classes ::: plane, parts of the being, adjective, noun,
children :::
branches ::: astral, astral travel

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object:astral
class:plane
class:parts of the being
word class:adjective
word class:noun

see also :::

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OBJECT INSTANCES [1] - TOPICS - AUTHORS - BOOKS - CHAPTERS - CLASSES - SEE ALSO - SIMILAR TITLES

TOPICS
astral_travel
astral_travel
SEE ALSO


AUTH

BOOKS
A_Treatise_on_Cosmic_Fire
Initiation_Into_Hermetics
Liber_ABA
Magick_Without_Tears
The_Book_of_Light
Toward_the_Future

IN CHAPTERS TITLE
1.00e_-_DIVISION_E_-_MOTION_ON_THE_PHYSICAL_AND_ASTRAL_PLANES
1.11_-_The_Soul_or_the_Astral_Body
1.12_-_The_Astral_Plane
1.17_-_Astral_Journey__Example,_How_to_do_it,_How_to_Verify_your_Experience
1.63_-_Fear,_a_Bad_Astral_Vision

IN CHAPTERS CLASSNAME

IN CHAPTERS TEXT
02.05_-_The_Godheads_of_the_Little_Life
1.00a_-_DIVISION_A_-_THE_INTERNAL_FIRES_OF_THE_SHEATHS.
1.00a_-_Introduction
1.00b_-_DIVISION_B_-_THE_PERSONALITY_RAY_AND_FIRE_BY_FRICTION
1.00c_-_DIVISION_C_-_THE_ETHERIC_BODY_AND_PRANA
1.00e_-_DIVISION_E_-_MOTION_ON_THE_PHYSICAL_AND_ASTRAL_PLANES
1.00_-_INTRODUCTORY_REMARKS
1.01_-_THE_STUFF_OF_THE_UNIVERSE
1.02_-_The_Magic_Circle
1.02_-_The_Stages_of_Initiation
1.02_-_The_Three_European_Worlds
1.035_-_The_Recitation_of_Mantra
1.03_-_Some_Practical_Aspects
1.03_-_THE_EARTH_IN_ITS_EARLY_STAGES
1.03_-_The_Sephiros
1.04_-_Body,_Soul_and_Spirit
1.04_-_The_Conditions_of_Esoteric_Training
1.04_-_The_Paths
1.04_-_The_Qabalah__The_Best_Training_for_Memory
1.05_-_Adam_Kadmon
1.05_-_Some_Results_of_Initiation
1.06_-_LIFE_AND_THE_PLANETS
1.06_-_The_Literal_Qabalah
1.06_-_The_Transformation_of_Dream_Life
1.07_-_The_Literal_Qabalah_(continued)
1.07_-_The_Magic_Wand
1.08a_-_The_Ladder
1.08_-_The_Magic_Sword,_Dagger_and_Trident
1.08_-_The_Splitting_of_the_Human_Personality_during_Spiritual_Training
1.09_-_Kundalini_Yoga
1.09_-_The_Guardian_of_the_Threshold
1.10_-_Mantra_Yoga
1.10_-_The_Magical_Garment
1.11_-_The_Soul_or_the_Astral_Body
1.12_-_The_Astral_Plane
1.13_-_The_Pentacle,_Lamen_or_Seal
1.14_-_The_Book_of_Magic_Formulae
1.14_-_The_Mental_Plane
1.15_-_In_the_Domain_of_the_Spirit_Beings
1.15_-_Truth
1.16_-_Advantages_and_Disadvantages_of_Evocational_Magic
1.17_-_Astral_Journey__Example,_How_to_do_it,_How_to_Verify_your_Experience
1.17_-_God
1.18_-_Asceticism
1.18_-_Evocation
1.19_-_The_Practice_of_Magical_Evocation
1.200-1.224_Talks
1.23_-_Improvising_a_Temple
1.25_-_Fascinations,_Invisibility,_Levitation,_Transmutations,_Kinks_in_Time
1.37_-_Death_-_Fear_-_Magical_Memory
1.51_-_How_to_Recognise_Masters,_Angels,_etc.,_and_how_they_Work
1.57_-_Beings_I_have_Seen_with_my_Physical_Eye
1.58_-_Do_Angels_Ever_Cut_Themselves_Shaving?
1.60_-_Knack
1.61_-_Power_and_Authority
1.63_-_Fear,_a_Bad_Astral_Vision
1.66_-_Vampires
1.68_-_The_God-Letters
1.71_-_Morality_2
1.83_-_Epistola_Ultima
1f.lovecraft_-_The_Electric_Executioner
1.whitman_-_As_I_Sat_Alone_By_Blue_Ontarios_Shores
2.04_-_ADVICE_TO_ISHAN
2.07_-_On_Congress_and_Politics
2.07_-_The_Cup
2.14_-_ON_THE_LAND_OF_EDUCATION
2.14_-_The_Bell
2.16_-_The_Magick_Fire
2.21_-_IN_THE_COMPANY_OF_DEVOTEES_AT_SYAMPUKUR
2.22_-_1941-1943
3.01_-_The_Soul_World
3.02_-_The_Formulae_of_the_Elemental_Weapons
3.11_-_Of_Our_Lady_Babalon
3.11_-_Spells
3.14_-_Of_the_Consecrations
3.15_-_Of_the_Invocation
3.18_-_Of_Clairvoyance_and_the_Body_of_Light
3.21_-_Of_Black_Magic
4.03_-_THE_ULTIMATE_EARTH
4.04_-_Conclusion
4.0_-_The_Path_of_Knowledge
5.4.01_-_Occult_Knowledge
5.4.02_-_Occult_Powers_or_Siddhis
Appendix_4_-_Priest_Spells
APPENDIX_I_-_Curriculum_of_A._A.
BOOK_II._--_PART_I._ANTHROPOGENESIS.
BOOK_II._--_PART_III._ADDENDA._SCIENCE_AND_THE_SECRET_DOCTRINE_CONTRASTED
BOOK_II._--_PART_II._THE_ARCHAIC_SYMBOLISM_OF_THE_WORLD-RELIGIONS
BOOK_I._--_PART_I._COSMIC_EVOLUTION
BOOK_I._--_PART_III._SCIENCE_AND_THE_SECRET_DOCTRINE_CONTRASTED
BOOK_I._--_PART_II._THE_EVOLUTION_OF_SYMBOLISM_IN_ITS_APPROXIMATE_ORDER
Book_of_Imaginary_Beings_(text)
Conversations_with_Sri_Aurobindo
Liber
Liber_111_-_The_Book_of_Wisdom_-_LIBER_ALEPH_VEL_CXI
Liber_46_-_The_Key_of_the_Mysteries
Liber_71_-_The_Voice_of_the_Silence_-_The_Two_Paths_-_The_Seven_Portals
P.11_-_MAGICAL_WEAPONS
r1914_04_08
r1914_05_22
r1919_07_18
Sayings_of_Sri_Ramakrishna_(text)
Talks_125-150
The_Divine_Names_Text_(Dionysis)
The_Dwellings_of_the_Philosophers
The_Essentials_of_Education
The_Logomachy_of_Zos

PRIMARY CLASS

astral
capacity
parts_of_the_being
plane
power
skill
SIMILAR TITLES
astral
astral travel
The Astral Temple
the Astral Temple

DEFINITIONS


TERMS STARTING WITH

Astral Bell. See BELLS, ASTRAL

Astral Body Generally equivalent to the Sanskrit linga-sarira, the ethereal model-body, usually invisible to our physical eyes, upon which the physical body (sthula-sarira) is modeled. There are three ethereal forms or bodies which might properly be called astral bodies: 1) mayavi-rupa — the illusory form-body of thought and substance projected by high initiates; 2) linga-sarira — the model- or pattern-body, the second principle of the human constitution; and 3) kama-rupa — the phantom or spook which is seen occasionally in the vicinity of graves or which occasionally materializes at seances.

Astral body: In occultism, man’s ethereal counterpart, a replica of the physical body (the gross body), but of a more subtle and tenuous substance, penetrating every nerve, fibre and cell of the physical organism, and constantly in a supersensitive state of vibration and pulsation. It may depart from the gross body for short whiles, but cannot sever its connection with the latter without causing it to die. The more active is the gross body, and the more conscious it is of its physical environment, the more inactive is the astral body. The astral body is most active when the gross body sleeps, and this is when the astral body may communicate with astral bodies of other living persons or of the dead.

Astral Body ::: This is the popular term for the model-body, the linga-sarira. It is but slightly less material than is thephysical body, and is in fact the model or framework around which the physical body is builded, andfrom which, in a sense, the physical body flows or develops as growth proceeds. It is the vehicle of pranaor life-energy, and is, therefore, the container of all the energies descending from the higher parts of thehuman constitution by means of the pranic stream. The astral body precedes in time the physical body,and is the pattern around which the physical body is slavishly molded, atom by atom. In one sense thephysical body may be called the deposit or dregs or lees of the astral body; the astral body likewise in its turn is but a deposit from the auric egg.

ASTRAL BODY, WORLD etc. (T.B.) The same as emotional envelope, world etc. However, in Blavatsky&

Astral Construct ::: An entity constructed through the willpower and imagination of the practitioner in order to accomplish a specific goal. The difference between this and an artificial spirit is more a matter of semantics and scope. Generally astral constructs have goals related to the Astral Plane and are viewed in terms of their effects on that layer of reality. See also Artificial Spirit.

Astral Double. See ASTRAL BODY; BHUTA; CHHAYA

Astral "language" A programming language based on {Pascal}, never implemented. ["ASTRAL: A Structured and Unified Approach to Database Design and Manipulation", T. Amble et al, in Proc of the Database Architecture Conf, Venice, June 1979]. (2000-01-27)

Astral ::: (language) A programming language based on Pascal, never implemented.[ASTRAL: A Structured and Unified Approach to Database Design and Manipulation, T. Amble et al, in Proc of the Database Architecture Conf, Venice, June 1979].(2000-01-27)

Astral light: In occult terminology, the name of a universal living element which is described as an element and a power at the same time and containing the character of all things. It is said to be the storehouse of memory for the Macrocosm, the contents of which may be reimbodied and reincarnated—and at the same time the storehouse of the memory of man’s Microcosm, into which he delves to recollect past happenings. While it exists uniformly all throughout the universe its density and activity are increased around certain objects, in particular around the human brain and spinal cord; it is the medium through which thought is transmitted, and its presence around man’s nerve cells and conduits enables human beings to perceive impressions on the astral aura and thus to “read by the astral light”—the akashic reading, scientifically called clairvoyance.

Astral Light ::: The astral light corresponds in the case of our globe, and analogically in the case of our solar system, towhat the linga-sarira is in the case of an individual man. Just as in man the linga-sarira or astral body is the vehicle or carrier of prana or life-energy, so is the astral light the carrier of the cosmic jiva or cosmic life-energy. To us humans it is an invisible region surrounding our earth, as H. P. Blavatsky expresses it,as indeed it surrounds every other physical globe; and among the seven kosmic principles it is the mostmaterial excepting one, our physical universe.The astral light therefore is, on the one hand, the storehouse or repository of all the energies of thekosmos on their way downwards to manifest in the material spheres -- of our solar system in general aswell as of our globe in particular; and, on the other hand, it is the receptacle or magazine of whateverpasses out of the physical sphere on its upward way.Thirdly, it is a kosmic "picture-gallery" or indelible record of whatever takes place on the astral andphysical planes; however, this last phase of the functions of the astral light is the least in importance andreal interest.The astral light of our own globe, and analogically of any other physical globe, is the region of thekama-loka, at least as concerns the intermediate and lower parts of the kama-loka; and all entities that diepass through the astral light on their way upwards, and in the astral light throw off or shed the kama-rupaat the time of the second death.The solar system has its own astral light in general, just as every globe in the universal solar system hasits astral light in particular, in each of these last cases being a thickening or materializing or concretingaround the globe of the general astral substance forming the astral light of the solar system. The astrallight, strictly speaking, is simply the lees or dregs of akasa and exists in steps or stages of increasingethereality. The more closely it surrounds any globe, the grosser and more material it is. It is thereceptacle of all the vile and horrible emanations from earth and earth beings, and is therefore in partsfilled with earthly pollutions. There is a constant interchange, unceasing throughout the solarmanvantara, between the astral light on the one hand, and our globe earth on the other, each giving andreturning to the other.Finally, the astral light is with regard to the material realms of the solar system the copy or reflection ofwhat the akasa is in the spiritual realms. The astral light is the mother of the physical, just as the spirit isthe mother of the akasa; or, inversely, the physical is merely the concretion of the astral, just as the akasais the veil or concretion of the highest spiritual. Indeed, the astral and physical are one, just as the akasicand the spiritual are one.

Astral Light This is the next cosmic plane above the physical, which is to the physical globes of our earth or of the other bodies of our solar system what the linga-sarira is to the human physical body. As such, it is the carrier of life-forces — jiva cosmically, and prana individually — and the storehouse of cosmic energies on their way to or from physical manifestation. It preserves an indelible record of all events on the astral and physical planes, there being continual interaction between the two planes. No natural phenomenon, whether mental, psychic, or physical, can be explained without it; without it, the physical world would crumble to impalpable dust.

Astral Monad or Soul The animal soul or vital-astral soul, the lowest and feeblest reflection or vehicle of the divine monad; when enlightened by the human monad, it produces the human being known today.

Astral Plane ::: Also Yetzirah. One of the Four Worlds as part of the Kabbalistic map of reality. A realm of reality situated between the Physical and Mental Planes that serves as the abode of the imagination. This is the foundation upon which the capacity to visualize exists and is where the ability to express many emotional archetypes originates. The most "real" aspects of experiences of astral projection, visionary journeys, and dreams tend to be found in this layer. See also Astral Projection.

Astral plane: In those occult doctrines which believe in various planes of existences beyond the material one (e.g., in Theosophy), the first plane of existence after the death of the physical body. In doctrines which recognize only one plane of existence beyond the material one (e.g., in Rosicrucianism), this term is interpreted as a name for the sphere of non-material existence.

Astral Plane. See ASTRAL LIGHT

Astral projection: In occult terminology, the partial or complete separation of the astral body (q.v.) from the physical body, and visiting another locality, near or far. This occurs in sleep—though, as a general rule, one does not recall the experience on waking. The adept can command his astral body to go any place he desires in order to make observations and investigations, and acquire essential information.

Astral Projection ::: The ability to firmly focus one's awareness within a form (sheath) envisioned in the Astral Plane. Through practice this allows for exploring the realm of individual and collective imagination lucidly and persistently. See also Astral Plane.

Astral shell: The personality in its aspect of disintegration after the death of the physical body.

Astral soul: In theosophical terminology, a synonym for the lower manas, the reflection of the higher Ego, and not synonymous with astral body.

Astral sphere: The astral world (q.v.).

Astral Temple ::: A temple and base of operations created through the willpower and imaginative faculties of the practitioner. Such a structure exists on the Astral Plane and through consistent practice and persistent reinforcement the structure can take on qualities of physicality that belie the usually fluid and transient nature of the Astral. This allows for such a place to be used for rituals and as a point to safely begin the exploration of other planes.

Astral Thrall ::: See Astral Construct.

Astral Watcher ::: Refers to either an astral construct used as a guardian or to the creation of a simulacrum that can remotely explore parts of the Astral while one is physically awake and conscious and upon reintegration bring forth visions and information on the targeted location.

Astral World. See ASTRAL LIGHT

Astral world: The first sphere of existence after the death of the body.

astral ::: 1. Of, relating to, emanating from, or resembling the stars. 2. Of the spirit world [Greek astron star].

astral ::: a. --> Pertaining to, coming from, or resembling, the stars; starry; starlike.

astral: Dealing with mystic consciousness, usually when projecting that consciousness beyond the physical form, shaping worlds with consciousness, or both. (See also Three Worlds.)

astralplane ::: Astral Plane An invisible place, also known as the astral world, which appears to parallel the physical world, within which one can travel in astral form. See also Astral Travel (below) and Out of Body Experience (OBE).

astralprojection ::: Astral Projection See Out of Body Experience (OBE).

astraltravel ::: Astral Travel Astral travel, whether induced or not, is the ability to move about outside one's physical body on the Astral Plane (see above). This form of travel is also known as astral projection or an Out of Body Experience (OBE).

astralworld ::: Astral World See Astral Plane above.


TERMS ANYWHERE

According to the Pistis Sophia, the power of Sophia resides specially in the solar Logos, whose planetary vehicle is Venus. This dual symbol has an upper and a nether pole, like akasa and the astral light. The lower pole is called Achamoth; Sophia-Achamoth is used sometimes in the sense of the lower aspect, and sometimes to denote the two poles together.

Acthna An invisible subterrestrial fire, sometimes causing volcanic eruptions, an “element in the life of the ‘great snake’ Vasuki, that according to Hindu mythology encircles the world, and by whose movements earthquakes may be produced” (BCW 7:283). Also “a certain state of the ‘soul’ of the earth, a mixture of astral and material elements, perhaps of an electric or magnetic character” (F. Hartmann, ibid.).

After death the lower classes of those on the left-hand path become the terrestrial or earthly elementaries. Cunning, low, vindictive, and seeking to retaliate their sufferings upon imbodied humanity, they become, until final annihilation, astral vampires, and therefore a constant psychic and even physical menace to those who open the doors of communication with them.

  “After death . . . there occurs what is called the ‘second death,’ which is the separation of the immortal part of the second or intermediate Duad from the lower portions of this Duad, which lower portions remain as the kama-rupa in the etheric or higher astral spheres which are intermediate between the devachanic and the earthly spheres. In time this kama-rupa gradually fades out in its turn, its life-atoms at such dissolution passing on to their various and unceasing peregrinations.

After death, when the second death occurs, man’s consciousness is withdrawn from the higher astral regions into the next superior sphere or plane — the human monad is indrawn into the spiritual monad. Then occurs the state of devachan.

A great distinction is drawn between spirit and soul, the vehicle of an ego. Theosophy objects to its use for astral kama-rupas of the seance room.

Ahum (Avestan) The lower personal existence or personal life; the lowest triad in the human septenary constitution: the physical body, the vital principle, and the astral body.

