and of Danavas and Daityas -- otherwise gods, celestial spirits, and giants or
Titans. "Happy are those who are born, even from the condition of gods, as men, in Bharata-Varsha!"
exclaim the incarnated gods themselves, during the Third Root-Race. Bharata is India, but in this case
it symbolized the chosen land in those days, and was considered the best of the divisions of Jambudwipa, as it was the land of active (spiritual) works par excellence; the land of initiation and of divine
knowledge.
Can one fail to recognise in Creuzer great powers of intuition, when, being almost unacquainted with
the Aryan Hindu philosophies, little known in his day, he wrote: -"We modern Europeans feel surprised when hearing talk of the Spirits of the Sun, Moon,
etc. But we repeat again, the natural good sense and the upright
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* See also Memoires a l'Academie, etc., of de Mirville, Vol. III., for a mass of evidence.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-21.htm (17 von 26) [06.05.2003 03:36:05]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, part 1, stanza 12
** In Vishnu-Purana, Book II., chap. 3, 4, et seq., may be found many corroborations of the same, if
one reads carefully. The reigns of gods, lower gods, and men are all enumerated in the descriptions of
the seven Islands, seven seas, seven mountains, etc., etc., ruled by Kings. Each king is said invariably
to have seven sons, an allusion to the seven sub-races. One instance will do. The King of Kusa dwipa
had seven sons (follow names) . . . "after whom the seven portions (Varsha) of the island were called.
There reside mankind along with Daityas and Danavas, as well as with spirits of Heaven
(Gandharvas, Yakshas, Kimpurushas, etc.) and gods." (Chapter iv.) There is but one exception in the
case of King Priyavrata, the son of the first Manu, Swayambhuva -- who had ten sons. But of these,
three -- Medha, Agnibahu, and Putra -- became ascetics, and refused their portions. Thus Priyavrata
divided the earth again into seven continents.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 370 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
judgment of the ancient peoples, quite foreign to our entirely material ideas upon
celestial mechanics and physical sciences . . . could not see in the stars and planets only
that which we see: namely, simple masses of light, or opaque bodies moving in circuits
in sidereal space, merely according to the laws of attraction or repulsion; but they saw in
them living bodies, animated by spirits as they saw the same in every kingdom of nature.
. . . This doctrine of spirits, so consistent and conformable to nature, from which it was
derived, formed a grand and unique conception, wherein the physical, the moral, and the
political aspects were all blended together . . . " ("Egypte," pp. 450 to 455.)
It is such a conception only that can lead man to form a correct conclusion about his origin and the
genesis of everything in the universe -- of Heaven and Earth, between which he is a living link.
Without such a psychological link, and the feeling of its presence, no science can ever progress, and
the realm of knowledge must be limited to the analysis of physical matter only.
Occultists believe in "spirits," because they feel (and some see) themselves surrounded on every side
by them.* Materialists do not. They live on this earth, just as, in the world of insects and even of
fishes, some creatures live surrounded by myriads of their own genus, without seeing, or so much as
sensing them.**
Plato is the first sage among the classics who speaks at length of the
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* As a general rule, now that the very nature of the inner man has become as blind as his physical
nature, man is situated on this globe as the Amphioxus is in the Ocean. Surrounded by shoals and
millions of various other fishes and creatures that see it, the Amphioxus species --having neither brain
nor any of the senses possessed by the other classes -- sees them not. Who knows whether, on the
Darwinian theory, these "Branchiostoma" are not the direct ancestors of our Materialists.
** The Occultists have been accused of worshipping gods or devils. We deny this. Among the
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-21.htm (18 von 26) [06.05.2003 03:36:05]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, part 1, stanza 12
numberless hosts of spirits -- men that were, and those who will be men -- there are those
immeasurably superior to the human race, higher and holier than the highest Saint on Earth, and wiser
than any mortal without exception. And there are those again who are no better than we are, as some
are far worse and inferior to the lowest savage. It is the latter classes that comm and the readiest
communication with our earth, who perceive and sense us, as the clairvoyants perceive and sense
them. The close proximity of our respective abodes and planes of perception are in favour of such intercommunication unfortunately, as they are ever ready to interfere with our affairs for weal or woe. If we
are asked how it is that none but sensitive hysterical natures, neuro- and psycho-pathic persons see and
occasionally talk with "Spirits," we answer the question by several other queries. We ask: "Do you
know the nature of hallucination, and can you define its psychic process? How can you tell that all
such visions are due merely to physical hallucinations? What makes you feel so sure that mental and
nervous diseases, while drawing a veil over our normal senses (so-called) do not reveal at the same
time vistas unknown to the healthy man, by throwing open doors usually closed against your scientific
perceptions (?): or that a psycho-spiritual faculty does not forthwith replace the loss, or the temporary
atrophy, of a purely physical sense? It is disease, or the exuberance of nervous fluid which produces
mediumship and visions --hallucinations, as you call them. But what does Science know even of
mediumship?" Truly were the [[Footnote continued on next page]]
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 371 A UNIVERSAL CORROBORATION.
divine Dynasties, and locates them on a vast continent which he calls Atlantis. Bailly was not the first
nor last to believe the same, and he had been preceded and anticipated in this theory by Father Kircher.
This learned Jesuit writes in "OEdipus AEgyptiacus" (Vol. I., p. 70): -"I confess, for a long time I had regarded all this (dynasties and the Atlantis) as pure fables (meras
nugas) to the day when, better instructed in Oriental languages, I judged that all those legends must be,
after all, only the development of a great truth. . . . ."
As de Rougemont shows, Theopompus, in his Meropis, made the priests of Phrygia and Asia Minor
speak exactly as the priests of Sais did when they revealed to Solon the history and fate of Atlantis.
According to Theopompus, it was a unique continent of an indefinite size, and containing two
countries inhabited by two races -- a fighting, warrior race, and a pious, meditative race,* which
Theopompus symbolizes by two cities.** The pious "city" was continually visited by the gods; the
belligerent "city" was inhabited by various beings invulnerable to iron, liable to be mortally wounded
only by stone and wood."*** De Rougemont treats this as a pure fiction of Theopompus ("Peuple
Primitif," vol. iii. 157) and even sees a fraud (supercherie) in the assertion of the Saitic priests. This
was denounced by the "Demonologists" as illogical. In the words of De Mirville: -- "A supercherie
which was based on a belief, the product of faith of the whole antiquity; a supposition which yet gave
its name to a whole mountain chain (the Atlas); which specified with the greatest precision a
topographical region (by placing some of its lands at a small distance from Cadiz and the strait of
Calpetus), which prophesied, 2,000 years before Columbus, the great trans-oceanic land situated
beyond that Atlantis and which "is reached" it said -- "by the islands not of the blessed, but of the good
spirits [[eudaimonia]] (our 'Iles Fortunees') -- such a supposition can never be an universal chimera."
(A word on "Atlantis," p. 29.)
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-21.htm (19 von 26) [06.05.2003 03:36:05]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, part 1, stanza 12
It is certain that, whether "chimera" or reality, the priests of the whole world had it from one and the
same source: the universal tradition
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous page]] modern Charcots to pay attention to the delirium of their
patients from a more psychic standpoint, Science, and physiology especially, might be more benefited
than they are now, and truth have a wider field of fact in its knowledge.
* These were the early Aryans and the bulk of the Fourth Root Races -- the former pious and
meditative (yoga-contemplation), the latter -- a fighting race of sorcerers, who were rapidly
degenerating owing to their uncontrolled passions.
** The Northern and Southern Divisions of Lemuria-Atlantis. The Hyperborean and the Equatorial
lands of the two continents. (See Sections about Lemuria and Atlantis in History.)
*** This is Occult and refers to the property of iron which, attracted by magnetic elements, is repelled
by others, which are made, by an occult process, as impervious to it as water to a blow.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 372 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
about the third great continent which perished some 850,000 years ago.* A continent inhabited by two
distinct races; distinct physically and especially morally; both deeply versed in primeval wisdom and
the secrets of nature; mutually antagonistic in their struggle, during the course and progress of their
double evolution. Whence even the Chinese teachings upon the subject, if it is but a fiction? Have they
not recorded the existence once upon a time of a holy island beyond the sun (Tcheou), and beyond
which were situated the lands of the immortal men? (See de Rougemont, ibid.) Do they not still believe
that the remnants of those immortal men -- who survived when the holy island had become black with
sin and perished -- have found refuge in the great desert of Gobi, where they still reside invisible to all,
and defended from approach by hosts of Spirits?
"If one has to lend ear to traditions," writes the very unbelieving Boulanger, ("Regne des Dieux,"
Introduction) . . . "the latter place before the reign of Kings, that of the Heroes and demi-gods; and still
earlier and beyond they place the marvellous reign of the gods and all the fables of the golden age. . . .
One feels surprised that annals so interesting should have been rejected by almost all our historians.
And yet the ideas communicated by them were once universally admitted and revered by all the
peoples; not a few revere them still, making them the basis of their daily life. Such considerations
seem to necessitate a less hurried judgment. . . . The ancients, from whom we hold these traditions,
which we accept no longer because we do not understand them now, must have had motives for
believing in them furnished by their greater proximity to the first ages, and which the distance that
separates us from them refuses to us . . . . Plato in his fourth book of Laws, says that, long before the
construction of the first cities, Saturn had established on earth a certain form of government under
which man was very happy. As it is the golden age he refers to, or to that reign of gods so celebrated in
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-21.htm (20 von 26) [06.05.2003 03:36:05]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, part 1, stanza 12
ancient fables . . . . let us see the ideas he had of that happy age, and what was the occasion he had to
introduce this fable into a treatise on politics. According to Plato, in order to obtain clear and precise
ideas on royalty, its origin and power, one has to turn back to the first principles of history and
tradition. Great changes, he says, have occurred in days of old, in heaven and on earth, and the present
state of things is one of the results (Karma). Our traditions tell us of many marvels, of changes that
have taken place in the course of the Sun, of Saturn's reign, and of a thousand other matters that
remained scattered about in human memory; but one never hears anything of the EVIL which has
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* The first continent, or island, if so preferred, "the cap of the North Pole," has never perished; nor will
it to the end of the Seven Races.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 373 WHEAT BROUGHT DOWN BY THE GODS.
produced those revolutions, nor of the evil which directly followed them. Yet . . . . that Evil is the
principle one has to talk about, to be able to treat of royalty and the origin of power. . . ."
That evil, Plato seems to see in the sameness or consubstantiality of the natures of the rulers and the
ruled, for he says that long before man built his cities, in the golden age, there was naught but
happiness on earth, for there were no needs. Why? Because Saturn, knowing that man could not rule
man, without injustice filling forthwith the universe through his whims and vanity, would not allow
any mortal to obtain power over his fellow creatures. To do this the god used the same means we use
ourselves with regard to our flocks. We do not place a bullock or a ram over our bullocks and rams,
but give them a leader, a shepherd, i.e., a being of a species quite different from their own and of a
superior nature. It is just what Saturn did. He loved mankind and placed to rule over it no mortal King
or prince but -- "Spirits and genii [[daimones]] of a divine nature more excellent than that of man."
It was god, the Logos (the synthesis of the Host) who thus presiding over the genii, became the first
shepherd and leader of men.* When the world had ceased to be so governed and the gods retired,
"ferocious beasts devoured a portion of mankind." "Left to their own resources and industry, inventors
then appeared among them successively and discovered fire, wheat, wine; and public gratitude deified
them . . . ."("De Legibus" 1, iv.; in Crit. and in Politic).
And mankind was right, as fire by friction was the first mystery of nature, the first and chief property
of matter that was revealed to man.
"Fruits and grain, unknown to Earth to that day, were brought by the 'Lords of Wisdom' for the benefit
of those they ruled -- from other lokas (spheres). . . " say the Commentaries. Now: "The earliest
inventions (?) of mankind are the most wonderful that the race has ever made. . . The first use of fire,
and the discovery of the methods by which it can be kindled; the domestication of animals; and, above
all, the processes by which the various cereals were first developed out of some wild grasses (?) -these are all discoveries with which, in ingenuity and in importance, no subsequent discoveries may
compare. They are all unknown to history -- all lost in the light of an EFFULGENT DAWN." ("Unity
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-21.htm (21 von 26) [06.05.2003 03:36:05]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, part 1, stanza 12
of Nature," Argyll.)
This will be doubted and denied in our proud generation. But if it is asserted that there are no grains
and fruits unknown to earth, then we may remind the reader that wheat has never been found in the
wild state: it is not a product of the earth. All the other cereals have been traced to their primogenital
forms in various species of wild grasses, but wheat has
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* The Secret Doctrine explains and expounds that which Plato says, for it teaches that those
"inventors" were gods and demi-gods (Devas and Rishis) who had become -- some deliberately, some
forced to by Karma -- incarnated in man.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 374 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
hitherto defied the efforts of botanists to trace it to its origin. And let us bear in mind, in this
connection, how sacred was that cereal with the Egyptian priests; wheat being placed even with their
mummies, and found thousands of years later in their coffins. Remember: -- "The servants of Horus
glean the wheat in the field of Aanroo. . . . wheat seven cubits high." ("Book of the Dead," chap. xcix.,
33; and clvi., 4.)* The reader is referred to Stanza VII., Verse 3, Book I., wherein this verse is
explained in another of its meanings, and also to the "Book of the Dead," chap. cix., v. 4 and 5.
"I am the Queen of these regions," says the Egyptian Isis; "I was the first to reveal to mortals the
mysteries of wheat and corn. . . . I am she who rises in the constellation of the dog . . . (Dog-star) . . . .
Rejoice, O Egypt! thou who wert my nurse." (Book I., chap. XIV.**
Sirius was called the dog-star. It was the star of Mercury or Budha, called the great instructor of
mankind, before other Buddhas.
The book of the Chinese Y-King, attri butes the discovery of agriculture to "the instruction given to
men by celestial genii."
"Woe, woe to the men who know nought, observe nought, nor will they see. . . . They are all blind***
since they remain ignorant how much the world is full of various and invisible creatures which crowd
even in the most sacred places" (Zohar, Part I., col. 177.)
The "Sons of God" have existed and do exist. From the Hindu Brahmaputras and Manasaputras (Sons
of Brahma and Mind-born sons) down to the B'ne-aleim of the Jewish Bible, the faith of the centuries
and
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* This is a direct reference to the esoteric division of man's principles symbolised by the divine wheat.
The legend which inscribes the third Registrar of the papyrus (Chap. cx. of the "Book of the Dead")
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-21.htm (22 von 26) [06.05.2003 03:36:05]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, part 1, stanza 12
states: "This is the region of the Manes (disembodied men) seven cubits high -- to wit: those just
translated and supposed to be still sevenfold with all their principles, even the body represented
astrally in the Kama-loka or Hades, before their separation . . . . . " and, there is wheat three cubits
high for mummies in a state of perfection" (i.e., those already separated, whose three higher principles
are in Devachan "who are permitted to glean it." This region (Devachan) is called "the land of the rebirth of gods," and shown to be inhabited by Scheo, Tefnant, and Seb. The "region for the manes seven
cubits high," (for the yet imperfect mummies), and the region for those "in a state of perfection" who
"glean wheat three cubits high," is as clear as possible. The Egyptians had the same esoteric
philosophy which is now taught by the cis-Himalayan adepts, who, when buried, have corn and wheat
placed over them.
** There are Egyptologists who have tried to identify Osiris with Menes, which is quite erroneous.
Bunsen assigns to Menes an antiquity of 5867 years B.C., and is denounced for it by Christians. But
"Isis-Osiris" reigned in Egypt before the Dendera Zodiac was painted on the ceiling of that temple, and
that is over 75,000 years ago!
*** In the text, "corked up" or "screwed up."
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 375 "SONS OF GOD" PERFECT AND IMPERFECT.
universal tradition force reason to yield to such evidence. Of what value is independent criticism so
called, or "internal evidence" (based usually on the respective hobbies of the critics), in the face of the
universal testimony, which never varied throughout the historical cycles? Read esoterically the sixth
chapter of Genesis, which repeats the statements of the Secret Doctrine, only changing slightly its
form, and drawing a different conclusion which clashes even with the Zohar. "There were giants in the
earth in those days; and also after that when 'the Sons of God' (b'ne-aleim) "came in unto the daughters
of men, and they bare children to them, the same became mighty men which were of old, men of
renown" (or giants).*
What does this sentence "and also after that" signify unless it means when explained: "There were
giants in the earth BEFORE, i.e., before the sinless sons of the Third Race; and also after that when
other sons of God, lower in nature, inaugurated sexual connection on earth (as Daksha did, when he
saw that his Manasaputras would not people the earth)"? And then comes a long break in this chapter
vi. of Genesis, between verses 4 and 5. For surely, it was not in or through the wickedness of the
"mighty men" . . . . men of renown, among whom is placed Nimrod the "mighty hunter before the
Lord," that "god saw that the wickedness of man was great," nor in the builders of Babel, for this was
after the Deluge; but in the progeny of the giants who produced monstra quaedam de genere giganteo,
monsters from whence sprang the lower races of men, now represented on earth by a few miserable
dying-out tribes and the huge anthropoid apes.
And if we are taken to task by theologians, whether Protestant or Roman Catholic, we have only to
refer them to their own literal texts. The above quoted verse was ever a dilemma, not alone for the men
of science and Biblical scholars, but also for priests. For, as the Rev. Father Peronne puts it: -- "Either
they (the B'ne-aleim) were good angels, and in such case how could they fall? Or they were bad
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-21.htm (23 von 26) [06.05.2003 03:36:05]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, part 1, stanza 12
(angels) and in this case could not be called b'ne-aleim, the "sons of God." (Praelectiones theol. ch. ii.)
This Biblical riddle -- "the real sense of which no author has ever understood," as candidly confessed
by Fourmont** -- can only be explained by the Occult doctrine, through the Zohar to the Western, and
the Book of Dzyan to the Eastern. What the former says we have seen; what the Zohar tells us is this:
B'ne-aleim was a name common to the Malachim (the good Messengers) and to the Ischin ("the lower
angels") (Rabbi Parcha).
We may add for the benefit of the demonologists that their Satan,
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Genesis vi., v. 4.
** Reflections critiques sur l'origine des anciens peuples.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 376 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
"the adversary," is included in Job among the sons of God or b'ne-aleim who visit their father."
(Chapter i.) But of this later on.
Now the Zohar says that the Ischin, the beautiful B'ne-aleim, were not guilty, but mixed themselves
with mortal men because they were sent on earth to do so. (Book of Ruth and Schadash; fol. 63, col. 3;
Amsterdam edition). Elsewhere the same volume shows these b'ne-aleim belonging to the tenth subdivision of the "Thrones" (Zohar, part iii., col. 113. But see also 1st vol. 184). It also explains that the
Ischin, "men-spirits," viri spirituales, now that men can see them no longer, help magicians to produce,
through their science, homunculi which are not small men but "men smaller (in the sense of inferiority)
than men." Both show themselves under the form that the Ischin had then, i.e., gaseous and ethereal.
Their chief is Azazel.
But Azazel, whom the Church dogma will associate with Satan, is nothing of the kind. Azazel is a
mystery, as explained elsewhere, and it is so expressed in Maimonides, "In More Nevochim" (chapter
xxvi., p. 8). "There is an impenetrable mystery in the narrative concerning Azazel." And so there is, as
Lanci, a librarian to the Vatican and one who ought to know, says -- we have quoted him before -- that
"this venerable divine name (nome divino e venerabile) has become through the pen of Biblical
scholars, a devil, a wilderness, a mountain, and a he-goat" (Sagra Scrittura). Therefore it seems foolish
to derive the name as Spencer does, from Ajal (separated) and El (god), hence "one separated from
God," the DEVIL. In the Zohar, Azazel is rather the Sacrificial victim than the "formal adversary of
Jehovah," as Spencer would have it (II., pp. 14, 29).
The amount of malicious fancy and fiction bestowed on that "Host" by various fanatical writers is
quite extraordinary. Azazel and his "host" are simply the Hebrew "Prometheus," and ought to be
viewed from the same standpoint. The Zohar shows the Ischin chained on the mountain in the desert,
allegorically; thus simply alluding to those "spirits" as being chained to the earth during the cycle of
incarnation. Azazel (or Azaziel) is one of the chiefs of the "transgressing" angels in Enoch, who
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-21.htm (24 von 26) [06.05.2003 03:36:05]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, part 1, stanza 12
descending upon Ardis, the top of Mount Armon, bound themselves by swearing loyalty to each other.
It is said that Azaziel taught men to make swords, knives, shields, to fabricate mirrors (?) to make one
see what is behind him (viz., "magic mirrors"). Amazarak taught all the sorcerers and dividers of roots;
Amers taught the solution of magic; Barkayal, astrology; Akibeel, the meaning of portents and signs;
Tamial, astronomy; and Asaradel taught the motion of the moon. "These seven were the first
instructors of the Fourth man" (i.e., of the Fourth Race). But why should allegory be always
understood as meaning all that its dead-letter expresses?
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 377 THE FALLACIES OF THE TWO CHURCHES.
It is the symbolical representation of the great struggle between divine wisdom, nous, and its earthly
reflection, Psuche, or between Spirit and Soul, in Heaven and on Earth. In Heaven --because the divine
MONAD had voluntarily exiled itself therefrom, to descend, for incarnating purposes, to a lower plane
and thus transform the animal of clay into an immortal god. For, as Eliphas Levi tells us, "the angels
aspire to become men; for the perfect man, the man-god, is above even angels." On Earth -- because no
sooner had Spirit descended than it was strangled in the coils of matter.
Strange to say, the Occult teaching reverses the characters; it is the anthropomorphous archangel with
the Christians, and the man-like God with the Hindus, which represent matter in this case; and the
Dragon, or Serpent, Spirit. Occult symbolism furnishes the key to the mystery; theological symbolics
conceal it still more. For the former explains many a saying in the Bible and even in the New
Testament which have hitherto remained incomprehensible; while the latter, owing to its dogma of
Satan and his rebellion, has belittled the character and nature of its would-be infinite, absolutely
perfect god, and created the greatest evil and curse on earth -- belief in a personal Devil. This mystery
is opened with the key to its metaphysical symbolism now restored; while that of theological
interpretation shows the gods and the archangels standing as symbols for the dead letter or dogmatic
religions, and as arrayed against the pure truths of Spirit, naked and unadorned with fancy.
Many were the hints thrown out in this direction in "Isis Unveiled," and a still greater number of
references to this mystery may be found scattered throughout these volumes. To make the point clear
once for all: that which the clergy of every dogmatic religion -- pre-eminently the Christian -- points
out as Satan, the enemy of God, is in reality, the highest divine Spirit -- (occult Wisdom on Earth) -- in
its naturally antagonistic character to every worldly, evanescent illusion, dogmatic or ecclesiastical
religions included. Thus, the Latin Church, intolerant, bigoted and cruel to all who do not choose to be
its slaves; the Church which calls itself the bride of Christ, and the trustee at the same time of Peter, to
whom the rebuke of the Master "get thee behind me Satan" was justly addressed; and again the
Protestant Church which, while calling itself Christian, paradoxically replaces the New Dispensation
by the old "Law of Moses" which Christ openly repudiated: both these Churches are fighting against
divine Truth, when repudiating and slandering the Dragon of esoteric (because divine) Wisdom.
Whenever anathematizing the Gnostic Solar Chnouphis -- the Agathodaemon -- Christos, or the
theosophical Serpent of Eternity, or even the Serpent of Genesis -- they
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-21.htm (25 von 26) [06.05.2003 03:36:05]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, part 1, stanza 12
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 378 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
are moved by the same Spirit of dark fanaticism that moved the Pharisees to curse Jesus by saying to
him "Say we not well thou hast a devil?"
Read the account about Indra (Vayu) in the Rig-Veda, the occult volume par excellence of Aryanism,
and then compare it with the same in the Puranas -- the exoteric version thereof, and the purposely
garbled account of the true Wisdom religion. In the Rig Veda Indra is the highest and greatest of the
Gods, and his Soma-drinking is allegorical of his highly spiritual nature. In the Puranas Indra becomes
a profligate, and a regular drunkard on the Soma juice, in the terrestrial way. He is the conqueror of all
the "enemies of the gods" -- the Daityas, Nagas (Serpents), Asuras, all the Serpent-gods, and of Vritri,
the Cosmic Serpent. Indra is the St. Michael of the Hindu Pantheon -- the chief of the militant Host.
Turning to the Bible, we find Satan, one of the "Sons of God" (Job. i. 6), becoming in exoteric
interpretation the Devil, and the Dragon in its infernal, evil sense. But in the Kabala ("Book of
Numbers") Samael, who is Satan, is shown to be identical with St. Michael, the slayer of the Dragon.
How is this? For it is said that Tselem (the image) reflects alike Michael and Samael who are one.
Both proceed, it is taught, from Ruach (Spirit), Neschamah (Soul) and Nephesch (life). In the
"Chaldean Book of Numbers" Samael is the concealed (occult) Wisdom, and Michael the higher
terrestrial Wisdom, both emanating from the same source but diverging after their issue from the
mundane soul, which on Earth is Mahat (intellectual understanding, or Manas (the seat of Intellect).
They diverge, because one (Michael) is influenced by Neschamah, while the other (Samael) remains
uninfluenced. This tenet was perverted by the dogmatic spirit of the Church; which, loathing
independent Spirit, uninfluenced by the external form (hence by dogma), forthwith made of SamaelSatan (the most wise and spiritual spirit of all) -- the adversary of its anthropomorphic God and sensual
physical man, the DEVIL! -------[[This page continued in next section]]
Next Section
Contents
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-21.htm (26 von 26) [06.05.2003 03:36:05]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2 pt 1, stanza 12 b
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky -- Vol. 2
Theosophical University Press Online Edition
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 378 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
[[This page continued from previous section]]
THE ORIGIN OF THE SATANIC MYTH.
Let us then fathom this creation of the Patristic fancy still deeper, and find its prototype with the
Pagans. The origin of the new Satanic myth is easy to trace. The tradition of the Dragon and the Sun is
echoed in every part of the world, both in its civilized and semi-savage regions. It took rise in the
whisperings about secret initiations among the profane, and was established universally through the
once universal heliolatrous religion. There was a time when the four parts of the world were covered
with the temples sacred to the Sun and the Dragon;
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 379 THE SECRET OF THE DRAGON.
but the cult is now preserved mostly in China and the Buddhist countries, "Bel and the Dragon being
uniformly coupled together, and the priest of the Ophite religion as uniformly assuming the name of
his God" ("Archaeology," Vol. xxv., p. 220, London). In the religions of the past, it is in Egypt we
have to seek for its Western origin. The Ophites adopted their rites from Hermes Trismegistus, and
heliolatrous worship crossed over with its Sun-gods into the land of the Pharaohs from India. In the
gods of Stonehenge we recognise the divinities of Delphi and Babylon, and in those of the latter the
devas of the Vedic nations. Bel and the Dragon, Apollo and Python, Krishna and Kaliya, Osiris and
Typhon are all one under many names -- the latest of which are Michael and the Red Dragon, and St.
George and his Dragon. As Michael is "one as God," or his "Double," for terrestrial purposes, and is
one of the Elohim, the fighting angel, he is thus simply a permutation of Jehovah. Whatever the
Cosmic or astronomical event that first gave rise to the allegory of the "War of Heaven," its earthly
origin has to be sought in the temples of Initiation and archaic crypts. The following are the proofs: -We find (a) the priests assuming the name of the gods they served; (b) the "Dragons" held throughout
all antiquity as the symbols of Immortality and Wisdom, of secret Knowledge and of Eternity; and (c)
the hierophants of Egypt, of Babylon, and India, styling themselves generally the "Sons of the Dragon"
and "Serpents"; thus the teachings of the Secret Doctrine are thereby corroborated.
There were numerous catacombs in Egypt and Chaldea, some of them of a very vast extent. The most
renowned of them were the subterranean crypts of Thebes and Memphis. The former, beginning on the
western side of the Nile, extended towards the Lybian desert, and were known as the Serpent's
catacombs, or passages. It was there that were performed the sacred mysteries of the kuklos anagkes,
the "Unavoidable Cycle," more generally known as "the circle of necessity"; the inexorable doom
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-22.htm (1 von 24) [06.05.2003 03:36:12]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2 pt 1, stanza 12 b
imposed upon every soul after the bodily death, and when it has been judged in the Amenthian region.
In de Bourbourg's book, Votan, the Mexican demi-god, in narrating his expedition, describes a
subterranean passage which ran underground, and terminated at the root of the heavens, adding that
this passage was a snake's hole, "un agujero de colubra"; and that he was admitted to it because he was
himself "a son of the snakes," or a serpent. ("Die Phoinizier," 70.)
This is, indeed, very suggestive; for his description of the snake's hole is that of the ancient Egyptian
crypt, as above mentioned. The hierophants, moreover, of Egypt, as of Babylon, generally styled them-
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 380 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
selves the "Sons of the Serpent-god," or "Sons of the Dragon," during the mysteries.
"The Assyrian priest bore always the name of his god," says Movers. The Druids of the CeltoBritannic regions also called themselves snakes. "I am a Serpent, I am a Druid," they exclaimed. The
Egyptian Karnak is twin brother to the Carnac of Bretagne, the latter Carnac meaning the serpent's
mount. The Dracontia once covered the surface of the globe, and these temples were sacred to the
Dragon, only because it was the symbol of the sun, which, in its turn, was the symbol of the highest
god -- the Phoenician Elon or Elion, whom Abraham recognised as El Elion.* Besides the surname of
serpents, they were called the "builders," the "architects"; for the immense grandeur of their temples
and monuments was such that even now the pulverised remains of them "frighten the mathematical
calculations of our modern engineers," says Taliesin.**
De Bourbourg hints that the chiefs of the name of Votan, the Quetzo-Cohuatl, or Serpent deity of the
Mexicans, are the descendants of Ham and Canaan. "I am Hivim," they say. "Being a Hivim, I am of
the great race of the Dragon (snake). I am a snake myself, for I am a Hivim." ("Cartas," 51; "Isis
Unveiled," Vol. I., 553, et seq.)
Furthermore, the "War in Heaven" is shown, in one of its significations, to have meant and referred to
those terrible struggles in store for the candidate for adeptship, between himself and his (by magic)
personified human passions, when the inner enlightened man had to either slay them or fail. In the
former case he became the "Dragon-Slayer," as having happily overcome all the temptations; and a
"Son of the Serpent" and a Serpent himself, having cast off his old skin and being born in a new body,
becoming a Son of Wisdom and Immortality in Eternity. (See Part II. on the Satanic Myth.)
Seth, the reputed forefa ther of Israel, is only a Jewish travesty of Hermes, the God of Wisdom, called
also Thoth, Tat, Seth, Set, and Satan. He is also Typhon -- the same as Apophis, the Dragon slain by
Horus; for Typhon was also called Set. He is simply the dark side of Osiris, his brother, as Angra
Mainyu is the black shadow of Ahura-mazda. Terrestrially, all these allegories were connected with
the trials of adeptship and initiation. Astronomically, they referred to the Solar and Lunar eclipses, the
mythical explanations of which we find to this day in India and Ceylon, where any one can study the
allegorical narratives and traditions which have remained unchanged for many thousands of years.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-22.htm (2 von 24) [06.05.2003 03:36:12]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2 pt 1, stanza 12 b
* See Sanchoniathon in "Eusebius," Pr. Ev. 36; Genesis xiv.
** "Society of Antiquaries of London," vol. xxv. p. 220.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 381 THE THEFT OF RAHU.
Rahu, mythologically is a Daitya -- a giant, a Demi-god, the lower part of whose body ended in a
Dragon or Serpent's tail. During the churning of the Ocean, when the gods produced amrita -- the
water of Immortality -- he stole some of it, and drinking, became immortal. The Sun and Moon, who
had detected him in his theft, denounced him to Vishnu, who placed him in the stellar spheres, the
upper portion of his body representing the Dragon's head and the lower (Ketu) the Dragon's tail; the
two being the ascending and descending nodes. Since then, Rahu wreaks his vengeance on the Sun and
Moon by occasionally swallowing them. But this fable had another mystic meaning, since Rahu, the
Dragon's head, played a prominent part in the mysteries of the Sun's (Vikarttana's) initiation, when the
candidate and the Dragon had a supreme fight.
The caves of the Rishis, the abodes of Tiresias and the Greek seers, were modelled on those of the
Nagas -- the Hindu King-Snakes, who dwelled in cavities of the rocks under the ground. From Sesha,
the thousand-headed Serpent, on which Vishnu rests, down to Python, the dragon serpent oracle, all
point to the secret meaning of the myth. In India we find the fact mentioned in the earliest Puranas.
The children of Surasa are the "mighty Dragons." The Vayu Purana replacing "Surasa" (of Vishnu
Purana) by Danayas or Danavas -- the descendants of Danu by the sage Kasyapa -- and those Danavas
being the giants (or Titans) who warred against the gods, they are thus shown identical with the
"Dragons" and "Serpents" of Wisdom.
By simply comparing the Sun-gods of every country, one may find their allegories agreeing perfectly
with one another; and the more the allegorical symbol is occult the more its corresponding symbol in
other systems agrees with it. Thus, if from three systems widely differing from each other in
appearance -- the old Aryan, the ancient Greek, and the modern Christian schemes -- we select several
Sun-gods and dragons at random, these will be found copied from each other.
Let us take Agni the fire-god, Indra the firmament, and Karttikeya from the Hindus; the Greek Apollo;
and Mikael, the "Angel of the Sun," the first of the AEons, called by the Gnostics "the saviour" -- and
proceed in order.
(1) Agni -- the fire-god -- is called in the Rig-Veda Vaiswanara. Now Vaisvanara is a Danava -- a giantdemon,* whose daughters Puloma and Kalaka are the mothers of numberless Danavas (30 millions),
by
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* He is thus named and included in the list of the Danavas in Vayu Purana; the Commentator of
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-22.htm (3 von 24) [06.05.2003 03:36:12]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2 pt 1, stanza 12 b
Bhagavata Purana calls him a son of Danu, but the name means also "Spirit of Humanity."
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 382 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
Kasyapa,* and live in Hiranyapura, "the golden city," floating in the air. Therefore, Indra is, in a
fashion, the step-son of these two as a son of Kasyapa; and Kasyapa is, in this sense, identical with
Agni, the fire-god, or Sun (Kasyapa-Aditya). To this same group belongs Skanda or Karttikeya (god of
War, the six-faced planet Mars astronomically), a Kumara, or virgin-youth, born of Agni** for the
purpose of destroying Taraka, the Danava Demon, the grandson of Kasyapa by Hiranyaksha, his
son,*** whose (Taraka's) yogi austerities were so extraordinary that they became formidable to the
gods, who feared such a rival in power.**** While Indra, the bright god of the Firmament, kills Vritra
(or Ahi), the Serpent-Demon -- for which feat he is called Vritra-han, "the destroyer of Vritra"; he also
leads the hosts of Devas (Angels or gods) against other gods who rebel against Brahma, for which he
is entitled Jishnu, "leader of the celestial Host." Karttikeya is found bearing the same titles. For killing
Taraka, the Danava, he is Taraka-Jit, "Vanquisher of Taraka,"***** "Kumara Guha," "the mysterious
Virgin-youth" "Siddha-Sena" -- "the leader of the Siddhas"; and Saktidhara -- "Spear-holder."
(2.) Now take Apollo, the Grecian sun-god, and by comparing the mythical accounts given of him, see
whether he does not answer both
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Kasyapa is called the Son of Brahma, and is the "Self-Born" to whom a great part of the work of
creation is attri buted. He is one of the seven Rishis; exoterically, the son of Marichi, the son of
Brahma; while Atharva-veda says, "The Self-born Kasyapa sprang from Time"; and esoterically -Time and Space are forms of the One incognizable Deity. As an Aditya, Indra is son of Kasyapa, as
also Vaivasvata Manu, our progenitor. In the instance given in the text, he is Kasyapa-Aditya, the Sun,
and the Sun-god, from whom all the "Cosmic" Demons, Dragons (nagas), Serpent, or Snake-gods, and
Danavas, the giants, are born. The meaning of the allegories given above is purely astronomical and
cosmical, but will serve to prove the identity of all.
** All such stories differ in the exoteric texts. In the Mahabharata, Karttikeya, "the six-faced Mars," is
the son of Rudra or Siva, Self-born without a mother from the seed of Siva cast into the fire. But
Karttikeya is generally called Agnibhu, "fire born."
*** Hiranyaksha is the ruler or king of the fifth region of Patala, a Snake-god.
**** The Elohim also feared the knowledge of Good and Evil for Adam, and therefore are shown as
expelling him from Eden or killing him spiritually.
***** The story told is, that Taraka (called also Kalabhana), owing to his extraordinary Yoga-powers,
had obtained all the divine knowledge of yoga-vidya and occult powers of the gods, who conspired
against him. Here we see the "obedient" Host of Archangels or minor gods conspiring against the
(future) Fallen angels, whom Enoch accuses of the great crime of disclosing to the world all "the
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-22.htm (4 von 24) [06.05.2003 03:36:12]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2 pt 1, stanza 12 b
secret things done in heaven." It is Michael, Gabriel, Raphael, Surgal and Uriel who denounced to the
Lord God those of their Brethren who were said to have pried into the divine mysteries and taught
them to men: by this means they themselves escaped a like punishment. Michael was commissioned to
fight the Dragon, and so was Karttikeya, and under the same circumstances. Both are "leaders of the
Celestial Host," both Virgins, both "leaders of Saints," "Spear-holders" (Saktidhara), etc., etc.
Karttikeya is the original of Michael and St. George, as surely as Indra is the prototype of Karttikeya.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 383 THE GODS, THE FACETS OF ONE GEM.
to Indra, Karttikeya, and even Kasyapa-Aditya, and at the same time to Michael (as the Angelic form
of Jehovah) the "angel of the Sun," who is "like," and "one with, God." Later ingenious interpretations
for monotheistic purposes, elevated though they be into not-to-be questioned Church dogmas, prove
nothing, except the abuse of human authority and power, perhaps.
Apollo is Helios (the Sun), Phoibus-Apollo ("the light of life and of the World"*) who arises out of the
golden-winged cup (the sun); hence he is the sun-god par excellence. At the moment of his birth he
asks for his bow to kill Python, the Demon Dragon, who attacked his mother before his birth,** and
whom he is divinely commissioned to destroy -- like Karttikeya, who is born for the purpose of killing
Taraka, the too holy and wise demon. Apollo is born on a sidereal island called Asteria -- "the golden
star island," the "earth which floats in the air," which is the Hindu golden Hiranyapura; "he is called
the pure, [[agnos]], Agnus Dei (the Indian Agni, as Dr. Kenealy thinks), and in the primal myth he is
exempt "from all sensual love" ("Book of God," p. 88). He is, therefore, a Kumara, like Karttikeya, and
as Indra was in his earlier life and biographies. Python, moreover, the "red Dragon," connects Apollo
with Michael, who fights the Apocalyptic Dragon, who wants to attack the woman in child-birth (See
Revelation xii.), as Python attacks Apollo's mother. Can any one fail to see the identity? Had the Rt.
Hon. W. E. Gladstone, who prides himself on his Greek scholarship and understanding of the spirit of
Homer's allegories, ever had a real inkling of the esoteric meaning of the Iliad and Odyssey, he would
have understood St. John's "Revelation," and even the Pentateuch, better than he does. For the way to
the Bible lies through Hermes, Bel, and Homer, as the way to these is through the Hindu and Chaldean
religious symbols.
The repetition of this archaic tradition is found in ch. xii. of St. John's Revelations, and comes from the
Babylonian legends without the smallest doubt, though the Babylonian story had its origin in the
allegories of the Aryans. The fragment read by the late George Smith (See "The Chaldean account of
Genesis," p. 304) is sufficient to disclose the source of the xii. chapter of the Apocalypse. Here it is as
given by the eminent Assyriologist:
"Our . . . fragment refers to the creation of mankind, called Adam; as (the man) in the Bible, he is
made perfect . . . but afterwards joins
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* The "life and the light" of the material physical world, the delight of the senses -- not of the soul.
Apollo is pre-eminently the human god, the god of emotional, pomp-loving and theatrical Church
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-22.htm (5 von 24) [06.05.2003 03:36:12]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2 pt 1, stanza 12 b
ritualism, with lights and music.
** See chap. xii. in Revelation where we find Apollo's mother persecuted by that Python, the Red
Dragon, who is also Porphyrion, the scarlet or red Titan.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 384 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
with the dragon of the Deep, the animal of Tiamat, the Spirit of Chaos, and offends against his god,
who curses him, and calls down on his head all the evils and troubles of Humanity."*
"This is followed by a war between the dragon and the powers of evil, or chaos on one side and the
gods on the other."
"The gods have weapons forged for them,** and Merodach (the archangel Michael in Revelation)
undertakes to lead the heavenly host against the dragons. The war, which is described with spirit, ends,
of course, in the triumph of the principles of Good. . . . ."***
This war of gods with the powers of the Deep, refers also, in its last and terrestrial application, to the
struggle between the Aryan adepts of the nascent Fifth Race and the Sorcerers of Atlantis, the Demons
of the Deep, the Islanders surrounded with water who disappeared in the Deluge. (See the last pages of
Vol. I., "Isis Unveiled," Atlantis.)
The symbols of the dragons and "War in Heaven" have, as already stated, more than one significance;
religious, astronomical and geological events being included in the one common allegory. But it had
also a Cosmological meaning. In India the Dragon story is repeated in one of its forms in the battles of
Indra with Vritra. In the Vedas this Ahi-Vritra is referred to as the Demon of Drought, the terrible hot
Wind. Indra is shown to be constantly at war with him; and with the help of his thunder and lightning
the god compels Ahi-Vritra to pour down in rain on Earth, and then slays him. Hence, Indra is called
the Vritra-Han or "the slayer of Vritra," as Michael is called the Conqueror and "Slayer of the
Dragon." Both these "Enemies" are then the "Old Dragon" precipitated into the depths of the Earth, in
this one sense.
The Zend-Avestic Amshaspends are a Host with a leader like St. Michael over them, and seem
identical with the legions of Heaven, when one reads the Vendidad. Thus in Fargard XIX., ii. 13 (42),
Zarathustra is told by Ahura Mazda to "invoke the Amesha Spenta who rule over the seven
Karshvares**** of the Earth"; which Karshvares in their seven
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* No "god" who curses his (supposed) own work, because he has made it imperfect, can be the one
infinite absolute wisdom, whether called Bel or Jehovah.
** In the Indian allegory of Tarakamaya, the war between the gods and the Asuras headed by Soma
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-22.htm (6 von 24) [06.05.2003 03:36:12]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2 pt 1, stanza 12 b
(the moon, the King of Plants), it is Viswa-Karma, the artificer of the gods, who forges, like Vulcan
(Tubal-Kain), their weapons for them.
*** We have said elsewhere that the "woman with child" of Revelation (xii.) was Aime, the great
mother, or Binah, the third Sephiroth, "whose name is Jehovah"; and the "Dragon," who seeks to
devour her coming child (the Universe), is the Dragon of absolute Wisdom -- that Wisdom which,
recognising the non-separateness of the Universe and everything in it from the Absolute ALL, sees in
it no better than the great Illusion, Mahamaya, hence the cause of misery and suffering.
**** The "Seven Karshvares of the Earth" -- the seven spheres of our planetary chain, [[Footnote
continued on next page]]
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 385 THE BUILDERS OF THE MATERIAL WORLD.
applications refer equally to the seven spheres of our planetary chain, to the seven planets, the seven
heavens, etc., according to whether the sense is applied to a physical, supra-mundane, or simply a
sidereal world. In the same Fargard (ii. and iii.), in his invocation against Angra Mainyu and his Host,
Zarathustra appeals to them in these words: "I invoke the seven bright Sravah with their sons and their
flocks" (42 Vendid. Saddh). The "Sravah" -- a word which the Orientalists have given up as one "of
unknown meaning" -- means the same Amshaspends, but in their highest occult meaning. The
"Sravah" are the noumenoi of the phenomenal Amshaspends, the souls or spirits of those manifested
Powers; and "their sons and their flock" refers to the planetary angels and their sidereal flock of stars
and constellations. "Amshaspend" is the exoteric term used in terrestrial combinations and affairs only.
Zarathustra addresses Ahura Mazda constantly as "thou, the maker of the material world." Ormazd is
the father of our earth (Spenta Armaiti), and she is referred to, when personified, as "the fair daughter
of Ahura Mazda" (Fargard, XIX. ii.), who is also the creator of the Tree (of occult and spiritual
knowledge and wisdom) from which the mystic and mysterious Caresma is taken. But the occult name
of the bright God was never pronounced outside the temple.
Samael or Satan, the seducing Serpent of Genesis, and one of the primeval angels who rebelled, is the
name of the "Red Dragon." He is the Angel of Death, the Talmud saying that "the Angel of Death and
Satan are the same," and, killed by Michael, he is once more killed by St. George, who also is a
Dragon Slayer; but see the transformations of this. Samael is identical with the Simoom, the hot wind
of the desert, or again with the Vedic demon of drought, as Vritra; "Simoom is called Ata butos" or -Diabolos, the devil.
Typhon, or the Dragon Aphophis -- the Accuser in the "Book of the Dead" -- is worsted by Horus, who
pierces his opponent's head with a spear; and Typhon is the all-destroying wind of the desert, the
rebellious element that throws everything into confusion. As Set -- he is the darkness of night, the
murderer of Osiris, who is the light of day and the sun. Archaeology demonstrates that Horus is
identical with Anubis,* whose effigy was discovered upon an Egyptian monument, with a cuirass and
a spear, like Michael and St. George. Anubis is also represented
[[Footnote(s) continued from previous page]] -------------------------------------------------
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-22.htm (7 von 24) [06.05.2003 03:36:12]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2 pt 1, stanza 12 b
the seven worlds -- also mentioned in the Rig-Veda -- are fully referred to elsewhere. There are six
rajamsi (worlds) above prithivi -- the earth, or "this" (idam), as opposed to that which is yonder (the
six globes on the three other planes). (See Rig-Veda, I., 34; III., 56; VII., 10411, and V., 60, 6. See on
Chronology.)
* Verse 62, chap. xvii., "Book of the Dead": Anubis is Horus who melts in him who is eyeless.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 386 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
as slaying a dragon, that has the head and tail of a serpent. (See Lenoir's "Du Dragon de Metz.")
Cosmologically, then, all the Dragons and Serpents conquered by their "Slayers" are, in their origin,
the turbulent confused principles in Chaos, brought to order by the Sun-gods or creative powers. In the
"Book of the Dead" those principles are called "the Sons of Rebellion." (See also "Egyptian
Pantheon," pp. 20, 23.) "In that night, the oppressor, the murderer of Osiris, otherwise called the
deceiving Serpent (Verse 54) . . . . calls the Sons of Rebellion in Air, and when they arrive to the East
of Heavens, then there is War in Heaven and in the entire World" (v. 49, "Book of the Dead," xvii.).
In the Scandinavian Eddas the "War" of the Ases with the Hrim-thurses (frost-giants), and of Asathor
with the Jotuns, the Serpents and Dragons and the "wolf" who comes out of "Darkness" --- is the
repetition of the same myth. The "evil Spirits,"* having begun by being simply the emblems of Chaos,
became euhemerized by the superstition of the rabble, until they have finally won the right of
citizenship in the most civilized and learned races of this globe -- since its creation as alleged -- and
became a dogma with Christians. As George Smith has it: "The evil principles (Spirits) emblems of
Chaos" (in Chaldea and Assyria as in Egypt, we see) . . "resist this change and make war on the Moon,
the eldest son of Bel, drawing over to their side the Sun, Venus and the atmospheric god Vul."
("Assyrian Discoveries," p. 403.) This is only another version of the Hindu "War in Heaven," between
Soma, the moon, and the gods -- Indra being the atmospheric Vul; which shows it plainly to be both a
Cosmogonical and an astronomical allegory, woven into and drawn from the earliest theogony as
taught in the Mysteries.
It is in the religious doctrines of the Gnostics that the real meaning of the Dragon, the Serpent, the
Goat, and all those symbols of powers now called Evil, can be seen the best; as it is they who divulged
the esoteric nature of the Jewish Substitute for AIN-SOPH in their teachings; of the true meaning of
which, while the Rabbins concealed it, the Christians, with a few exceptions, knew nothing. Surely
Jesus of Nazareth would have hardly advised his apostles to show themselves as wise as the serpent,
had the latter been a symbol of the Evil one; nor would the Ophites, the learned Egyptian Gnostics of
"the Brotherhood of the Serpent," have reverenced a living snake in their ceremonies as the emblem of
WISDOM, the divine Sophia (and a type of the all-good, not the all-bad), were that reptile so closely
connected with Satan. The fact is, that even as a common ophidian it has ever been a dual symbol; and
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-22.htm (8 von 24) [06.05.2003 03:36:12]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2 pt 1, stanza 12 b
* These "evil Spirits" can by no means be identified with Satan or the Great Dragon. They are the
Elementals generated or begotten by ignorance -- Cosmic and human passions -- or Chaos.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 387 WHO FIRST CREATED WOMAN?
as a Dragon it had never been anything else than a symbol of the manifested Deity in its great Wisdom.
The Draco volans, the flying Dragon of the early painters, may be an exaggerated picture of the real
extinct antediluvian animal; but those who have faith in the Occult teachings believe that in the days of
old there were such creatures as flying Dragons, or a kind of Pterodactyl, and that it is those gigantic
winged lizards that served as the prototypes for the Seraph of Moses and his great Brazen Serpent.*
The Jews had worshipped the latter idol themselves, but, after the religious reforms brought about by
Hezekiah, turned round, and called that symbol of the great or Higher God of every other nation -- a
Devil, and their own usurper -- the "One God."**
The appellation Sa'tan, in Hebrew satan, "an adversary" (from the verb shatana, "to be adverse," to
persecute) belongs by right to the first and cruelest "adversary of all the other gods" -- Jehovah, not to
the Serpent, which spoke only words of sympathy and wisdom, and is at the worst, even in the dogma,
"the adversary of men." This dogma, based as it is on chapter iii. of Genesis, is as illogical and unjust
as it is paradoxical. For who was the first to create that original and hence-forward universal tempter
of man -- the woman? Not the serpent surely, but the "Lord God" himself, who, saying: -- "It is not
good that the man should be alone" -- made woman, and "brought her unto the man" (18-22). If the
unpleasant little incident that followed was and is still to be regarded as the "original sin," then it
exhibits the Creator's divine foresight in a poor light indeed. It would have been far better for the first
Adam (of chap. 1.) to have been left either "male and female," or "alone." It is the Lord God,
evidently, who was the real cause of all the mischief, the "agent provocateur," and the Serpent -- only
a prototype of Azazel, "the scapegoat for the sin of (the God of) Israel," the poor Tragos having to pay
the penalty for his Master's and Creator's blunder. This, of course, is addressed only to those who
accept the opening events of the drama of humanity in Genesis in their dead-letter sense. Those who
read them esoterically, are not reduced to fanciful
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* See Numbers xxi. 8-9. God orders Moses to build a brazen Serpent "Saraph"; to look upon which
heals those bitten by the fiery serpents. The latter were the Seraphim, each one of which, as Isaiah
shows (vi. 2), "had six wings"; they are the symbols of Jehovah, and of all the other Demiurgi who
produce out of themselves six sons or likenesses -- Seven with their Creator. Thus, the Brazen Serpent
is Jehovah, the chief of the "fiery serpents." And yet, in 2 Kings xviii., it is shown that King Hezekiah,
who, like as David his father, "did that which was right in the sight of the Lord" -- "brake in pieces the
brazen serpent that Moses had made . . . and called it Nehushtan," or piece of brass.