Akasha: In occultism, a celestial ether, or astral light that fills all space. According to occult teaching, every thought and action which takes place in the material world, is recorded in this akashic medium, whereby one possessed of psychic vision can read and translate the panorama of history, the Akashic Records. They also hint that some day science will be able to tap this record and thus draw upon and even re-enact the words and actions of past ages. (Also spelled Akasa.)

akash&

Akasic Magnetism In theosophy both electricity and magnetism are considered as the vital fluids or effluxes of living beings, which flow forth from them and, interblending and interworking, produce the multimyriad forms of electric and magnetic phenomenal activity common everywhere. This means that both magnetism and electricity are to be traced to their source in cosmic akasa, which is in the great what the magnetism of an individual is in the small. The changes occurring in the earth’s magnetism “are due to akasic magnetism incessantly generating electric currents which tend to restore disturbed equilibrium” (ML 160). Hence all magnetic or electrical activity on earth is produced by astral magnetism and electricity incessantly generating electric and magnetic currents which reproduce themselves in the physical sphere.

Alam: Arabic for world. In Sufi terminology, the seven cosmic planes called alam are: 1) the lowest one, alam i sugrah, the world of human experience; 2) alam i nasut, the material world of forms and bodies; 3) alam i mithal, the astral world; 4) alam i malakut, the spiritual world; 5) alam i kabrut, the radiant plane of divine splendor; 6) alam i lahut, the exalted divine plane of the first emanation; 7) the highest, alam i hahut, plane of absolute inactual being.

Alkahest First used by Paracelsus to denote the Menstruum or universal solvent which, according to Paracelsus and Van Helmont, can reduce all bodies, simple or compound, to the primum ens. In one sense it is akasa, which in its lower form is the anima mundi or astral light. Van Helmont believed that such a general solvent is obtainable by chemical means, so far as it applies to physical things. But psychologically it signifies that the multiform and changing elements which rule our actions can be brought under control of the enlightened will by reducing them to the essence from which they all spring. The alkahest from its metaphysical, psychological, and mystical aspect is therefore the higher self which by its intrinsic energies, working upon matter or “lead,” produces in time the “pure gold,” or in other words brings the entire human constitution into perfect harmony and spiritual sympathy with the alkahest, monadic essence, or higher self.

Alkahest: The universal solvent sought by alchemists. Materially, a substance capable of dissolving all other material substance, reducing it to the original matter of which it was formed. Symbolically, a force capable of affecting the astral forms of all things and of dissolving them by changing the polarity of their molecules.

All the apparent proofs of identity of “spirit” can be accounted for otherwise than by supposing the actual presence of the departed individual in the seance room. Such communications as are received evince no knowledge beyond that which we already have, and show no signs of emanating from a high source — and almost invariably such communications are trifling and paltry. Mediumship and seances are most harmful practice, as they open the door to the entry of pernicious obsessing influences from the lower astral realms. Moreover such practice may obstruct and retard the natural decomposition of the discarded lower elements of the deceased, and thus keep alive his kama-rupa beyond the term of its natural astral death. The appeal of astralism is very powerful to those who feel convinced that they have thereby obtained assurance of immortality and of the continued existence of their lost loved ones.

Also the vital or animal soul — the third and lowest of the three souls of a human being: the personal ego in the human constitution. The vehicle of pranatman is the astral-vital monad in its turn working through the human body. The pranatman, so far as man is concerned, may otherwise be called the human soul, which comprises manas, kama, and prana. This ego or pranatman is mortal, being a composite, and hence endures only during the cycle of one earth-life; while its range of consciousness is restricted to globe D of the earth planetary chain. Nonetheless, the monadic point around which the pranatman reassembles for each incarnation is immortal as a monad, albeit this monad is still in a low degree of evolutionary unfoldment.

Although a species of necromancy, or consulting with the dead, was not infrequent in the countries bordering the Mediterranean Sea, yet invariably it was strongly discountenanced and in many cases rigorously put down by the State. Even in those cases where Greek and Roman literature show important personages in mythology consulting the dead, it was understood among the educated that the astral spooks or shades thus evoked were by no means spirits of excarnate human beings; but the attempt was to gather from the astral shades automatic responses from impressions retained in the astral corpses.

A mental image is a reality, and in materializing it the operator merely copies natural processes, since everything in the physical world is a materialization of something in the inner worlds working through the astral world into the physical. It is done by the use of psychic or psychophysiological faculties which have to be acquired by training, for even in the cases of those born with these powers, they exist because of training in previous lives. Some spiritistic mediums instinctively possess the power of precipitation, but use it ignorant of its causes and rationale, and hence without conscious control. Were the adept or mahatma himself to employ precipitation for the conveying of intelligence to others, something which is very rarely done, the precipitation would be achieved by the will of the adept gathering astral and ethereal substance from the surrounding atmosphere by the power of his will and condensing it onto the paper.

Amesha-Spentas (Avestan) Ameshā-Spentās [from a not + mesha, mara mortal, mutable + spenta benefactor, holy, soul-healing] Immortal benefactors; six in number: Vohu-Manah, Asha-Vahishta, Khshathra-Vayria, Spenta-Armaiti (love), Haurvatat (perfection), and Ameretat (immortality). The first three are attributes of Ahura-Mazda, abstractions without form. These male positive creative forces leave their impressions in the mental world and give birth to the second trinity, who lead man to freedom. “The Amshaspends, [are] our Dhyan-Chohans or the ‘Serpents of Wisdom.’ They are identical with, and yet separate from Ormazd (Ahura-Mazda). They are also the Angels of the Stars of the Christians — the Star-yazatas 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” (SD 2:358).

Ana (Chaldean) The invisible heaven; the astral light, the heavenly mother of the terrestrial sea. One of the triad comprising the goddesses Ana, Belita, and Damkina. As mother of the sea, a likely origin of the Christian symbology of the Virgin Mary standing on the crescent moon and of her connection with the sea. “Anna (the name of the Mother of the Virgin Mary) . . . is derived from the Chaldean Ana” (SD 1:91).

Anaitis, Anait (Chaldean) Also Anaitia, Aneitis, Tanais, Nanaea. A goddess whose worship was widespread over large portions of the Near East; “identical with the Hindu Annapurna, one of the names of Kali — the female aspect of Siva — at her best” (TG 21). Identified with the Greek Artemis and Aphrodite. “Anna (the name of the Mother of the Virgin Mary) . . . is derived from the Chaldean Ana, heaven, or Astral Light, Anima Mundi; whence Anaitia, Devi-durga, the wife of Siva, is also called Annapurna, and Kanya, the Virgin; ‘Uma-Kanya’ being her esoteric name, and meaning the ‘Virgin of light,’ Astral Light in one of its multitudinous aspects” (SD 1:91-2).

An ancient Egyptian zodiac has been found which represented three Virgins: “The three ‘Virgins,’ or Virgo in three different positions, meant . . . the record of the first three ‘divine or astronomical Dynasties,’ who taught the Third 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 birth-place — 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” (SD 2:435-6).

An apparition of another kind which, though rare, is genuine and authentic, is due to a dying person’s intense thought of another, making him for a brief moment objective to the latter. It may be due to an intense will to see or to appear to the other person, or it may be a more automatic projection of the mayavi-rupa of the dying one. These last cases, however, must be distinguished in quality from the adept’s consciously exercised power to project his higher astral-mental form to any distance in his mayavi-rupa. “The rays of thought have the same potentiality for producing forms in the astral atmosphere as the sunrays have with regard to a lens. Every thought so evolved with energy from the brain creates nolens volens a shape” (BCW 10:224).

Anesthesia [from Greek anaisthesia no feeling] Want of feeling; a condition of total or partial insensibility, particularly to touch. The many classical references to anesthetics indicate that the ancients knew much about the subject that has not been rediscovered. Blavatsky refers to the sacred beverage used by the hierophants in ceremonies to free the astral soul from the bonds of matter, so that the inner man might rise to the level of spirit (IU 2:117, 1:540).

An event on the physical plane may be preceded by causes not perceptible to our physical senses, yet of which our more subtle inner senses are aware. Some people and many animals may have a presentiment of an earthquake, through sensitiveness to certain astral and physical conditions which precede the actual earth-shock. Explaining such a case as that of avoiding a doomed train brings up the general question of prediction and the problem of time. In these cases the inner sense may perceive an event before it has happened on the physical plane, and such cases are too numerous for them to be lightly dismissed as imaginary or mere coincidences. See also PROPHECY

Anima Mundi (Latin) World-soul, world-mother; the divine-spiritual-astral-physical source of emanations, the cosmic generative and animating principle of all beings, the creative Third Logos in its female aspect. In its highest and intermediate portions, it corresponds to the alaya of Northern Buddhism and hence to akasa. Identified variously with Isis, Sephira, Sophia, the Holy Ghost, mahat, mulaprakriti, etc., but used in a hazy and often materializing sense, so that it cannot be accurately regarded as a synonym for any one of these. “It is in a sense the ‘seven-skinned mother’ of the stanzas in the Secret Doctrine, the essence of seven planes of sentience, consciousness and differentiation, moral and physical. In its highest aspect it is Nirvana, in its lowest Astral Light. It was feminine with the Gnostics, the early Christians and the Nazarenes; bisexual with other sects, who considered it only in its four lower planes. Of igneous, ethereal nature in the objective world of form (and then ether), and divine and spiritual in its three higher planes. When it is said that every human soul was born by detaching itself form the Anima Mundi, it means, esoterically, that our higher Egos are of an essence identical with It, which is a radiation of the ever unknown Universal Absolute” (TG 22-3).

Another name for the spirit-man is monad used in a generalizing sense, which becomes confusing when one remembers that in the human septenary constitution there are several monads coordinately evolving. There is the divine monad, virtually atman; the spiritual monad, buddhi-manas overshone by atman; the human monad or reincarnating ego, the higher manas in conjunction with the aroma of kama and overshone by atma-buddhi; then on still lower scales of evolutionary unfolding come the animal monad seated in the manas-kama; the astral monad seated in the prana-lingasarira; and finally the physical monad, the lingasarira-sthulasarira under the gentle efflux of the higher principles, which accounts for the permanency, albeit changeability, of the physical person. In reality every portion of human pneumatology is a monad, each one producing all that any other produces, each lower being the vehicle or seat of the next higher, and the higher ones being merely more unfolded than the lower ones.

Another phase of evolution of the life-waves during the third round was the great outflow of differing animal forms which took place, due to the immense pressure of the inner urge of the various life-centers to express themselves in their respective phases of evolutionary unfolding. However, what we now call the mammalian stocks were a much later development, for these appeared during the fourth round; though there were forerunners even of the mammalia during the last part of the third round. Furthermore, all of these various stocks or groups of evolving beings originated in astral types thrown off by third round man. The present “amphibia, birds, reptiles, fishes, etc., are the resultants of the Third Round, astral fossil forms stored up in the auric envelope of the Earth and projected into physical objectivity subsequent to the deposition of the first Laurentian rocks” (SD 2:684) when this took place during the fourth round.

Antariksha, Antariksha (Sanskrit) Antarīkṣa, Antarikṣa [from antar within, interior + īkṣa from the verbal root īkṣ to behold, see] The mid-region; the firmament or space between earth and heaven, the abode of apsaras (nymphs), gandharvas (celestial musicians), and yakshas (nature sprites of many types) along with the mythical wish-granting cow of plenty, Kamadhenu. In the Vedas, antariksha is the middle or second of three lokas (spheres) usually enumerated as bhur, bhuvar, and svar. Above these rise in serial order the four higher lokas of the ordinary Brahmanical hierarchy. Hierarchically, taking the bhurloka as the physical sphere, bhuvarloka or antariksha corresponds with the astral plane. In the Vishnu-Purana (3:3), Antariksha is named as the Vyasa (arranger of the Veda) in the 13th dvapara yuga in the Vaivasvata manvantara, our present world cycle.

Anthropogenesis That stage of theogony when the spiritual monads of the central spiritual fire are passing through the human kingdom. If we include under “human being” everything from the primal spark to the culminating point of evolution, then anthropogenesis would become coextensive with cosmogenesis. The two cannot be sharply separated, for not only is man involved in those cosmic kingdoms which are at other stages than the human, but the human being, in common with every other organism, is an epitome of the universe. Three lines of evolution converge in humankind: the monadic or divine-spiritual, the intellectual from the manasa-dhyanis, and the vital-astral-physical. But we are not a mere product generated by external forces or creative powers outside of ourselves; it is the growth outwards from our own inner essence that is fundamental.

Any attempt by an untrained student, without a teacher, to try to develop these chakras is sure to cause disaster, since it can result only in the arousing of powerful forces which he has not yet acquired the means to control, and which will therefore control him. Once awakened, they cannot be put to sleep again, and the result will be disorganization, physical or mental or both, manifested in disease, insanity, depravity, or death; in the worst cases, the unfortunate dabbler may set his feet on a path of black magic ending in the final separation of his spiritual ego from its hapless psycho-vital-astral-physical vehicle. The spiritual and higher intellectual powers and faculties must be cultivated first; and this cannot be done by any attempt at artificial stimulation based on fixing the attention on spots in the body or head. The only safe way to practice the chela life is to forget about the body and its mechanism, thus allowing evolution to proceed in its natural course, and dangerous forces to life quiescent until they come naturally and harmoniously into operation.

Apart from this scientific use of relativity, its wider meaning is of prime importance in theosophy. Though we may say, in a general way, that all things are relative to each other, yet for purposes of reasoning or calculation it is necessary to assume certain things as constant; as for instance, in measuring velocities on the earth, we may assume that the earth is motionless; though when we enter the field of astronomy, we regard the earth as in motion with regard to the sun, and again may regard the sun as in motion relatively to some other position assumed as at rest. By applying this principle we arrive at the conclusion that nothing in the universe, whether physical, astral, mental, or spiritual, is completely specified to our human mind except by its relations to other things. This principle is expressed by such sayings as that all objects are manifestations of a universal principle or that there are no absolutes.

Apas-bhuta (Sanskrit) Apas-bhūta [from ap water + bhūta element from the verbal root bhū to be, become] The water element; sixth in the descending scale of the seven cosmic bhutas (of which five are popularly reckoned), and second in the ascending scale of the cosmic ladder of elements. Apas-bhuta has its analog in the human constitution in the linga-sarira, the model or astral body. See also APAS-TATTVA.

Archaes: A synonym for astral light (q.v.).

Archaeus, Archeus [from Greek archaios original, ancient] Used by Paracelsus and others after him to denote the unitary cosmic or human spiritual-vital force or essence. It is one aspect of the anima mundi and therefore the source of all astral-physical phenomena, whether as energy or substance; also called Father-Ether.

As diamond, dorje has a direct mystical reference to the supposedly indestructible nature of the diamond. It is the symbol of possession of siddhis or supernormal powers spiritual, intellectual, and astral. Those who wield this wand of power or diamond-thunderbolt are called vajra-panins.

Ashta-vijnana (Sanskrit) Aṣṭa-vijñāna [from aṣṭa eight + vijñāna function of consciousness, discernment] Eight or eightfold faculties; used in mystical Mahayana Buddhist works to signify what in Hindu philosophy is called the jnanendriyas (organs of consciousness or of conscious existence in imbodied life). This group of inner faculties, functions, or powers of consciousness has direct reference to the skandhas of Brahmanical philosophy. While the skandhas range from the highest down to and including those of the astral-vital-physical vehicle, nevertheless when closely grouped together the ashta-vijnana may be considered as a unitary vehicle, the field of action of the spiritual ego; hence “One must see with his spiritual eye, hear with his Dharmakayic ear, feel with the sensations of his Ashta-vijnyana (spiritual ‘I’) before he can comprehend this doctrine fully . . .” (ML 200).

A similar effect may be produced in an unborn child by something which happens to the mother. A mental picture, an astral form, and a physical form are three linked stages in a series; which explains how a sorcerer can use his imagination for his evil purposes, and how the imagination of a mother can affect the body of the unborn child.

  “As Kamaloka is on the earth plane and differs from its degree of materiality only in the degree of its plane of consciousness, for which reason it is concealed from our normal sight, the occasional apparition of such shells is as natural as that of electric balls and other atmospheric phenomena. Electricity as a fluid, or atomic matter (for Theosophists hold with Maxwell that it is atomic), though invisible, is ever present in the air, and manifests under various shapes, but only when certain conditions are there to ‘materialize’ the fluid, when it passes from its own on to our plane and makes itself objective. Similarly with the eidola of the dead. They are present, around us, but being on another plane do not see us any more than we see them. But whenever the strong desires of living men and the conditions furnished by the abnormal constitutions of mediums are combined together, these eidola are drawn — nay, pulled down from their plane on to ours and made objective. This is Necromancy; it does no good to the dead, and great harm to the living, in addition to the fact that it interferes with a law of nature. The occasional materialization of the ‘astral bodies’ or doubles of living persons is quite another matter. These ‘astrals’ are often mistaken for the apparitions of the dead, since, chameleon-like, our own ‘Elementaries,’ along with those of the disembodied and cosmic Elementals, will often assume the appearance of those images which are strongest in our thoughts. In short, at the so-called ‘materialization’ séances it is those present and the medium, who create the peculiar likeness of the apparitions. Independent ‘apparitions’ belong to another kind of psychic phenomena. Materializations are also called ‘form-manifestations’ and ‘portrait statues.’ To call them materialized spirits is inadmissible, for they are not spirits but animated portrait-statues, indeed” (TG 210).

As liquors deaden the higher mind and feelings, while arousing the lower nature, the victim is largely devoid of the ordinary self-protection of his judgment, will, and conscience, and has gravitated to his own animal level. That he is, for the time, living in the consciousness of his own astral body accounts for the extraordinary strength he often displays, for the disorientation where he “wants to go home,” for his forgetfulness of all this afterwards, and for the convulsions which, when present, are reported as indistinguishable from true epilepsy. To the depleting vital drain from the continued restlessness and violent activity of the attacks, is added the abnormal strain of obsession by one or another excarnate entity which has been vitalized in proportion as the sufferer is exhausted.

  As regards the evolution of mankind, the Secret Doctrine postulates three new propositions, which stand in direct antagonism to modern science as well as to current religious dogmas: it teaches (a) the simultaneous evolution of seven human groups on seven different portions of our globe; (b) the birth of the astral, before the physical body: the former being a model for the latter; and (c) that man, in this Round, preceded every mammalian — the anthropoids included — in the animal kingdom. — 2:1

Assessors One name given by Europeans to the 42 judges in the scene of the weighing of the heart in the Egyptian Book of the Dead. They stand as accusers of the defunct before Osiris in the former’s progress through Amenti after death. The idea of the judges reading the record from the weighing of the defunct’s heart is a variant of the teaching concerning the lipikas or karmic scribes recording all things in the astral light (cf SD 1:104-5).