** And Satan stood up against Israel and moved David to number Israel (Chron. xxi. 1.) "The anger of
the Lord Jehovah was kindled against Israel," and he moved David to say: "Go, number Israel" (2
Samuel, xxiv. 1). The two are then identical.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-22.htm (9 von 24) [06.05.2003 03:36:12]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2 pt 1, stanza 12 b
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 388 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
speculations and hypothesis; they know how to read the symbolism therein contained, and cannot err.
There is at present no need to touch upon the mystic and manifold meaning of the name Jehovah in its
abstract sense, one independent of the Deity falsely called by that name. It was a blind created
purposely by the Rabbins, a secret preserved by them with ten-fold care after the Christians had
despoiled them of this God-name which was their own property.* But the following statement is made.
The personage who is named in the first four chapters of Genesis variously as "God," the "Lord God,"
and "Lord" simply, is not one and the same person; certainly it is not Jehovah. There are three distinct
classes or groups of the Elohim called Sephiroth in the Kabala, Jehovah appearing only in chapter iv.,
in the first verse of which he is named Cain, and in the last transformed into mankind -- male and
female, jah-veh.** The "Serpent," moreover, is not Satan, but the bright Angel, one of the Elohim
clothed in radiance and glory, who, promising the woman that if they ate of the forbidden fruit "ye
shall not surely die," kept his promise, and made man immortal in his incorruptible nature. He is the
Iao of the mysteries, the chief of the Androgyne creators of men. Chapter iii. contains (esoterically) the
withdrawal of the veil of ignorance that closed the perceptions of the Angelic Man, made in the image
of the "Boneless" gods, and the opening of his consciousness to his real nature; thus showing the bright
Angel (Lucifer) in the light of a giver of Immortality, and as the "Enlightener"; while the real Fall into
generation and matter is to be sought in chapter iv. There, Jehovah-Cain, the male part of Adam the
dual man, having separated himself from Eve, creates in her "Abel," the first natural woman,* and
sheds the Virgin blood. Now Cain, being shown identical with Jehovah, on the authority of the correct
reading of verse i. (chapter iv., Genesis), in the original Hebrew text; and the Rabbins teaching that
"Kin (Cain), the Evil, was the Son of Eve by Samael, the devil who took Adam's place"; and the
Talmud adding that "the evil Spirit, Satan, and Samael, the angel of Death, are the same" --(Babba
Battra, 16a) -- it becomes easy to see that Jehovah (mankind, or "Jah-hovah") and Satan (therefore the
tempting Serpent) are one and
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Dozens of the most erudite writers have sifted thoroughly the various meanings of the name J'hovah
(with, and without the masoretic points), and shown their multifarious bearings. The best of such
works is the "Source of Measures, the Hebrew Egyptian Mystery."
** In the above-mentioned work (p. 233 App.), verse 26 of the 4th chap. of Genesis is correctly
translated "then men began to call themselves Jehovah," but less correctly explained, perhaps, as the
last word ought to be written Jah (male) Hovah (female), to show that from that time the race of
distinctly separate man and woman began.
*** See for explanation the excellent pages of appendix vii. of the same work.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 389 JEHOVAH OPHIOMORPHOS.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-22.htm (10 von 24) [06.05.2003 03:36:12]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2 pt 1, stanza 12 b
the same in every particular. There is no Devil, no Evil, outside mankind to produce a Devil. Evil is a
necessity in, and one of the supporters of the manifested universe. It is a necessity for progress and
evolution, as night is necessary for the production of Day, and Death for that of Life -- that man may
live for ever.
Satan represents metaphysically simply the reverse or the polar opposite of everything in nature.* He
is the "adversary," allegorically, the "murderer," and the great Enemy of all, because there is nothing
in the whole universe that has not two sides -- the reverses of the same medal. But in that case, light,
goodness, beauty, etc., may be called Satan with as much propriety as the Devil, since they are the
adversaries of darkness, badness, and ugliness. And now the philosophy and the rationale of certain
early Christian sects -- called heretical and viewed as the abomination of the times -- will become
more comprehensible. We may understand how it was that the sect of SATANIANS came to be
degraded, and were anathematized without any hope of vindication in a future day, since they kept
their tenets secret. How, on the same principle, the CAINITES came to be degraded, and even the
(Judas) ISCARIOTES; the true character of the treacherous apostle having never been correctly
presented before the tribunal of Humanity.
As a direct consequence, the tenets of the Gnostic sects also become clear. Each of these sects was
founded by an Initiate, while their tenets were based on the correct knowledge of the symbolism of
every nation. Thus it becomes comprehensible why Ilda-Baoth was regarded by most of them as the
god of Moses, and was held as a proud, ambitious, and impure spirit, who had abused his power by
usurping the place of the highest God, though he was no better, and in some respects far worse than his
brethren Elohim; the latter representing the all-embracing, manifested deity only in their collectivity,
since they were the fashioners of the first differentiations of the primary Cosmic substance for the
creation of the phenomenal Universe. Therefore Jehovah was called by the Gnostics the Creator of,
and one with Ophiomorphos, the Serpent, Satan, or EVIL. (See "Isis Unveiled," II, 184). They taught
that Turbo and Adonai were "names of Jao-Jehovah, who is an emanation of Ilda Baoth" (Codex
Nazaraeus). (See Part II., "The Fallen Angels.") This amounted in their language to saying what the
Rabbins expressed in a more veiled way, by stating that -- "Cain had been generated by Samael or
Satan."
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* In Demonology, Satan is the leader of the opposition in Hell, the monarch of which was Beelzebub.
He belongs to the fifth kind or class of demons (of which there are nine according to mediaeval
demonology), and he is at the head of witches and sorcerers. But see in the text the true meaning of
Baphomet, the goat-headed Satan, one with Azaziel, the scape goat of Israel. Nature is the god PAN.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 390 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
The fallen Angels are made in every ancient system the prototypes of fallen men -- allegorically, and,
those men themselves -- esoterically. Thus the Elohim of the hour of creation became the "BeniElohim," the sons of God, among whom is Satan -- in the Semitic traditions; war in heaven between
Thraetaona and Azhi-dahaka, the destroying Serpent, ends on earth, according to Burnouf, in the battle
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-22.htm (11 von 24) [06.05.2003 03:36:12]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2 pt 1, stanza 12 b
of pious men against the power of Evil, "of the Iranians with the Aryan Brahmins of India." And the
conflict of the gods with the Asuras is repeated in the Great War -- the Mahabharata. In the latest
religion of all, Christianity, all the Combatants, gods and demons, adversaries in both the camps, are
now transformed into Dragons and Satans, simply in order to connect EVIL personified with the
Serpent of Genesis, and thus prove the new dogma.* ------NOAH WAS A KABIR, HENCE HE MUST HAVE BEEN A DEMON.
It matters little whether it is Isis, or Ceres -- the "Kabiria" -- or again the Kabiri, who have taught men
agriculture; but it is very important to prevent fanatics from monopolising all the facts in history and
legend, and from fathering their distortions of truth, history, and legend upon one man. Noah is either a
myth along with the others, or one whose legend was built upon the Kabirian or Titanic tradition, as
taught in Samothrace; he has, therefore, no claim to be monopolized by either Jew or Christian. If, as
Faber tried to demonstrate at such cost of learning and research, Noah is an Atlantean and a Titan, and
his family are the Kabiri or pious Titans, etc. -- then biblical chronology falls by its own weight, and
along with it all the patriarchs -- the antediluvian and pre-Atlantean Titans. As now discovered and
proven, Cain is Mars, the god of power and generation, and of the first (sexual) bloodshed.** TubalCain is a Kabir, "an instructor of every artificer in brass and iron"; or -- if this will please better -- he is
one with Hephaestos or Vulcan; Jabal is taken from the Kabiri -- instructors in agriculture, "such as
have cattle," and Jubal is "the father of all those who handle the harp," he, or they who fabricated the
harp for Kronos and the trident for Poseidon.***
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Vide for further details upon the Satanic myth, Part II. on Symbolism, in this volume.
** As he is also Vulcan or Vul-cain, the greatest god with the later Egyptians, and the greatest Kabir.
The god of time was Chium in Egypt, or Saturn, or Seth, and Chium is the same as Cain.
*** See Strabo, comparing them to the Cyclopes -- XIV. p. 653 et seq. (Callim in Del., 31 Stat. Silo.
IV., 6, 47; etc., etc.)
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 391 THE FLOOD LEGENDS.
The history or "fables" about the mysterious Telchines -- fables echoing each and all the archaic events
of our esoteric teachings -- furnish us with a key to the origin of Cain's genealogy (Genesis, ch. iii.);
they give the reason why the Roman Catholic Church identifies "the accursed blood" of Cain and Ham
with Sorcery, and makes it responsible for the Deluge. Were not the Telchines -- it is argued -- the
mysterious ironworkers of Rhodes; they who were the first to raise statues to the gods, furnish them
with weapons, and men with magic arts? And is it not they who were destroyed by a deluge at the
comm and of Zeus, as the Cainites were by that of Jehovah?
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-22.htm (12 von 24) [06.05.2003 03:36:12]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2 pt 1, stanza 12 b
The Telchines are simply the Kabiri and the Titans, in another form. They are the Atlanteans also.
"Like Lemnos and Samothrace," says Decharme, "Rhodes, the birth-place of the Telchines, is an island
of volcanic formation." (Genii of Fire, p. 271.) The island of Rhodes emerged suddenly out of the seas,
after having been previously engulfed by the Ocean, say the traditions. Like Samothrace (of the
Kabiri) it is connected in the memory of men with the Flood legends. As enough has been said on this
subject, however, it may be left for the present.
But we may add a few more words about Noah, the Jewish representative of nearly every pagan God
in one or another character. The Homeric songs contain, poetized, all the later fables about the
Patriarchs, who are all sidereal, cosmic, and numerical symbols and signs. The attempt to disconnect
the two genealogies -- those of Seth and Cain* -- and the further attempt, as futile, to show them real,
historical men, has only led to more serious inquiries into the history of the Past, and to discoveries
which have damaged for ever the supposed revelation. For instance, the identity of Noah and
Melchizedek being established, the further identity of Melchizedek, or Father Sadik, with KronosSaturn is proved also.
That it is so may be easily demonstrated. It is not denied by any of the Christian writers. Bryant (See
"Analysis of Ancient Mythology," Vol. II., p. 760) concurs with all those who are of opinion, that Sydic,
or
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Nothing could be more awkward and childish, we say, than this fruitless attempt to disconnect the
genealogies of Cain and of Seth, or to conceal the identity of names under a different spelling. Thus,
Cain has a Son ENOCH, and Seth a Son ENOCH also (Enos, Ch'anoch, Hanoch; -- one may do what
one likes with Hebrew unvowelled names). In the Cainite line Enoch begets IRAD, Irad MEHUJAEL,
the latter METHUSAEL, and Methusael, Lamech. In the Sethite line, Enoch begets Cainan, and this
one MAHALEEL (a variation on Mehujael), who gives birth to JARAD (or Irad); Jarad to ENOCH
(Number 3), who produces Methuselah (from Methusael), and finally Lamech closes the list. Now all
these are symbols (Kabalistically) of solar and lunar years, of astronomical periods, and of
physiological (phallic) functions, just as in any other pagan symbolical creed. This has been proven by
a number of writers.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 392 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
Sadic, was the patriarch Noah (as also Melchizedek); and that the name by which he is called, or
, Sadic, a
Sadic, corresponds to the character given of him in Genesis, chap. vi., 9. "He was
JUST man, and perfect in his generation. All science and every useful art were attri buted to him, and
through his sons transmitted to posterity." (See New Encyclopaedia by Abraham Rees, F.R.S.)
Now it is Sanchoniathon, who informs the world that the Kabiri were the Sons of Sydic or Zedek
(Melchizedek). True enough, this information, having descended to us through Eusebius (Preparatio
Evangelica), may be regarded with a certain amount of suspicion, as it is more than likely that he dealt
with Sanchoniathon's works as he has with Manetho's Synchronistic Tables. But let us suppose that the
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-22.htm (13 von 24) [06.05.2003 03:36:12]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2 pt 1, stanza 12 b
identification of Sydic, Kronos, or Saturn with Noah and Melchizedek, is based on one of the Eusebian
pious hypotheses. Let us accept it as such, along with Noah's characteristic as a just man, and his
supposed duplicate, the mysterious Melchizedek, King of Salem, and priest of the high god, after "his
own order" (See Hebrews, ch. v. 6, and vii. 1, et seq.); and finally, having seen what they all were
spiritually, astronomically, psychically and cosmically, let us now see what they became rabbinically
and KABALISTICALLY.
Speaking of Adam, Kain, Mars, etc., as personifications, we find the author of "The Source of
Measures" enunciating our very esoteric teachings in his Kabalistic researches. Thus he says: -"Now Mars was the lord of birth and of death, of generation and of destruction, of
ploughing, of building, of sculpture or stone-cutting, of Architecture . . . . in fine, of all .
. . . ARTS. He was the primeval principle, disintegrating into the modification of two
opposites for production. Astronomically, too,* he held the birthplace of the day and
year, the place of its increase of strength, Aries, and likewise the place of its death,
Scorpio. He held the house of Venus, and that of the Scorpion. He, as birth, was good; as
death, was Evil. As good, he was light; as bad, he was night. As good, he was man; as
bad, he was woman. He held the cardinal points, and as Cain, or Vulcan,** or Pater
Sadic, or Melchizadek, he was lord of the Ecliptic, or
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* The AEolian name of Mars was [[Areus]], and the Greek Ares, [[Ares]], is a name over the
etymological significance of which, philologists and Indianists, Greek and Sanskrit scholars have
vainly worked to this day. Very strangely, Max Muller connects both the names Mars and Ares with
the Sanskrit root mar, whence he traces their derivation, and from which, he says, the name of Maruts
(the storm-gods) comes. Welcker, however, offers more correct etymologies. (See Griech. Gotterlehre,
I., 415.) However it may be, etymologies of roots and words alone will never yield the esoteric
meaning fully, though they may help to useful guesses.
** As the same author shows: "The very name Vulcain appears in the reading; for in the first words (of
chap. iv. Genesis, 5) is to be found V'elcain, or V'ulcain, agreeably to the deepened u sound of the
letter vau. Out of its immediate context, it may be [[Footnote continued on next page]]
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 393 THE LEGENDS OF IRAN.
balance, or line of adjustment, and therefore was THE JUST ONE. The ancients held to
there being seven planets, or great gods, growing out of eight, and Pater Sadik, the Just
or Right One, was lord of the eighth, which was Mater Terra. ("Source of Measures," p.
186-70.)
This makes their functions plain enough after they had been degraded, and establishes the identity.
The Noachian Deluge, as described in its dead letter and within the period of Biblical chronology,
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-22.htm (14 von 24) [06.05.2003 03:36:12]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2 pt 1, stanza 12 b
having been shown to have never existed, the pious, but very arbitrary supposition of Bishop
Cumberl and has but to follow that deluge into the land of fiction. Indeed it seems rather fanciful to any
impartial observer to be told that there were "two distinct races of Kabiri," the first consisting of Ham
and Mizraim, whom he conceives to be Jupiter and Dionysus of Mnaseas; the second, "of the children
of Shem, are the Kabiri of Sochoniston, while their father Sydyk is consequently the Scriptural Shem."
(Append. de Cabiris, ap. Orig. gent. p. 364, 376, and the latter statement on p. 357.)
The Kabirim, "the mighty ones," are identical with our primeval Dhyan-Chohans, with the corporeal
and the incorporeal Pitris, and with all the rulers and instructors of the primeval races, which are
referred to as the Gods and Kings of the divine Dynasties. ------THE OLDEST PERSIAN TRADITIONS ABOUT THE POLAR, AND THE
SUBMERGED CONTINENTS.
Legendary lore could not distort facts so effectually as to reduce them to unrecognisable shape.
Between the traditions of Egypt and Greece on the one hand, and Persia on the other -- a country ever
at war with the former -- there is too great a similarity of figures and numbers to allow such
coincidence to be due to simple chance. This was well proven by Bailly. Let us pause for a moment to
examine these traditions from every available source, to compare the better those of the Magi with the
so-called Grecian "fables."
Those legends have now passed into popular tales, the folklore of Persia, as many a real fiction has
found its way into our universal History. The stories of King Arthur and his knights of the Round
Table are also fairy tales to all appearance; yet they are based on facts, and pertain to the History of
England. Why should not the folklore of Iran be part and parcel of the history and the pre-historic
events of Atlantis? That folklore says as follows:
[[Footnote ]]----------------------------
[[Continued from previous page]] read as "and the god Cain," or Vulcain. If, however, anything is
, Cain, the iron point of a lance, a smith
wanting to confirm the Cain-Vulcain idea, Fuerst says:
(blacksmith), inventor of sharp iron tools and smith work" (p. 278).
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 394 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
Before the creation of Adam, two races lived and succeeded each other on Earth; the Devs who reigned
7,000 years, and the Peris (the Izeds) who reigned but 2,000, during the existence of the former. The
Devs were giants, strong and wicked; the Peris were smaller in stature, but wiser and kinder.
Here we recognize the Atlantean giants and the Aryans, or the Rakshasas of the Ramayana and the
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-22.htm (15 von 24) [06.05.2003 03:36:12]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2 pt 1, stanza 12 b
children of Bharata Varsha, or India; the ante- and the post-diluvians of the Bible.
Gyan (or rather Gnan, true or occult Wisdom and knowledge), also called Gian-ben-Gian (or Wisdom,
son of Wisdom), was the king of the Peris.* He had a shield as famous as that of Achilles, only instead
of serving against an enemy in war, it served as a protection against black magic, the sorcery of the
Devs. Gian-ben-Gian had reigned 2,000 years when Iblis, the devil, was permitted by God to defeat the
Devs and scatter them to the other end of the world. Even the magic shield, which, produced on the
principles of astrology, destroyed charms, enchantments, and bad spells, could not prevail against Iblis,
who was an agent of Fate (or Karma).** They count ten kings in their last metropolis called Khanoom,
and make the tenth, Kaimurath, identical with the Hebrew Adam. These kings answer to the ten
antediluvian generations of kings as given by Berosus.
Distorted as those legends are now found, one can hardly fail to identify them with the Chaldean,
Egyptian, Greek, and even Hebrew traditions. The latter, disdaining in its exclusiveness to speak of preadamite nations, yet allows these to be clearly inferred, by sending out Cain -- one of the two only
living men on earth -- into the land of Nod, where he gets married and builds a city (Gen. iv.), etc.
Now if we compare the 9,000 years mentioned by the Persian tales with the 9,000 years, which Plato
declared had passed since the submersion of the last Atlantis, a very strange fact is made apparent.
Bailly remarked, but distorted it by his interpretation. The Secret Doctrine may restore the figures to
their true meaning. "First of all," we read in "Critias" that "one must remember that 9,000 years have
elapsed since the war of the nations, which lived above and outside the Pillars of Hercules, and those
which peopled the lands on this side."
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Some derive the word from Paras which produced Pars, Persia, Pars; but it may be equally derived
from Pitar or Pitris, the Hindu progenitors of the Fifth Race -- the Fathers of Wisdom or the Sons of
"Will and Yoga" -- who were called Pitar, as were the divine Pitars of the First Race.
** See for these traditions the "Collection of Persian Legends," in Russian, Georgian, Armenian, and
Persian; Herbelot's narrative Legendes Persanes, "Biblio theque Orientale," p. 298, 387, etc., and
Danville's Memoires. We give in a condensed narrative that which is scattered in hundreds of volumes
in European and Asiatic languages, as well as in oral traditions.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 395 ESOTERIC CHRONOLOGY.
In "Timaeus" Plato says the same. The Secret Doctrine declaring that most of the later islander
Atlanteans perished in the interval between 850,000 and 700,000 years ago, and that the Aryans were
200,000 years old when the first great "island" or continent was submerged, there hardly seems any
reconciliation possible between the figures. But there is, in truth. Plato, being an Initiate, had to use the
veiled language of the Sanctuary, and so had the Magi of Chaldea and Persia, through whose exoteric
revelations the Persian legends were preserved and passed to posterity. Thus, one finds the Hebrews
calling a week "seven days," and "a week of years" when each of its days represents 360 solar years,
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-22.htm (16 von 24) [06.05.2003 03:36:12]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2 pt 1, stanza 12 b
and the whole "week" is 2,520 years, in fact. They had a Sabbatical week, a Sabbatical year, etc., etc.,
and their Sabbath lasted indifferently 24 hours or 24,000 years -- in their secret calculations of the
Sods. We of the present times call an age a century. They of Plato's day, the initiated writers, at any
rate, meant by a millenium, not a thousand but 100,000 years; Hindus, more independent than any,
never concealed their chronology. Thus, when saying 9,000 years, the Initiates will read 900,000 years,
during which space of time -- i.e, from the first appearance of the Aryan race, when the Pliocene
portions of the once great Atlantis began gradually sinking* and other continents to appear on the
surface, down to the final disappearance of Plato's small island of Atlantis, the Aryan races had never
ceased to fight with the descendants of the first giant races. This war lasted till nearly the close of the
age which preceded the Kali Yug, and was the Mahabharatean war so famous in Indian History. Such
blending of the events and epochs, and the bringing down of hundreds of thousands into thousands of
years, does not interfere with the numbers of years that had elapsed, according to the statement made
by the Egyptian priests to Solon, since the destruction of the last portion of Atlantis. The 9,000 years
were the correct figures given. The latter event has never been kept a secret, and had only faded out of
the memory of the Greeks. The Egyptians had their records complete, because isolated; for, being
surrounded by sea and desert, they had been left untrammelled by other nations, till about a few
millenniums before our era.
History, for the first time, catches a glimpse of Egypt and its great mysteries through Herodotus, if we
do not take into account the Bible, and its queer chronology.** And how little Herodotus could tell is
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* The main continent perished in the Miocene times, as already stated.
** From Bede downwards all the chronologists of the Church have differed among themselves, and
contradicted each other. "The chronology of the Hebrew text has been grossly altered, especially in the
interval next after the Deluge": -- says Whiston (Old Test., p. 20).
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 396 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
confessed by himself when speaking of a mysterious tomb of an Initiate at Sais, in the sacred precinct
of Minerva. There, he says "behind the chapel . . . is the tomb of One, whose name I consider it
impious to divulge . . . In the enclosure stand large obelisks and there is a lake near, surrounded with a
stone wall formed in a circle. In this lake they perform by night, that person's adventures, which they
call Mysteries: on these matters, however, though I am accurately acquainted with the particulars of
them, I must observe a discreet silence" (ii. 170).
On the other hand, it is well to know that no secret was so well preserved and so sacred with the
ancients, as that of their cycles and computations. From the Egyptians down to the Jews it was held as
the highest sin to divulge anything pertaining to the correct measure of time. It was for divulging the
secrets of the Gods, that Tantalus was plunged into the infernal regions; the keepers of the sacred
Sibylline Books were threatened with the death penalty for revealing a word from them. Sigalions
(images of Harpocrates) were in every temple -- especially in those of Isis and Serapis -- each pressing
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-22.htm (17 von 24) [06.05.2003 03:36:12]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2 pt 1, stanza 12 b
a finger to the lips; while the Hebrews taught that to divulge, after initiation into the Rabbinical
mysteries, the secrets of Kabala, was like eating of the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge: it was
punishable by death.
And yet, we Europeans accepted the exoteric chronology of the Jews! What wonder that it has
influenced and coloured ever since all our conceptions of science and the duration of things!
The Persian traditions, then, are full of two nations or races, now entirely extinct, as some think;
whereas, they are only transformed. They are ever speaking of, and describing the mountains of Kaf
(Kafaristan?), which contain a gallery built by the giant Argeak, wherein the statues of the ancient men
under all their forms are preserved. They call them Sulimans (Solomons), or the wise kings of the East,
and count seventy-two kings of that name.* Three among them reigned for 1,000 years each.
(Herbelot, p. 829.)
Siamek, the beloved son of Kaimurath (Adam), their first king, died murdered by his giant brother.
The father had a perpetual fire preserved on the tomb which contained his cremated ashes; hence -- the
origin of fire-worship, as some Orientalists think.
Then came Huschenk, the prudent and the wise. It was his dynasty which re-discovered metals and
precious stones, which had been concealed by the Devs or Giants in the bowels of the earth; how to
make brass-work, to cut canals, and improve agriculture. As usual, it is Huschenk, again, who is
credited with having written the work called
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Thence King Solomon, whose traces are nowhere to be found outside of the Bible, and the
description of whose magnificent palace and city dovetail with those of the Persian tales; though they
were unknown to all pagan travellers, even to Herodotus.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 397 THE PERSIAN PHOENIX.
"Eternal Wisdom," and even with having built the cities of Luz, Babylon and Ispahan, though they
were built ages later. But as modern Delhi is built on six other older cities, so these just-named cities
may be built on emplacements of other cities of an immense antiquity. As to his date, it can only be
inferred from another legend.