  “A state produced sometimes by physiological disorders, sometimes by mediumship, and at others by drunkenness. But the cause that produces the visions has to be sought deeper than physiology. All such visions, especially when produced through mediumship, are preceded by a relaxation of the nervous system, invariably generating an abnormal magnetic condition which attracts to the sufferer waves of astral light. It is the latter that furnishes the various hallucinations. These, however, are not always what physicians would make them, empty and unreal dreams. No one can see that which does not exist — i.e., which is not impressed — in or on the astral waves. A Seer may, however, perceive objects and scenes (whether past, present, or future) which have no relation whatever to himself, and also perceive several things entirely disconnected with each other at one and the same time, thus producing the most grotesque and absurd combinations. Both drunkard and Seer, medium and Adept, see their respective visions in the Astral Light; but while the drunkard, the madman, and the untrained medium, or one suffering from brain-fever, see, because they cannot help it, and evoke the jumbled visions unconsciously to themselves, the Adept and the trained Seer have the choice and the control of such visions. They know where to fix their gaze, how to steady the scenes they want to observe, and how to see beyond the upper outward layers of the Astral Light. With the former such glimpses into the waves are hallucinations: with the latter they become the faithful reproduction of what actually has been, is, or will be, taking place. The glimpses at random caught by the medium, and his flickering visions in the deceptive light, are transformed under the guiding will of the Adept and Seer into steady pictures, the truthful representations of that which he wills to come within the focus of his perception” (TG 133-4).

Astral Bell. See BELLS, ASTRAL

Astral Body Generally equivalent to the Sanskrit linga-sarira, the ethereal model-body, usually invisible to our physical eyes, upon which the physical body (sthula-sarira) is modeled. There are three ethereal forms or bodies which might properly be called astral bodies: 1) mayavi-rupa — the illusory form-body of thought and substance projected by high initiates; 2) linga-sarira — the model- or pattern-body, the second principle of the human constitution; and 3) kama-rupa — the phantom or spook which is seen occasionally in the vicinity of graves or which occasionally materializes at seances.

Astral body: In occultism, man’s ethereal counterpart, a replica of the physical body (the gross body), but of a more subtle and tenuous substance, penetrating every nerve, fibre and cell of the physical organism, and constantly in a supersensitive state of vibration and pulsation. It may depart from the gross body for short whiles, but cannot sever its connection with the latter without causing it to die. The more active is the gross body, and the more conscious it is of its physical environment, the more inactive is the astral body. The astral body is most active when the gross body sleeps, and this is when the astral body may communicate with astral bodies of other living persons or of the dead.

Astral Body ::: This is the popular term for the model-body, the linga-sarira. It is but slightly less material than is thephysical body, and is in fact the model or framework around which the physical body is builded, andfrom which, in a sense, the physical body flows or develops as growth proceeds. It is the vehicle of pranaor life-energy, and is, therefore, the container of all the energies descending from the higher parts of thehuman constitution by means of the pranic stream. The astral body precedes in time the physical body,and is the pattern around which the physical body is slavishly molded, atom by atom. In one sense thephysical body may be called the deposit or dregs or lees of the astral body; the astral body likewise in its turn is but a deposit from the auric egg.

Astral Double. See ASTRAL BODY; BHUTA; CHHAYA

Astral "language" A programming language based on {Pascal}, never implemented. ["ASTRAL: A Structured and Unified Approach to Database Design and Manipulation", T. Amble et al, in Proc of the Database Architecture Conf, Venice, June 1979]. (2000-01-27)

Astral light: In occult terminology, the name of a universal living element which is described as an element and a power at the same time and containing the character of all things. It is said to be the storehouse of memory for the Macrocosm, the contents of which may be reimbodied and reincarnated—and at the same time the storehouse of the memory of man’s Microcosm, into which he delves to recollect past happenings. While it exists uniformly all throughout the universe its density and activity are increased around certain objects, in particular around the human brain and spinal cord; it is the medium through which thought is transmitted, and its presence around man’s nerve cells and conduits enables human beings to perceive impressions on the astral aura and thus to “read by the astral light”—the akashic reading, scientifically called clairvoyance.

Astral Light ::: The astral light corresponds in the case of our globe, and analogically in the case of our solar system, towhat the linga-sarira is in the case of an individual man. Just as in man the linga-sarira or astral body is the vehicle or carrier of prana or life-energy, so is the astral light the carrier of the cosmic jiva or cosmic life-energy. To us humans it is an invisible region surrounding our earth, as H. P. Blavatsky expresses it,as indeed it surrounds every other physical globe; and among the seven kosmic principles it is the mostmaterial excepting one, our physical universe.The astral light therefore is, on the one hand, the storehouse or repository of all the energies of thekosmos on their way downwards to manifest in the material spheres -- of our solar system in general aswell as of our globe in particular; and, on the other hand, it is the receptacle or magazine of whateverpasses out of the physical sphere on its upward way.Thirdly, it is a kosmic "picture-gallery" or indelible record of whatever takes place on the astral andphysical planes; however, this last phase of the functions of the astral light is the least in importance andreal interest.The astral light of our own globe, and analogically of any other physical globe, is the region of thekama-loka, at least as concerns the intermediate and lower parts of the kama-loka; and all entities that diepass through the astral light on their way upwards, and in the astral light throw off or shed the kama-rupaat the time of the second death.The solar system has its own astral light in general, just as every globe in the universal solar system hasits astral light in particular, in each of these last cases being a thickening or materializing or concretingaround the globe of the general astral substance forming the astral light of the solar system. The astrallight, strictly speaking, is simply the lees or dregs of akasa and exists in steps or stages of increasingethereality. The more closely it surrounds any globe, the grosser and more material it is. It is thereceptacle of all the vile and horrible emanations from earth and earth beings, and is therefore in partsfilled with earthly pollutions. There is a constant interchange, unceasing throughout the solarmanvantara, between the astral light on the one hand, and our globe earth on the other, each giving andreturning to the other.Finally, the astral light is with regard to the material realms of the solar system the copy or reflection ofwhat the akasa is in the spiritual realms. The astral light is the mother of the physical, just as the spirit isthe mother of the akasa; or, inversely, the physical is merely the concretion of the astral, just as the akasais the veil or concretion of the highest spiritual. Indeed, the astral and physical are one, just as the akasicand the spiritual are one.

Astral Light This is the next cosmic plane above the physical, which is to the physical globes of our earth or of the other bodies of our solar system what the linga-sarira is to the human physical body. As such, it is the carrier of life-forces — jiva cosmically, and prana individually — and the storehouse of cosmic energies on their way to or from physical manifestation. It preserves an indelible record of all events on the astral and physical planes, there being continual interaction between the two planes. No natural phenomenon, whether mental, psychic, or physical, can be explained without it; without it, the physical world would crumble to impalpable dust.

Astral Monad or Soul The animal soul or vital-astral soul, the lowest and feeblest reflection or vehicle of the divine monad; when enlightened by the human monad, it produces the human being known today.

Astral plane: In those occult doctrines which believe in various planes of existences beyond the material one (e.g., in Theosophy), the first plane of existence after the death of the physical body. In doctrines which recognize only one plane of existence beyond the material one (e.g., in Rosicrucianism), this term is interpreted as a name for the sphere of non-material existence.

Astral Plane. See ASTRAL LIGHT

Astral projection: In occult terminology, the partial or complete separation of the astral body (q.v.) from the physical body, and visiting another locality, near or far. This occurs in sleep—though, as a general rule, one does not recall the experience on waking. The adept can command his astral body to go any place he desires in order to make observations and investigations, and acquire essential information.

Astral shell: The personality in its aspect of disintegration after the death of the physical body.

Astral soul: In theosophical terminology, a synonym for the lower manas, the reflection of the higher Ego, and not synonymous with astral body.

Astral sphere: The astral world (q.v.).

Astral World. See ASTRAL LIGHT

Astral world: The first sphere of existence after the death of the body.

As with so many cosmic powers and their symbols, these other gods have been relegated in Judaism and Christianity to the position of evil powers hostile to mankind, to be fled from instead of revered, or ruled as obedient helpers when inferior to the human status. The whole idea of the Adversary or Devil is enshrined in the word daemones. But fallen angels, represented as rebels against God, were merely performing their natural duty in evolution by forming the lower worlds. As personification of evil, the word can only be truthfully applied to those beings that man himself, by his evil thoughts and passions, has generated to hover in the lowest strata of the astral light or haunt kama-loka. However, the ancient Greeks and Romans themselves drew a sharp distinction between the daemones of more ethereal type, truly spiritual beings, and the lower earth-haunting daemones who were distinctly denizens of the lower astral and physical realms, and which the ancients dreaded — with reason — far more than modern Christians have ever done. See also AGATHODAEMON

Athanor [probably from Arabic] A self-feeding furnace of the alchemists, and also a transmitting agent formed of astral substance or fluid. “Electricity, the one Life at the upper rung of Being, and Astral Fluid, the Athanor of the Alchemists, at its lowest; God and devil, good and evil” (SD 1:81).

At most, this dealing with the dead is necromancy — a wrong condemned by the wise in all ages as misleading at the least, very dangerous and ethically demoralizing at the worst. The passive medium under alien astral control, is the very antithesis of the highly evolved human mediator whose awakened spiritual, intellectual, and psychic nature serves as a conscious channel of inspiring influence between lofty spiritual powers and ordinary men, or between mahatmas of the Great White Lodge and men.

At one time the lower quaternary was given as kama (desire), prana (vitality), linga-sarira (astral body) and sthula-sarira (physical body); later the physical body was excluded from the list of principles, and lower manas was added to make up the four. These principles, however, must not be regarded as separate things conjoined or strung together, as they are several aspects or states of manifestation of the one life that circulates through the human constitution. Another way of regarding the matter is to say that there are two triads, the higher triad of atma-buddhi with higher manas and the lower triad of our astral-vital nature, each of which becomes a complete quaternary when the element of self-conscious mind is added to it.

At the beginning of the human stage of the fourth round on globe D, the lunar pitris or human monads projected their astral doubles from the bodies which these pitris had evolved during the third round, and “it is this subtle, finer form, which serves as the model round which Nature builds physical man” (SD 1:180). The human life-wave has completed its fourth root-race on this globe and has now reached the midpoint of its fifth root-race. The point of man’s grossest physical development has already been passed and his body henceforth will evolve along the lines of increasing refinements and ethereality.

Audhumla (Icelandic) [from audr void + hum dusk] Dusky void; in Norse mythology, the cow (symbol of fertility) formed of the frozen vapors of elivagar (glaciers, ice waves). From her udder flowed the four streams that nourished the frost giant Ymir. She is the female principle and Ymir the male principle; the four streams of milk “which diffused themselves throughout space (the astral light in its purest emanation)” (IU 1:147). Audhumla licked the salt ice blocks and uncovered the head of Buri, the parentless progenitor of all living beings. “The meaning of the allegory is evident. It is the precosmic union of the elements, of Spirit, or the creative Force, with Matter, cooled and still seething, which it forms in accordance with universal Will. Then the Ases, ‘the pillars and supports of the World’ (Cosmocratores), step in and create as All-father wills them” (TG 43).

Aura ::: An extremely subtle and therefore invisible essence or fluid that emanates from and surrounds not onlyhuman beings and beasts, but as a matter of fact plants and minerals also. It is one of the aspects of theauric egg and therefore the human aura partakes of all the qualities that the human constitution contains.It is at once magneto-mental and electrovital, suffused with the energies of mind and spirit -- the qualityin each case coming from an organ or center of the human constitution whence it flows. It is the sourceof the sympathies and antipathies that we are conscious of. Under the control of the human will it can beboth life-giving and healing, or death-dealing; and when the human will is passive the aura has an actionof its own which is automatic and follows the laws of character and latent impulses of the being fromwhom it emanates. Sensitives have frequently described it in more or less vague terms as a light flowingfrom the eyes or the heart or the tips of the fingers or from other parts of the body. Sometimes this fluid,instead of being colorless light, manifests itself by flashing and scintillating changes of color -- the coloror colors in each case depending not only upon the varying moods of the human individual, but alsopossessing a background equivalent to the character or nature of the individual. Animals are extremelysensitive to auras, and some beasts even descry the human being surrounded with the aura as with acloud or veil. In fact, everything has its aura surrounding it with a light or play of color, and especially isthis the case with so-called animated beings.The essential nature of the aura usually seen is astral and electrovital. The magnificent phenomena ofradiation that astronomers can discern at times of eclipse, long streamers with rosy and other coloredlight flashing forth from the body of the sun, are not flames nor anything of the sort, but are simply theelectrovital aura of the solar body -- a manifestation of solar vitality, for the sun in occultism is a livingbeing, as indeed everything else is.

Aura [from Greek, Latin aura air] A subtle invisible essence or fluid emanating from and surrounding beings, both those classed as animate and inanimate. To the eyes of clairvoyants the human aura appears as a halo of light, variously colored according to the momentary psychic and mental condition of the individual. Since everything in the universe is a center of living energies of one kind or another, it must necessarily be surrounded by a field of force, representing its radiations into the surrounding space and upon all objects within its sphere of influence. The human being is of a composite nature, and his aura will, therefore, be composite, including astral-vital, psychomental, and spiritual emanations, and any of these may be perceptible according to the plane on which the perceiver is able to function. But the aura, even though not commonly visible to our eyes, is nevertheless perceptible by the effects which it produces upon those subtle senses which all possess in addition to the conventional five. By the auras of persons we are affected, both consciously and unconsciously, and thus is explained the influence which people exercise on each other. Animals are in some ways far more sensitive to auras than we are.

Auric Egg ::: A term which appertains solely to the more recondite teachings of occultism, of the esoteric philosophy.Little can be said here about it except to state that it is the source of the human aura as well as ofeverything else that the human septenary constitution contains. It is usually of an oviform or egg-shapedappearance, whence its name. It ranges from the divine to the astral-physical, and is the seat of all themonadic, spiritual, intellectual, mental, passional, and vital energies and faculties of the human septiformconstitution. In its essence it is eternal, and endures throughout the pralayas as well as during themanvantaras, but necessarily in greatly varying fashion in these two great periods of kosmic life.

Auric Egg or Envelope The source of the human aura, taking its name from its shape. It ranges from the divine to the astral-physical, and is the seat of all the monadic, spiritual, intellectual, mental, passional, and vital energies and faculties. In its essence it is eternal and endures throughout the pralayas as well as during the manvantaras.

Automatic Writing The practice in which a person takes pen and paper, makes his mind blank, and waits for his pen to write by some involuntary impulse. Sometimes the pen is replaced by a mechanical device such as an ouija board. The results vary from purely negative ones, through the stage of illegible scrawls, up to elaborate consecutive messages or even quotations from rare books. The ability of different persons to succeed in this practice varies, a minority being specially apt; and the aptitude can be developed by practice. The usual spiritualistic explanation is that these writings are communications from those “on the other side.” But in every case it is necessary for the automatic writer to resign the control of his own will over his physical and vital-astral body and to surrender these to the use of influences unknown to him.

Azoth [from Arabic azzaug the metal mercury] Used by Paracelsus for his universal remedy; mercury was regarded as a sort of common or root-metal contained in all other metals. Such words as mercury, in alchemical language, were generic rather than specific, and gross elements were considered as derivative from subtle ones. Thus a unitary and radical element, the parent of the other elements, is intended; the synthesis of the four elements, one aspect of the astral light.

Back of all the orderly unfolding of the embryonic cells — usually ascribed to nature — is the subconscious directing influence of the monadic ego born from and bathing in the cosmic intelligence. In human beings the reincarnating ego is a ray of a spiritual monad, whose self-consciousness and activity takes in the solar system. This monad is karmically bound to oversee the evolving career of the human ego; and this celestial parentage in the cosmic hierarchy makes humans literally children of the sun. Here, then, is the solution of the biological mystery of unfolding purpose which is so harmoniously worked out by the reproductive material of a single cell. This intelligent influence acts upon the embryo through the directive power of “the astral fluid, working through and in conjunction with the vital capacities and potentialities of the cell . . .” (MIE 217-8).

Bacteria A numerous and varied class of microorganisms which exist in the air, earth, water, and in and on the bodies of plants, animals, and men. Bacteria, like all manifested things, are dual in action, being both beneficial and injurious to others: some of them provide the necessary enzymes for functional use, and others produce dangerous toxins. They are vital factors throughout the plant and animal kingdoms between which they are an organic link; and they are also a medium of contact between the astral and physical planes. As such they serve as material agents for certain phases of the operations of the laws of nature on the terrestrial plane.

Barhishad (Sanskrit) Barhiṣad [from barhiṣ sacred kusa grass, fire + the verbal root sad to sit] Mystically, those who attend to or who are engrossed in domestic affairs, material or merely pragmatical concerns; those pitris (fathers, ancestors) who evolved the human astral-physical form. These lunar ancestors — seven or ten classes — evolved forth their astral bodies or chhayas (shadows), thus forming the first astral-physical races of humanity in which the higher classes of pitris, the agnishvattas, incarnated, thus making out of a relatively intellectually senseless mankind, true thinking human beings.

astral ::: 1. Of, relating to, emanating from, or resembling the stars. 2. Of the spirit world [Greek astron star].

astral ::: a. --> Pertaining to, coming from, or resembling, the stars; starry; starlike.

astral’ grey light and shadow.

Baubo The Matron Baubo, the enchantress “before she succeeds in reconciling the soul — Demeter, to its new position, finds herself obliged to assume the sexual forms of an infant. Baubo is matter, the physical body; and the intellectual, as yet pure astral soul can be ensnared into its new terrestrial prison but by the display of innocent babyhood. Until then, doomed to her fate, Demeter, or Magna-mater, the Soul, wonders and hesitates and suffers; but once having partaken of the magic potion prepared by Baubo, she forgets her sorrows; for a certain time she parts with that consciousness of higher intellect that she was possessed of before entering the body of a child. Thenceforth she must seek to rejoin it again; and when the age of reason arrives for the child, the struggle — forgotten for a few years of infancy — begins again” (IU 2:112).