In the same tradition that wise prince is credited with having made war against the giants on a twelvelegged horse, whose birth is attri buted to the amours of a crocodile with a female hippopotamus. This
dodecaped was found on the "dry island" or new continent; much force and cunning had to be used to
secure the wonderful animal, but no sooner had Huschenk mounted him, than he defeated every
enemy. No giants could withstand his tremendous power. Notwithstanding, this king of kings was
killed by an enormous rock thrown at him by the giants from the great mountains of Damavend.*
Tahmurath is the third king of Persia, the St. George of Iran, the knight who always has the best of,
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-22.htm (18 von 24) [06.05.2003 03:36:12]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2 pt 1, stanza 12 b
and who kills, the Dragon. He is the great enemy of the Devs who, in his day, dwelled in the
mountains of Kaf, and occasionally made raids on the Peris. The old French chronicles of the Persian
folklore call him the Dev-bend, the conqueror of the giants. He, too, is credited with having founded
Babylon, Nineveh, Diarbek, etc., etc. Like his grand-sire Huschenk, Tahmurath (Taimuraz) also had
his steed, only far more rare and rapid -- a bird called Simorgh-Anke. A marvellous bird, in truth,
intelligent, a polyglot, and even very religious. (See Orient. Collect. ii., 119.) What says that Persian
Phoenix? It complains of its old age, for it is born cycles and cycles before the days of Adam (also
Kaimurath). It has witnessed the revolutions of long centuries. It has seen the birth and the close of
twelve cycles of 7,000 years each, which multiplied esoterically will give us again 840,000 years.**
(Orient. Collect. ii., 119 et seq.) Simorgh is born with the last deluge of the pre-Adamites, says the
"romance of Simorgh and the good Khalif"! (Tales of Derbent.)
What says the "Book of Numbers"? Esoterically, Adam Rishoon is the lunar Spirit (Jehovah, in a
sense, or the Pitris) and his three Sons -- Ka-yin, Habel, and Seth -- represent the three races, as
already explained. Noah-Xisuthrus represents in his turn (in the cosmo-geological key) the 3rd Race
separated, and his three sons, its last three races; Ham, moreover, symbolizing that race which
uncovered the "nakedness" of the Parent Race, and of the "Mindless," i.e., committed sin.
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Orient. Trad., p. 454. See also Bailly's "Lettres sur l'Atlantide."
** Remember that the Rabbins teach that there are to be seven successive renewals of the globe; that
each will last 7,000 years, the total duration being thus 49,000 years (See Rabbi Parcha's "wheel"; also
Kenealy's "Book of God," p. 176). This refers to 7 Rounds, 7 Root-races, and sub-races, the truly occult
figures, though sorely confused.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 398 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
Tahmurath visits on his winged steed (Ahriman) the Mountains of Koh-Kaf or Kaph. He finds there
the Peris ill-treated by the giants, and slays Argen, and the giant Demrusch. Then he liberates the good
Peri, Mergiana*, whom Demrusch had kept as a prisoner, and takes her over to the dry island, i.e., the
new continent of Europe.** After him came Giamschid, who builds Esikekar, or Persepolis. This king
reigns 700 years, and believes himself, in his great pride, immortal, and demands divine honours. Fate
punishes him, he wanders for 100 years in the world under the name of Dhulkarnayn "the two horned."
But this epithet has no connection with the "two-horned" gentleman of the cloven foot. The "twohorned" is the epithet given in Asia, uncivilized enough to know nothing of the attri butes of the devil,
to those conquerors who have subdued the world from the East to the West.
Then come the usurper Zohac, and Feridan, one of the Persian heroes, who vanquishes the former, and
shuts him up in the mountains of Damavend. These are followed by many others down to Kaikobad,
who founded a new dynasty.
Such is the legendary history of Persia, and we have to analyze it. What are the mountains of Kaf to
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-22.htm (19 von 24) [06.05.2003 03:36:12]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2 pt 1, stanza 12 b
begin with?
Whatever they may be in their geographical status, whether they are the Caucasian or Central Asian
mountains, it is far beyond these mountains to the North, that legend places the Devs and Peris; the
latter the remote ancestors of the Parses or Farses. Oriental tradition is ever referring to an unknown
glacial, gloomy sea, and to a dark region, within which, nevertheless, are situated the Fortunate
Islands, wherein bubbles, from the beginning of life on earth, the fountain of life (Herbelot, p. 593;
Armenian Tales, p. 35). But the legend asserts, moreover, that a portion of the first dry island
(continent), having detached itself from the main body, has remained, since then, beyond the
mountains of Koh-kaf, "the stony girdle that surrounds the world." A journey of seven months'
duration will bring him who is possessed of "Soliman's ring" to that "fountain," if he keeps on
journeying North straight before him as the bird flies. Journeying therefore from Persia straight north,
will bring one along the sixtieth degree of longitude, holding to the west, to Nova Zemblia; and from
the Caucasus to the eternal ice beyond the Arctic circle would land one between 60 and 45 degrees of
longitude, or between Nova Zemblia and Spitzbergen. This, of course, if one has the dodecapedian
horse of
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Mergain, or Morgana, the fairy sister of King Arthur, is thus shown of Oriental descent.
** Where we find her, indeed, in Great Britain, in the romance of the Knights of the Round Table.
Whence the identity of name and fairy-hood, if both heroines did not symbolize the same historical
event which had passed into a legend?
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 399 THE ARCTIC CONTINENT.
Huschenk or the winged Simorgh of Tahmurath (or Taimuraz), upon which to cross over the Arctic
Ocean.*
Nevertheless, the wandering songsters of Persia and the Caucasus will maintain, to this day, that far
beyond the snow-capped summits of Kap, or Caucasus, there is a great continent now concealed from
all. That it is reached by those who can secure the services of the twelvelegged progeny of the
crocodile and the female hippopotamus, whose legs become at will twelve wings**; or by those who
have the patience to wait for the good pleasure of Simorgh-anke, who promised that before she dies
she will reveal the hidden continent to all, and make it once more visible and within easy reach, by
means of a bridge, which the Ocean Devs will build between that portion of the "dry island" and its
severed parts.*** This relates, of course, to the seventh race, Simorgh being the Manvantaric cycle.
It is very curious that Cosmas Indicopleustes, who lived in the sixth century A.D., should have always
maintained that man was born, and dwelt at first in a country beyond the Ocean, a proof of which had
been given him in India, by a learned Chaldean (Cosmas Indicopleustes in Collect. nova Patrum, t. ii,
p. 188; also see Journ. des Savants, Suppl. 1707, p. 20.) He says: "The lands we live in are surrounded
by the ocean, but beyond that ocean there is another land which touches the walls of the sky; and it is
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-22.htm (20 von 24) [06.05.2003 03:36:12]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2 pt 1, stanza 12 b
in this land that man was created and lived in paradise. During the Deluge, Noah was carried in his
ark into the land his posterity now inhabits." (Ibid.) The twelve-legged horse of Huschenk was found
on that continent named the dry island. (Supra, p. 154.)
The "Christian topography" of Cosmas Indicopleustes and its merits are well known; but here the good
father repeats a universal tradition, now, moreover, corroborated by facts. Every arctic traveller
suspects a continent or a "dry island" beyond the line of eternal ice. Perhaps now the meaning of the
following passage from one of the Commentaries may become clearer.
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* To this day the aborigines of Caucasus speak of their mountains as Kap-kaz, using the consonant p
instead of the usual v (Kavkaz or Caucasus). But their bards say that it requires seven months for a
swift horse to reach the "dry land" beyond Kaf, holding north without ever deviating from one's way.
** Bailly thought he saw in this horse a twelve-oared ship. The Secret Doctrine teaches that the early
Third Race built boats and flotillas before it built houses. But the "horse," though a much later animal,
has, nevertheless, a more occult primitive meaning. The crocodile and the hippopotamus were held
sacred and represented divine symbols, both with the ancient Egyptians and with the Mexicans.
Poseidon is, in Homer, the God of the Horse, and assumes that form himself to please Ceres. Arion,
their progeny, is one of the aspects of that "horse," which is a cycle.
*** The severed parts must be Norway and other lands in the neighbourhood of the Arctic Circle.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 400 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
"In the first beginnings of (human) life, the only dry land was on the Right end* of the sphere, where it
(the globe) is motionless.** The whole earth was one vast watery desert, and the waters were tepid . . .
. There man was born on the seven zones of the immortal, the indestructible of the Manvantara.***
There was eternal spring in darkness. (But) that which is darkness to the man of today, was light to the
man of his dawn. There, the gods rested, and Fohat**** reigns ever since . . . . Thus the wise fathers
say that man is born in the head of his mother (earth), and that her feet at the left end generated
(begot) the evil winds that blow from the mouth of the lower Dragon . . . . Between the first and second
(races) the eternal central (land) was divided by the water of life.*****
"It flows around and animates her (mother earth's) body. Its one end issues from her head; it becomes
foul at her feet (the Southern Pole). It gets purified (on its return) to her heart -- which beats under the
foot of the sacred Shambalah, which then (in the beginnings) was not yet born. For it is in the belt of
man's dwelling (the earth) that lies concealed the life and health of all that lives and breathes.******
During the first and second (races) the belt was covered with the great waters. (But) the great mother
travailed under the waves and a new land was joined to the first one which our wise men call the headgear (the cap). She travailed harder for the third (race) and her waist and navel appeared above the
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-22.htm (21 von 24) [06.05.2003 03:36:12]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2 pt 1, stanza 12 b
* The two poles are called the right and left ends of our globe -- the right being the North Pole -- or the
head and feet of the earth. Every beneficent (astral and cosmic) action comes from the North; every
lethal influence from the South Pole. They are much connected with and influence "right" and "left"
hand magic.
** The more one approaches the poles the less rotation is felt; at the poles proper, the diurnal
revolution is quite neutralized. Thence the expression that the sphere is "motionless."
*** It is averred in Occultism that the land or island, which crowns the North Pole like a skull-cap, is
the only one which prevails during the whole Manvantara of our "Round." All the central continents
and lands will emerge from the sea bottom many times in turn, but this land will never change.
**** Bear in mind that the Vedic and Avestian name of Fohat is Apam-Napat. In the Avesta he stands
between the fire-yazatas and the water-yazatas. The literal meaning is "Son of the Waters," but these
"waters" are not the liquid we know, but Ether -- the fiery waters of space. Fohat is the "Son of Ether"
in its highest aspect, Akasa, the Mother-Father of the primitive Seven, and of Sound or LOGOS. Fohat
is the light of the latter. See Book I.
***** This "water" is the blood or fluid of life which animates the earth, compared here to a living
body.
****** Occult teaching corroborates the popular tradition which asserts the existence of a fountain of
life in the bowels of the earth and in the North Pole. It is the blood of the earth, the electromagnetic
current, which circulates through all the arteries; and which is said to be found stored in the "navel" of
the earth.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 401 THE UNREACHABLE LAND.
water. It was the belt, the sacred Himavat, which stretches around the world.* She broke toward the
setting sun from her neck** downward (to the south west), into many lands and islands, but the eternal
land (the cap) broke not asunder. Dry lands covered the face of the silent waters to the four sides of
the world. All these perished (in their turn). Then appeared the abode of the wicked (the Atlantis). The
eternal land was now hid, for the waters became solid (frozen) under the breath of her nostrils and the
evil winds from the Dragon's mouth," etc., etc.
This shows that Northern Asia is as old as the Second Race. One may even say that Asia is
contemporary with man, since from the very beginnings of human life its root-continent, so to speak,
already existed; that part of the world now known as Asia being only cut off from it in a later age, and
divided by the glacial waters.
If, then, the teaching is understood correctly, the first continent which came into existence capped over
the whole North Pole like one unbroken crust, and remains so to this day, beyond that inland sea which
seemed like an unreachable mirage to the few arctic travellers who perceived it.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-22.htm (22 von 24) [06.05.2003 03:36:12]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2 pt 1, stanza 12 b
During the Second Race more land emerged from under the waters as a continuation of the "head"
from the neck. Beginning on both hemispheres, on the line above the most northern part of
Spitzbergen*** on
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Occultism points to the Himalayan chain as that "belt," and maintains that whether under the water
or above, it encircles the globe. The navel is described as situated to the setting sun or to the west of
the Himavat in which lie the roots of Meru, which mountain is north of the Himalaya. Meru is not "the
fabulous mountain in the navel or centre of the earth," but its roots and foundations are in that navel,
though it is in the far north itself. This connects it with the "central" land "that never perishes"; the
land in which "the day of the mortal lasts six months and his night another six months." As the Vishnu
Purana has it: "for the North of Meru there is, therefore, always night during day in other regions; for
Meru is north of all the dwipas and varshas" (islands and countries). (Book II., chap. viii.) Meru is
therefore neither on Atlas as Wilford suggests, nor, as Wilson tried to show, "absolutely in the centre
of the globe," only because "relatively with the inhabitants of the several portions, to all of whom the
East is that quarter where the sun first appears."
** Even the Commentaries do not refrain from Oriental metaphor. The globe is likened to the body of
a woman, "mother earth." From her neck downward, means from the inland sea now beyond the
impassable barrier of ice. The Earth, as Parasara says: "is the mother and nurse, augmented with all
creatures and their qualities, the comprehender of all the worlds."
*** For the Stanzas call this locality by a term translated in the commentary as a place of no latitude
(niraksha) the abode of the gods. As a scholiast says from the Surya-Sidhanta:
"Above this (the Siddha) goes the sun when situated at the equinoxes; they have neither equinoctial
shadow nor elevation of the pole (akshonnati, v. 42). In both directions from these are two pole-stars
(dhruvatara), fixed in the midst of the sky; [[Footnote continued on next page]]
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 402 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
Mercator's Projection, on our side, it may have included, on the American side, the localities that are
now occupied by Baffin's Bay and the neighbouring islands and promontories. There it hardly reached,
southward, the 70th degree of latitude; here -- it formed the horse-shoe continent of which the
commentary speaks; of the two ends of which, one included Greenl and with a prolongation which
crossed the 50th degree a little south west, and the other Kamschatka, the two ends being united by
what is now the northern fringe of the coasts of Eastern and Western Siberia. This broke asunder and
disappeared. In the early part of the Third Race -- Lemuria was formed (Vide supra). When it was
destroyed in its turn, Atlantis appeared.
[[This page continued in next section]]
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-22.htm (23 von 24) [06.05.2003 03:36:12]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2 pt 1, stanza 12 b
[[Footnote continued from previous page]] to those who are situated in places of no latitude (niraksha)
both these have their place in the horizon. Hence there is (on that land) no elevation of the poles, the
two pole-stars being situated in their horizon; but their degrees of colatitude (lumbaka) are 90; at Meru
the degrees of latitude (aksha) are of the same number." (43 and 44.)
Next Section
Contents
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-22.htm (24 von 24) [06.05.2003 03:36:12]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, pt 1, stanza 12 c
he Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky -- Vol. 2
Theosophical University Press Online Edition
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 402 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
[[This page continued from previous section]]
WESTERN SPECULATIONS,
FOUNDED ON THE GREEK AND PURANIC TRADITIONS.
Thus it becomes natural to find that, on even such meagre data as have reached the profane historian,
Rudbeck, a Swedish scientist, tried to prove about two centuries ago that Sweden was the Atlantis of
Plato. He thought, even, that he had found in the configuration of ancient Upsala, the situation and
measurements given by the Greek sage of the capital of "Atlantis." As Bailly proved, Rudbeck was
mistaken; but so was Bailly likewise, and still more. For Sweden and Norway had formed part and
parcel of ancient Lemuria, and also of Atlantis on the European side, just as Eastern and Western
Siberia and Kamschatka had belonged to it, on the Asiatic. Only, once more, when was it? We can find
it out approximately only by studying the Puranas, if we will have nought to do with the Secret
teachings.
Three quarters of a century have already elapsed since Captain (now Colonel) Wilford brought forward
his fanciful theories about the British islands being the "White Island," the Atala of the Puranas. This
was sheer nonsense, as the Atala is one of the seven dwipas, or islands, belonging to the nether lokas,
one of the seven regions of Patala (the antipodes). Moreover, as Wilford* shows, the Puranas place it
"on
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Wilford makes many mistakes. He identifies, for instance, Sveta-dwipa (the white Island), the "island
in the northern part of Toyambhudi," with England, and then tries to identify it with Atala (a nether
region) and Atlantis. Now the former is the abode of Vishnu, exoterically, and Atala is a hell. He also
places it in the Euxine or Icshu (Black) Sea, and then seems to connect it, in another place, with Africa
and Atlas.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 403 ORIENTALISTS IN THE WRONG BOX.
the seventh zone or seventh climate," -- rather, on the seventh measure of heat: which thus locates it
between the latitudes of 24 and 28 degrees north. It is then to be sought on the same degree as the
Tropic of Cancer, whereas England is between the 50th and 60th degrees of latitude. Wilford speaks of
it as Atala, Atlantis, the white island. And in vol. viii. of Journal of Asiatic Researches, p. 280, its
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-23.htm (1 von 21) [06.05.2003 03:36:17]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, pt 1, stanza 12 c
enemy is called the "White Devil," the demon of terror. For he says: "In their (the Hindu and
Mahomedan) romances, we see Kai-caus going to the mountain of 'As-burj, at the foot of which the
Sun sets,' to fight the Dev-Sefid, or white devil, the Taradaitya of the Puranas, whose abode was on
the seventh stage of the world, answering to the seventh zone of the Buddhists, or the White Island."
Now here the Orientalists have been, and are still, facing the Sphinx's riddle, the wrong solution of
which will ever destroy their authority, if not their persons, in the eyes of every Hindu scholar, even
those who are not initiates. For there is not a statement in the Puranas -- on the conflicting details of
which Wilford based his speculations -- which has not several meanings, and does not apply to both
the physical and the metaphysical worlds. If the old Hindus divided the face of the globe
geographically into seven zones, climates, dwipas, and into seven hells and seven heavens,
allegorically, that measure of seven did not apply in both cases to the same localities. It is the north
pole, the country of "Meru," which is the seventh division, as it answers to the Seventh principle (or
fourth metaphysically), of the occult calculation, for it represents the region of Atma, of pure soul, and
Spirituality. Hence Pushkara is shown as the seventh zone, or dwipa, which encompasses the Kshira
Ocean, or Ocean of milk (the ever-frozen white region) in the Vishnu (and other) Puranas (Book II ch.
iv.). And Pushkara, with its two Varshas, lies directly at the foot of Meru. For it is said that "the two
countries north and south of Meru are shaped like a bow," . . and that "one half of the surface of the
earth is on the south of Meru and the other half on the north of Meru -- beyond which is half of
Pushkara" (Vishnu Purana, Asiatic Researches, etc.). Geographically, then, Pushkara is America,
Northern and Southern; and allegorically it is the prolongation of Jambu-dwipa* in the middle of
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Every name in the Puranas has to be examined at least under two aspects; geographically, and
metaphysically, in its allegorical application; e.g., Nila, the (blue) mountain which is one of the
boundaries to the north of Meru, is again to be sought geographically in a mountain range in Orissa,
and again in a mountain quite different from the others (in Western Africa). Jambu-dwipa is Vishnu's
dominion -- the world, limited in the Puranas to our globe, the region which contains Meru only, and
again it is divided to contain Bharata-varsha (India), its best division, and the fairest, says Parasara.
Likewise with Pushkara and all others.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 404 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
which stands Meru, for it is the country inhabited by beings who live ten thousand years, who are free
from sickness or failing; where there is neither virtue nor vice, caste or laws, for these men are "of the
same nature as the Gods," (Vishnu Purana, Book II. ch. iv.). Wilford is inclined to see Meru in Mount
Atlas, and locates there also the Loka-lokas. Now Meru, we are told, which is the Swar-loka, the abode
of Brahma, of Vishnu, and the Olympus of Indian exoteric religions, is described geographically as
"passing through the middle of the earth-globe, and protruding on either side" (Surya Siddhanta, v. 5,
Whitney's trans.). On its upper station are the gods, on the nether (or South pole) is the abode of
demons (hells). How can then Meru be Mount Atlas? Besides which, Taradaitya, a demon, cannot be
placed on the seventh zone if the latter is identified with the "white" Island, which is Sveta-dwipa, for
reasons given in the foot-note. (Vide infra.)
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-23.htm (2 von 21) [06.05.2003 03:36:17]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, pt 1, stanza 12 c
Wilford accuses the modern Brahmans "of having jumbled them (islands and countries) all together"
(A.R. III. 300); but he jumbled them still more. He believes that as the Brahmanda and Vayu Puranas
divide the old continent into seven dwipas, said to be surrounded by a vast ocean, beyond which lie the
regions and mountains of Atala (ibid), hence "most probably the Greeks divided the nation of Atlantis,
which, as it could not be found after having once been discovered, they conceived to have been
destroyed by some shock of nature."
Finding certain difficulties in believing that the Egyptian priests, Plato, and even Homer, had all built
their notions of Atlantis on Atala -- a nether region located at the Southern pole -- we prefer holding to
the statements given in the secret books. We believe in the seven "continents," four of which have
already lived their day, the fifth still exists, and two are to appear in the future. We believe that each of
these is not strictly a continent in the modern sense of the word, but that each name, from Jambu down
to Pushkara,* refers to the geographical names given (i.) to the dry lands covering the face of the
whole earth during the period of a Root-Race, in general; and (ii.) to what remained of these after a
geological (race) Pralaya -- as "Jambu," for instance: and (iii.) to those localities which will enter,
after the future cataclysms, into the formation of new universal "continents," peninsulas, or dwipas** -each continent being, in one sense, a greater or smaller region of dry land surrounded with water. Thus,
that whatever
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Jambu, Plaksha, Salmali, Kusa, Krauncha, Saka, and Pushkara.
** Such as Saka and Pushkara, for instance, which do not yet exist, but into which will enter such
lands as some portions of America, of Africa, and Central Asia, with the Gobi region. Let us bear in
mind that Upadwipas means "root" islands, or the dry land in general.
"jumble" the nomenclature of these may represent to the profane, there is none, in fact, to him who has
the key.
Thus, we believe we know that, though two of the Puranic "islands" -- the sixth and seventh
"continents" -- are yet to come, nevertheless there were, or there are, lands which will enter into the
composition of the future dry lands, of new earths whose geographical faces will be entirely changed,
as were those of the past. Therefore we find in the Puranas that Saka-dwipa is (or will be) a continent,
and that Sankha-dwipa, as shown in the Vayu Purana, is only "a minor island," one of the nine
divisions (to which Vayu adds six more) of Bharata Varsha. Because Sankha-dwipa was peopled by
"Mlechchhas (unclean foreigners), who worshipped Hindu divinities," therefore they were connected
with India.* This accounts for Sankhasura, a King of a portion of Sankha-dwipa, who was killed by
Krishna; that King who resided in the palace "which was an ocean shell, and whose subjects lived in
shells also," says Wilford.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-23.htm (3 von 21) [06.05.2003 03:36:17]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, pt 1, stanza 12 c
"On the banks of the Nile** (?) there were frequent contests between the Devatas (divine beings, demigods) and the Daityas (giants); but the latter tribe having prevailed, their King, Sankhasura, who
resided in the Ocean, made frequent incursions in the night" (As. Res., Vol. III. 225.)
It is not on the banks of the Nile, but on the coasts of Western Africa, south of where now lies
Morocco, that these battles took place. There was a time when the whole of the Sahara desert was a
sea, then a continent as fertile as the Delta, and then, only after another temporary submersion, it
became a desert similar to that other wilderness, the desert of Shamo or Gobi. This is shown in Puranic
tradition, for on the same page as above cited, it is said: "The people were between two fires; for, while
Sankhasura was ravaging one side of the continent, Krauncha (or Cracacha), King of Kraunch, used to
desolate the other; both armies . . . thus changed the most fertile regions into a savage desert."
That not only the last island of Atlantis, spoken of by Plato, but a large continent, first divided, and
then broken later on into seven peninsulas and islands (called dwipas), preceded Europe, is sure. It
covered the whole of the North and South Atlantic regions, as well as portions of the North and South
Pacific, and had islands even in the Indian Ocean (relics of Lemuria). The claim is corroborated by
Indian Puranas, Greek writers, and Asiatic, Persian, and Mohammedan traditions. Wilford, who
confuses sorely the Hindu and the Mussulman legends, shows this, however, clearly. (See Vol. VIII., X.
and XI. of
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* They were called demons, Asuras, giants, and monsters, because of their wickedness; and thus their
country was likened to Atala -- a hell, because of that.
** Not on the river Nile, surely, but near the Nila mountains of the Atlas range.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 406 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
Asiatic Researches.) And his facts and quotations from the Puranas give direct and conclusive
evidence that the Aryan Hindus and other ancient nations were earlier navigators than the Phoenicians,
who are now credited with having been the first seamen that appeared in the post-diluvian times. This
is what is given in the Journal of the Asiatic Society, III., pp. 325, et seq.: -"In their distress the few nations who survived (in the war between Devatas and Daityas) raised their
hands to Bhagavan, 'Let him who can deliver us . . . be our King'; using the word I'T (a magic term not
understood by Wilford, evidently) which re-echoed through the whole country."
Then comes a violent storm, the waters of the Kali are strangely agitated, "when there appeared from
the waves . . a man, afterwards called I'T, at the head of a numerous army, saying abhayan, no fear" . .
. and scattered the enemy. "The King I'T," explains Wilford, "is a subordinate incarnation of M'rira"
(Mrida, a form of Rudra, probably?) who "re-established peace and prosperity throughout all Sankhadwipa, through Barbaradesa, Hissast'han and Awasthan or Arabia . . " etc., etc.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-23.htm (4 von 21) [06.05.2003 03:36:17]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, pt 1, stanza 12 c
Surely, if the Hindu Puranas give a description of wars on continents and islands situated beyond
Western Africa in the Atlantic Ocean; if their writers speak of Barbaras and other people such as
Arabs -- they who were never known to navigate, or cross the Kala pani (the black waters of the
Ocean) in the days of Phoenician navigation -- then their Puranas must be older than those Phoenicians
(placed at from 2,000 to 3,000 years B.C.). At any rate those traditions must have been older;* as -"In the above accounts," writes an adept, "the Hindus speak of this island as existing and in great
power; it must, therefore, have been more than eleven thousand years ago."