“Before man could become male and female physically, his prototype, the creating Elohim, had to arrange his Form on this sexual plane astrally. That is to say, the atoms and the organic forces, descending into the plane of the given differentiation, had to be marshaled in the order intended by Nature, so as to be ever carrying out, in an immaculate way, that law which the Kabala calls the balance, through which everything that exists does so as male and female in its final perfection, in this present stage of materiality. Chochmah, Wisdom, the Male Sephiroth, had to diffuse itself in, and through, Binah, intelligent Nature, or Understanding” (SD 2:84). After the separation, the third eye began to disappear, and death as we now understand it was not known until then.

Belial (Hebrew) Bĕliyya‘al [from bĕlī nothing, not + ya‘al worth, profit, use] Worthless, signifying wickedness; also a wicked man, a destroyer, a waster. A name given by Hebrew and Christian demonologists to the aggregate of evil astral forces or influences, some of them partaking of an individualized type, whose influence is always pernicious to humans, and association with which is invariably immoral because suggestive of evil. It is a name personifying these astral entities of evil.

Bells, Astral; Bell Sounds A melodious silvery sound as of a bell, said to be produced by creating “an inter-etheric vacuum” (SD 1:557).

  “Bereft of all that pertains to the real entity, the genuine man, the bhuta is as much a corpse in the astral realms as is the decaying physical body left behind at physical death; and consequently, astral or psychical intercourse of any kind with these shells is productive only of evil. The bhutas, although belonging in the astral world, are magnetically attracted to physical localities similar in type to the remnants of impulses still inhering in them. The bhuta of a drunkard is attracted to wine-cellars and taverns; the bhuta of one who has lived a lewd life is attracted to localities sympathetic to it; the thin and tenuous bhuta of a good man is similarly attracted to less obnoxious and evil places” (OG 17-18).

Bhur Bhuvah Svah (Sanskrit) Bhūr Bhuvaḥ Svaḥ The names of the first three of the seven lokas (worlds) of this kosmos, meaning literally earth, midworld or astral world, and heaven world; the three great vyahritis or mystical utterances pronounced after Om by every Brahmin in commencing his daily prayers.

bhur bhuvah swah. ::: the three worlds or realms of existence &

Bhuta (Sanskrit) Bhūta [from the verbal root bhū to be, become] Has been; as an adjective become, been gone; as a noun, that which is or exists, any living being; entities that have lived and passed on. Applied specifically to “spooks, ghosts, simulacra, the reliquiae, of dead men; in other words, the astral dregs and remnants of human beings. They are the ‘shades’ of the ancients, the pale and ghostly phantoms living in the astral world, or the astral copies of the men that were; and the distinction between the bhuta and the kama-rupa is very slight.

Bhutas: Astral shades of human beings.

Bhuta(s)(Sanskrit) ::: The past participle of the verb-root bhu, meaning "to be," or "to become"; hence bhutasliterally means "has beens" -- entities that have lived and passed on. The bhutas are "shells" from whichall that is spiritual and intellectual has fled: all that was the real entity has fled from this shell, and naughtis left but a decaying astral corpse. The bhutas are the spooks, ghosts, simulacra, reliquiae, of dead men;in other words, the astral dregs and remnants of human beings. They are the "shades" of the ancients, thepale and ghostly phantoms living in the astral world, or the astral copies of the men that were; and thedistinction between the bhuta and the kama-rupa is very slight.Bereft of all that pertains to the real entity, the genuine man, the bhuta is as much a corpse in the astralrealms as is the decaying physical body left behind at physical death; and consequently, astral orpsychical intercourse of any kind with these shells is productive only of evil. The bhutas, althoughbelonging in the astral world, are magnetically attracted to physical localities similar in type to theremnants of impulses still inhering in them. The bhuta of a drunkard is attracted to wine cellars andtaverns; the bhuta of one who has lived a lewd life is attracted to localities sympathetic to it; the thin andtenuous bhuta of a good man is similarly attracted to less obnoxious and evil places. All over the ancientworld and throughout most of even the modern world these eidola or "images" of dead men have beenfeared and dreaded, and relations of any kind with them have been consistently and universally avoided.(See also Eidolon)

Bhuta-vidya or Bhuta-vijnana (Sanskrit) Bhūta-vidyā, Bhūta-vijñāna [from bhūta has been, kama-lokic spooks + vidyā, vijñāna knowledge] The knowledge of evil beings, demonology; hence, the art of exorcising, treating, and curing demoniac possession — one of the branches of ancient medicine. Bhuta in ancient usage, while including what medieval Europeans called demons, refers to what in theosophy is called elementaries and other denizens of the astral realms — commonly of human origination, but sometimes astral rejects of the animal kingdom. See also AYUR VEDA

bhuvah &

Bhuvar-loka (Sanskrit) Bhuvar-loka [from bhuvas air, atmosphere from the verbal root bhū to become + loka world, place] World of development or growth — so called because it is one of the higher astral realms acting as one of the fields for the evolution of sentient beings. The sixth counting downwards of the seven lokas, popularly signifying the ethereal realm or sphere between the earth and the sun. The corresponding tala is mahatala. Bhuvarloka is often spoken of in Hindu literature as the middle region (referring to the triad of ethereal dwellings name bhur, bhuvas, and svar) and as the abode of the munis. While the exoteric statements about the various lokas and talas are based on truth, they are usually picturesque and allegorical, and commonly limit the ideas associated with them to some particular or outstanding characteristic, so while true enough when properly understood, they are almost always imperfect because incomplete.

Blavatsky also speaks of primitive humanity as relatively intellectually senseless bhutas or phantoms: “the word in India now means ghosts, ethereal or astral phantoms, while in esoteric teaching it means elementary substances, something made of attenuated, non-compound essence, and, specifically, the astral double of any man or animal. In this case these primitive men are the doubles of the first ethereal Dhyanis or Pitris” (SD 2:102n).

Both these classes of astral souls or phantoms are attracted to and thickly cluster about the grossest and most material places and beings of the physical sphere. Any person of spiritual character and aspiring soul, however, repels these astral entities by a type of psychomagnetic antipathy.

Brain-mind Used by theosophists for the astral mind of the personal ego, the pale and too often distorted reflection of the intellection of the reincarnating ego. It is, in fact, the representative in the physical world of kama-manas, mind conditioned by materiality. The lower mind or psycho-nervous effluvia of the brain acts through the nervous ganglia in the kamic centers, such as the liver, stomach, and spleen, though the central ganglia of this nervous system are situated in the base of the skull. The brain, and with it the heart, however, are likewise the organs of spiritual and intellectual powers far higher than those represented by the merely human personality working through the brain-mind; hence the higher forms of thought, supersensuous, superconscious, correlate with the cerebral and cardiac centers.

Breath In the astral-vital organisms of living beings the breath is called prana, which also means “life.” This is not limited to the respiratory functions, but includes what physiologists might call nerve currents operating in all parts of the body, of which the pulmonary diastole and systole is only a particular manifestation. Hatha yoga deals with the study and use of these functions, but before such aspects of the lower knowledge can be profitably or even safely used, the learner must have acquired self-mastery, stability, and disinterestedness of motive.

But the moon is a triple symbol, and may stand for the lower astral light, the linga-sarira, and the female generative function. In the symbol of Mercury, which represents the human being, we have the crescent representing the lower mind or soul; the circle, heart or spirit; and the cross, functions or body. This symbolism appears in other planetary symbols: in Saturn, for instance, the cross is over the crescent, while in Jupiter the crescent is over the cross. Also, the crescent and star (or sun) is the emblem of the Moslem faith.

But this horrible fate, the easy descent, is brought about gradually. Passing from human birth to an inferior human birth, and then to one still more inferior, the degenerate astral monad — all that remains of the human being that once was — may finally even enter the body of some beast to which it feels attracted (and this is one side of the teaching of transmigration, which has been so badly misunderstood); some finally go even to plants perhaps, at the last, and will ultimately vanish. The astral monad will then have faded out. Such lost souls are exceedingly rare.

Cabales; Caballi: In occultism, “the astral bodies of those who died by violence (external or self-inflicted) prior to the end of their natural term of life. These earth-bound, suffering souls are said to wander within the sphere of the attraction of the earth until the end of their natural term of life.” (L. W. de Laurence)

cadastral ::: a. --> Of or pertaining to landed property.

Catalepsy: A death-like state of physical coma, bodily rigidity, in which normal functions of the body, including sensations, are suspended and consciousness ceases; it may last from minutes to days. According to certain occultists, it is produced primarily in the astral body during the process of exteriorization.

Catalepsy (Greek) katalepsis [from kata down + lambanein to seize] A psychomotor condition of morbid sleep, associated with a peculiar plastic rigidity of the muscles which may be made to assume strained attitudes and retain them for an indefinite time. There is more or less profound loss of consciousness and of the skin sensibility. The origin of the name reflects the ancient view that the attacks are due to the sudden seizure of the victim by some supernatural influence, such as an evil spirit; the causes assigned by medical writers are extremely varied and oftentimes absurd. The cataleptic state may occur in attacks of epilepsy, hysteria, chronic alcoholism, in various functional and organic mental and nervous diseases, and in that variety of dementia praecox known as catatonia. This list of diseases, characterized by general nervous and emotional instability, suggests the rationale of the ancient view that catalepsy is one of the many types of astral obsession. Textbook descriptions of typical cases are consistent pictures of an abnormal displacement of the conscious human ego whose helpless body then is subjected to purposeless, unnatural, and strained conditions and attitudes by some low-grade astral entity.

Catatonia [from Greek kata down + tonos tension] Referred to as tension-insanity, this condition is marked with successive stages of psychological depression, excitement, and stupor; the typical symptoms are peculiar mannerisms, stereotyped movements, a cataleptoid muscular rigidity, and great mental and physical stubbornness. There may be hallucinations, depressing illusions, or fantastic religious ideas, or sudden impulsions of violence or indecency, and there is always a dulling of the higher emotional and ethical feelings. After an attack, the person often admits that he has been acting perversely, foolishly, or childishly, but explains that he could not help it. When analyzed in the light of composite human nature, and of the action of different principles during life and after death, the peculiar conditions are explainable. Evidently the sufferers are overcome by some besieging astral entity of kama-rupic nature; or in certain cases by aggregated or collected thought-impressions of former emotional and lower mental storms, excitements, or passion, which at times of ethical inattention flow back upon the brain-mind and affect the receptive body and its nervous system, so that these cases are really reactional effects of precedaneous causes which may even go back in time to a preceding life or lives.

Celestial Body Taken from Coleridge, who divined that in the human celestial body must be stored the memory of all preexistent experiences of the soul. The phrase is said to mean the thought-vehicle of the monad in devachan, through which functions the manasic ego (Key 137). The range of stored memory of experiences varies in extent according to the degree of sublimity of the different vestures. Ancient mysticism taught that the self has several vestures, each of which may be called a body or sheath through which the monad acts and by which it comes in contact with the particular worlds in which it may be functioning. “There are also celestial bodies and bodies terrestrial” (1 Cor 15:40). For instance, the Vedantic classification of the kosas (sheaths of atman) gives annamayakosa (physical body), pranamayakosa (vital-astral body), manomayakosa (psychological or lower manasic body), vijnanamayakosa (higher manasic body), and anandamayakosa (buddhic body). In the Taraka Raja-Yoga system are the following upadhis or vehicles of atman: sthulopadhi (gross vehicle), sukshmopadhi (subtile vehicle), and karanopadhi (causal vehicle or self).

Chakra(Cakra, Sanskrit) ::: A word signifying in general a "wheel," and from this simple original meaning therewere often taken for occult and esoteric purposes a great many subordinate, very interesting, and in somecases highly mystical and profound derivatives. Chakra also means a cycle, a period of duration, inwhich the wheel of time turns once. It also means the horizon, as being circular or of a wheel-form. Itlikewise means certain centers or pranic spherical loci of the body in which are supposed to collectstreams of pranic energy of differing qualities, or pranic energies of different kinds. These physiologicalchakras, which are actually connected with the pranic circulations and ganglia of the auric egg, andtherefore function in the physical body through the intermediary of the linga-sarira or astral model-body,are located in different parts of the physical frame, reaching from the parts about the top of the skull tothe parts about the pubis. It would be highly improper, having at heart the best interests of humanity, togive the occult or esoteric teaching concerning the exact location, functions, and means of controlling thephysiological chakras of the human body; for it is a foregone conclusion that were this mysticalknowledge broadcast, it would be sadly misused, leading not only in many cases to death or insanity, butto the violation of every moral instinct. Alone the high initiates, who as a matter of fact have risen abovethe need of employing the physiological chakras, can use them at will, and for holy purposes -- which infact is something that they rarely, if indeed they ever do.

Chakra: In theosophical terminology, a sense organ of the ethereal body, visible only to a clairvoyant. There are ten chakras, which permit those trained in their use to gain knowledge of the astral world. (Three of the ten chakras are used in black magic only.)

Chakra (Sanskrit) Cakra Wheel; cycle; the horizon, as being circular or of a wheel-form; likewise certain pranic centers of the body. “These physiological chakras, which are actually connected with the pranic circulations and ganglia of the Auric Egg, and therefore function in the physical body through the intermediary of the linga-sarira, or astral model-body, are located in different parts of the physical frame, reaching from the parts about the top of the skull to the parts about the pubis. . . . were this mystical knowledge broadcast, it would be sadly misused, leading not only in many cases to death or insanity, but to the violation of every moral instinct. Alone the high initiates, who as a matter of act have risen above the need of employing physiological chakras, can use them at will, and for holy purposes — which in fact is something that they rarely, if indeed they ever do” (OG 26-7).

chandra. ::: the moon; the presiding deity of the moon or the astral lunar world

Chhaya Birth The primeval mode of asexual procreation of the first root-race of mankind on this globe in this round. This first race, who were mere chhayas (astral forms or images), are said to have oozed out from the forms of the pitris. See also SANJNA

Chhaya(Chaya, Sanskrit) ::: Literally a "shade," "simulacrum," or "copy." In the esoteric philosophy, the wordsignifies the astral image of a person, and with this idea are bound up some of the most intricate andrecondite teachings of human evolution. The Secret Doctrine of H. P. Blavatsky contains manyinvaluable hints as to the part played by the chhayas of the pitris in human development.It is a word also which is applied with similar meaning to kosmical matters, for the esoteric studentshould never forget the ancient maxim of Hermes: "What is above is the same as what is below; what isbelow is the same as what is above."Briefly, then, and so far as human evolution is concerned, the chhaya may be called the astral body orimage.

Chhaya (Sanskrit) Chāyā A shade, shadow, copy; esoterically, the astral image or body of a person. Besides referring to the human astral form, the term is usually applied to the shadows or copies — the astral body-projections — of the spiritual beings or pitris who played an important part in the early evolutionary development of humankind. In the first root-race, “the pure, celestial Being (Dhyan Chohan) and the great Pitris of various classes were commissioned — the one to evolve their images (Chhaya), and make of them physical man, the others to inform and thus endow him with divine intelligence and the comprehension of the Mysteries of Creation” (SD 2:233n). This idea also appears in the Zohar: “ ‘In the Tzalam (shadow image) of Elohim (the Pitris), was made Adam (man)’ ” (SD 2:137). See also SANJNA

Chitragupta (Sanskrit) Citragupta [from citr to depict, color with various colors + gupta hidden] The secret recorder who paints the picture of the person’s life on the astral light; a deva-scribe in the abode of the dead, who records human virtues and vices and reads out the account of every soul’s life from his register when the excarnate soul arrives in the kingdom of Yama, the god of death; a variant of the lipikas.

Chorea [from Greek choreia dancing] A disorder of the nervous system, characterized by a peculiar convulsive and irregular action of the voluntary muscles, especially those of the face and extremities. It has been called insanity of the muscles, since their action is without harmony or purpose, and each seems to have a will of its own. It is most common in the impressionable years of childhood and adolescence, though appearing at different ages and associated with other diseases which, as a rule, are free from choreic movements. All types have significant common features. First, that many cases are free from organic disease shows that this is a purely functional one; when it complicates other diseases, it retains the typical movements of essential chorea. Whether it develops after some infectious or exhausting condition or polluting experience, or after some mental or psychological strain or shock, like fright or fear, the choreiform reaction indicates the occurrence of an unstable balance between the physical and astral bodies and the inner and higher manasic in man. Persons who develop chorea share a common psychic susceptibility which marks those who are subject to disturbances like hysteria, mediumship, epilepsy, and other phases of obsession. In addition, there are similar signs of a besieging influence at first, as when the child grows peevish, capricious, and restless, wants improper food, is listless at school, suffers with disturbed sleep and night-terrors; and later begin the convulsive movements in the muscles which are naturally under the control of the conscious will. The individual will thus weakened and, in some cases, psychic changes like hallucinations and somnambulism, point to the characteristic action of some astral influence. Further evidence of this is seen in the danger of chorea developing into more serious nervous disorders; whereas, with proper mental, moral, and physical care, cure results when the spiritual will regains its rightful place in controlling the course of life.

Christ myth: A theory popular in Germany from about 1910. It represents Jesus as either an astral deity who came to earth, suffered, died and rose again, or as the projection of the repressed social, economic and political aspirations of the lower classes in the Roman Empire.

Circulations of the Kosmos ::: Also Circulations of the Universe. This is a term used in the ancient wisdom or esoteric philosophy tosignify the network, marvelously intricate and builded of the channels or canals or paths or roadsfollowed by peregrinating or migrating entities as these latter pass from sphere to sphere or from realm torealm or from plane to plane. The pilgrim monads, however far advanced or however little advanced intheir evolution, inevitably and ineluctably follow these circulations. They can do nothing else, for theyare simply the spiritual, psychomagnetic, astral, and physical pathways along which the forces of theuniverse flow; and consequently, all entities whatsoever being indeed imbodiments of forces must ofnecessity follow the same routes or pathways that the abstract forces themselves use.These circulations of the kosmos are a veritable network between planet and planet, and planet and sun,and between sun and sun, and between sun and universe, and between universe and universe.Furthermore, the circulations of the kosmos are not restricted to the material or astral spheres, but are ofthe very fabric and structure of the entire universal kosmos, inner as well as outer. It is one of the mostmystical and suggestive doctrines of theosophy.