But another calculation and proof may be adduced of the great antiquity of these Hindu Aryans who
knew of (because they had once dwelt in it) and described the last surviving island of Atlantis -- or
rather of that remnant of the Eastern portion of that continent which had
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Says Wilford of the division of Atlantis and Bharata or India, confusing the two accounts and
Priyavrata with Medhatithi: -- "The division was made by Priyavrata. . . . He had ten sons, and it was
his intention to divide the whole world. In the same manner Neptune divided Atlantis between his ten
sons. . . . One of them had . . . the extremity of the Atlantis" -- which "is probably the old continent. . . .
This Atlantis was overwhelmed by a flood. . . . and it seems that by Atlantis we should understand the
Antediluvian Earth over which ten princes were born to rule according to the mythology of the West
(and of the East, also) but seven only of them sat upon the throne." (Vol. III. p. 286.) . . Some also are
of opinion that of the seven dwipas six were destroyed by a flood (Vol. VIII. p. 367). Wilford takes it to
be "Gades which included Spain," but it was Plato's island -- rather.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 407 THE PUZZLES OF ANTIQUITY.
perished soon after the upheaval of the two Americas* -- the two Varshas of Pushkara. This may be
demonstrated, moreover, on an astronomical calculation by an adept who criticises Wilford. For
recalling what the Orientalist had brought forward concerning the Mount Ashburj "at the foot of which
the sun sets," where was the war between the Devatas and the Daityas,** he says: -"We will consider, then, the latitude and longitude of the lost island, and of the remaining Mount
Ashburj. It was on the seventh stage of the world, i.e., in the seventh climate (which is between the
latitude of 24 degrees and latitude 28 degrees north) . . . This island, the daughter of the Ocean, is
frequently described as lying in the West; and the sun is represented as setting at the foot of its
mountain (Ashburj, Atlas, Teneriffe or Nila, no matter the name), and fighting the white Devil of the
'White Island.' "
Now, considering this statement from its astronomical aspect, and knowing that Krishna is the
incarnated Sun (Vishnu), a solar God; and that he is said to have killed Dev-Sefid, the white giant -- a
possible personification of the ancient inhabitants at the foot of the Atlas -- perchance Krishna may be
only a representation of the vertical beams of the Sun? Those inhabitants (the Atlantides) are, we have
seen, accused by Diodorus of daily cursing the Sun, and ever fighting his influence. This is an
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-23.htm (5 von 21) [06.05.2003 03:36:17]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, pt 1, stanza 12 c
astronomical interpretation of course. But it will now be proved that Sankhasura, and Sancha dwipa,
and all their history, is also geographically and ethnologically Plato's "Atlantis" in Hindu dress.
It was just remarked that since, in the Puranic accounts, the island is still existing, then those accounts
must be older than the 11,000 years elapsed since Sancha dwipa, or the Poseidonis of Atlantis,
disappeared. Is it not barely possible that Hindus should have known the island still earlier? Let us turn
again to astronomical demonstrations, which make this quite plain if one assumes, according to the
said adept, that "at the time when the summer tropical 'colure' passed through the Pleiades, when corLeonis would be upon the equator; and when Leo was vertical to Ceylon at sunset, then would Taurus
be vertical to the island of Atlantis at noon."
This explains, perhaps, why the Singhalese, the heirs of the
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* America, the "new" world -- is thus, though not much, older; still it is older than Europe, the "old
world."
** If Div or Dev-Sefid's (the Taradaitya's) abode was on the seventh stage, it is because he came from
Pushkara, the Patala (antipodes) of India, or from America. The latter touched the walls, so to say, of
Atlantis, before the latter sank finally. The word Patala, meaning both the antipodal countries and
infernal regions, thus became synonymous in ideas and attri butes as well as in name.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 408 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
Rakshasas and Giants of Lanka, and the direct descendants of Singha, or Leo, became connected with
Sancha dwipa or Poseidonis (Plato's Atlantis). Only, as shown by Mackey's "Sphinxiad," this must
have occurred about 23,000 years ago, astronomically; at which time the obliquity of the ecliptic must
have been rather more than 27 degrees, and consequently Taurus must have passed over "Atlantis" or
"Sancha dwipa." And that it was so is clearly demonstrated.
"The sacred bull Nandi was brought from Bharata to Sancha to meet Rishabha (Taurus) every Kalpa.
But when those of the White Island (who descended originally from Sveta dwipa),* who had mixed
with the Daityas (giants) of the land of iniquity, had become black with Sin, then Nandi remained for
ever in the "White Island" (or Sveta dwipa.) "Those of the Fourth World (race) lost AUM" -- say the
Commentaries.
Asburj (or Azburj), whether the peak of Teneriffe or not, was a volcano, when the sinking of the
"western Atala" (or hell) began, and those who were saved told the tale to their children. Plato's
Atlantis perished between water below and fire above; the great mountain vomiting flames all the
while. "The 'fire-vomiting Monster' survived alone out of the ruins of the unfortunate island."
Do the Greeks, accused of borrowing a Hindu fiction (Atala), and inventing from it another (Atlantis),
stand also accused of getting their geographical notions and the number seven from them? (Vide in
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-23.htm (6 von 21) [06.05.2003 03:36:17]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, pt 1, stanza 12 c
Part II. the several sections on the SEPTENATE in nature.)
"The famous Atlantis exists no longer, but we can hardly doubt that it did once," says Proclus, "for
Marcellus, who wrote a history of Ethiopian affairs, says that such, and so great an island once existed,
and this is evidenced by those who composed histories relative to the external sea. For they relate that
in this time there were seven islands in the Atlantic sea sacred to Proserpine; and besides these, three
of immense magnitude, sacred to Pluto . . . Jupiter . . . and Neptune. And, besides this, the inhabitants
of the last island (Poseidonis) preserved the memory of the prodigious magnitude of the Atlantic island
as related by their ancestors, and of its governing for many periods all the islands in the Atlantic sea.
From this isle one may pass to other large
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Neither Atlantis, nor yet Sancha dwipa, was ever called "White Island." When tradition says that "the
White Island became black on account of the sins of people" it only means the denizens of the "White
Island," or Siddhapura, or Sveta dwipa, who descended to the Atlantis of the Third and Fourth races, to
"inform the latter; and who, having incarnated, became black with sin" -- a figure of speech. All the
Avatars of Vishnu are said to come originally from the White Island. According to Tibetan tradition
the White Island is the only locality which escapes the general fate of other dwipas and can be
destroyed by neither fire nor water, for -- it is the "eternal land."
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 409 WHAT MARCELLUS SAYS.
islands beyond, which are not far from the firm land, near which is the true sea."
"These seven dwipas (inaccurately rendered islands) constitute, according to Marcellus, the body of
the famous Atlantis," writes Wilford himself. . . . . This evidently shows that Atlantis is the old
continent. . . . The Atlantis was destroyed after a violent storm (?): this is well known to the Puranics,
some of whom assert that in consequence of this dreadful convulsion of nature, six of the dwipas
disappeared" . . . (xi., 27).
Enough proofs have now been given to satisfy the greatest sceptic. Nevertheless, direct proofs based
on exact science are also added. Volumes might be written, however, to no purpose for those who will
neither see nor hear, except through the eyes and ears of their respective authorities.
Hence the teaching of the Roman Catholic scholiasts, namely, that Hermon, the mount in the land of
Mizpeth -- meaning "anathema," "destruction" -- is the same as Mount Armon. As a proof of this,
Josephus is often quoted, as affirming that still in his own day enormous bones of giants were daily
discovered on it. But it was the land of Balaam the prophet, whom the "Lord loved well"; and so mixed
up are facts and personages in the said scholiasts' brains, that, when the Zohar explains the "birds"
which inspired Balaam to mean "Serpents," to wit, the wise men and adepts at whose school he had
learnt the mysteries of prophecy -- the opportunity is again taken of showing Mount Hermon inhabited
by the "winged dragons of Evil, whose chief is Samael" (the Jewish Satan).
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-23.htm (7 von 21) [06.05.2003 03:36:17]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, pt 1, stanza 12 c
"It is to those unclean spirits chained on Mount Hermon of the Desert, that the scapegoat of Israel, who
assumed the name of one of them (Azaz(y)el), was sent" (Spencer).
We say it is not so. The Zohar has the following explanation on the practice of magic which is called in
Hebrew Nehhaschim, or the "Serpents' Works." It says (Part III. col. 302): -- "It is called nehhaschim,
because the magicians (practical Kabalists) work surrounded by the light of the primordial serpent,
which they perceive in heaven as a luminous zone composed of myriads of small stars" . . . which
means simply the astral light, so called by the Martinists, by Eliphas Levi, and now by all the modern
Occultists. (Vide Sections about.) ------THE "CURSE" FROM A PHILOSOPHICAL POINT OF VIEW.
The foregoing teachings of the SECRET DOCTRINE, supplemented by universal traditions, must now
have demonstrated that the Brahmanas and Puranas, the Yathas and other Mazdean Scriptures,
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 410 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
down to the Egyptian, Greek, and Roman, and finally to the Jewish Sacred records, all have the same
origin. None are meaningless and baseless stories, invented to entrap the unwary profane: all are
allegories intended to convey, under a more or less fantastic veil, the great truths gathered in the same
field of pre-historic tradition. Space forbids us from entering, in these two volumes, into further and
more minute details with respect to the four Races which preceded our own. But before offering to the
student the history of the psychic and spiritual evolution of the direct antediluvian fathers of our Fifth
(Aryan) humanity, and before demonstrating its bearing upon all the other side branches grown from
the same trunk, we have to elucidate a few more facts. It has been shown, on the evidence of the whole
ancient literary world, and the intuitional speculations of more than one philosopher and scientist of
the later ages, that the tenets of our Esoteric Doctrine are corroborated by inferential as well as by
direct proof in almost every case. That neither the "legendary" giants, nor the lost continents, nor yet
the evolution of the preceding races, are quite baseless tales. In the Addenda which close this volume,
science will find itself more than once unable to reply; they will, it is hoped, finally dispose of every
sceptical remark with regard to the sacred number in nature, and our figures in general. (Vide on the
Septenaries.)
Meanwhile, one task is left incomplete: that of disposing of that most pernicious of all the theological
dogmas -- the CURSE under which mankind is alleged to have suffered ever since the supposed
disobedience of Adam and Eve in the bower of Eden.
Creative powers in man were the gift of divine wisdom, not the result of sin. This is clearly instanced
in the paradoxical behaviour of Jehovah, who first curses Adam and Eve (or Humanity) for the
supposed committed crime, and then blesses his "chosen people" by saying "Be fruitful and multiply,
and replenish the earth" (Gen. ix. 1). The curse was not brought on mankind by the Fourth Race, for
the comparatively sinless Third Race, the still more gigantic Antediluvians, had perished in the same
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-23.htm (8 von 21) [06.05.2003 03:36:17]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, pt 1, stanza 12 c
way; hence the Deluge was no punishment, but simply a result of a periodical and geological law. Nor
was the curse of KARMA called down upon them for seeking natural union, as all the mindless
animal-world does in its proper seasons; but, for abusing the creative power, for desecrating the divine
gift, and wasting the life-essence for no purpose except bestial personal gratification. When
understood, the third chapter of Genesis will be found to refer to the Adam and Eve of the closing
Third and the commencing Fourth Races. In the beginning, conception was as easy for woman as it
was for all animal creation. Nature had never intended that woman should bring forth her young ones
"in sorrow." Since that period, however, during the
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 411 THE ANCIENT AND THE MODERN MAN.
evolution of the Fourth Race, there came enmity between its seed, and the "Serpent's" seed, the seed or
product of Karma and divine wisdom. For the seed of woman or lust, bruised the head of the seed of
the fruit of wisdom and knowledge, by turning the holy mystery of procreation into animal
gratification; hence the law of Karma "bruised the heel" of the Atlantean race, by gradually changing
physiologically, morally, physically, and mentally, the whole nature of the Fourth Race of mankind,*
until, from the healthy King of animal creation of the Third Race, man became in the Fifth, our race, a
helpless, scrofulous being, and has now become the wealthiest heir on the globe to constitutional and
hereditary diseases, the most consciously and intelligently bestial of all animals!**
This is the real CURSE from the physiological standpoint, almost the only one touched upon in the
Kabalistic esotericism. Viewed from this aspect, the curse is undeniable, for it is evident. The
intellectual evolution, in its progress hand-in-hand with the physical, has certainly been a curse instead
of a blessing -- a gift quickened by the "Lords of Wisdom," who have poured on the human manas the
fresh dew of their own spirit and essence. The divine Titan has then suffered in vain; and one feels
inclined to regret his benefaction to mankind, and sigh for those days so graphically depicted by
AEschylus, in his "Prometheus Bound," when, at the close of the first Titanic age (the age that
followed that of ethereal man, of the pious Kandu and Pramlocha), nascent, physical mankind, still
mindless and (physiologically) senseless, is described as -"Seeing, they saw in vain;
Hearing, they heard not; but like shapes in dreams,
Through the long time all things at random mixed."
Our Saviours, the Agnishwatta and other divine "Sons of the Flame of Wisdom" (personified by the
Greeks in Prometheus***), may well, in
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* How wise and grand, how far-seeing and morally beneficent are the laws of Manu on connubial life,
when compared with the licence tacitly allowed to man in civilized countries. That those laws have
been neglected for the last two millenniums does not prevent us from admiring their forethought. The
Brahmin was a grihasta, a family man, till a certain period of his life, when, after begetting a son, he
broke with married life and became a chaste Yogi. His very connubial life was regulated by his
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-23.htm (9 von 21) [06.05.2003 03:36:17]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, pt 1, stanza 12 c
Brahmin astrologer in accordance with his nature. Therefore, in such countries as the Punjab, for
instance, where the lethal influence of Mussulman, and later on of European, licentiousness, has hardly
touched the orthodox Aryan castes, one still finds the finest men -- so far as stature and physical
strength go -- on the whole globe; whereas the mighty men of old have found themselves replaced in
the Deccan, and especially in Bengal, by men whose generation becomes with every century (and
almost with every year) dwarfed and weakened.
** Diseases and over-population are facts that can never be denied.
*** In Mrs. Anna Swanwick's volumes, "The Dramas of AEschylus," it is said of "Prometheus Bound"
(Vol. II., pp. 146, 147), that Prometheus truly appears in it "as [[Footnote continued on next page]]
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 412 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
the injustice of the human heart, be left unrecognized and unthanked. They may, in our ignorance of
the truth, be indirectly cursed for Pandora's gift: but to find themselves proclaimed and declared by the
mouth of the clergy, the EVIL ONES, is too heavy a Karma for "Him" "who dared alone "-- when
Zeus "ardently desired" to quench the entire human race -- to save "that mortal race" from perdition,
or, as the suffering Titan is made to say: -"From sinking blasted down to Hades' gloom.
For this by the dire tortures I am bent,
Grievous to suffer, piteous to behold,
I who did mortals pity! . . . . "
The chorus remarking very pertinently: -"Vast boon was this thou gavest unto mortals . . . ."
Prometheus answers: -"Yea, and besides 'twas I that gave them fire.
CHORUS: Have now these short-lived creatures flame-eyed fire?
PROM.: Ay, and by it full many arts will learn. . . . . "
But, with the arts, the fire received has turned into the greatest curse: the animal element, and
consciousness of its possession, has changed periodical instinct into chronic animalism and
sensuality.* It is this which hangs over humanity like a heavy funereal pall. Thus arises the
responsibility of free-will; the Titanic passions which represent humanity in its darkest aspect; "the
restless insatiability of the lower passions and desires, when, with self-asserting insolence, they bid
defiance to the restraints of law."**
Prometheus having endowed man, according to Plato's "Protagoras," with that "wisdom which
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-23.htm (10 von 21) [06.05.2003 03:36:17]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, pt 1, stanza 12 c
ministers to physical well-being," but the lower aspect of manas of the animal (Kama) having
remained unchanged,
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous page]] the champion and benefactor of mankind, whose condition .
. . . is depicted as weak and miserable in the extreme. . . . Zeus, it is said, proposed to annihilate these
puny ephemerals, and to plant upon the earth a new race in their stead." We see the Lords of Being
doing likewise, and exterminating the first product of nature and the sea, in the Stanzas (V, et seq.). . . .
Prometheus represents himself as having frustrated this design, and as being consequently subjected,
for the sake of mortals, to the most agonising pain, inflicted by the remorseless cruelty of Zeus. We
have, thus, the Titan, the symbol of finite reason and free will (of intellectual humanity, or the higher
aspect of Manas), depicted as the sublime philanthropist, while Zeus, the supreme deity of Hellas, is
portrayed as the cruel and obdurate despot, a character peculiarly revolting to Athenian sentiment."
The reason for it is explained further on. The "Supreme Deity" bears, in every ancient Pantheon -including that of the Jews -- a dual character, composed of light and shadow.
* The animal world, having simple instinct to guide it, has its seasons of procreation, and the sexes
become neutralized during the rest of the year. Therefore, the free animal knows sickness but once in
its life -- before it dies.
** Introduction to "Prometheus Bound," p. 152.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 413 THE TRAVESTY OF PROMETHEUS.
instead of "an untainted mind, heaven's first gift" (AEschylus), there was created the eternal vulture of
the ever unsatisfied desire, of regret and despair coupled with "the dreamlike feebleness that fetters the
blind race of mortals" (p. 556), unto the day when Prometheus is released by his heaven-appointed
deliverer, Herakles.
Now Christians -- Roman Catholics especially -- have tried to prophetically connect this drama with
the coming of Christ. No greater mistake could be made. The true theosophist, the pursuer of divine
wisdom and worshipper of ABSOLUTE perfection -- the unknown deity which is neither Zeus nor
Jehovah -- will demur to such an idea. Pointing to antiquity he will prove that there never was an
original sin, but only an abuse of physical intelligence -- the psychic being guided by the animal, and
both putting out the light of the spiritual. He will say, "All ye who can read between the lines, study
ancient wisdom in the old dramas -- the Indian and the Greek; read carefully the one just mentioned,
one enacted on the theatres of Athens 2,400 years ago, namely 'Prometheus Bound' " The myth
belongs to neither Hesiod nor AEschylus; but, as Bunsen says, it "is older than the Hellenes
themselves," for it belongs, in truth, to the dawn of human consciousness. The Crucified Titan is the
personified symbol of the collective Logos, the "Host," and of the "Lords of Wisdom" or the
HEAVENLY MAN, who incarnated in Humanity. Moreover, as his name Pro-me-theus, meaning "he
who sees before him" or futurity, shows* -- in the arts he devised and taught to humanity,
psychological insight was not the least. For as he complains to the daughters of Oceanos: -http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-23.htm (11 von 21) [06.05.2003 03:36:17]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, pt 1, stanza 12 c
"Of prophecies the various modes I fixed,
And among dreams did first discriminate
The truthful vision . . . and mortals guided
To a mysterious art. . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
All arts to mortals from Prometheus came. . ."
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* From [[pro metis]] pro metis, "forethought." "Professor Kuhn," we are told in the above-named
volumes of "The Dramas of AEschylus," "considers the name of the Titan to be derived from the
Sanskrit word Pramantha, the instrument used for kindling fire. The root mand or manth, implies
rotatory motion, and the word manthami (used to denote the process of fire kindling) acquired the
secondary sense of snatching away; hence we find another word of the same stock, pramatha,
signifying theft." This is very ingenious, but perhaps not altogether correct; besides, there is a very
prosaic element in it. No doubt in physical nature, the higher forms may develop from the lower ones,
but it is hardly so in the world of thought. And as we are told that the word manthami passed into the
Greek language and became the word manthano, to learn; that is to say, to appropriate knowledge;
whence prometheia, fore-knowledge, fore-thought; we may find, in searching, a more poetical origin
for the "fire-bringer" than that displayed in its Sanskrit origin. The Svastica, the sacred sign and the
instrument for kindling sacred fire, may explain it better. "Prometheus, the fire-bringer, is the
Pramantha personified," goes on the author; "he finds his prototype in the Aryan [[Footnote continued
on next page]]
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 414 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
Leaving for a few pages the main subject, let us pause and see what may be the hidden meaning of
this, the most ancient as it is the most suggestive of traditional allegories. As it relates directly to the
early races, this will be no real digression.
The subject of AEschylus' drama (the trilogy is lost) is known to all cultured readers. The demi-god
robs the gods (the Elohim) of their secret -- the mystery of the creative fire. For this sacrilegious
attempt he is struck down by KRONOS* and delivered unto Zeus, the FATHER and creator of a
mankind which he would wish to have blind intellectually, and animal-like; a personal deity, which
will not see MAN "like one of us." Hence Prometheus, "the fire and light-giver," is chained on Mount
Caucasus and condemned to suffer torture. But the triform Fates (Karma), whose decrees, as the Titan
says, even Zeus: -"E'en he the fore-ordained cannot escape. . . "
-- ordain that those sufferings will last only to that day when a son of Zeus -"Ay, a son bearing stronger than his sire" (787)
..........
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-23.htm (12 von 21) [06.05.2003 03:36:17]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, pt 1, stanza 12 c
"One of thine (Io's) own descendants it must be. ."(791)
-- is born. This "Son" will deliver Prometheus (the suffering Humanity) from his own fatal gift. His
name is, "He who has to come. . . . "
On the authority, then, of these few lines, which, like any other allegorical sentence, may be twisted
into almost any meaning; namely, on the words pronounced by Prometheus and addressed to Io, the
daughter of Inachos, persecuted by Zeus -- a whole prophecy is constructed by some Catholic writers.
Says the crucified Titan: -"And, portent past belief, the speaking oaks
By which full clearly, in no riddling phrase
Wast hailed as the illustrious spouse of Zeus
. . . . . . . . . (v. 853).
. . . . stroking thee
With touch alone of unalarming hand;
Then thou dark Epaphos shalt bear, whose name
Records his sacred gendering . . . . " (870)
This was construed by several fanatics -- des Mousseaux and de Mir[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous page]] Matarisvan, a divine . . . . personage, closely associated
with the fire god of the Veda, Agni. . . ." Mati, in Sanskrit, is "understanding," and a synonym of
MAHAT and manas, and must be of some account in the origin of the name: Promati is the son of
Fohat, and has his story also.
* Kronos is "time," and thus the allegory becomes very suggestive. (See closing pages of this Subsection.)
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 415 CHRIST CONNECTED WITH EPAPHOS.
ville amongst others -- into a clear prophecy. Io -- "is the mother of God," we are told, and "dark
Epaphos" -- Christ. But, the latter has not dethroned his father, except metaphorically, if one has to
regard Jehovah as that "Father"; nor has the Christian Saviour hurled his Father down into Hades.
Prometheus says, in verse 930, that Zeus will be humbled yet; as for himself: -" . . . . such marriage he prepares
Which from his throne of power to nothingness
Shall hurl him down; so shall be all fulfilled
His father Kronos' curse . . . .
. . . . Then let him sit
Confiding in his lofty thunder-peals,
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-23.htm (13 von 21) [06.05.2003 03:36:17]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, pt 1, stanza 12 c
And wielding with both hands the fiery bolt;
For these shall not avail, but fail he shall,
A fall disgraceful, not to be endured . . . . " (v. 980).
"Dark Epaphos" was the Dionysos-Sabazius, the son of Zeus and of Demeter in the Sabasian
Mysteries, during which the "father of the gods," assuming the shape of a Serpent, begot on Demeter,
Dionysos, or the solar Bacchus. Io is the moon, and at the same time the EVE of a new race, and so is
Demeter -- in the present case. The Promethean myth is a prophecy indeed; but it does not relate to any
of the cyclic Saviours who have appeared periodically in various countries and among various nations,
in their transitionary conditions of evolution. It points to the last of the mysteries of cyclic
transformations, in the series of which mankind, having passed from the ethereal to the solid physical
state, from spiritual to physiological procreation, is now carried onward on the opposite arc of the
cycle, toward that second phase of its primitive state, when woman knew no man, and human progeny
was created, not begotten.
That state will return to it and to the world at large, when the latter shall discover and really appreciate
the truths which underlie this vast problem of sex. It will be like "the light that never shone on sea or
land," and has to come to men through the Theosophical Society. That light will lead on and up to the
true spiritual intuition. Then (as expressed once in a letter to a theosophist), "the world will have a
race of Buddhas and Christs, for the world will have discovered that individuals have it in their own
powers to procreate Buddha-like children -- or demons." "When that knowledge comes, all dogmatic
religions, and with these the demons, will die out."
If we reflect upon the serial development of the allegory, and the character of the heroes, the mystery
may be unriddled. KRONOS is of course "time" in its cyclic course. He swallows his children -- the
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* See, for explanation of this curse, the last page of the present sub-section.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 416 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
personal gods of exoteric dogmas included. He has swallowed instead of Zeus, his stone idol; but the
symbol has grown, and has only developed in human fancy as mankind was cycling down toward only
its physical and intellectual -- not spiritual -- perfection. When it is as far advanced in its spiritual
evolution Kronos will be no longer deceived. Instead of the stone image he will have swallowed the
anthropomorphic fiction itself. Because, the serpent of wisdom, represented in the Sabasian mysteries
by the anthropomorphised Logos, the unity of spiritual and physical Powers, will have begotten in
Time (Kronos) a progeny -- Dionysos-Bacchus or the "dark Epaphos," the "mighty one" -- the race that
will overthrow him. Where will he be born? Prometheus traces him to his origin and birth-place in his
prophecy to Io. Io is the moon-goddess of generation -- for she is Isis and she is Eve, the great
mother.* He traces the path of the (racial) wanderings as plainly as words can express it. She has to
quit Europe and go to Asia's continent, reaching there the highest of the mountains of Caucasus (737),
the Titan telling her: -http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-23.htm (14 von 21) [06.05.2003 03:36:17]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, pt 1, stanza 12 c
"When thou hast crossed the flood, limit betwixt
Two continents, fronting the burning East." (810)
that she must travel eastward, after passing the "Kimmerian Bosphorus," and cross what is evidently
the Volga and now Astrakhan on the Caspian Sea. After this she will encounter "fierce northern blasts"
and cross thither to the land of the "Arimaspian host" (east of Herodotus' Scythia) to -"Pluto's gold-abounding flood. . . ."(825)
Which is rightly conjectured by Professor Newman to have meant the
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* It is complained by the author of the version on, and translator of, "Prometheus Bound" that in this
tracing of Io's wanderings, "no consistency with our known geography is attainable" (p. 191, Vol. II).
There may be good reason for it. First of all it is the journey and wandering from place to place of the
race from which the "tenth," or Kalki Avatar, so called, is to issue. This he calls the "Kingly race born
in Argos" (888). But Argos has no reference here to Argos in Greece. It comes from Arg or arca -- the
female generative power symbolised in the moon -- the navi-formed Argha of the mysteries, meaning
the Queen of Heaven. Eustathius shows that, in the dialect of the Arg-ians, Io signified the moon;
while esotericism explains it as the divine Androgyne, or the mystic 10; in Hebrew 10 is the perfect
number, or Jehovah. Arghya in Sanskrit is the libation cup, the navi-form or boat-shaped vessel in
which flowers and fruit are offered to the deities. Arghyanath is a title of the Maha-Chohan, meaning
"the Lord of Libations;" and Arghya Varsha -- "the land of libations" -- is the mystery name of that
region which extends from Kailas mountain nearly to the Schamo Desert -- from within which the
Kalki Avatar is expected. The Airyana-Varsedya of the Zoroastrians, as a locality, is identical with it.
It is now said to have been situated between the sea of Aral, Baltistan, and little Tibet; but in olden
times its area was far larger, as it was the birth-place of physical humanity, of which Io is the mother
and symbol.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 417 THE MISTAKE OF ARRIAN EXPLAINED.
Ural, the Arimaspi of Herodotus being "the recognised inhabitants of this golden region."
And here comes, between verses 825 and 835, a puzzle to all the European interpreters. Says the Titan:
-"To these (Arimaspi and Grypes) approach not; a far border land
Thou next wilt reach, where dwells a swarthy race
Near the Sun's founts, where is the AEthiop "river";
Along its banks proceed till thou attain
The mighty rapids, where from Bybline heights
Pure draughts of sacred water Neilos sends . . . "
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-23.htm (15 von 21) [06.05.2003 03:36:17]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, pt 1, stanza 12 c
There Io was ordained to found a colony for herself and sons. Now we must see how the passage is
interpreted. As Io is told that she has to travel eastward till she comes to the river Ethiops, which she is
to follow till it falls into the Nile -- hence the perplexity. "According to the geographical theories of the
earliest Greeks" we are informed by the author of the version on "Prometheus Bound" -"This condition was fulfilled by the river Indus. Arrian (vi. i.) mentions that Alexander
the Great, when preparing to sail down the Indus (having seen crocodiles in the river
Indus, and in no other river except the Nile . . . ), seemed to himself to have discovered
the sources of the Nile, as though the Nile, rising from some place in India, and flowing
through much desert land, and thereby losing its name Indus, next . . . flowed through
inhabited land, being now called the Nile by the Ethiopians of those parts and afterwards
by the Egyptians. Virgil in the 4th Georgic echoes the absolute error" (p. 197, Vol. II.).
Both Alexander and Virgil may have erred considerably in their geographical notions; but the
prophecy of Prometheus has not so sinned, in the least -- not, at any rate, in its esoteric spirit. When a
certain race is symbolised, and events pertaining to its history are rendered allegorically, no
topographical accuracy ought to be expected in the itinerary traced for its personification. Yet it so
happens, that the river "Ethiops" is certainly the Indus, and it is also the Nil or Nila. It is the river born
on the Kailas (heaven) mountain, the mansion of the gods -- 22,000 feet above the level of the sea. It
was the Ethiops river -- and was so called by the Greeks, long before the days of Alexander, because
its banks, from Attock down to Sind, were peopled by tribes generally referred to as the Eastern
Ethiopians. India and Egypt were two kindred nations, and the Eastern Ethiopians -- the mighty
builders -- have come from India, as is pretty well proved, it is hoped, in "ISIS UNVEILED." (Vol. I.
p. 569-70).
Then why could not Alexander, and even the learned Virgil have used the word Nile or Neilos when
speaking of the Indus, since it is one of its names? To this day that river is called, in the regions around
Kala-Bagh, nil (blue), and Nilah, "the blue river." The water here is of such dark blue colour that the
name given to it from time immemorial led to
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 418 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
a small town on its banks being called by the same name. It exists to this day. Evidently Arrian -- who
wrote far later than the day of Alexander, and who was ignorant of the old name of the Indus -- has
unconsciously slandered the Greek conqueror. Nor are our modern historians much wiser, in judging
as they do. For they often make the most sweeping declarations on mere appearances, as much as their
ancient colleagues ever did in days of old, when no Encyclopaedias were yet ready for them.
The race of IO, "the cow-horned maid" is then simply the first pioneer race of the AEthiopians brought
by her from the Indus to the Nile (which received its name in memory of the mother river of the
colonists from India*). For does not Prometheus say to Io** that the sacred Neilos (the god, not the
river) --
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-23.htm (16 von 21) [06.05.2003 03:36:17]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, pt 1, stanza 12 c
. . . "He to the land, three-cornered, thee shall guide," -- namely, to the Delta, where her sons are
foreordained to found -- . . . . . "that far-off colony . . ." (v. 830 et seq.).
It is there that a new race (the Egyptians) will begin, and a "female race" (873) which, "fifth in
descent" from dark Epaphos -"Fifty in number shall return to Argos."
........
Then one of the fifty virgins will fail through love and shall -- . . .
A kingly race in Argos bear
........
But from this seed shall dauntless heroes spring,
Bow-famous, who shall free me from these ills."
When this hero shall arise, the Titan does not reveal; for as he remarks: -"This, to set forth at large needs lengthy speech."
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Alexander, who was better acquainted with Attock than with India (where he never went) could not
have failed to hear the Indus near its very sources called Nil and Nilah. Even if a mistake, it is thus
easily accounted for.
** That Io is identical allegorically with Isis and the moon is shown by her being "cow-horned." The
allegory undeniably reached Greece from India, where Vach -- "the melodious cow" (Rig-Veda) "from
whom mankind was produced" (Bhagavata Purana) is shown in the Aitareya Brahmana as pursued by
her father Brahma, who was moved by an illicit passion, and changed her into a deer. Hence Io,
refusing to yield to Jupiter's passion, becomes "horned." The cow was in every country the symbol of
the passive generative power of nature, Isis, Vach, Venus -- the mother of the prolific god of love,
Cupid, but, at the same time, that of the Logos whose symbol became with the Egyptians and the
Indians -- the bull -- as testified to by Apis and the Hindu bulls in the most ancient temples. In esoteric
philosophy the cow is the symbol of creative nature, and the Bull (her calf) the spirit which vivifies
her, or "the Holy Spirit," as Mr. Kenealy shows. Hence the symbol of the horns. These were sacred
also with the Jews, who placed near the altar horns of Shittim wood, by seizing which a criminal
ensured his safety.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 419 WAS AESCHYLUS INITIATED?
But "Argos" is Arghya Varsha, the land of libation of the old Hierophants, whence the deliverer of
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-23.htm (17 von 21) [06.05.2003 03:36:17]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, pt 1, stanza 12 c
Humanity will appear, a name which became ages later that of its neighbour, India -- the Arya-varta of
old.
That the subject formed part of the Sabasian mysteries is made known by several ancient writers: by
Cicero (in Tuscul. Quaest. I, ii. No. 20) and by Clemens Alexandrinus (Strom. I, ii., oper. tom. 1, p.
467 -- Ed. Potter's). The latter writers are the only ones who attri bute the fact that AEschylus was
charged by the Athenians with sacrilege and condemned to be stoned to death, to its true cause. They
say that having been himself uninitiated, AEschylus had profaned the Mysteries by exposing them in
his trilogies on a public stage.* But he would have incurred the same condemnation had he been
initiated -- which must have been the case, as otherwise he must, like Socrates, have had a daimon to
reveal to him the secret and sacred allegorical drama of initiation. At all events, it is not the "father of
the Greek tragedy" who invented the prophecy of Prometheus; for he only repeated in dramatic form
that which was revealed by the priests during the MYSTERIA of the Sabasia.** The latter, however, is
one of the oldest sacred festivals, whose origin is to this day unknown to history. Mythologists connect
it through Mithras (the Sun, called Sabasius on some old monuments) with Jupiter and Bacchus. But it
was never the property of the Greeks, but dates from days immemorial.
The translators of the drama wonder how AEschylus could become guilty of such "discrepancy
between the character of Zeus as portrayed in the 'Prometheus Bound' and that depicted in the
remaining dramas." (Mrs. A. Swanwick.) This is just because AEschylus, like Shakespeare, was and
will ever remain the intellectual "Sphinx" of the ages. Between Zeus, the abstract deity of Grecian
thought, and the Olympic Zeus, there was an abyss. The latter represented during the mysteries no
higher a principle than the lower aspect of human physical intelligence -- Manas wedded to Kama;
Prometheus -- its divine aspect merging into and aspiring to Buddhi -- the divine Soul. Zeus was the
human soul and nothing more, whenever shown yielding to his lower passions, -- the jealous God,
revengeful and cruel in its egotism or I-AM-NESS. Hence, Zeus is represented as a serpent -- the
intellectual tempter of man -- which, nevertheless, begets in the course of
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Herodotus and Pausanias supposed that the cause of the condemnation was that AEschylus, adopting
the theogony of the Egyptians, made Diana, the daughter of Ceres, and not of Latona. (See AElian Var.
Hist. I, v. c. xviii., tom. 1, p. 433 Edition Gronov.) But AEschy Ius was initiated.
** Sabasia was a periodical festival with mysteries enacted in honour of some gods, a variant on the
Mithraic Mysteries. The whole evolution of the races was performed in them.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 420 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
cyclic evolution the "Man-Saviour," the solar Bacchus or "Dionysos," more than a man.
Dionysos is one with Osiris, with Krishna, and with Buddha (the heavenly wise), and with the coming
(tenth) Avatar, the glorified Spiritual Christos, who will deliver the suffering Christos (mankind, or
Prometheus, on its trial). This, say Brahminical and Buddhistic legends, echoed by the Zoroastrian and
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-23.htm (18 von 21) [06.05.2003 03:36:17]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, pt 1, stanza 12 c
now by the Christian teachings (the latter only occasionally), will happen at the end of Kaliyuga. It is
only after the appearance of Kalki-Avatar, or Sosiosh, that man will be born from woman without sin.
Then will Brahma, the Hindu deity; Ahura-Mazda (Ormazd), the Zoroastrian; Zeus, the GrecoOlympian Don Juan; Jehovah, the jealous, repenting, cruel, tribal God of the Israelites, and all their
likes in the universal Pantheon of human fancy -- vanish and disappear in thin air. And along with
these will vanish their shadows, the dark aspects of all those deities, ever represented as their "twin
brothers" and creatures, in exoteric legend, their own reflection on earth -- in esoteric philosophy. The
Ahrimans and Typhons, the Samaels and Satans, must be all dethroned on that day, when every dark
evil passion will be subdued.
There is one eternal Law in nature, one that always tends to adjust contraries and to produce final
harmony. It is owing to this law of spiritual development superseding the physical and purely
intellectual, that mankind will become freed from its false gods, and find itself finally -- SELFREDEEMED.
In its final revelation, the old myth of Prometheus -- his proto- and anti-types being found in every
ancient theogony -- stands in each of them at the very origin of physical evil, because at the threshold
of human physical life. KRONOS is "Time," whose first law is that the order of the successive and
harmonious phases in the process of evolution during cyclic development should be strictly preserved -under the severe penalty of abnormal growth with all its ensuing results. It was not in the programme
of natural development that man -- higher animal though he may be -- should become at once -intellectually, spiritually, and psychically -- the demi-god he is on earth, while his physical frame
remains weaker and more helpless and ephemeral than that of almost any huge mammal. The contrast
is too grotesque and violent; the tabernacle much too unworthy of its indwelling god. The gift of
Prometheus thus became a CURSE -- though foreknown and foreseen by the HOST personified in that
personage, as his name well shows.* It is in this that rests, at one and the same time,
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Vide supra, a foot-note concerning the etymology of [[prometis]] prometis or forethought.
Prometheus confesses it in the drama when saying: -- [[Footnote continued on next page]]
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 421 ONE OF THE FUNCTIONS OF ZEUS.
its sin and its redemption. For the Host that incarnated in a portion of humanity, though led to it by
Karma or Nemesis, preferred free-will to passive slavery, intellectual self-conscious pain and even
torture "while myriad time shall flow" -- to inane, imbecile, instinctual beatitude. Knowing such an
incarnation was premature and not in the programme of nature, the heavenly host, "Prometheus," still
sacrificed itself to benefit thereby, at least, one portion of mankind.* But while saving man from
mental darkness, they inflicted upon him the tortures of the self-consciousness of his responsibility -the result of his free will -- besides every ill to which mortal man and flesh are heir to. This torture
Prometheus accepted for himself, since the Host became henceforward blended with the tabernacle
prepared for them, which was still unachieved at that period of formation.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-23.htm (19 von 21) [06.05.2003 03:36:17]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, pt 1, stanza 12 c
Spiritual evolution being incapable of keeping pace with the physical, once its homogeneity was
broken by the admixture, the gift thus became the chief cause, if not the sole origin of Evil.** The
allegory which shows KRONOS cursing Zeus for dethroning him (in the primitive "golden" age of
Saturn, when all men were demi-gods), and for creating a physical race of men weak and helpless in
comparison; and then as delivering to his (Zeus') revenge the culprit, who despoiled the gods of their
prerogative of creation and who thereby raised man to their level, intellectually and spiritually -- is
highly philosophical. In the case of Prometheus, Zeus represents the Host of the primeval progenitors,
of the PITAR, the "Fathers" who created man senseless
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous page]]
"Oh! holy Ether, swiftly-winged gales . . . .
Behold what I, a god, from gods endure
.........
And yet what say I? Clearly I foreknew
All that must happen . . . .
. . . . The Destined it behoves,
As best I may, to bear, for well I wot
How incontestable the strength of Fate . . . . (88-105)
"Fate" stands here for KARMA, or Nemesis.
* Mankind is obviously divided into god-informed men and lower human creatures. The intellectual
difference between the Aryan and other civilized nations and such savages as the South Sea Islanders,
is inexplicable on any other grounds. No amount of culture, nor generations of training amid
civilization, could raise such human specimens as the Bushmen, the Veddhas of Ceylon, and some
African tribes, to the same intellectual level as the Aryans, the Semites, and the Turanians so called.
The "sacred spark" is missing in them and it is they who are the only inferior races on the globe, now
happily -- owing to the wise adjustment of nature which ever works in that direction -- fast dying out.
Verily mankind is "of one blood," but not of the same essence. We are the hot-house, artificially
quickened plants in nature, having in us a spark, which in them is latent.
** The philosophical view of Indian metaphysics places the Root of Evil in the differentiation of the
Homogeneous into the Heterogeneous, of the unit into plurality.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 422 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
and without any mind; while the divine Titan stands for the Spiritual creators, the devas who "fell" into
generation. The former are spiritually lower, but physically stronger, than the "Prometheans":
therefore, the latter are shown conquered. "The lower Host, whose work the Titan spoiled and thus
defeated the plans of Zeus," was on this earth in its own sphere and plane of action; whereas, the
superior Host was an exile from Heaven, who had got entangled in the meshes of matter. They (the
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-23.htm (20 von 21) [06.05.2003 03:36:17]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, pt 1, stanza 12 c
inferior "Host") were masters of all the Cosmic and lower titanic forces; the higher Titan possessed
only the intellectual and spiritual fire. This drama of the struggle of Prometheus with the Olympic
tyrant and despot, sensual Zeus, one sees enacted daily within our actual mankind: the lower passions
chain the higher aspirations to the rock of matter, to generate in many a case the vulture of sorrow,
pain, and repentance. In every such case one sees once more -"A god . . . in fetters, anguish fraught;
The foe of Zeus, in hatred held by all. . . . "
A god, bereft even of that supreme consolation of Prometheus, who suffered in self-sacrifice -"For that to men he bare too fond a mind. . ."
as the divine Titan is moved by altruism, but the mortal man by Selfishness and Egoism in every
instance.
The modern Prometheus has now become Epi-metheus, "he who sees only after the event"; because the
universal philanthropy of the former has long ago degenerated into selfishness and self-adoration. Man
will rebecome the free Titan of old, but not before cyclic evolution has re-established the broken
harmony between the two natures -- the terrestrial and the divine; after which he becomes impermeable
to the lower titanic forces, invulnerable in his personality, and immortal in his individuality, which
cannot happen before every animal element is eliminated from his nature. When man understands that
"Deus non fecit mortem" (Sap. I., 13), but that man has created it himself, he will re-become the
Prometheus before his Fall.
For the full symbolism of Prometheus and the origin of this mythos in Greece, the reader is referred to
Part II. of this Volume, chapter "A Second Key to Prometheus," etc. In the said Part -- a kind of
supplement to the present portion -- every additional information is given upon those tenets that will be
the most controverted and questioned. This work is so heterodox, when confronted with the
acknowledged standards of theology and modern science, that no proof which tends to show that these
standards often usurp an illegal authority should be neglected.
Next Section
Contents
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-23.htm (21 von 21) [06.05.2003 03:36:17]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, pt 1, Ad on St 12
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky -- Vol. 2
Theosophical University Press Online Edition
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 423 THE "BUDDHAS OF CONFESSION."
ADDITIONAL FRAGMENTS FROM A COMMENTARY
ON THE VERSES OF STANZA XII.
THE MS. from which these additional explanations are taken belongs to the group called
"Tongshaktchi Sangye Songa," or the Records of the "Thirty-five Buddhas of Confession," as they are
exoterically called. These personages, however, though called in the Northern Buddhist religion
"Buddhas," may just as well be called Rishis, or Avatars, etc., as they are "Buddhas who have
preceded Sakyamuni" only for the Northern followers of the ethics preached by Gautama. These great
Mahatmas, or Buddhas, are a universal and common property: they are historical sages -- at any rate,
for all the Occultists who believe in such a hierarchy of Sages, the existence of which has been proved
to them by the learned ones of the Fraternity. They are chosen from among some ninety-seven
Buddhas in one group, and fifty-three in another,* mostly imaginary personages, who are really the
personifications of the powers of the first-named.** These "baskets" of the oldest writings on "palm
leaves" are kept very secret. Each MS. has appended to it a short synopsis of the history of that subrace to which the particular "Buddha-Lha" belonged. The one special MS. from which the fragments
which follow are extracted, and then rendered into a more comprehensible language, is said to have
been copied from stone tablets which belonged to a Buddha of the earliest day of the Fifth Race, who
had witnessed the Deluge and the submersion of the chief continents of the Atlantean race. The day
when much, if not all, of that which is given here from the archaic records, will be found correct, is not
far distant. Then the modern symbologists will acquire the certitude that even Odin, or the god Woden,
the highest god in the German and Scandinavian mythology, is one of these thirty-five Buddhas; one
of the earliest, indeed, for the continent to which he and his race belonged, is also one of the earliest.
So early, in truth, that in the days when tropical nature was to be found, where now lie eternal
unthawing snows, one could cross almost by dry land from Norway via Iceland and Greenland, to the
lands that at present surround Hudson's
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Gautama Buddha, named Shakya Thub-pa, is the twenty-seventh of the last group, as most of these
Buddhas belong to the divine dynasties which instructed mankind.
** Of these "Buddhas," or the "Enlightened," the far distant predecessors of Gautama the Buddha, and
who represent, we are taught, once living men, great adepts and Saints, in whom the "Sons of
Wisdom" had incarnated, and who were, therefore, so to speak, minor Avatars of the Celestial Beings -eleven only belong to the Atlantean race, and 24 to the Fifth race, from its beginnings. They are
identical with the Tirtankaras of the Jainas.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-24.htm (1 von 14) [06.05.2003 03:36:20]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, pt 1, Ad on St 12
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 424 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
Bay.* Just, as in the palmy days of the Atlantean giants, the sons of the "giants from the East," a
pilgrim could perform a journey from what in our days is termed the Sahara desert, to the lands which
now rest in dreamless sleep at the bottom of the waters of the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea.
Events which were never written outside the human memory, but which were religiously transmitted
from one generation to another, and from race to race, may have been preserved by constant
transmission "within the book volume of the brain," and through countless aeons, with more truth and
accuracy than inside any written document or record. "That which is part of our souls is eternal," says
Thackeray; and what can be nearer to our souls than that which happens at the dawns of our lives?
Those lives are countless, but the soul or spirit that animates us throughout these myriads of existences
is the same; and though "the book and volume" of the physical brain may forget events within the
scope of one terrestrial life, the bulk of collective recollections can never desert the divine soul within
us. Its whispers may be too soft, the sound of its words too far off the plane perceived by our physical
senses; yet the shadow of events that were, just as much as the shadow of the events that are to come,
is within its perceptive powers, and is ever present before its mind's eye.
It is this soul-voice, perhaps, which tells those who believe in tradition more than in written History,
that what is said below is all true, and relates to pre-historic facts.
This is what is written in one passage: -"THE KINGS OF LIGHT HAVE DEPARTED IN WRATH. THE SINS OF MEN HAVE BECOME
SO BLACK THAT EARTH QUIVERS IN HER GREAT AGONY. . . . THE AZURE SEATS
REMAIN EMPTY. WHO OF THE BROWN, WHO OF THE RED, OR YET AMONG THE BLACK
(races), CAN SIT IN THE SEATS OF THE BLESSED, THE SEATS OF KNOWLEDGE AND
MERCY! WHO CAN ASSUME THE FLOWER OF POWER, THE PLANT OF THE GOLDEN
STEM AND THE AZURE BLOSSOM?"
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* This may account for the similarity of the artificial mounds in the U. S. of America, and the tumuli
in Norway. It is this identity that led some American archaeologists to suggest that Norwegian
mariners had discovered America some one thousand years ago. (Vide Holmboe's Traces de
Bouddhisme en Norvege, p. 23). There is no doubt that America is that "far distant land into which
pious men and heavy storms had transferred the sacred doctrine," as a Chinese writer suggested by his
description to Neumann. But neither Professor Holmboe, of Stockholm, nor the American
archaeologists, have guessed the right age of the mounds, or the tumuli. The fact that Norwegians may
have re-discovered the land that their long-forgotten forefa thers believed to have perished in the
general submersion, does not conflict with that other fact that the Secret Doctrine of the land which
was the cradle of physical man, and of the Fifth Race, had found its way into the so-called New World
ages and ages before the "Sacred Doctrine" of Buddhism.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-24.htm (2 von 14) [06.05.2003 03:36:20]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, pt 1, Ad on St 12
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 425 THE OLDEST RECORDS ABOUT ATLANTIS.
The "Kings of Light" is the name given in all old records to the Sovereigns of the divine Dynasties.
The "azure seats" are translated "celestial thrones" in certain documents. The "flower of power" is now
the Lotus; what it may have been at that period, who can tell.
The writer proceeds, like the later Jeremiah, to bewail the fate of his people. They had become bereft
of their "azure" (celestial) kings, and "they of the Deva hue," the moon-like complexion, and "they of
the refulgent (golden) face" have gone "to the land of bliss, the land of metal and fire"; or -- agreeably
with the rules of symbolism -- to the lands lying North and East, from whence "the great waters have
been swept away, sucked in by the earth and dissipated in the air." The wise races had perceived "the
black storm-dragons, called down by the dragons of wisdom" -- and "had fled, led on by the shining
Protectors of the most Excellent Land" -- the great ancient adepts, presumably; those the Hindus refer
to as their Manus and Rishis. One of them was Vaivasvata Manu.
They "of the yellow hue" are the forefa thers of those whom Ethnology now classes as the Turanians,
the Mongols, Chinese and other ancient nations; and the land they fled to was no other than Central
Asia. There entire new races were born; there they lived and died until the separation of the nations.
But this "separation" did not take place either in the localities assigned for it by modern science, nor in
the way the Aryans are shown to have divided and separated by Mr. Max Muller and other Aryanists.
Nearly two-thirds of one million years have elapsed since that period. The yellow-faced giants of the
post-Atlantean day, had ample time, throughout this forced confinement to one part of the world, and
with the same racial blood and without any fresh infusion or admixture in it, to branch off during a
period of nearly 700,000 years into the most heterogeneous and diversified types. The same is shown
in Africa; nowhere does a more extraordinary variability of types exist, from black to almost white,
from gigantic men to dwarfish races; and this only because of their forced isolation. The Africans have
never left their continent for several hundred thousands of years. If to-morrow the continent of Europe
were to disappear and other lands to re-emerge instead; and if the African tribes were to separate and
scatter on the face of the earth, it is they who, in about a hundred thousand years hence, would form
the bulk of the civilized nations. And it is the descendants of those of our highly cultured nations, who
might have survived on some one island, without any means of crossing the new seas, that would fall
back into a state of relative savagery. Thus the reason given for dividing humanity into superior and
inferior races falls to the ground and becomes a fallacy.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 426 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
Such are the statements made and facts given in the archaic records. Collating and comparing them
with some modern theories of Evolution, minus natural selection (Vide "Physiological Selection" by
G. J. Romanes, F.R.S.), these statements appear quite reasonable and logical.* Thus, while the Aryans
are the descendants of the yellow Adams, the gigantic and highly civilized tlanto-Aryan race, the
Semites -- and the Jews along with them -- are those of the red Adam; and both de Quatrefages and the
writers of the Mosaic Genesis are right. For, could chapter v. of the First Book of Moses be compared
with the genealogies found in our Archaic Bible, the period from Adam unto Noah would be found
noticed therein, of course under different names, the respective years of the Patriarchs being turned
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-24.htm (3 von 14) [06.05.2003 03:36:21]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, pt 1, Ad on St 12
into periods, the whole being shown symbolical and allegorical. In the MS. under consideration many
and frequent are the references to the great knowledge and civilization of the Atlantean nations,
showing the polity of several of them and the nature of their arts and sciences. If the Third Root-Race,
the Lemuro-Atlanteans, are already spoken of as having been drowned "with their high civilizations
and gods" ("Esoteric Buddhism," p. 65), how much more may the same be said of the Atlanteans!