Clairvoyance Clear-seeing; generally, the power to use the psychic sense of vision to see things on the astral plane, the imperfect shadows of things to come or the astral records of things past. But this faculty is of restricted scope and very apt to mislead; prematurely developed in an untrained person, it is more likely to lead to error than to benefit. True clairvoyance is the opening of spiritual vision, called in India the Eye of Siva and beyond the Himalayas the Eye of Dangma; a faculty which enables the seer to see the truth and to recognize it as such. Among the seven saktis (occult powers) is enumerated jnana-sakti, which in its higher aspects is the power of knowing, true clairvoyance, but which on lower planes becomes more or less perfect psychic clairvoyance. True clairvoyance enables the seer to discern the reality behind its veils, to know right action, and to see what is happening in worlds removed by distance or difference of plane from our own. Retrospective clairvoyance interprets the past through its indelible records in the akasa.

Clairvoyance ::: In its largest sense the word simply means "clear-seeing," insight behind the veils, inner visioning.Genuine clairvoyance is a spiritual faculty and is the ability to see and to see aright; and in seeing toknow that your seeing is truth. This is no psychical faculty. The clairvoyance commonly called thepsychical clairvoyance is very deceptive, because it is a mere moonlight reflection so to speak, and thismoonlight reflection is uncertain, deceiving, and illusory. Genuine spiritual clairvoyance, of which thepsychical clairvoyance so called is but a feeble ray, will enable one to see what passes at immensedistances. You can sit in your armchair and see, with eyes closed, all that you care to see, however faraway. This can be done not only in this exterior world, but one can penetrate into the interior andinvisible worlds with this spiritual vision, and thus know what is going on in the worlds spiritual andethereal. This vision is not physical vision, nor that which, on the astral plane, manifests itself aspsychical clairvoyance; but true vision is spiritual clairvoyance -- seeing through the inner spiritual eye.

Controls In Spiritualism, one of the two intermediaries between the living receiver of the communications and the so-called spirit from whom the communications come. These intermediaries are the medium, who is on earth, and the control, who is beyond and serves as the agent of the communicating spirit and who controls the medium. Sometimes “guides” is used in a similar sense. In common with the spirits themselves, controls are spurious personalities engendered out of the temporary interaction of various elements in the astral light and the constitution of the medium and sitters.

Corpora superœlestia: This Latin term (meaning super-heavenly bodies) is applied by spiritualists to forms regarded as the refined, intelligent elements of astral forms, visible only through highest spiritual perception.

Cosmically sakti or the saktis originate in the summit of the astral light or akasa, which in one sense may be considered as not only the womb of the cosmic saktis, but as their playground and in another sense as the saktis collectively themselves. In man, sakti is the buddhi in its higher aspect, and the activities of the various pranas in the human constitution in its lower aspect. There is no essential distinction between any divinity and its consort, between Brahman and pradhana, Brahma and prakriti, or between parabrahman and mulaprakriti. Furthermore, all the saktis are either conscious entities in nature, or vital effluxes or emanations, cosmic fluids, with which nature is infused throughout.

  “cyclic pralaya so-called are but obscurations, during which periods Nature, i.e., everything visible and invisible on a resting planet — remains in statu quo. Nature rests and slumbers, no work of destruction going on on the globe even if no active work is done. All forms, as well as their astral types, remain as they were at the last moment of its activity. The ‘night’ of a planet has hardly any twilight preceding it. It is caught like a huge mammoth by an avalanche, and remains slumbering and frozen till the next dawn of its new day — a very short one indeed in comparison to the ‘Day of Brahma’ ” (SD 2:660n).

Daemon or Demon [from Greek daimon, Latin daemon] A god, angel, or celestial power or spirit, of varying degrees of ethereality, and ranging from the supreme deity of the hierarchy, through the greater gods, down to mere genii and lemures. Originally the term applied to deity in general, but later it usually was referred to beings intermediate between the gods and mankind, representing the powers and functions of gods. The Greeks and Romans sometimes used the term for the human divine egos. Philsophers such as Plato divided the daemons into three classes, “the first two are invisible; their bodies are pure ether and fire (Planetary Spirits); the Daimons of the third class are clothed with vapoury bodies; they are usually invisible, but sometimes, making themselves concrete, become visible for a few seconds. These are the earthly spirits, or our astral souls” (BCW 6:187).

Death ::: Death occurs when a general break-up of the constitution of man takes place; nor is this break-up amatter of sudden occurrence, with the exceptions of course of such cases as mortal accidents or suicides.Death is always preceded, varying in each individual case, by a certain time spent in the withdrawal ofthe monadic individuality from an incarnation, and this withdrawal of course takes place coincidentlywith a decay of the seven-principle being which man is in physical incarnation. This decay precedesphysical dissolution, and is a preparation of and by the consciousness-center for the forthcomingexistence in the invisible realms. This withdrawal actually is a preparation for the life to come ininvisible realms, and as the septenary entity on this earth so decays, it may truly be said to beapproaching rebirth in the next sphere.Death occurs, physically speaking, with the cessation of activity of the pulsating heart. There is the lastbeat, and this is followed by immediate, instantaneous unconsciousness, for nature is very merciful inthese things. But death is not yet complete, for the brain is the last organ of the physical body really todie, and for some time after the heart has ceased beating, the brain and its memory still remain activeand, although unconsciously so, the human ego for this short length of time, passes in review every eventof the preceding life. This great or small panoramic picture of the past is purely automatic, so to say; yetthe soul-consciousness of the reincarnating ego watches this wonderful review incident by incident, areview which includes the entire course of thought and action of the life just closed. The entity is, for thetime being, entirely unconscious of everything else except this. Temporarily it lives in the past, andmemory dislodges from the akasic record, so to speak, event after event, to the smallest detail: passesthem all in review, and in regular order from the beginning to the end, and thus sees all its past life as anall-inclusive panorama of picture succeeding picture.There are very definite ethical and psychological reasons inhering in this process, for this process forms areconstruction of both the good and the evil done in the past life, and imprints this strongly as a record onthe fabric of the spiritual memory of the passing being. Then the mortal and material portions sink intooblivion, while the reincarnating ego carries the best and noblest parts of these memories into thedevachan or heaven-world of postmortem rest and recuperation. Thus comes the end called death; andunconsciousness, complete and undisturbed, succeeds, until there occurs what the ancients called thesecond death.The lower triad (prana, linga-sarira, sthula-sarira) is now definitely cast off, and the remaining quaternaryis free. The physical body of the lower triad follows the course of natural decay, and its various hosts oflife-atoms proceed whither their natural attractions draw them. The linga-sarira or model-body remains inthe astral realms, and finally fades out. The life-atoms of the prana, or electrical field, fly instantly backat the moment of physical dissolution to the natural pranic reservoirs of the planet.This leaves man, therefore, no longer a heptad or septenary entity, but a quaternary consisting of theupper duad (atma-buddhi) and the intermediate duad (manas-kama). The second death then takes place.Death and the adjective dead are mere words by which the human mind seeks to express thoughts whichit gathers from a more or less consistent observation of the phenomena of the material world. Death isdissolution of a component entity or thing. The dead, therefore, are merely dissolving bodies -- entitieswhich have reached their term on this our physical plane. Dissolution is common to all things, becauseall physical things are composite: they are not absolute things. They are born; they grow; they reachmaturity; they enjoy, as the expression runs, a certain term of life in the full bloom of their powers; thenthey "die." That is the ordinary way of expressing what men call death; and the corresponding adjectiveis dead, when we say that such things or entities are dead.Do you find death per se anywhere? No. You find nothing but action; you find nothing but movement;you find nothing but change. Nothing stands still or is annihilated. What is called death itself shouts forthto us the fact of movement and change. Absolute inertia is unknown in nature or in the human mind; itdoes not exist.

Delirium Tremens (Latin) [from delirare to rave + tremere to tremble] Trembling delirium; the delirium arising from alcoholic poisoning, characterized by constant tremor, insomnia, great exhaustion, distressing illusions, and hallucinations. The abnormal consciousness displayed in this condition is graphic evidence of the existence of the astral realm interpenetrating and influencing the physical world. The characteristic hallucinations are of grotesque, vicious enemies and of various horrible animals and insects actively seeking to terrify and injure the agitated, confused sufferer who is evidently conscious on the low levels of the astral plane. Here, among the dregs in the astral light, all the vile and cruel thoughts and deeds of human life, and the worst animal impulses, are reflected back upon the earth, mankind, and beasts. Here, also, the actively evil elementaries or kama-rupic entities are instinctively drawn to any human victim who unconsciously invades their realm, attracted and vitalized by the fumes of the alcoholic liquors with which the person has saturated his body.

Demon(s) [from Greek daimones, Latin daemons] In many of the later religions, such as Christianity, either the gods of rival religions, nature spirits of paganism, or the exuviae or shells of the dead. Actually demons are a relatively modern misapprehension of a large class of nature sprites which in ancient thought comprised a vast range of spiritual, semi-spiritual, and astral beings, existing in different degrees of evolutionary unfoldment, and therefore classified into groups from the fully self-conscious down to the only partly conscious elementals of the astral realms. The teaching regarding daimones was extremely recondite; the later medieval Christian Demonologies, however, dealt almost exclusively with beings of low grade and of an astral character lacking moral sense and self-consciousness, which for ages have been called in European countries by names such as fairies, sprites, goblins, hobgoblins, pixies, nixies, and brownies. See also DAEMON

Devils may denote various kinds of evil or partially evil entities in nature, evil because not yet sufficiently evolved to express the spiritual light within them; or entities generated from human thoughts and inhabiting the lower regions of the astral light. In the singular it may stand as a wide generalization for human selfishness and passions. Sensitives seeing these thought-impression in the astral light, may be inclined to view them as realities. See also DRAGON; LUCIFER; SATAN; SERPENT

Diakka Coined by Andrew Jackson Davis (1826-1910), a prominent American Spiritualist, to denote kama-lokic elementaries and astral spooks or shells generally,who are amoral, deceptive beings existing in a shady corner of the Summer Land. (cf. Diakka and Their Earthly Victims). Blavatsky cites Porphyry in connection with the Diakka: “It is with the direct help of these bad demons, that every kind of sorcery is accomplished . . . These spirits pass their time in deceiving us, with a great display of cheap prodigies and illusions; their ambition is to be taken for gods, and their leader demands to be recognized as the supreme god” (IU 1:219).

dial ::: n. --> An instrument, formerly much used for showing the time of day from the shadow of a style or gnomon on a graduated arc or surface; esp., a sundial; but there are lunar and astral dials. The style or gnomon is usually parallel to the earth&

Different schools have different enumerations, for though the truth is one and the same, yet when it is formally expressed, we must expect adaptations rather than exactitudes. One theosophical division gives 1) the divine monad; 2) its first vehicle, the spiritual soul; then 3) the human soul; 4) the astral-vital soul; and 5) the physical body. See also PRINCIPLES

Difficult as it is to distinguish as among the manes, larvae, and lemures, the manes were considered by Roman philosophers and poets equivalent to the human soul or monad; whereas the larvae and lemures were distinctly the shells or shades existent in the astral light and being the cast-off portions of the human monad when it ascends into, or reaches, devachan.

Dis (Icelandic) Sister; in Norse myths an attendant spirit or constant companion. Possibly the astral double of a living entity for when one’s dis is absent, it presages death. Another companion entity, superior to the dis, is the hamingja, the higher self or guardian angel which protects and encourages the evolving soul, making the human monad in effect an asmegir — a god-maker or potential ase.

Doppelganger (German) Double-goer; usually, a species of real phantom, seen before, after, or at the time of the death of an individual, and serving as a notification or warning of the death. In some cases the double seen is that of the seer himself, though this is not the true doppelganger. The doppelganger is most often the mayavi-rupa which can be seen at even immense distances from the individual whose presentation it is, yet the term doppelganger can likewise incorrectly be applied to the very occasional projections of the astral body which, however, can at no time wander far from its physical frame. The true doppelganger or mayavi-rupa, whether seen or unseen, falls into two classes, without counting the rare cases involving the linga-sarira mentioned above: the mayavi-rupa projected by hpho-wa, by will and with the consciousness of the ego; and the occasional automatic or involuntary projections of the mayavi-rupa due to intense concentration of the mind upon something or someone.

Doppelgänger: The astral body (q.v.).

Double: A synonym for astral body or Doppelgänger (q.v.).

Dream body: A term which is more or less a synonym for astral body (q.v.).

Drought, Drouth A cyclic condition of the earth’s astral light reacting upon the atmosphere and cooperating with other meteorological causes bringing about periods of dryness over larger or smaller portions of the earth; in extreme form, it brings about a state of periodic ekpyrosis or burning, resulting in the reduction of fertile areas into deserts. The opposite of this condition, resulting in extraordinary rains and floods of longer duration, and sometimes extending over wide surfaces of the earth, is called cataclysm. The dragon is said by the Chinese to be able to affect climate, producing droughts, rain, etc., a direct reference to the astral light in its cyclic workings upon earth; in history, the human application of the dragon is made to magicians of the fourth or early fifth root-race. Samael, Satan, or the Red Dragon, the Simoom, and the Vedic Vritra are drought producers, as is the Babylonian Tiamat, the dragon slain by Bel or by Merodach.

Dumah (Hebrew) Dūmāh The land of silence, the regions of the dead; in the Qabbalah used for the Angel of Silence or of Death. It has somewhat the same significance as the Greek Hades; another term for the same astral regions is She’ol.

Dweller: An occult term for malignant or hostile astral doubles of the dead.

Dweller on the Threshold ::: A literary invention of the English mystic and novelist Sir Bulwer Lytton, found in his romance Zanoni.The term has obtained wide currency and usage in theosophical circles. In occultism the word "dweller,"or some exactly equivalent phrase or expression, has been known and used during long ages past. Itrefers to several things, but more particularly has an application to what H. P. Blavatsky calls "certainmaleficent astral Doubles of defunct persons." This is exact. But there is another meaning of this phrasestill more mystical and still more difficult to explain which refers to the imbodied karmic consequencesor results of the man's past, haunting the thresholds which the initiant or initiate must pass before he canadvance or progress into a higher degree of initiation. These dwellers, in the significance of the word justlast referred to are, as it were, the imbodied quasi-human astral haunting parts of the constitution thrownoff in past incarnations by the man who now has to face them and overcome them -- very real and livingbeings, parts of the "new" man's haunting past. The initiant must face these old "selves" of himself andconquer or -- fail, which failure may mean either insanity or death. They are verily ghosts of the deadmen that the present man formerly was, now arising to dog his footsteps, and hence are very truly calledDwellers on the Threshold. In a specific sense they may be truly called the kama-rupas of the man's pastincarnations arising out of the records in the astral light left there by the "old" man of the "new" man whonow is.

  “Each sub-division among the physical sheaths performs not only the duty of receiving and transmitting sensations, but also has the power of retaining a memory of them which is registered in the appropriate ganglions of the body, and continually, from there, implanted in the corresponding center of sensation and action in the astral body. At the same time the physical brain has always the power, as is of course a common fact, of collecting all the physical sensations and impressions” (Echoes of Orient 2:37).

Earth-spirit The psychic as opposed to the heavenly nature of man or of any celestial body, and therefore the astral light, the lower and lowest portions of the anima mundi. With the Gnostics and Nazarenes it was feminine; in Jewish mystical thought it is Samael, also in a sense Jehovah — in other senses Satan. It builds the physical body of terrestrial beings. In some systems it stands for the entire matter-side of manifestation; in others it is the last of a series of spirits pertaining to a hierarchy of beings and planes.

Ecstasy, Ecstasis (Greek) [from ekstasis displacement, standing out from the proper place, hence rising above] A transference of consciousness from the physical plane to another inner and superior plane, accompanied by awareness and memory of the experience. It is necessary to distinguish between an astral-psychic experience and a truly psychospiritual one. The former is delusive and fraught with harm; the latter is the state of illumination spoken of by Plotinus, resulting from the true asceticism of the disciple, and in its highest form is the same as the high stage of meditation of the Hindu yogi.

Ectenic Force [from Greek ektenes stretched out, extended] Name proposed by Professor Thury of Geneva for a force or agent which is supposed to be the cause or operative agency in the production of psychic phenomena such as levitation, moving objects without contact, thought transference, hypnotism, etc. Pervading all matter — nervous, organic, or inorganic — it is equivalent to Crookes' psychic force and similar hypothetical agents, and to the lowest portions of the akasa or lower astral light in connection with human nerve-force.

Ectoplasm: A term coined by Professor Richet (a contraction of the Greek words ektos, exteriorized, and plasma, substance) for the mysterious protoplasmic substance which streams forth from the bodies of mediums, producing super-physical phenomena, including materializations, under manipulation by a discarnate intelligence. Ectoplasm is described as matter which is invisible and impalpable in its primary state, but assuming the state of a vapor, liquid or solid, according to its stage of condensation. It emits an ozone-like smell. The ectoplasm is considered by spiritualists to be the materialization of the astral body.

Egg-born The earlier divisions of the third root-race, which produced their offspring from eggs — a method which may still be said to exist in humans today, as well as among the animals. This race and its method of reproduction was the logical outcome of the so-called “sweat-born” of the later second and earliest third root-race. The human race from its beginnings on globe D passed through different modes of reproduction which again depended upon the physiological characteristics of the various phases through which humanity progressed from ethereal through astral into physical types. At first humanity was sexless and then, through various phases of seeding, budding, and egg-bearing, became androgynous, its offspring as time passed appearing with one or the other sex predominating, and finally during the latter third root-race appeared distinct males and females from birth as at present. The higher intellectual dhyanis (manasas, sons of wisdom) would not incarnate in the earliest forms, nor even in the bodies of the early egg-born. The first half of the egg-born race was therefore mortal in its lower or personal aspects, there being as yet no personal ego to survive; the inner monadic fires were there, but with no proper vehicle into which to pour their flames. The second half became intellectually immortal at will and spiritually immortal by reason of the development and incarnation of the fifth or manas principle through the agency of the informing manasas. In the days of Lemuria, the middle and later third root-race, the egg-born are to be referred not only to the physiological processes of reproduction then current, but to the seven dhyani-chohanic classes who incarnated in the “seven Elect” of the third root-race. See also ROOT-RACE, THIRD

Egkosmioi or Enkosmioi (Greek) In the world or universe; applied by Proclus to his second highest rank of gods or planetary spirits, the first rank being the twelve huperouranioi (supercelestial). They are the inspiring and inspiriting agencies in the universe, the indwelling gods whose spiritual, intellectual, and psychic movements provide the universe in which they exist with the respective ranges of spiritual, intellectual, and psychic intelligence and forces. The very lowest range of these indwelling divinities, however, are but slightly above the elemental beings of the cosmic astral plane.