It is from the Fourth Race that the early Aryans got their knowledge of "the bundle of wonderful
things," the Sabha and Mayasabha, mentioned in the Mahabharata, the gift of Mayasur to the
Pandavas. It is from them that they learnt aeronautics, Viwan Vidya (the "knowledge of flying in airvehicles"), and, therefore, their great arts of meteorography and meteorology. It is from them, again,
that the Aryans inherited their most valuable science of the hidden virtues of precious and other stones,
of chemistry, or rather alchemy, of mineralogy, geology, physics and astronomy.
Several times the writer has put to herself the question: "Is the story of Exodus -- in its details at least -as narrated in the Old Testament, original? Or is it, like the story of Moses himself and many others,
simply another version of the legends told of the Atlanteans?" For who, upon hearing the story told of
the latter, will fail to perceive the great similarity of the fundamental features? The anger of "God" at
the obduracy of Pharaoh, his comm and to the "chosen" ones, to spoil the Egyptians, before departing,
of their "jewels of silver and jewels of gold" (Exod. xi.); and finally the Egyptians and their Pharaoh
drowned in the Red Sea (xiv.). For here is a fragment of the earlier story from the Commentary: -[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Vide the first pages of Part III., SCIENCE AND THE SECRET DOCTRINE CONTRASTED.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 427 THE DOOM OF ATLANTIS.
. . . "And the 'great King of the dazzling Face,' the chief of all the Yellow-faced, was sad, seeing the
sins of the Black-faced.
"He sent his air-vehicles (Viwan) to all his brother-chiefs (chiefs of other nations and tribes) with
pious men within, saying: 'Prepare. Arise ye men of the good law, and cross the land while (yet) dry.'
'The Lords of the storm are approaching. Their chariots are nearing the land. One night and two days
only shall the Lords of the Dark Face (the Sorcerers) live on this patient land. She is doomed, and they
have to descend with her. The nether Lords of the Fires (the Gnomes and fire Elementals) are
preparing their magic Agneyastra (fire-weapons worked by magic). But the Lords of the Dark Eye
("Evil Eye") are stronger than they (the Elementals) and they are the slaves of the mighty ones. They
are versed in Ashtar (Vidya, the highest magical knowledge).* Come and use yours (i.e., your magic
powers, in order to counteract those of the Sorcerers). Let every lord of the Dazzling Face (an adept of
the White Magic) cause the Viwan of every lord of the Dark Face to come into his hands (or
possession), lest any (of the Sorcerers) should by its means escape from the waters, avoid the rod of
the Four, (Karmic deities) and save his wicked' (followers, or people).
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-24.htm (4 von 14) [06.05.2003 03:36:21]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, pt 1, Ad on St 12
'May every yellow face send sleep from himself (mesmerize?) to every black face. May even they (the
Sorcerers) avoid pain and suffering. May every man true to the Solar Gods bind (paralyze) every man
under the lunar gods, lest he should suffer or escape his destiny.
'And may every yellow face offer of his life-water (blood) to the speaking animal of a black face, lest
he awaken his master.**
'The hour has struck, the black night is ready, etc., etc.
...............
'Let their destiny be accomplished. We are the servants of the great Four.*** May the Kings of light
return.' "
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Wrote the late Brahmachari Bawa, a Yogi of great renown and holiness: "Extensive works on Ashtar
Vidya and such other sciences were at different times compiled in the languages of the times. But the
Sanskrit originals were lost at the time of the partial deluge of our country." . . . (See Theosophist of
June, 1880, "Some Things the Aryans Knew.") For Agneyastra, see Wilson's Specimens of the Hindu
Theatre, I., p. 297.
** Some wonderful, artificially-made beast, similar in some way to Frankenstein's creation, which
spoke and warned his master of every approaching danger. The master was a "black magician," the
mechanical animal was informed by a djin, an Elemental, according to the accounts. The blood of a
pure man alone could destroy him. Vide Part II., xxvii., "Seven in Astronomy, Science, and Magic."
*** The four Karmic gods, called the Four Maharajahs in the Stanzas.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 428 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
"The great King fell upon his dazzling Face and wept. . . .
"When the Kings assembled the waters had already moved. . . .
"(But) the nations had now crossed the dry lands. They were beyond the water mark. Their Kings
reached them in their Viwans, and led them on to the lands of Fire and Metal (East and North)."
...............
Still, in another passage, it is said: -" . . . . Stars (meteors) showered on the lands of the black Faces; but they slept.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-24.htm (5 von 14) [06.05.2003 03:36:21]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, pt 1, Ad on St 12
"The speaking beasts (the magic watchers) kept quiet.
"The nether lords waited for orders, but they came not, for their masters slept.
"The waters arose, and covered the valleys from one end of the Earth to the other. High lands
remained, the bottom of the Earth (the lands of the antipodes) remained dry. There dwelt those who
escaped; the men of the yellow-faces and of the straight eye (the frank and sincere people).
"When the Lords of the Dark Faces awoke and bethought themselves of their Viwans in order to
escape from the rising waters, they found them gone."
Then a passage shows some of the more powerful magicians of the "Dark Face" -- who awoke earlier
than the others -- pursuing those who had "spoilt them" and who were in the rear-guard, for -- "the
nations that were led away, were as thick as the stars of the milky way," says a more modern
Commentary, written in Sanskrit only.
"Like as a dragon-snake uncoils slowly its body, so the Sons of men, led on by the Sons of Wisdom,
opened their folds, and spreading out, expanded like a running stream of sweet waters. . . . . . many of
the faint-hearted among them perished on their way. But most were saved."
Yet the pursuers, "whose heads and chests soared high above the water," chased them "for three lunar
terms" until finally reached by the rising waves, they perished to the last man, the soil sinking under
their feet and the earth engulfing those who had desecrated her.
This sounds a good deal like the original material upon which the similar story in Exodus was built
many hundred thousands of years later. The biography of Moses, the story of his birth, childhood and
rescue from the Nile by Pharaoh's daughter, is now shown to have been adapted from the Chaldean
narrative about Sargon. And if so, the Assyrian tile in the British Museum being a good proof of it,
why not that of the Jews robbing the Egyptians of their jewels, the death of Pharaoh and his army, and
so on? The gigantic magicians of Ruta and Daitya, the "lords of the Dark Face," may have become in
the later narrative the Egyptian Magi, and the yellow-faced nations of
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 429 SHADOWY MEMENTOS OF THE PAST.
the Fifth Race, the virtuous sons of Jacob, the "chosen people." . . . One more statement has to be
made: There have been several Divine Dynasties -- a series for every Root Race beginning with the
Third, each series according and adapted to its Humanity. The last Seven Dynasties referred to in the
Egyptian and Chaldean records belong to the Fifth Race, which, though generally called Aryan, was
not entirely so, as it was ever largely mixed up with races to which Ethnology gives other names. It
would be impossible, in view of the limited space at our disposal, to go any further into the description
of the Atlanteans, in whom the whole East believes as much as we believe in the ancient Egyptians,
but whose existence the majority of the Western Scientists deny, as they have denied, before this,
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-24.htm (6 von 14) [06.05.2003 03:36:21]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, pt 1, Ad on St 12
many a truth, from the existence of Homer down to that of the carrier pigeon. The civilization of the
Atlanteans was greater even than that of the Egyptians. It is their degenerate descendants, the nation of
Plato's Atlantis, which built the first Pyramids in the country, and that certainly before the advent of
the "Eastern AEthiopians," as Herodotus calls the Egyptians. This may be well inferred from the
statement made by Ammianus Marcellinus, who says of the Pyramids that "there are also subterranean
passages and winding retreats, which, it is said, men skilful in the ancient mysteries, by means of
which they divined the coming of a flood, constructed in different places lest the memory of all their
sacred ceremonies should be lost."
These men who "divined the coming of floods" were not Egyptians, who never had any, except the
periodical rising of the Nile. Who were they? The last remnants of the Atlanteans, we maintain. Those
races which are dimly suspected by Science, and thinking of which Mr. Ch. Gould, the well-known
geologist, says: "Can we suppose that we have at all exhausted the great museum of nature? Have we,
in fact, penetrated yet beyond its antechambers? Does the written history of man, comprising a few
thousand years, embrace the whole course of his intelligent existence? Or have we in the long mythical
eras, extending over hundreds of thousands of years, and recorded in the chronologies of Chaldea and
of China, shadowy mementos of pre-historic man, handed down by tradition, and perhaps transported
by a few survivors to existing lands from others, which, like the fabled (?) Atlantis of Plato, may have
been submerged, or the scene of some great catastrophe which destroyed them with all their
civilization" ("Mythical Monsters," p. 19).
After this one can turn with more confidence to the words of a Master who wrote, several years before
these words were penned by Mr. Gould: -- "The Fourth Race had its periods of the highest civilization.
Greek and Roman and even Egyptian civilizations are nothing com-
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 430 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
pared to the civilizations that began with the Third Race" -- after its separation.
But if this civilization and the mastery of arts and sciences are denied to the Third and Fourth Races,
no one will deny that between the great civilizations of antiquity, such as those of Egypt and India,
there stretched the dark ages of crass ignorance and barbarism ever since the beginning of the
Christian era up to our modern civilization; during which period all recollection of these traditions was
lost. As said in Isis Unveiled: "Why should we forget that, ages before the prow of the adventurous
Genoese clove the Western waters, the Phoenician vessels had circumnavigated the globe, and spread
civilization in regions now silent and deserted? What archaeologist will dare assert that the same hand
which planned the Pyramids of Egypt, Karnak, and the thousand ruins now crumbling to oblivion on
the sandy banks of the Nile, did not erect the monumental Nagkon-Wat of Cambodia? or trace the
hieroglyphics on the obelisks and doors of the deserted Indian village, newly discovered in British
Columbia by Lord Dufferin? or those on the ruins of Palenque and Uxmal, of Central America? Do
not the relics we treasure in our museums -- last mementos of the long 'lost arts' -- speak loudly in
favour of ancient civilization? And do they not prove, over and over again, that nations and continents
that have passed away have buried along with them arts and sciences, which neither the first crucible
ever heated in a mediaeval cloister, nor the last cracked by a modern chemist, have revived, nor will -http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-24.htm (7 von 14) [06.05.2003 03:36:21]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, pt 1, Ad on St 12
at least, in the present century."
And the same question may be put now that was put then; it may be once more asked: "How does it
happen that the most advanced standpoint that has been reached in our times, only enables us to see in
the dim distance up the Alpine path of knowledge the monumental proofs that earlier explorers have
left to mark the plateaux they had reached and occupied?
"If modern masters are so much in advance of the old ones, why do they not restore to us the lost arts
of our postdiluvian forefa thers? Why do they not give us the unfading colours of Luxor -- the Tyrian
purple; the bright vermilion and dazzling blue which decorate the walls of this place, and are as bright
as on the first day of their application? The indestructible cement of the pyramids and of ancient
aqueducts; the Damascus blade, which can be turned like a corkscrew in its scabbard without breaking;
the gorgeous, unparalleled tints of the stained glass that is found amid the dust of old ruins and beams
in the windows of ancient cathedrals; and the secret of the true malleable glass? And if chemistry is so
little able to rival even the early mediaeval ages in some arts, why boast of achievements which,
accord-
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 431 MISTAKES OF THE EGYPTOLOGISTS.
ing to strong probability, were perfectly known thousands of years ago? The more archeology and
philology advance, the more humiliating to our pride are the discoveries which are daily made, the
more glorious testimony do they bear in behalf of those who, perhaps on account of the distance of
their remote antiquity, have been until now considered ignorant flounderers in the deepest mire of
superstition."
Among other arts and sciences, the ancients -- ay, as a heirloom from the Atlanteans -- had those of
astronomy and symbolism, which included the knowledge of the Zodiac.
As already explained, the whole of antiquity believed, with good reason, that humanity and its races
are all intimately connected with the planets, and these with Zodiacal signs. The whole world's History
is recorded in the latter. In the ancient temples of Egypt this was proved by the Dendera Zodiac; but
except in an Arabic work, the property of a Sufi, the writer has never met with a correct copy of these
marvellous records of the past, as also of the future, history of our globe. Yet the original records exist,
most undeniably.
As Europeans are unacquainted with the real Zodiacs of India, nor do they understand those they
happen to know (witness Bentley), the reader is advised, in order to verify the statement, to turn to the
work of Denon (Travels in Egypt, Vol. II.) in which, if understood, the two famous Egyptian Zodiacs,
can be found and examined. Having seen them personally, the writer has no longer need to trust to
what other students -- who have examined and studied both very carefully - have to say of them. As
asserted by the Egyptian Priests to Herodotus, who was informed that the terrestrial Pole and the Pole
of the Ecliptic had formerly coincided, thus was it found and corroborated by Mackey.* For he states
that the Poles are represented on the Zodiacs in both positions, "And in that which shows the Poles
(polar axes) at right angles, there are marks which prove that 'it was not the last time they were in that
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-24.htm (8 von 14) [06.05.2003 03:36:21]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, pt 1, Ad on St 12
position; but the first' -- after the Zodiacs had been traced." "Capricorn," he adds, "is represented at the
North Pole, and Cancer is divided, near its middle, at the South Pole; which is a confirmation that
originally they had their winter when the Sun was in Cancer; but the chief characteristics of its being a
monument commemorating the first time that the Pole had been in that position, are the Lion and the
Virgin." (See in Part II., "A Mystery of the Zodiac.")
Broadly calculated, it is believed by the Egyptologists that the great Pyramid was built 3,350 B.C. (See
Proctor, Knowledge, Vol. I. pp. 242, 400); and that Menes and his Dynasty existed 7 50 years before
the Fourth
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* "The Mythological Astronomy of the Ancients Demonstrated" by a strangely intuitional symbologist
and astronomer, a kind of a self-made adept of Norwich, who lived in the first quarter of this century.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 432 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
Dynasty (supposed to have built the Pyramids) had appeared ("The Great Pyramid," Stanil and Wake).
Thus 4,100 years B.C. is the age assigned to Menes. Now Sir J. Gardner Wilkinson's declaration that
"all the facts lead to the conclusion that the Egyptians had already made very great progress in the arts
of civilization before the age of Menes, and perhaps before they immigrated into the valley of the Nile"
(Rawlinson's "Herodotus," vol. ii. p. 345) is very suggestive, as destroying this hypothesis. It points to
great civilization in prehistoric times, and a still greater antiquity. The Schesoo-Hor ("the servants of
Horus") were the people who had settled in Egypt; and, as M. G. Maspero affirms, it is to this
prehistoric race that "belongs the honour . . . of having founded the principal cities of Egypt, and
established the most important sanctuaries." This was before the great Pyramid epoch, and when Egypt
had hardly arisen from the waters. Yet "they possessed the hieroglyphic form of writing special to the
Egyptians, and must have been already considerably advanced in civilization." It was, says Lenormant,
"the country of the great prehistoric sanctuaries, seats of the sacerdotal dominion, which played the
most important part in the origin of civilization." What is the date assigned to this people? We hear of
4,000, at the utmost of 5,000 years B.C. (Maspero). Now it is claimed that it is by means of the cycle
of 25,868 years (the Sidereal year) that the approximate year of the erection of the Great Pyramid can
be ascertained. "Assuming that the long narrow downward passage was directed towards the pole star
of the pyramid builders, astronomers have shown that . . . . Alpha Draconis, the then pole-star, was in
the required position about 3,350 B.C., as well as in 2,170 B.C. (Proctor, quoted by Stanil and Wake.)
But we are also told that "this relative position of Alpha Draconis and Alcyone being an extraordinary
one . . it could not occur again for a whole sidereal year" (ibid). This demonstrates that, since the
Dendera Zodiac shows the passage of three sidereal years, the great Pyramid must have been built
78,000 years ago, or in any case that this possibility deserves to be accepted at least as readily as the
later date of 3,350 B.C.
Now on the Zodiac of a certain temple in far Northern India, as on the Dendera Zodiac, the same
characteristics of the signs are found. Those who know well the Hindu symbols and constellations,
will be able to find out by the description of the Egyptian, whether the indications of the chronological
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-24.htm (9 von 14) [06.05.2003 03:36:21]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, pt 1, Ad on St 12
time are correct or not. On the Dendera Zodiac as preserved by the modern Egyptian Coptic and Greek
adepts, and explained a little differently by Mackey, the Lion stands upon the Hydra and his tail is
almost straight, pointing downwards at an angle of forty or fifty degrees, this position agreeing with
the original conformation of these constellations. "But in many places we see the Lion (Simha),"
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 433 THEORIES OF A SELF-MADE ADEPT.
Mackey adds, "with his tail turned up over his back, and ending with a Serpent's head; thereby
showing that the Lion had been 'inverted'; which, indeed, must have been the case with the whole
Zodiac and every other Constellation, when the Pole had been inverted."
Speaking of the Circular Zodiac, given also by Denon, he says: -- There, "the Lion is standing on the
Serpent, and his tail forming a curve downward, from which it is found that though six or seven
hundred thousand years must have passed between the two positions, yet they had made but little
difference between in the constellations of Leo and the Hydra; while Virgo is represented very
differently in the two. In the circular Zodiac, the Virgin is nursing her child; but it seems that they had
not had that idea when the pole was first within the plane of the Ecliptic; for in this Zodiac, as given
by Denon, we see three Virgins between the Lion and the Scales, the last of which holds in her hand
an ear of wheat. It is much to be lamented that there is in this Zodiac a breach of the figure in the latter
part of Leo and the beginning of Virgo which has taken away one Decan out of each sign."
Nevertheless, the meaning is plain, as the three Zodiacs belong to three different epochs: namely, to
the last three family races of the fourth Sub-race of the Fifth Root-race, each of which must have lived
approximately from 25 to 30,000 years. The first of these (the "Aryan-Asiatics") witnessed the doom
of the last of the populations of the "giant Atlanteans"* who perished some 850,000 years ago (the
Ruta and Daitya Island-Continents) toward the close of the Miocene Age.** The fourth sub-race
witnessed the destruction of the last remnant of the Atlanteans -- the Aryo-Atlanteans in the last island
of Atlantis, namely, some 11,000 years ago. In order to understand this the reader
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* The term "Atlantean" must not mislead the reader to regard these as one race only, or even a nation.
It is as though one said "Asiatics." Many, multityped, and various were the Atlanteans, who
represented several humanities, and almost a countless number of races and nations, more varied
indeed than would be the "Europeans" were this name to be given indiscriminately to the five existing
parts of the world; which, at the rate colonization is proceeding, will be the case, perhaps, in less than
two or three hundred years. There were brown, red, yellow, white and black Atlanteans; giants and
dwarfs (as some African tribes comparatively are, even now).
** Says a teacher in "Esoteric Buddhism," on p. 64: "In the Eocene age, even in its very first part, the
great cycle of the fourth race men the (Lemuro) Atlanteans had already reached its highest point (of
civilization), and the great continent, the father of nearly all the present continents, showed the first
symptoms of sinking. . . ." And on page 70, it is shown that Atlantis as a whole perished during the
Miocene period. To show how the continents, races, nations and cycles overlap each other, one has but
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-24.htm (10 von 14) [06.05.2003 03:36:21]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, pt 1, Ad on St 12
to think of Lemuria, the last of whose lands perished about 700,000 years before the beginning of the
Tertiary period (see p. 65 of the same work), and the last of "Atlantis" only 11,000 years ago; thus
both overlapping -- one the Atlantean period, and the other the Aryan.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 434 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
is asked to glance at the diagram of the genealogical tree of the Fifth Root-Race -- generally, though
hardly correctly, called the Aryan race, and the explanations appended to it.
Let the reader remember well that which is said of the divisions of Root Races and the evolution of
Humanity in this work, and stated clearly and concisely in Mr. Sinnett's "Esoteric Buddhism."
1. There are seven ROUNDS in every manvantara; this one is the Fourth, and we are in the Fifth RootRace, at present.
2. Each Root-Race has seven sub-races.
3. Each sub-race has, in its turn, seven ramifications, which may be called Branch or "Family" races.
4. The little tribes, shoots, and offshoots of the last-named are countless and depend on Karmic action.
Examine the "genealogical tree" hereto appended, and you will understand. The illustration is purely
diagrammatic, and is only intended to assist the reader in obtaining a slight grasp of the subject, amidst
the confusion which exists between the terms which have been used at different times for the divisions
of Humanity. It is also here attempted to express in figures -- but only within approximate limits, for
the sake of comparison -- the duration of time through which it is possible to definitely distinguish one
division from another. It would only lead to hopeless confusion if any attempt were made to give
accurate dates to a few; for the Races, Sub-Races, etc., etc., down to their smallest ramifications,
overlap and are entangled with each other until it is nearly impossible to separate them.
The human Race has been compared to a tree, and this serves admirably as an illustration.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-24.htm (11 von 14) [06.05.2003 03:36:21]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, pt 1, Ad on St 12
The main stem of a tree may be compared to the ROOT-RACE (A).
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 435 ILLUSTRATION OF THE RACES.
Its larger limbs to the various SUB-RACES; seven in number (B1, B2).
On each of these limbs are seven BRANCHES, OR FAMILY-RACES. (C).
After this the cactus-plant is a better illustration, for its fleshy "leaves" are covered with sharp spines,
each of which may be compared to a nation or tribe of human beings.
Now our Fifth Root-Race has already been in existence -- as a race sui generis and quite free from its
parent stem -- about 1,000,000 years; therefore it must be inferred that each of the four preceding SubRaces has lived approximately 210,000 years; thus each Family-Race has an average existence of
about 30,000 years. Thus the European "Family Race" has still a good many thousand years to run,
although the nations or the innumerable spines upon it, vary with each succeeding "season" of three or
four thousand years. It is somewhat curious to mark the comparative approximation of duration
between the lives of a "Family-Race" and a "Sidereal year."
The knowledge of the foregoing, and the accurately correct division, formed part and parcel of the
Mysteries, where these Sciences were taught to the disciples, and where they were transmitted by one
hierophant to another. Everyone is aware that the European astronomers assign (arbitrarily enough) the
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-24.htm (12 von 14) [06.05.2003 03:36:21]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, pt 1, Ad on St 12
date of the invention of the Egyptian Zodiac to the years 2000 or 2400 B.C. (Proctor); and insist that
this invention coincides in its date with that of the erection of the Great Pyramid. This, to an Occultist
and Eastern astronomer, must appear quite absurd. The year of the Kaliyuga is said to have begun
between the 17th and 18th of February in the year 3102 B.C. Now the Hindus claim that in the year
20400 before Kaliyugam, the origin of their Zodiac coincided with the spring equinox -- there being at
the time a conjunction of the Sun and Moon -- and Bailly proved by a lengthy and careful computation
of that date, that, even if fictitious, the epoch from which they had started to establish the beginning of
their Kaliyug was very real. That "epoch is the year 3102 before our era," he writes. (See Part III.,
Book I. "Hindu Astronomy defended by an Academician".) The lunar eclipse arriving just a fortnight
after the beginning of the black Age -- it took place in a point situated between the Wheat Ear of Virgo
and the star [[theta]] of the same constellation. One of their most esoteric Cycles is based upon certain
conjunctions and respective positions of Virgo and the Pleiades -- (Krittika). Hence, as the Egyptians
brought their Zodiac from Southern India and Lanka,* the esoteric meaning was evidently identical.
The three "Virgins," or Virgo in three different positions, meant, with both, the record of the first three
"divine or astronomical Dynasties," who taught the Third
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Ceylon.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 436 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
Root-Race; and after having abandoned the Atlanteans to their doom, returned (or redescended, rather)
during the third Sub-Race of the Fifth, in order to reveal to saved humanity the mysteries of their birthplace -- the sidereal Heavens. The same symbolical record of the human races and the three Dynasties
(Gods, Manes -- semi-divine astrals of the Third and Fourth, and the "Heroes" of the Fifth Race),
which preceded the purely human kings, was found in the distribution of the tiers and passages of the
Egyptian Labyrinth. As the three inversions of the Poles of course changed the face of the Zodiac, a
new one had to be constructed each time. In Mackey's "Sphinxiad" the speculations of the bold author
must have horrified the orthodox portion of the population of Norwich, as he says, fantastically
enough: -"But, after all, the greatest length of time recorded by those monuments (the Labyrinth, the Pyramids
and the Zodiacs) does not exceed five millions of years (which is not so)*; which falls short of the
records given us both by the (esoteric) Chinese and Hindus; which latter nation has registered a
knowledge of time for seven or eight millions of years**; which I have seen upon a talisman of
porcelain. . . . "
The Egyptian priests had the Zodiacs of the Atlantean Asura-Maya, as the modern Hindus still have.
As stated in "Esoteric Buddhism," the Egyptians, as well as the Greeks and "Romans" some thousand
years ago, were "remnants of the Atlanto-Aryans," i.e., the former, of the older, or the Ruta
Atlanteans; the last-named, the descendants of the last race of that island, whose sudden disappearance
was narrated to Solon by the Egyptian Initiates. The human Dynasty of the older Egyptians, beginning
with Menes, had all the knowledge of the Atlanteans, though there was no more Atlantean blood in
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-24.htm (13 von 14) [06.05.2003 03:36:21]
The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, pt 1, Ad on St 12
their veins. Nevertheless, they had preserved all their Archaic records. All this has been shown long
ago.*** And it is just because the Egyptian Zodiac is between 75 and 80,000 years old that the Zodiac
of the Greeks is far later. Volney has correctly pointed out in his "Ruins of Empires" (p. 360) that it is
only 16,984 years old, or up to the present date 17,082.****
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* The forefa thers of the Aryan Brahmins had their Zodiacal calculations and Zodiac from those born
by Kriyasakti power, the "Sons of Yoga"; the Egyptians from the Atlanteans of Ruta.
** The former, therefore, may have registered time for seven or eight millions of years, but the
Egyptians could not.
*** This question was amply challenged, and as amply discussed and answered. See Five Years of
Theosophy. (Art. "Mr. Sinnett's Esoteric Buddhism," pp. 325-46).
**** Volney says that, as Aries was in its 15th degree 1447 B.C., it follows that the first degree of
"Libra" could not have coincided with the vernal equinox more lately than 15,194 years B.C., to which
if you add 1790 since Christ, when Volney wrote this, it appears that 16,984 years have elapsed since
the (Greek or rather Hellenic) origin of the Zodiac.
Next Section
Contents
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-24.htm (14 von 14) [06.05.2003 03:36:21]
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 437 MORE IN THE FORTHCOMING VOLUMES.
CONCLUSION.
Space forbids us to say anything more, and this part of the "Secret Doctrine" has to be closed. The
forty-nine Stanzas and the few fragments from the Commentaries just given are all that can be
published in these volumes. These, with some still older records -- to which none but the highest
Initiates have access -- and a whole library of comments, glossaries, and explanations, form the
synopsis of Man's genesis.
It is from the Commentaries that we have hitherto quoted and tried to explain the hidden meaning of
some of the allegories, thus showing the true views of esoteric antiquity upon geology, anthropology,
and even ethnology. We will endeavour in the Part which follows, to establish a still closer
metaphysical connection between the earliest races and their Creators, the divine men from other
worlds; accompanying the statements proffered with the most important demonstrations of the same in
esoteric Astronomy and Symbolism.
In Volume III. of this work (the said volume and the IVth being almost ready) a brief history of all the
great adepts known to the ancients and the moderns in their chronological order will be given, as also a
bird's eye view of the Mysteries, their birth, growth, decay, and final death -- in Europe. This could not
find room in the present work. Volume IV. will be almost entirely devoted to Occult teachings.
The duration of the periods that separate, in space and time, the Fourth from the Fifth Race -- in the
historical* or even the legendary beginnings of the latter -- is too tremendous for us to offer, even to a
Theosophist, any more detailed accounts of them. During the course of the post-diluvian ages -marked at certain periodical epochs by the most terrible cataclysms -- too many races and nations were
born, and have disappeared almost without leaving a trace, for any one to offer any description of the
slightest value concerning them. Whether the Masters of Wisdom have a consecutive and full history
of our race from its incipient stage down to the present times; whether they possess the uninterrupted
record of man since he became the complete physical being, and became thereby the king of the
animals and master on this earth -- is not for the writer to say. Most probably they have,
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* The word "historical" is used, because, although historians have dwarfed almost absurdly the dates
that separate certain events from our modern day, nevertheless, once that they are known and accepted,
they belong to history. Thus the Trojan War is an historical event; and though even less than 1,000
years B.C. is the date assigned to it, yet in truth it is nearer 6,000 than 5,000 years B.C.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-25.htm (1 von 9) [06.05.2003 03:36:23]
and such is our own personal conviction. But if so, this knowledge is only for the highest Initiates, who
do not take their students into their confidence. The writer can, therefore, give but what she has herself
been taught, and no more.
But even this will appear to the profane reader rather as a weird, fantastic dream, than as a possible
reality.
This is only natural and as it should be, since for years such was the impression made upon the humble
writer of these pages herself. Born and bred in European, matter-of-fact and presumably civilized
countries, she assimilated the foregoing with the utmost difficulty. But there are proofs of a certain
character which become irrefutable and are undeniable in the long run, to every earnest and
unprejudiced mind. For a series of years such were offered to her, and now she has the full certitude
that our present globe and its human races must have been born, grown and developed in this, and in
no other way.
But this is the personal view of the writer; and her orthodoxy cannot be expected to have any more
weight than any other "doxy," in the eyes of those to whom every fresh theory is heterodox until
otherwise proved. Therefore are we Occultists fully prepared for such questions as these: "How does
one know that the writer has not invented the whole scheme? And supposing she has not, how can one
tell that the whole of the foregoing, as given in the Stanzas, is not the product of the imagination of the
ancients? How could they have preserved the records of such an immense, such an incredible
antiquity?"
The answer that the history of this world since its formation and to its end "is written in the stars," i.e.,
is recorded in the Zodiac and the Universal Symbolism whose keys are in the keeping of the Initiates,
will hardly satisfy the doubters. The antiquity of the Zodiac in Egypt is much doubted, and it is denied
point-blank with regard to India. "Your conclusions are often excellent, but your premises are always
doubtful," the writer was once told by a profane friend. To this, the answer came that it was one point,
at least, gained on the scientific syllogisms. For, with the exception of a few problems from the
domain of purely physical science, both the premises and conclusions of the men of Science are as
hypothetical as they are almost invariably erroneous. And if they do not so appear to the profane, the
reason is simply this: the said profane is very little aware, taking as he does his scientific data on faith,
that both premises and conclusions are generally the product of the same brains, which, however
learned, are not infallible; a truism demonstrated daily by the shifting and re-shifting of scientific
theories and speculations.
However it may be, the records of the temples, Zodiacal and traditional, as well as the ideographic
records of the East, as read by the
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 439 MODERN SCIENCE MISTRUSTED.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-25.htm (2 von 9) [06.05.2003 03:36:23]
adepts of the Sacred Science and Vidya, are not a whit more doubtful than the so-called ancient history
of the European nations, now edited, corrected, and amplified by half a century of archaeological
discoveries, and the very problematical readings of the Assyrian tiles, cuneiform fragments, and
Egyptian hieroglyphics. So are our data based upon the same readings, in addition to an almost
inexhaustible number of Secret works of which Europe knows nothing -- plus the perfect knowledge
by the Initiates of the symbolism of every word so recorded. Some of these records belong to an
immense antiquity. Every archaeologist and palaeontologist is acquainted with the ideographic
productions of certain semi-savage tribes, who from time immemorial have aimed at rendering their
thoughts symbolically. This is the earliest mode of recording events and ideas. And how old this
knowledge is in the human race may be inferred from some signs, evidently ideographic, found on
hatchets of the Palaeolithic period. The red Indian tribes of America, only a few years ago
comparatively speaking, petitioned the President of the United States to grant them possession of four
small lakes, the petition being written on the tiny surface of a piece of a fabric, which is covered with
barely a dozen representations of animals and birds. (See Lubbock.) The American savages have a
number of such different kinds of writing, but not one of our Scientists is yet familiar, or even knows
of the early hieroglyphic cypher, still preserved in some Fraternities, and named in Occultism the
Senzar. Moreover, all those who have decided to regard such modes of writing -- e.g., the ideographs
of the Red Indians, and even the Chinese characters -- as "attempts of the early races of mankind to
express their untutored thoughts," will decidedly object to our statement, that writing was invented by
the Atlanteans, and not at all by the Phoenicians. Indeed, such a claim as that writing was known to
mankind many hundreds of millenniums ago, in the face of the philologists who have decreed that
writing was unknown in the days of, and to Panini, in India, as also to the Greeks in the time of
Homer, will be met by general disapprobation, if not with silent scorn. All denial and ridicule
notwithstanding, the Occultists will maintain the claim, and simply for this reason: from Bacon down
to our modern Royal Society, we have a too long period, full of the most ludicrous mistakes made by
Science, to warrant our believing in modern scientific assumptions rather than in the denials of our
Teachers. Writing, our scientists say, was unknown to Panini; and this sage nevertheless composed a
grammar which contains 3,996 rules, and is the most perfect of all the grammars that were ever made!
Panini is made out to have lived barely a few centuries B.C., by the most liberal; and the rocks in Iran
and Central Asia (whence the philologists and historians
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 440 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
show us the ancestors of the same Panini, the Brahmins, coming into India) are covered with writing,
two and three thousand years old (12,000, according to some fearless palaeontologists).
Writing was an ars incognita in the days of Hesiod and Homer, agreeably to Grote, and unknown to
the Greeks so late as 770 B.C.; and the Phoenicians who had invented it, and knew writing as far back
as 1500 B.C., at the earliest,* were living among the Greeks, and elbowing them, all the time! All
these scientific and contradictory conclusions disappeared, however, into thin air, when Schliemann
discovered (a) the site of ancient Troy, whose actual existence had been so long regarded as a fable;
and (b), excavated on that site ear thenware vessels with inscriptions in characters unknown to the
paleontologists and the all-denying Sanskritists. Who will now deny Troy, or these Archaic
inscriptions? As Professor Virchow witnesses: -- "I was myself an eye-witness of two such
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-25.htm (3 von 9) [06.05.2003 03:36:23]
discoveries, and helped to gather the articles together. The slanderers have long since been silenced,
who were not ashamed to charge the discoverer with an imposture."** Nor were truthful women
spared any more than truthful men. Du Chaillu, Gordon-Cumming, Madame Merian,*** Bruce, and a
host of others were charged with lying.
Madame Merian -- says the author of "Mythical Monsters," who gives this information in the
Introduction -- was accused of deliberate falsehood in reference to her description of a bird-eating
spider nearly two hundred years ago. But now-a-days reliable observers have confirmed it in regard to
South America, India, and elsewhere. Audubon was accused by botanists of having invented the
yellow water-lily, which he figured in his Birds of the South under the name of Nymphaea lutea, and
after having lain under the imputation for years, was confirmed at last by the discovery of the long-lost
flower in Florida in 1876 (Pop. Sci. Monthly, No. 60, April 1877). And, as Audubon was called a liar
for this, and for his Holiaetus Washingtonii,**** so Victor Hugo was ridiculed for . . . . his marvellous
word-painting of the devil-fish, and his description of a man becoming its helpless victim. "The thing
was derided as an impossibility; yet within a few years were discovered, on the shores of
Newfoundland, cuttle fish with arms extending to thirty feet in length, and capable of dragging a goodsized
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* It is an historical fact that Sanchoniathon compiled and wrote in Phoenician characters -- from annals
and State documents in the archives of the older Phoenician cities -- the full record of their religion in
1250 B.C.
** Prof. Virchow, in Appendix I to Schliemann's Ilios. Murray, 1880.
*** Gosse writes of the latter: "She is set down a thorough heretic, not at all to be believed, a
manufacturer of unsound natural history, an inventor of false facts in science." ("Romance of Natural
History," p. 227.)
**** Dr. Cover writes: "That famous bird of Washington was a myth; either Audubon was mistaken,
or else, as some do not hesitate to affirm, he lied about it."
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 441 A WHOLESALE DENIAL.
boat beneath the surface; and their action has been reproduced for centuries past . . . . by Japanese
artists." ("Mythical Monsters," p. 11 Introd.).
And if Troy was denied, and regarded as a myth; the existence of Herculaneum and Pompeii declared
a fiction; the travels of Marco Polo laughed at and called as absurd a fable as one of Baron
Munchausen's tales, why should the writer of "Isis Unveiled" and of the "Secret Doctrine" be any
better treated? Mr. Charles Gould, the author of the above-cited volume quotes in his excellent work a
few lines from Macmillan (1860), which are as true as life, and too much to the point not to be
reproduced: "When a naturalist, either by visiting such spots of earth as are still out of the way, or by
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-25.htm (4 von 9) [06.05.2003 03:36:23]
his good fortune, finds a very queer plant or animal, he is forthwith accused of inventing his game. . . .
. . As soon as the creature is found to sin against preconception, the great (mis ?) guiding Spirit, a
priori by name, who furnishes philosophers with their omniscience pro re nata, whispers that no such
thing can be, and forthwith there is a charge of hoax. The heavens themselves have been charged with
hoaxes. When Leverrier and Adams predicted a planet by calculation, it was gravely asserted in some
quarters that the planet which had been calculated was not the planet but another which had
clandestinely and improperly got into the neighbourhood of the true body. The disposition to suspect
hoax is stronger than the disposition to hoax. Who was it that first announced that the classical
writings of Greece and Rome were one huge hoax perpetrated by the monks in what the announcer
would be as little or less inclined than Dr. Maitl and to call the dark ages?" (p. 13).
Thus let it be. No disbeliever who takes the "Secret Doctrine" for a "hoax" is forced or even asked to
credit our statements. These have already been proclaimed to be such by certain very clever American
journalists before even the work went to press.*
Nor, is it after all, necessary that any one should believe in the Occult Sciences and the old teachings,
before one knows anything or even
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* So far back as July, 1888, at a time when the MSS. of this work had not yet left my writing table,
and the Secret Doctrine was utterly unknown to the world, it was already being denounced as a
product of my brain and no more. These are the flattering terms in which the Evening Telegraph (of
America) referred to this still unpublished work in its issue of June 30, 1888: "Among the fascinating
books for July reading is Mme. Blavatsky's new book on Theosophy . . . (!) the SECRET DOCTRINE.
. . . But because she can soar back into the Brahmin ignorance . . . (! ?) . . . is no proof that everything
she says is true." And once the prejudiced verdict given on the mistaken notion that my book was out,
and that the reviewer had read it, neither of which was or could be the case, now that it is really out the
critic will have to support his first statement, whether correct or otherwise, and thus get out of it,
probably by a more slashing criticism than ever.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 442 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
believes in his own soul. No great truth was ever accepted a priori, and generally a century or two
passed before it began to glimmer in the human consciousness as a possible verity, except in such
cases as the positive discovery of the thing claimed as a fact. The truths of to-day are the falsehoods
and errors of yesterday, and vice versa. It is only in the XXth century that portions, if not the whole, of
the present work will be vindicated.
It is no fact going against our statements, therefore, even if Sir John Evans does affirm that writing
was unknown in the stone age. For it may have been unknown during that period in the Fifth Aryan
race, and have been perfectly known to the Atlanteans of the Fourth, in the palmy days of their highest
civilization. The cycles of the rise and fall of the nations and races are there to account for it.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-25.htm (5 von 9) [06.05.2003 03:36:23]
If told that there have been cases before now of forged pseudographs being palmed off on the
credulous, and that our work may be classed with Jacolliot's "Bible in India" (in which, by the way,
there are more truths among its errors than are found in the works of orthodox and recognized
Orientalists) -- the charge and comparison will dismay us very little. We bide our time. Even the
famous "Ezour-Veda" of the last century, considered by Voltaire "the most precious gift from the East
to the West," and by Max Muller "about the silliest book that can be read," is not altogether without
facts and truths in it. The cases when the a priori negations of specialists became justified by
subsequent corroborations form but an insignificant percentage of those that were fully vindicated by
subsequent discoveries, and confirmed to the great dismay of the learned objectors. "Ezour Veda," was
a very small bone of contention compared with the triumph of Sir William Jones, Anquetil de Perron,
and others in the matter of Sanskrit and its literature. Such facts are recorded by Professor Max Muller
himself, who, speaking of the discomfiture of Dugald Stewart and Co. in connection with this, states
that "if the facts about Sanskrit were true, Dugald Stewart was too wise not to see that the conclusions
drawn from them were inevitable. He therefore denied the reality of such a language as Sanskrit
altogether, and wrote his famous essay to prove that Sanskrit had been put together after the model of
Greek and Latin, by those arch-forgers and liars, the Brahmans, and that the whole of Sanskrit
literature was an imposition" (Science of Language, p. 168). The writer is quite willing and feels proud
to keep company with these Brahmans, and other historical "liars," in the opinion of our modern
Dugald Stewarts. She has lived too long, and her experience has been too varied and personal, for her
not to know at least something of human nature. "When you doubt, abstain," says the wise Zoroaster,
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 443 PARADOXES OF SCIENCE.
whose prudent aphorism is found corroborated in every case by daily life and experience. Yet, like St.
John the Baptist, this sage of the past Ages is found preaching in the desert, in company with a more
modern philosopher, namely Bacon, who offers the same priceless bit of practical Wisdom. "In
contemplation," he says (in any question of Knowledge, we add), "if a man begin with certainties, he
shall end in doubts; but if he will be content to begin with doubts, he shall end in certainties."
With this piece of advice from the father of English Philosophy to the representatives of British
scepticism we ought to close the debate, but our theosophical readers are entitled to a final piece of
Occult information.
Enough was said to show that evolution in general, events, mankind, and everything else in Nature
proceed in cycles. We have spoken of seven Races, five of which have nearly completed their earthly
career, and have claimed that every Root-Race, with its sub-races and innumerable family divisions
and tribes, was entirely distinct from its preceding and succeeding race. This will be objected to, on the
authority of uniform experience in the question of Anthropology, and Ethnology. Man was -- save in
colour and type, and perhaps a difference in facial peculiarities and cranial capacity -- ever the same
under every climate and in every part of the world, say the Naturalists: ay, even in stature. This, while
maintaining that man descends from the same unknown ancestor as the ape, a claim that is logically
impossible without an infinite variation of stature and form, from his first evolution into a biped. The
very logical persons who maintain both propositions are welcome to their paradoxical views. Once
more we address only those who, doubting the general derivation of myths from "the contemplation of
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-25.htm (6 von 9) [06.05.2003 03:36:23]
the visible workings of external nature" . . . . think it, "less hard to believe that these wonderful stories
of gods and demi-gods, of giants and dwarfs, of dragons and monsters of all descriptions, are
transformations, than to believe them to be inventions." It is only such "transformations" in physical
nature, as much as in the memory and conceptions of our present mankind, that the Secret Doctrine
teaches. It confronts the purely speculative hypotheses of modern Science, based upon the experience
and exact observations of barely a few centuries, with the unbroken tradition and records of its
Sanctuaries; and brushing away that tissue of cobweb-like theories, spun in the darkness that covers a
period of hardly a few millenniums back, and which Europeans call their "History," the Old Science
says to us: Listen, now, to my version of the memoirs of Humanity.
The human Races are born one from the other, grow, develop, become
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 444 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
old, and die. Their sub-races and nations follow the same rule. If your all-denying modern science and
so-called philosophy do not contest that the human family is composed of a variety of well-defined
types and races, it is only because the fact is undeniable, no one would say that there was no external
difference between an Englishman, an African negro, and a Japanese or Chinaman. On the other hand
it is formally denied by most naturalists that mixed human races, i.e., the seeds for entirely new races,
are any longer formed in our days. But this last is maintained on good grounds by de Quatrefages and
some others.
Nevertheless our general proposition will not be accepted. It will be said that whatever forms man has
passed through in the long pre-historic Past there are no more changes for him (save certain variations,
as at present) in the future. Hence that our Sixth and Seventh Root Races are fictions.
To this it is again answered: How do you know? Your experience is limited to a few thousand years, to
less than a day in the whole age of Humanity and to the present types of the actual continents and isles
of our Fifth Race. How can you tell what will or will not be? Meanwhile, such is the prophecy of the
Secret Books and their no uncertain statements.
Since the beginning of the Atlantean Race many million years have passed, yet we find the last of the
Atlanteans, still mixed up with the Aryan element, 11,000 years ago. This shows the enormous
overlapping of one race over the race which succeeds it, though in character and external type the elder
loses its characteristics, and assumes the new features of the younger race. This is proved in all the
formations of mixed human races. Now, Occult philosophy teaches that even now, under our very
eyes, the new Race and Races are preparing to be formed, and that it is in America that the
transformation will take place, and has already silently commenced.
Pure Anglo-Saxons hardly three hundred years ago, the Americans of the United States have already
become a nation apart, and, owing to a strong admixture of various nationalities and inter-marriage,
almost a race sui generis, not only mentally, but also physically. "Every mixed race, when uniform and
settled, has been able to play the part of a primary race in fresh crossings," says de Quatrefages.
"Mankind, in its present state, has thus been formed, certainly, for the greatest part, by the successive
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-25.htm (7 von 9) [06.05.2003 03:36:23]
crossing of a number of races at present undetermined" ("The Human Species," p. 274.)
Thus the Americans have become in only three centuries a "primary race," pro tem., before becoming
a race apart, and strongly separated from all other now existing races. They are, in short, the germs of
the Sixth sub-race, and in some few hundred years more, will become
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 445 THE COMING NEW RACE.
most decidedly the pioneers of that race which must succeed to the present European or fifth sub-race,
in all its new characteristics. After this, in about 25,000 years, they will launch into preparations for
the seventh sub-race; until, in consequence of cataclysms -- the first series of those which must one
day destroy Europe, and still later the whole Aryan race (and thus affect both Americas), as also most
of the lands directly connected with the confines of our continent and isles -- the Sixth Root-Race will
have appeared on the stage of our Round. When shall this be? Who knows save the great Masters of
Wisdom, perchance, and they are as silent upon the subject as the snow-capped peaks that tower above
them. All we know is, that it will silently come into existence; so silently, indeed, that for long
millenniums shall its pioneers -- the peculiar children who will grow into peculiar men and women -be regarded as anomalous lusus naturae, abnormal oddities physically and mentally. Then, as they
increase, and their numbers become with every age greater, one day they will awake to find
themselves in a majority. It is the present men who will then begin to be regarded as exceptional
mongrels, until these die out in their turn in civilised lands; surviving only in small groups on islands -the mountain peaks of to-day -- where they will vegetate, degenerate, and finally die out, perhaps
millions of years hence, as the Aztecs have, as the Nyam-Nyam and the dwarfish Moola Koorumba of
the Nilghiri Hills are dying. All these are the remnants of once mighty races, the recollection of whose
existence has entirely died out of the remembrance of the modern generations, just as we shall vanish
from the memory of the Sixth Race Humanity. The Fifth will overlap the Sixth Race for many
hundreds of millenniums, changing with it slower than its new successor, still changing in stature,
general physique, and mentality, just as the Fourth overlapped our Aryan race, and the Third had
overlapped the Atlanteans.
This process of preparation for the Sixth great Race must last throughout the whole sixth and seventh
sub-races (vide supra, the diagram of the Genealogical Tree of the Fifth Race). But the last remnants
of the Fifth Continent will not disappear until some time after the birth of the new Race; when another
and new dwelling, the sixth continent, will have appeared above the new waters on the face of the
globe, so as to receive the new stranger. To it also will emigrate and settle all those who shall be
fortunate enough to escape the general disaster. When this shall be -- as just said -- it is not for the
writer to know. Only, as nature no more proceeds by sudden jumps and starts, than man changes
suddenly from a child into a mature man, the final cataclysm will be preceded by many smaller
submersions and destructions both by wave and volcanic fires. The exultant pulse will beat
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 446 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-1-25.htm (8 von 9) [06.05.2003 03:36:23]
high in the heart of the race now in the American zone, but there will be no more Americans when the
Sixth Race commences; no more, in fact, than Europeans; for they will have now become a new race,
and many new nations. Yet the Fifth will not die, but survive for a while: overlapping the new Race for
many hundred thousands of years to come, it will become transformed with it -- slower than its new
successor -- still getting entirely altered in mentality, general physique, and stature. Mankind will not
grow again into giant bodies as in the case of the Lemurians and the Atlanteans; because while the
evolution of the Fourth race led the latter down to the very bottom of materiality in its physical
development, the present Race is on its ascending arc; and the Sixth will be rapidly growing out of its
bonds of matter, and even of flesh.
Thus it is the mankind of the New world -- one by far the senior of our Old one, a fact men had also
forgotten -- of Patala (the Antipodes, or the Nether World, as America is called in India), whose
mission and Karma it is, to sow the seeds for a forthcoming, grander, and far more glorious Race than
any of those we know of at present. The Cycles of Matter will be succeeded by Cycles of Spirituality
and a fully developed mind. On the law of parallel history and races, the majority of the future
mankind will be composed of glorious Adepts. Humanity is the child of cyclic Destiny, and not one of
its Units can escape its unconscious mission, or get rid of the burden of its co-operative work with
nature. Thus will mankind, race after race, perform its appointed cycle-pilgrimage. Climates will, and
have already begun, to change, each tropical year after the other dropping one sub-race, but only to
beget another higher race on the ascending cycle; while a series of other less favoured groups -- the
failures of nature -- will, like some individual men, vanish from the human family without even
leaving a trace behind.
Such is the course of Nature under the sway of KARMIC LAW: of the ever present and the everbecoming Nature. For, in the words of a Sage, known only to a few Occultists:-- "THE PRESENT IS
THE CHILD OF THE PAST; THE FUTURE, THE BEGOTTEN OF THE PRESENT. AND YET, O
PRESENT MOMENT! KNOWEST THOU NOT THAT THOU HAST NO PARENT, NOR CANST
THOU HAVE A CHILD; THAT THOU ART EVER BEGETTING BUT THYSELF? BEFORE
THOU HAST EVEN BEGUN TO SAY 'I AM THE PROGENY OF THE DEPARTED MOMENT,
THE CHILD OF THE PAST,' THOU HAST BECOME THAT PAST ITSELF. BEFORE THOU
UTTEREST THE LAST SYLLABLE, BEHOLD! THOU ART NO MORE THE PRESENT BUT
VERILY THAT FUTURE. THUS, ARE THE PAST, THE PRESENT, AND THE FUTURE, THE
EVER-LIVING TRINITY IN ONE -- THE MAHAMAYA OF THE ABSOLUTE IS." -------
questions, comments, suggestions/feedback, take-down requests, contribute, etc
contact me @ integralyogin@gmail.com or join the integral discord server (chatrooms)
if the page you visited was empty, it may be noted and I will try to fill it out. cheers
change font "color":
change "background-color":
change "font-family":
change "padding":
change "table font size":
last updated: 2022-02-02 19:49:10
312836 site hits