Ego(Latin) ::: A word meaning "I." In theosophical writings the ego is that which says "I am I" -- indirect orreflected consciousness, consciousness reflected back upon itself as it were, and thus recognizing its ownmayavi existence as a "separate" entity. On this fact is based the one genuine "heresy" that occultismrecognizes: the heresy of separateness.The seat of the human ego is the intermediate duad -- manas-kama: part aspiring upwards, which is thereincarnating ego; and part attracted below, which is the ordinary or astral human ego. The consciousnessis immortal in the reincarnating ego, and temporary or mortal in the lower or astral human ego.Consider the hierarchy of the human being's constitution to grow from the immanent Self: this last is theseed of egoity on the seven (or perhaps better, six) planes of matter or manifestation. On each one ofthese seven planes (or six), the immanent Self or paramatman develops or evolves a sheath or garment,the upper ones spun of spirit, and the lower ones spun of "shadow" or matter. Now each such sheath orgarment is a "soul"; and between the self and such a soul -- any soul -- is the ego.Thus atman is the divine monad, giving birth to the divine ego, which latter evolves forth the monadicenvelope or divine soul; jivatman, the spiritual monad, has its child which is the spiritual ego, which inturn evolves forth the spiritual soul or individual; and the combination of these three considered as a unitis buddhi; bhutatman, the human ego -- the higher human soul, including the lower buddhi and highermanas; pranatman, the personal ego -- the lower human soul, or man. It includes manas, kama, andprana; and finally the beast ego -- the vital-astral soul: kama and prana.

Egregores Coined by Eliphas Levi, who explains it as “the chiefs of the souls who are the spirits of energy and action” (SD 1:259). They are beings “whose bodies and essence is a tissue of the so-called astral light. They are the shadows of the higher Planetary Spirits whose bodies are of the essence of the higher divine light” (TG 111). They are “the ‘giants’ of Genesis who loved the daughters of men: an allusion to the first prehuman (so to say) races of men evoluted, not born — Alpha and the Omega of Humanity in this our ‘Round’ ” (BCW 6:176).

Eidolon [from Greek eidolon form, shape; a phantom-double of the human form; Latin simulacrum] The astral double of living beings; the shade or perisprit, the kama-rupa after death before its disintegration. The phantom which can appear under certain conditions to survivors of the deceased.

Eidolon: Greek name for the astral body or Kama Rupa (q.v.).

Eidolon(Greek; plural eidola) ::: A word meaning "image" of the man that was. After death there remains in theastral world -- which is on the other side of the threshold of physical life, the etheric world -- the"shadow" of the man that was. The ancients called these human shadows, shades; modern children andnursemaids call them ghosts and spooks; and each such shade is but an eidolon, or astral image or palecopy of the physical man that was. This eidolon coheres for a while in the astral realms or in thesuperphysical ether, and its particles are magnetically held more or less coherent as long as the physicalcorpse is not fully dissolved into its component elements; but these eidola in a comparatively short timefade out, for they decay in a manner closely resembling the disintegration of the physical body.

Eighth Sphere or Planet of Death ::: A term used in the more esoteric or inner part of the teachings about which little can be said, for over thispart of the doctrine there has always been drawn a thick veil of secrecy and silence.Frequently the term is confused with avichi, but this is incorrect, because the two, while closelyconnected, are nevertheless quite distinct. While avichi is a state where very evil human beings "die andare reborn without interruption," yet not without hope of final redemption -- something which canactually take place even on our physical plane in the cases of very evil or soulless men -- the EighthSphere represents a degree of psychomental degeneration still more advanced. As just hinted, even inavichi there is a possibility of reinsoulment by the ray of the spiritual monad; whereas in the EighthSphere or Planet of Death such possibility finally vanishes, and the entity which has sunk to the Planet ofDeath is what is technically called in the esoteric philosophy a "lost soul." In the Eighth Sphere the lostsouls are ground over and over in nature's laboratory, and are finally dissipated into their componentpsycho-astral elements or life-atoms. The Eighth Sphere or Planet of Death is an actual globe. It is also ofcourse a state or condition of being; whereas the avichi is almost exclusively a state or condition in whichan entity may find itself, although obviously this entity must have position or place and therefore localityin space -- on our earth or elsewhere.

Eighth Sphere or Planet of Death Both a globe and a condition of being, where utterly, irredeemably corrupt human souls are attracted, to be dissipated as earth entities. These “lost souls” have through lifetimes lost their link with their inner god, and so can no longer serve as a channel for those spiritual forces. Too gross to remain in kama-loka or avichi, they sink to this slowly dying planet of our solar system, invisible because too dense, which acts as a vent or receptacle for human waste. “The Eighth Sphere is a very necessary organic part of the destiny of our earth and its chain. . . . in the solar system there are certain bodies which act as vents, cleansing channels, receptacles for human waste and slag. . . . [the lost soul] therefore sinks into the Planet of Death or the globe of Mara to which its own heavy material magnetism drags it, where it is dissipated as an entity from above, which means from our globe, and is slowly ground over in nature’s laboratory. . . . However, precisely because the lost soul is yet an aggregate of astral-vital-psychical life-atoms connected around a monad as yet scarcely evolved, this monad, when freed from its earth veil of life atoms, thereupon begins in the Planet of Death a career of its own in this highly material globe.” (FSO 347-8)

Elementaries: In occult terminology, the astral corpses of the dead. An Elementary is the ethereal counterpart of the person no longer alive; as the physical body is dissolved into the elements to which it belongs, also the Elementary is decomposed into its astral elements. Elementaries of good persons decompose soon, while those of the wicked may exist for a long time. Theosophy uses the word Elementary in the meaning of “the disembodied souls of the depraved.”

Elementaries ::: "Properly, the disembodied souls of the depraved; these souls having at some time prior to deathseparated from themselves their divine spirits, and so lost their chance for immortality" (TheosophicalGlossary, H. P. Blavatsky).Strictly speaking, the word "elementaries" should be used as H. P. Blavatsky defines it in this quotationfrom her. But in modern theosophical literature the word has come to signify more particularly thephantoms or eidola of disembodied persons, these phantoms or eidola really being the kama-rupicshades, with especial application to the cases of grossly materialistic ex-humans whose evil impulses andappetites still inhering in the kama-rupic phantom draw these phantoms to physical spheres congenial tothem. They are a real danger to psychical health and sanity, and literally haunt living human beingspossessing tendencies akin to their own. They are soulless shells, but still filled with energies of adepraved and ignoble type. Their destiny of course is like that of all other pretas or bhutas -- ultimatedisintegration; for the gross astral atoms composing them slowly dissolve through the years after themanner of a dissolving column of smoke or a wisp of dark cloud on a mountainside.

Elementaries The earth-bound disimbodied human souls of people who were evil or depraved when imbodied: the conscious or quasi-conscious astral souls of people who on earth refused all spiritual light, remained and died deeply immersed in the mire of matter, and from whose souls or intermediate, personal nature the immortal spirit has gradually separated. These may exist for centuries before completely dissolving. Blavatsky writes of the spiritual death leading to this condition: “When one falls into a love of self and love of the world, with its pleasures, losing the divine love of God and of the neighbor, he falls from life to death. The higher principles which constitute the essential elements of his humanity perish, and he lives only on the natural plane of his faculties. Physically he exists, spiritually he is dead. . . . This spiritual death results from disobedience of the laws of spiritual life, which is followed by the same penalty as the disobedience of the laws of natural life. But the spiritually dead have still their delights; they have their intellectual endowments and power, and intense activities. All the animal delights are theirs, and to multitudes of men and women these constitute the highest ideal of human happiness. The tireless pursuit of riches, of the amusements and entertainments of social life; the cultivation of graces of manner, of taste in dress, of social preferment, of scientific distinction, intoxicate and enrapture these dead-alive . . .” (IU 1:318).

Emotional body: A synonym used by many occult authors for the astral body (q.v.).

Empusa (Greek) A horrible monster, often considered to be a specter, said to be sent by Hecate in her capacity as deity of the underworld, to scare people, especially travelers; it was said to change into various shapes. By transferred meaning, used of hobgoblins in general. However, empusa was also a generalizing term for certain spectral beings or appearances entering the physical world from the lower realms of the astral, which were all directly under control of the moon, Hecate being goddess of the moon in one of the its most esoteric functions.

Epigenesis [from Greek epi upon + genesis production] A biological theory of generation which holds that the embryo is created from the original germinal elements by a process of gradual evolution, i.e., by a passage from a relatively homogeneous condition to a specialized condition through a process of differentiation. This replaced the older idea of encasement according to which the future organism existed entire, but of microscopic dimensions, within the ovum, and was afterwards merely enlarged; and it also replaced the idea that the organism was formed by a relatively sudden accretion of parts derived from the corresponding organs in the parents. It thus accommodated embryology to the modern theory of evolution. It is open to the objections that by attempting to view growth as a purely physical process, development is made to appear as a process of accretion or adding together, instead of as a process of unfolding; and suggests the notion that something entirely new can be formed by such an additive process. But nothing can be formed unless it has previously existed in entirety, though on a subtler plane of materiality; and the coming together of physical elements is merely the filling in of a plan that has already been sketched. The astral prototype of the physical organism, seeking incarnation, draws together the physical elements required, using the procreative processes as a means. The older theory of encasement contains as much truth as the epigenesis theory, though distorted by a too physical and theological view of the process. See also EMBRYO

Epilepsy A disorder recognized in antiquity as an obsession or possession by an elementary which ousts temporarily the astral-vital soul from the physical body and for the time being assumes control of the bodily mechanism. The mind thereby loses direct connection with its physical vehicle and unconsciousness results. The theosophical teaching about elementaries — astral entities whose intense desires draw them to neurotic, mediumistic, and negatively sensitive natures — gives the key to the injurious, purposeless explosions of force in the person who has been dissociated from his body and brain. Of the various bizarre sensations which usher in many typical attacks, one of the most common is the sudden look of fear or terror with which the sufferer stares fixedly as if held in thrall by some gruesome astral sight. The frequent hallucinations are, as a rule, of the same quality which the alcoholic senses in delirium tremens. Blavatsky says that epileptic fits “are the first and strongest symptoms of genuine mediumship” (Key 195).

Equivalent to the astral light, and the source and synthesis of the two aspects of the manifested astro-etheric light: the one being the light- and life-giving (’od) and the other the matter side (’ob), the dealer of death.

Etheric Body. See ASTRAL BODY; LINGA-SARIRA

Evil Spirits A vague expression, often applied by theological misinterpretation to the Fallen Angels — the cosmic spirits who form or produce the lower worlds; or to the powers of the matter side of nature. Again, it may designate any of a numerous class of nonphysical beings, such as elementals, nature spirits, ghosts, or astral entities generated by human thoughts, all known in Christianity under the generalizing term Devil.

Evocation [from Latin evocare to call forth] The calling forth of simulacra of the departed by magical processes; or the calling forth of the daemons or nature spirits of various classes by will directed by knowledge. The spiritual aspects of human beings cannot, however, be called forth, except in rare instances immediately after death, which in this case means black magic; and even so, these disimbodied spirits do not actually come, but cause their simulacrum to be formed, or send a messenger. The attempt thus to evoke the departed is a wrongful interference with the courses of nature and detrimental to the welfare of the departing egos. It is much easier and more common to evoke spooks from kama-loka, or denizens of the lower astral light; and the appearances thus created are often of a composite nature, to which the medium and sitters, whether knowingly or not, contribute. This must necessarily be the case where there is actual materialization. Such practices come under the general heading of necromancy.

Evolution [from Latin evolutio unrolling, opening] The unfolding or bringing into manifestation of the inherent, already inwardly existing characteristics of a being; it is therefore growth from within, development. The process is universal, since the universe consists of living beings, all of which are growing because unfolding. Evolution presupposes two main factors: the entity which is evolving, and the form which is evolved. These two are related as spirit to matter, as the monad to its organism. Every one of the countless beings which constitute the universe is essentially a spark of the universal divine fire, life, or spirit; and at any time is at one stage or another of a continuous career of unfolding growth. Every spark creates for itself a succession of forms by which it expresses more or less of its inherent qualities. The physical vehicles are merely the physical end-products; before these physical imbodiments are engendered, there are other imbodiments made of subtler grades of matter or consciousness-substance on intermediate planes, and astral stuff on the lower plane close to the physical. Evolution is a continual reaction between what is within and what is without: environment modifies growth; but without the urge of the indwelling monad, there could be no action upon environment, nor any reaction by environment.

Evolution is an ancient and cardinal tenet of the archaic wisdom and was formerly called emanation. In mankind, three distinct, principal lines of evolution take place and converge; the spiritual, the mental or manasic, and the astral-vital-physical. The manasic factor is derived from the perfected humanity of a previous manvantara, whose entrance into the human stock of the third root-race brought about the union of the heavenly and the terrestrial so as to make a complete self-conscious being who thereafter mirrors every plane in nature. In humankind, the divine monad, a spark of the universal spirit, emanates from itself its first vehicle, and thus is formed the spiritual monad, atma-buddhi. This monad, emanating from itself in its turn another vehicle, becomes the higher human soul or reimbodying ego; and the emanational process is continued throughout the human constitution by the formation of the astral-vital soul which in its turn emanates or oozes forth the physical body.

Fetahil, Ptahil (Gnostic) With the Nazarene Gnostics, the builder of the material worlds. In the Codex Nazaraeus, Abatur, the Father, opens a gate and walks to the dark water (chaos) and looks down into it. The darkness reflects the image, whereupon a son appears or is emanated, the Logos or Demiurge, Fetahil. Because Fetahil is thus produced in order to bring forth the worlds of manifestation, the Codex describes him as being immersed in the abyss of primordial stuff or matter (chaos), soliloquizing on his inability alone to produce it. Whereupon Spiritus (the Gnostic “Mother”) appears and unites with Karabtanos, cosmic kama involved in primordial matter, thus bringing forth seven stellars. These are, however, seven imperfect figures “which represent also the seven capital sins, the progeny of an astral soul separated from its divine source (spirit) and matter, the blind demon of concupiscence. Seeing this, Fetahil extends his hand towards the abyss of matter, and says: — ‘Let the Earth exist, just as the abode of the powers has exited.’ Dipping his hand in the chaos, which he condenses, he creates our planet” (SD 1:195).

Finally, the aphorism denotes the astral light, represented by a black triangle inverted on a white (SD 1:424).

Fire: Esoterically, one of the four Elements. In the teachings of Rosicrucians and Hermetists, fire, like man, has a body (the visible flame), a soul (astral fire) and spirit, and it has a fourfold aspect—heat (equivalent to life), light (equivalent to mind), electricity (molecular powers), and the radical cause of its existence.

Fireless Progenitors Primeval mankind issued from the bodies of its fireless astral progenitors, who were aeriform and devoid of compactness, although these progenitors were the former astral-physical vehicles of the human stock itself. Thus we may say that the adult issued from the body or being of his youthful progenitor, himself as a child. These progenitors are called fireless because, not having the flame or fire of mind, they could not consciously receive and contain the higher intellectual pitris or classes of the manasaputras.

Fire-Mist In The Secret Doctrine (1:83, 86-7) used to signify the fire or living intellectual life of the one element in its second stage as Father-Mother, akasa, jivatman, divine astral light, or world-soul; or again as the first or highest stage of physical or lower astral substance, in some respects equivalent to the mahabhuta creation.

Flames Largely interchangeable with fire, both being borrowed from the Fire-philosophers in an attempt to render the ancient teachings. Often the same distinction is made as in ordinary usage: that flame is a portion of fire, or that fire is a more abstract and general term and flame a more concrete and particular. Thus, the intellectual and guiding cosmic spirits, as well as the astrally and physically creative builders, are spoken of as being a hierarchy of flames. The Lords of the Flame are the agnishvatta-pitris, or the intelligent architects cosmically; as the givers of mind to humanity they are alluded to as those whose fire is too pure for the production of physical mortal mankind. The Asiatic Qabbalists or Shemitic initiates meant by Holy Flame what is called the anima mundi or world-soul, and this is why adepts were called sons of the holy flame. Flame is also a projection of fire, as when a flame of the divine fire descends into matter, or flames of fire descend upon one inspired by the Holy Spirit or encircle the head of an initiate.

Fluid body: A synonymous term for astral body (q.v.).

Fluidic Double Often used by Europeans for the linga-sarira, the astral or model body, whose form is duplicated with extreme exactness by that of the physical body, but which is mobile somewhat as a fluid is, instead of being comparatively rigid like the crystallized or physical body.

Fourth dimension: A higher order of space, additional to the three known dimensions of height, width and length; a direction which is neither up-or-down nor right-or-left nor back-or-forth, but at right angles to all three. Many philosophers consider time (duration, the past-or-present direction) a fourth dimension—but the “fourth dimension” just described is conceived of as a fourth spatial dimension. In occult terminology, the fourth dimension has to do with internal qualities which, when seen in the astral light, become visible. It has been defined as “the sum of the other three dimensions,” and also as “man’s expanding sense of time.”

Four The square of two, and the second even number, hence feminine in characteristics. It was regarded by the Pythagoreans with especial esteem, for it was the base number of the tetraktys. It corresponds to a solid figure, or a square — the quaternary although on the spiritual plane, as being the immediate successor of the triad, it became the symbol of immortality, and hence in this sense a perfect number, the ideal root of all subsequent hierarchical numbers on the lower planes including the physical. Thus there is the spiritual four as the mother-type of all productivity, and there was likewise the material four, the ideal root of all numbers on the astral and physical planes. It was called by the Pythagoreans the key-keeper of nature, but it was only so in union with the number three, for then the sum made seven — the perfect number of nature in our world. The Hermetists had the same idea: four was the symbol of truth when expanded into a cube, for when this cube is unfolded the production is seven. Four is the number “which affords an arithmetical division between unity and seven, as it surpasses the former by the same number (three), as it is itself surpassed by the seven, since four is by as many numbers above one, as seven is above four” (SD 2:582).

From another more general standpoint Samsara is the passage through the three worlds as commonly given in Buddhism: physical, astral, and mental; and from a more esoteric viewpoint the word could embrace the entire whirlings or wanderings of the monadic centers of beings through the seven Worlds.

From another point of view they may be looked upon as life-atoms in different stages of evolutionary growth; and being in various degrees of evolution they are variously spiritual, ethereal, astral, or material, running through vast ranges on all these planes. Thus they exist everywhere: in the air we breathe, the food we eat, and all the tissues of physical nature. Through their agency we perform all our bodily or mental activities.

From a theosophical viewpoint this is extremely hazardous, as we are protected by our physical organism and by our own will from the dangerous, often malignant influences of the lower astral light; and to strive to break down that barrier is a proceeding which can lead to a breakdown of our linkage with our higher self.

From immemorial antiquity occultly it was taught that the south pole was the vent of the earth, and hence the abode of elemental entities, whether terrestrial or cosmic, or of inferior kinds. Thus is was sometimes called the Pit. “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” (SD 2:400n).

gastralgia ::: n. --> Pain in the stomach or epigastrium, as in gastric disorders.

Generally speaking, because of their menacing aspects, the term Dweller on the Threshold might be applied to the denizens of kama-loka, specifically to the past kama-lokic or astral remnants of a former incarnation which haunt the new imbodiment of that reincarnating ego. A person who gives way to strongly material impulse and desires forms for himself a kama-rupa which, when the person dies, can persist without undergoing complete dissolution until the quick return of such materially-minded human soul to reincarnation, when the kama-rupa is then strongly attracted to the person thus reimbodied and haunts him as an evil genius, continually instilling by automatic psychomagnetic action thoughts and impulses of evil, temptations, and suggestions of fear and terror — all of which the person himself was responsible for in his last life.

Genius, Genii (Latin) [from the verbal root gen birth, innate] Generally an indwelling spiritual or ethereal being, as contrasted with a corporeal being. Genii are the active individualizing beings or elements in the constitution of any entity, although invariably of ethereal or spiritual type. For instance, in the human being, the intellectual genius is the manasaputra in our constitution; likewise our astral genius is the vital-astral monad, or astral person.

Germ Cell The early physical vehicle or carrier of the ’ “spiritual plasm’ that dominates the germinal plasm” in the development of the embryo (SD 1:219); “every germ-cell, human or other, is the physical expression of inner, ethereal, and psycho-magnetic activities, and is a compact or bundle or sheaf of inner forces and substances ranging from the divine through intermediate degrees down to the astral and the physical, just as man, but on a much larger scale, himself is” (ET 487 3rd & rev ed). Each germ-cell is the precipitation or projection on and into the physical plane of an inner, psycho-ethereal radiation, an incarnation of a ray point originating in the inner worlds and contacting physical matter by psychomagnetic affinity, and thus arousing a proper particle or molecular aggregate of living physical substance into becoming a reproductive cell. This ray point or tip of the imbodying ray or radiance, is not the reincarnating ego itself, but the tip of the projected ray issuing from the reimbodying ego. When this ego — itself a ray from the spiritual monad — reaches its own intermediate sphere, after leaving its parent-monad, it descends no farther into matter from that plane. But its radiated influence, its psychomagnetic ray, having stronger affinities for material worlds than itself, goes deeper into matter and there awakens into activity the life-atoms in each of the various planes between that of the reimbodying ego and the grossest matter of physical earth. When this psycho-vital-electric or -magnetic ray awakens some particular life-atom in gross physical matter on earth, that life-atom so chosen belonged to the same reimbodying ego before, and therefore responds to its own “parent.” It may even be regarded as the tip of the reimbodying ray from which it is precipitated into matter, “which physical matter, as atoms, is thus attracted around this tip, building first the material imbodiment of the said life-atom and by progressive accretion finally becoming the living germ-cell” (ET 488 4 3rd & rev ed).

Germ In cosmogenesis, the germ stands for the first well-developed localized cosmic entity, luminous and semi-astral, that is to be a future world, whether a globe or a sun. Hence the germ is the developed resultant of the first cosmic impulse of the primeval intelligent formative principle working downwards into manifestation. This stage in the evolution of a cosmic entity, whether globe or sun, in Sanskrit is called hiranyagarbha (golden germ or womb), for out of the germ as from a womb springs or evolves the entity later to appear. The Secret Doctrine (2:176) speaks of the self-existent Kama, born from the heart of Brahma, as the personification of “the first movement that stirred the ONE, after its manifestation from the purely abstract principle, to create, ‘Desire first arose in It, which was the primal germ of mind; . . . the bond which connects Entity with Non-Entity.’”

Ghost: In mediumistic terminology, a deceased person or the image of a deceased person appearing to the living. Identified by occultists with the astral shell or etheric double (q.v.).

Ghost The occasional apparitions of deceased persons — but in no instances whatsoever of the spirits of the dead — or invisible astral entities producing various psychic phenomena. This age-old belief is consistent with the breaking up of composite human nature into its component parts at death. As the astral model-body, when freed from its familiar physical duplicate, is still magnetically attached to the body, it is sometimes seen haunting the new grave for a short time. Soon the atoms of this shadowy form begin to dissipate. But the more ethereal and enduring astral atoms cohere in the kama-rupic body of the deceased person’s lower mental, emotional, and psychic nature. These imbodied lower passions and desires become in connection with their astral automatic vehicle an earth-bound entity when they are separated from the reimbodying ego at the second death in the purgatorial astral underworld. These so-called spooks are what the Roman writers named umbrae or larvae of the dead; earlier, the Greeks spoke of these human reliquiae as eidola — the astral “images” of the dead. The ancients were well informed regarding the shades or shells which were cast off by the purified inner self when it ascended from kama-loka to its devachan in higher spheres.

Ghoul [from Arabic ghul, ghuwal] In popular Arabic lore a class of evil beings, haunting the mountains and woods and preying upon mankind and animals. More specifically, the astral or astral-physical entities haunting cemeteries or burial grounds, with an eye upon the danger to humans or animals who come into contact with them. These Arabic ghouls are earth-bound kama-rupas of the most debased and material type, and parallel the Hindu preta of the lowest type, or even the pisachas, etc.

Great terrestrial crucible: See: Astral light.

Hades or Aides (Greek) [from aides, Aidoneus the invisible] Son of Kronos and Rhea, brother of Zeus and Poseidon. When the world was shared among the three brothers, Hades obtained the nether regions sometimes equated with Dis, Orcus, and Tartarus. After the time of Homer the name was given to the region he presided over with his consort Persephone. This corresponds to the underworld, those regions of the astral light which extend from the highest kama-loka to the deepest depths of avichi; although the more restricted usage of Hades applies to kama-loka. Hades is pictured as a dark realm in the depths of the earth, surrounded by rivers. However, the meaning of underworld shifts according to the viewpoint had at any time, the earth itself sometimes being equated with Hades.

Hallucination: A non-veridical or delusive perception of a sense object occurring when no object is in fact present to the organs of sense. (Cf. negative hallucination.) In occultistic and esoteric terminology, a state following a relaxation of the nervous system which attracts waves of astral light to the individual who thus may temporarily acquire and use extrasensory or extratemporal perception (q.v.).

Hatha Yoga (Sanskrit) Haṭha-yoga A lower form of yoga practice which uses physical means for purposes of self-development, teaching that it is possible to attain to a certain grade of psychomental abstraction and to develop some of the lower vital-astral powers, by means of a set of physical exercises and postures, by the regulation of the breath, or by certain other psychophysical methods. These methods are to be neither recommended nor followed, for they are exceedingly dangerous except when practiced in minor degree under the supervision of a teacher, and above everything else in full coordination with the higher forms of yoga.

Haunted Houses Physicho-astral remains of the deceased tend to haunt the places where they dwelt in life; and in cases which are relatively rare, though numerous absolutely, conditions may bring about a connection between the lower astral plane and the physical so that visible images are seen, voices or footsteps heard, and objects may be moved. In some cases the astral image or reliquiae may persist for centuries, making what is called a ghost; it is an astral corpse or relic, automatically repeating acts or words. Often bones have been found under a house, and popular belief has it that the haunting has ceased after they were ceremonially interred. Sometimes there is an evident desire on the part of the kama-rupa to communicate information of some sort, as of a hidden document or buried treasure, and this is not because the kama-rupa is the spirit desiring to communicate its information, but because the kama-rupa has stamped upon it photographically, as it were, the intense desire of the person during life to guard the treasure and conceal it, and even to reveal it to some individual.

Higher Ego The individuality, as contrasted with the personality; the higher ego lies in atma-buddhi-manas as the reincarnating ego, and is a reflection or minor projection of the higher self or atman. The higher ego is contrasted with the lower or personal ego which is formed from the kamic, astral, and physical imbodiments of the former.

Higher Triad ::: The imperishable spiritual ego considered as a unity. It is the reincarnating part of man's constitutionwhich clothes itself in each earth-life in a new personality or lower quaternary. The higher triad, speakingin the simplest fashion, is the unity of atman, buddhi, and the higher manas; and the lower quaternaryconsists of the lower manas or kama-manas, the prana or vitality, the linga-sarira or astral model-body,and the physical vehicle.Another manner of considering the human constitution in its spiritual aspects is that viewed from thestandpoint of consciousness, and in this latter manner the higher triad consists of the divine monad, thespiritual monad, and the higher human monad. The higher triad is often spoken of in a collective sense,and ignoring details of division, as simply the reincarnating monad, or more commonly the reincarnatingego, because this latter is rooted in the higher triad.Many theosophists experience quite unnecessary difficulty in understanding why the human constitutionshould be at one time divided in one way and at another time divided in another way. The difficulty liesin considering these divisions as being absolute instead of relative, in other words, as representingwatertight compartments instead of merely indefinite and convenient divisions. The simplestpsychological division is probably that which divides the septenary constitution of man in three parts: anuppermost duad which is immortal, an intermediate duad which is conditionally immortal, and a lowertriad which is unconditionally mortal. (See Fundamentals of the Esoteric Philosophy, 1st ed., pp. 167,525; 2nd rev. ed., pp. 199, 601).

Hippopotamus In ancient Egypt, a symbol connected with every goddess, especially Rert or Rertu, Apet, and Ta-urt. It was used as a kindly guardian of the dead in the underworld in the Book of the Dead. In a contrary aspect, the monster Am-mit, which appears in the judgment scene, has the hindquarters of a hippopotamus. It represents the horrors and fear of the astral world awaiting the defunct, which spring into life if that person’s karma has brought about awakening self-consciousness in kama-loka.

Houen (Chinese) The lower portion of the human soul, corresponding to kama. The other human aspect is the ling, the higher ling corresponding to buddhi and the lower ling to manas (BCW 7:202). The houen after death becomes the kama-rupa or astral elementary. Chinese used to evoke houen in cases of murder to receive information on the case (BCW 7:205).

Human Ego ::: The human ego is seated in that part of the human constitution which theosophists call the intermediateduad, manas-kama. The part which is attracted below and is mortal is the lower human ego. The partwhich aspires upwards towards the buddhi and ultimately joins it is the higher human ego orreincarnating ego. The dregs of the human ego after the death of the human being and after the seconddeath in the kama-loka, remain in the astral spheres as the disintegrating kama-rupa or spook.

Human mediumship is a voluntary, or more often involuntary, subjection to the lower planes of astral substance which, while more ethereal than ordinary matter, yet are of a quality more gross, more powerful, and usually more malefic. Entrance into these astral realms produces a species of astral intoxication, from the delusion of strange because unknown and often unequilibrated forces, deceptive astral pictures; and the astral intoxication is increased because of considering these experiences as wonder-phenomena. In other words, the conditions and experiences sensed are as genuine, and as unreliable and utterly useless, as are the hallucinations of the delirious or insane. Only an occultist of masterful will and great purity of life can rise consciously to the spiritual plane and, looking down on the astral levels below, understand, control, and remember what he sees. In untrained mediumship the atoms and molecules of the astrally “controlled” body which the alien astral entity uses to mold into a form and to move with its own desire-impulses, retain this astral psychomagnetic imprint. With repeated trances, the medium grows continuously and progressively less than his individual self, because of his thoughts and feelings becoming mixed with, overlaid, or blurred by ideas and emotions which per se are abnormal and misleading. He therefore becomes irresponsible as a source of genuine spiritual knowledge and prevision, and still less responsible as a guardian of sacred truths. Because of this, untrained mediumship precludes initiation into the Mysteries as the person’s faith in his astral “control” would dominate him instead of the rules of the sanctuary.

Human Soul ::: The human soul, speaking generally, is the intermediate nature of man's constitution, and being animperfect thing it is drawn back into incarnation on earth where it learns needed lessons in this sphere ofthe universal life.Another term for the human soul is the ego -- a usage more popular than accurate, because the humanego is the soul of the human soul so to speak, the human soul being its vehicle. The ego is that whichsays in each one of us, "I am I, not you!" It is the child of the immanent Self; and through itsimprisonment in matter as a ray of the overruling immanent Self, it learns to reflect its consciousnessback upon itself, thus obtaining cognition of itself as self-conscious and hetero-conscious, i.e., knowingitself, and knowing "non-self" or other selves.Just as our higher and highest nature work through this human soul or intermediate nature of us, so doesthis last in its turn work and function through bodies or vehicles or sheaths of more or less etherealizedmatters which surround and enclose it, which are of course still lower than itself, and which thereforegive it the means of contacting our own lower and lowest planes of matter; and these lower planesprovide us with the vital-astral-physical parts of us. This human soul or intermediate nature manifeststherefore as best it can through and by the astral-physical vehicle, the latter our body of human flesh.In the theosophical classification, the human soul is divided into the higher human soul, composed of thelower buddhi and the higher manas -- and the self corresponding to it is the bhutatman, meaning the "selfof that which has been" or the reincarnating ego -- and the lower human soul, the lower manas and kama,and the self corresponding to it is pranatman or astral personal ego, which is mortal.

Hydra (Greek) A water serpent, feminine, corresponding to a masculine hydros; usually the monster which Hercules overcomes in one of his twelve labors. As the twelve labors signify, among other things, the trials of an initiant in the Mysteries, the mythologic hydra symbolizes the psycho-astral forces which have to be mastered.

Hypnotism [from Greek hypnos sleep] One name for an artificially produced somnambulistic, entranced, or psychologized state. A better word for the procedure is psychologization, hypnotism being but one phase of the general subject which includes fascination, multiple or double personality, some religious ecstasies, and different methods of psychic healing. All these things operate in and upon the important intermediate part between our spiritual and physical-astral self and usually affect the latter self very strongly. This intermediate part is the human soul of the reincarnating entity — the man or woman we see and know. As this includes the psychomental-emotional powers and faculties, it is intimately related to intelligence and sanity, to emotions and conduct, and to health.

Hysteria This protean disorder is regarded as a functional neurosis with abnormal sensations, emotions, or paroxysms, manifesting itself chiefly by emotional instability, by the ease with which it is influenced, in negativism and impulsiveness, a tendency to make sensations, a remarkable egotism, desire to talk, to fabricate, and to simulate. There is constant, capricious change of mood and activity. No other disorder can counterfeit so many diseases as hysteria. The psychic faculties at times displayed in clairvoyance, hallucinations, cataleptic and somnambulistic states, etc., show an active functioning in the astral body; while convulsive and other abnormal movements, and mental absences in which the actor does and says bizarre, unwonted, and inexplicable things for various periods of which only a vague or no remembrance is retained, point to the play of some astral entity, as occurs in other obsessions.

Iddhi (Pali) Iddhi [from the verbal root sidh to succeed, attain an objective, reach accomplishment] Equivalent to the Sanskrit siddhi, used to signify the powers or attributes of perfection: powers of various kinds, spiritual and intellectual as well as astral and physical, acquired through training, discipline, initiation, and individual holiness. In Buddhism it is generally rendered “occult power.” There are two classes of iddhis, the higher of which, according to the Digha-Nikaya and other Buddhist works, are eight in number: 1) the power to project mind-made images of oneself; 2) to become invisible; 3) to pass through solid things, such as a wall; 4) to penetrate solid ground as if it were water; 5) to walk on water; 6) to fly through the air; 7) to touch sun and moon; and 8) to ascend into the highest heavens. The same work represents the Buddha as saying: “It is because I see danger in the practice of these mystic wonders that I loathe and abhor and am ashamed thereof” (1:213) — a true statement although iddhis are powers of the most desirable kind when pertaining to the higher nature, for they are of spiritual, intellectual, and higher psychical character. It is only when iddhis or siddhis are limited to the meaning of the gross astral psychic attributes that the Buddha properly condemns them as being dangerous always, and to the ambitious and selfish person extremely perilous. Further, it was an offense against the regulations of the Brotherhood (Samgha) for any member to display any powers before the laity.

Idea, as Plato pointed out, means primarily a prototype existing in the cosmic mind and manifested in forms by the action of cosmic energy, guided by ideation, working in matter. Therefore it must be regarded as innate, and our thoughts are mental manifestations of ideas. With Plato and Aristotle (when not using the word to denote species), ideas were the fundamental roots of manifested things, as viewed under the aspect of consciousness rather than under that of matter. Hence the faculty of ideation, considered cosmically, is originative and creative of what lies latent in ideation itself, and can be so in the human being, since each individual is a microcosm. This is quite different from the faculty of making mental images of sensory experiences, these images being really what the Greeks called phantasmata. Yet even this is a degree of the original process and may be called, perhaps, astral ideation.

Immortality That which is not subject to death, deathlessness. Death is the dissolution of a compound entity, where the compound itself ceases to exist, though its elements do not perish. Nor does the ensouling entity perish because of the dissolution of its physical, astral, or other vehicle. Hence in a restricted sense certain elements can be said to be immortal, relative to the compound they form.

In a larger sense, the kinnaras, kimpurushas, etc., are entities belonging to our planetary chain who partake partly of the nature of matter or form, and partly of spirit. They have a definite place in the economy of the planetary chain and perform their functions very much as the human hierarchy does. They are more advanced than the mere nature sprites or elementals, but yet are inferior to humankind, and are to be classed generally with the hosts of quasi-astral beings.

In all these cases the condition results from a compression of the astral fluid already existing “about a person, so as to form an elastic shell, absolutely non-penetrable by any physical object” (IU 1:378). Nor does ordinary heat register, as such, on astral substance. This invisible shell of compressed astral fluid also accounts for the instances where the person so protected cannot be shot. In these cases the bullets appear just beyond the muzzle of the weapon, quiver in the air, and fall to the ground, as if meeting an impenetrable barrier. This protecting, elastic shell also explains why heavy blows and attacks with sharp instruments will make no impression upon “convulsionaries” as was shown by the historic records in the cases of the convulsionaries of St. Medard (IU 1:373-6).

Incense Fragrant incense has been used from immemorial antiquity practically worldwide, often in ceremonial magic of various kinds. Incense may be simple, as in the usage of burning leaves, bark, or wood, the smoke itself being often so fragrant as to fall under the modern ideas of incense; or compound when it is composed of various ingredients, all of a more or less fragrant character when burned. The explanation of the original use of incense was that it was a strong purifying agent, some plants thus used in purificatory fumigations being far more powerful in effect than others. In its worst uses, incense is distinctly stupefying in character, and when so used its burning partakes of sorcery. Its purificatory effect is because smoke of various kinds, or the fumes from the burning, are antiseptic or cleansing in character; and some plants especially when burned repel evil-natured denizens in the astral light.

Incubus: A term generally applied to designate a demon, astral form of a dead person or of a sorcerer, which has sexual intercourse with mortal women.

Incubus (Latin) [from in upon + cub lie] The nightmare, regarded as an astral goblin which lies upon the sleeper. Modern medicine regards it as a subjective impression produced by physiological disorders, but we must take into account as well the lower strata of the astral light, teeming with soulless elementals as well as astral vampires or elementaries, ready to take advantage of unguarded and disordered conditions.

Indriya (Sanskrit) Indriya Power, force, especially with reference to the faculty of sense; sense itself, including the inner or astral organ of sense; also occasionally the number five as symbolic of the five senses. The buddhi-indriyani or jnanendriyani are the five inner organs or faculties of perception: eye, ear, nose, tongue, and skin. To these are added the karmendriyani (organs of action): larynx, hand, foot, anus, and generative parts; between these ten organs and atman stands manas, which thus with the atman and the ten faculties and organs of sense, make twelve divisions of the human constitution. In Vedantic philosophy the four inner organic faculties (antar-indriyani) are manas, buddhi, ahamkara, and chitta.

In exoteric mythologies the bodily senses and functions are said to have their presiding deities, so that there are two septenary sets: the causal spiritual, and their material reflections as effects. The cycles of septenary evolution bring forth the spiritual or divine; intellectual and higher psychological; the lower psychological, including the passional, and the instinctual; and the semi-corporeal and purely physical natures. The senses belong to the last two groups. The astral-vital-physical nature furnishes sensory organs, through which the inner senses can act, thus causing the functioning of the physical senses. These physiological senses develop pari passu with the physicalization of humanity.

In general the consensus of all antiquity was that communication or intercourse of any kind with astral entities, whether spooks, shells, elementaries, or what not, was extremely dangerous and often evil in their influence upon human character. In India such astral entities are called bhutas, pisachas, etc.

In its connection with nephesh, equivalent to the Greek psyche or Latin anima, there is frequently found the phrase nephesh hayyah (living creature). Equivalent also to the Sanskrit prana or vitality; and when considered as an entity, it corresponds closely with the astral monad, for prana or vitality must have its astral vehicle or body to work through, such as the linga-sarira.

In modern sciences dealing with biology, evolution, and anthropology, legitimate inference from facts has been much interfered with by preconceived ideas. Modern science suffers from its failure to see the necessity of postulating an astral or formative world behind the physical, this astral world being in itself but one stage in a rising scale or ladder of invisible worlds. To ascertain the facts upon which to build a true inductive system, we must admit the existence in man of means of direct perception other than those afforded by the physical senses.

Inner Man The true and immortal entity in us, as contrasted with the outward and mortal form (physical body, astral body, etc.). The higher ego, the higher manas or manas in conjunction with atma-buddhi; nous as opposed to psyche.

In our day cremation is favored chiefly for hygienic reasons, as preventing the pollution of the soil and water supply and thus removing causes of infection. Cremation does not destroy even the chemical atoms, much less the life-atoms. It aids the dissolution of the astral body, which is no longer attracted magnetically to the decaying corpse or able to exchange life-atoms with it.

In past stages of evolution, when inchoate attempts at formation were made, and when planes and states of matter were not as they are now, strange monsters existed, which were at first purely lower astral, then astral-physical, and finally physical, before they died out. Hence the idea that the hydra was derived from traditions or astral visions of some reptile-monster of the Mesozoic Age may be an imperfect intuition of the facts.

In popular modern theosophical literature, the word has also been applied to the phantoms or kama-rupic shades of disimbodied persons in general, especially to the case of grossly materialistic humans whose evil impulses and appetites, still inhering in the kama-rupic phantom, draw these phantoms to physical spheres congenial to them. Even these last are a real danger to the psychological health and sanity of imbodied humans, and literally haunt living human beings possessing tendencies akin to their own. Such soulless astral shells are less dangerous than actual elementaries because far less conscious, but are still filled with energies of a depraved and ignoble type. Their destiny is like that of all other pretas or bhutas — ultimate disintegration; for the gross astral atoms composing them slowly dissolve after the manner of a dissolving column of smoke.

Insanity [from Latin in not + sanus sound] Unsoundness of the mental faculties or organs, with or without loss of volition and of consciousness. “Arcane science teaches that the abandonment of the living body by the soul frequently occurs, and that we encounter every day, in every condition of life, such living corpses. Various causes, among them overpowering fright, grief, despair, a violent attack of sickness, or excessive sensuality may bring this about. The vacant carcass may be entered and inhabited by the astral form of an adept sorcerer, or an elementary (an earth-bound disembodied human soul), or, very rarely, an elemental. . . . In insanity, the patient’s astral being is either semi-paralyzed, bewildered, and subject to the influence of every passing spirit of any sort, or it has departed forever, and the body is taken possession of by some vampirish entity near its own disintegration, and clinging desperately to earth, whose sensual pleasures it may enjoy for a brief season longer by this expedient” (IU 2:589).

Intermediate Nature ::: To speak of man as a trichotomy, or as having a division into three parts -- as in the Christian NewTestament: a "natural" body, a psychical body, and a spiritual body -- is a convenient expression, but itby no means sets forth in detail the entire economy of man's inner being.Following then this trichotomy, there is first the divinespiritual element in the human constitution whichis man's own individual inner god; second, the soul or human monad, which is his human egoic self, hisintermediate or psychical or second nature; third, all the composite lower part of him which althoughcomprising several sheaths may be conveniently grouped under the one term vehicle or body. Gods,monads, and atoms collectively in nature are copied in the essential trichotomy of man, as spirit, soul,and body, and hence the latter is another way of saying man's divine-spiritual, intermediate soul, andastral-physical parts.It is the intermediate nature, offspring of the divine spark, which enshrines the ray from the divine spark,its spiritual sun so to say, and steps it down into the ordinary mentality of man. It is this intermediatenature which reincarnates. The divine-spiritual part of man does not reincarnate, for this part of man hasno need of learning the lessons that physical life can give: it is far above them all. But it is theintermediate part functioning through the various garments or sheaths of the inner man -- these garmentsmay be called astral or ethereal -- which in this manner can reach down to and touch our earthly plane;and the physical body is the garment of flesh in touch with the physical world.The intermediate nature is commonly called the human soul. It is an imperfect thing, and is that whichcomes back into incarnation, because it is drawn to this earth by attraction. It learns much needed lessonshere, in this sphere of the universal life. (See also Principles of Man)

In the Hindu pantheon a cognate is Annapurna (a name of Devi-Durga, wife of Siva), meaning “full of food” — the fecund mother, the “Astral Light in one of its multitudinous aspects” (SD 1:92). See also ANAITIS; MARY

In theosophy, atoms have to be considered in relation to monads; in The Secret Doctrine gods, monads, and atoms are a triad like spirit, soul, and body. A monad is a divine-spiritual life-atom, a living being, evolving on its own plane, and a life-atom is the vehicle of the monad which ensouls it, and in turn ensouls a physical atom. The ultimates of nature are atoms on the material side, monads on the energic side; monads are indivisible, atoms divisible (a departure from the etymological meaning). Thus there is a quaternary of gods, monads, life-atoms, and physical atoms. “An atom may be compared to (and is for the Occultist) the seventh principle of a body or rather of a molecule. The physical or chemical molecule is composed of an infinity of finer molecules and these in their turn of innumerable and still finer molecules. Take for instance a molecule of iron and so resolve it that it becomes non-molecular; it is then, at once transformed into one of its seven principles, viz., its astral body; the seventh of these is the atom. The analogy between a molecule of iron, before it is broken up, and this same molecule after resolution, is the same as that between a physical body before and after death. The principle remains minus the body. Of course this is occult alchemy, not modern chemistry” (TBL 84).

In theosophy the moon is only physically a satellite of the earth; in other respects it is the earth’s mother. Modern astronomy knows nothing as to the actual cosmological role played in the spatial deeps by the satellites of the planets or of the suns — particularly those moon-satellites, which being true moons (as is the moon of earth) are the extinct astral bodies or kama-rupas of the former physical imbodiments of the globe-chain, which now they accompany as attendants. The parts that the true moons especially play in the drama of cosmogonical history is enormous. Such true moons are the dwellers on the threshold of the globes which they thus attend.

In the psychological division made by the ancient Greeks, the phren stands properly for that portion of the human constitution which is ordinarily designated as human mind or reason, the typical characteristic of the human soul which undergoes its devachan. Hence it is that Homer described the shade or ghost of Patroclus as having both psyche and eidolon, or animal instincts and kama-rupic shape, but entirely without phren — human mind or reason, which had already shaken off the kama-rupa and gone into its devachan. The reference to the phren still existing in the kama-rupic shade of Teiresias, in the Odyssey, shows that in this case this great Greek prophet and initiate is spoken of in connection with his nirmanakayic work in the astral world. So well was this known to the ancients, that Teiresias was supposed to retain all his powers after death, while the lower principles of other mortals who died became shades.

In The Secret Doctrine chemistry is mentioned as being, together with biology, one of the magicians of the future, especially in its form of chemical physics, when it is no longer the mechanistic science into which it has degenerated. “In Esoteric Philosophy, every physical particle corresponds to and depends on its higher noumenon — the Being to whose essence it belongs; and above as below, the Spiritual evolves from the Divine, the psycho-mental from the Spiritual — tainted from its lower plane by the astral — the whole animate and (seemingly) inanimate Nature evolving on parallel lines, and drawing its attributes from above as well as from below” (SD 1:218).

In the Vedantic fourfold classification of the human constitution, it is the second division — the others being 1) sthula-sarira, 3) karana-sarira, and 4) atman. The sukshma-sarira “bears to the physical body the same relationship which the astral world bears to the objective plane of the solar system. It is sometimes called kama-rupa in our theosophical dissertations. This unfortunate expressive has given rise also to a misconception that the principle called kama represents this astral body itself, and is transformed into it. But it is not so. It is composed of elements of quite a different nature. Its senses are not so differentiated and localized as in the physical body, and, being composed of finer materials, its powers of action and thought are considerably greater than those found in the physical organism” (Notes on BG 30-1).

In the Zohar and Talmud, the place of purification. After death, Dumah (the Angel of Death, or the shadowy land of silence, the region of the astral dead — She’ol, Hades, the underworld) leads the impure Neshamah to the dwelling of Gei’ Hinnom, where it must be purified in order to proceed upon its journey (Zohar i 218b). Just as cities need a crematorium for purifying purposes, so has the earth a gehenna, a planet like our own which is “termed by the occultists the eighth sphere . . . on which all the dross and scorification of the cosmic matter pertaining to our planet is in a continual state of remodelling” (IU 1:328).

In working upon the physical body, prana automatically uses the linga-sarira (model-body) as its vehicle of expression during earth-life. Prana may be said to be the psychoelectric veil or field manifesting in the individual as vitality. The life-atoms of prana fly instantly back, at the moment of physical dissolution, to the natural pranic reservoirs of the planet. Further, occultism teaches that “(a) the life-atoms of our (Prana) life-principle are never entirely lost when a man dies. That the atoms best impregnated with the life-principle (an independent, eternal, conscious factor) are partially transmitted from father to son by heredity, and partially are drawn once more together and become the animating principle of the new body in every new incarnation of the Monads. Because (b), as the individual Soul is even the same, so are the atoms of the lower principles (body, its astral, or life double, etc.), drawn as they are by affinity and Karmic law always to the same individuality in a series of various bodies, etc. . . .” (SD 2:671-2).

  “is that ethereal form which one would assume when leaving his physical he would appear in his astral body — having in addition all the knowledge of an Adept. The Bodhisattva develops it in himself as he proceeds on the Path. Having reached the goal and refused its fruition, he remains on Earth, as an Adept; and when he dies, instead of going into Nirvana, he remains in that glorious body he has woven for himself, invisible to uninitiated mankind, to watch over and protect it. . . . to be enabled to help humanity, an Adept who has won the right to Nirvana, ‘renounces the Dharmakaya body’ in mystic parlance; keeps, of the Sambhogakaya, only the great and complete knowledge, and remains in his Nirmanakaya body. The esoteric school teaches that Gautama Buddha with several of his Arhats is such a Nirmanakaya . . .” (VS 96-7).

  “It is this kama-rupa which legend and story in the various ancient world-religions or philosophies speak of as the ‘shade,’ and which it has been customary in the Occident to call the ‘spook,’ or ‘ghost.’ It is, in short, all the mortal elements of the human soul that was. The kama-rupa is an exact astral duplicate, in appearance and mannerism, of the man who died; it is his eidolon or ‘image’ ” (OG 76-7).

It might be said that the universe is infilled with chiliocosms, each one corresponding more or less to a hierarchy with its own integral system of worlds, regions, or divisions, each division again being subdivided to form the vast complexity of universal nature we see around us. Further, each such hierarchy from another standpoint consists of divine, spiritual, intellectual, astral, or astral-physical divisions running from the higher downwards to the lowest; and the three lowest of each such chiliocosm bear the names kama-loka (or kama-dhatu), rupa-loka (or rupa-dhatu), and arupa-loka (or arupa-dhatu), these three commonly spoken of as the trailokya, the name applying to whatever universe, hierarchy, or chiliocosm they may be in or belong to.

“It thus becomes clear why the Agnishwatta, devoid of the grosser creative fire, hence unable to create physical man, having no double, or astral body, to project, since they were without any form, are shown in exoteric allegories as Yogis, Kumaras (chaste youths), who became ‘rebels,’ Asuras, fighting and opposing gods . . . Yet it is they alone who could complete man, i.e., make of him a self-conscious, almost a divine being — a god on Earth. The Barhishad, though possessed of creative fire, were devoid of the higher mahat-mic element. Being on a level with the lower principles — those which precede gross objective matter — they could only give birth to the outer man, or rather to the model of the physical, the astral man” (SD 2:78-9). The barhishads “could only create, or rather clothe, the human Monads with their own astral Selves, but they could not make man in their image and likeness. ‘Man must not be like one of us,’ say the creative gods, entrusted with the fabrication of the lower animal but higher; . . . Their creating the semblance of men out of their own divine Essence means, esoterically, that it is they who became the first Race, and thus shared its destiny and further evolution. They would not, simply because they could not, give to man that sacred spark which burns and expands into the flower of human reason and self-consciousness, for they had it not to give” (SD 2:94-5).

Jagrat(Sanskrit) ::: The state of consciousness when awake, as opposed to svapna, the dreaming-sleeping state ofconsciousness, and different again from sushupti when the human consciousness is plunged intoprofound self-oblivion. The highest of all the states into which the consciousness may cast itself, or becast, is the turiya ("fourth"), which is the highest state of samadhi, and is almost a nirvanic condition.All these states or conditions of the consciousness are affections or phases of the constitution of man, andof beings constructed similarly to man. The waking state, or jagrat, is the state or condition ofconsciousness normal to the imbodied human being when not asleep. Svapna is the state ofconsciousness more or less freed from the sheath of the body and partially awake in the astral realms,higher or lower as the case may be. Sushupti is the state of self-oblivion into which the human being isplunged when the percipient consciousness enters into the purely manasic condition, which isself-oblivion for the relatively impotent brain-mind; whereas the turiya state, which is a practicalannihilation of the ordinary human consciousness, is an attainment of union with atma-buddhiovershadowing or working through the higher manas. Actually, therefore, it is becoming at one with themonadic essence.

Jiva(Sanskrit) ::: This is a word meaning essentially a living being per se, apart from any attributes or qualitiesthat such living being may have or possess. It therefore is the exactly proper equivalent of thetheosophical term monad. In one sense, therefore, jiva could be also used for a life-atom, provided thatthe emphasis be laid on the word life, or rather life-entity -- not an "atom of life," but a being whoseessence is pure living individuality. Monad in its divine-spiritual essence, and life-atom in itspranic-astral-physical being -- such is a jiva; and between these two extremes are the numerous planes orsheaths on and in which the individualized consciousness works.

Ka (Egyptian) Ka plural kau. Equivalent to the astral double, model-body, or linga-sarira. The ancient Egyptians held that when a human being was born, the ka was born with him and remained with him throughout his life. Even after death it remained in the tomb with the corpse; it was popularly believed that the offerings placed on graves were made to perpetuate the ka. Furthermore, the gods possessed them, each deity being said to have many kau; thus in one text the god Ra is said to possess seven bau (souls) and 14 kau. Even cities were held to possess kau in the heaven world.

Kala Brahma (Gouri) Another name for the god Sabda Brahma, a mystic name for akasa or the astral light, the source of occult sounds and the power of mantras. Sabda Brahma’s “vehicle is called Shadja, and the latter is the basic tone in the Hindu musical scale. It is only after . . . passing through the study of preliminary sounds, that a Yogi begins to see Kala Brahma, i.e., perceives things in the Astral Light” (BCW 4:166; cf 4:164).

Kama-loka is the abode of the disimbodied astral forms called kama-rupas and of the still highly vitalized astral entities who quit physical existence as suicides and executed criminals who, thus violently hurled out of their bodies before the term of natural death, are as fully alive as ever they were on earth, lacking only the physical body and its linga-sarira. In addition the kama-loka contains elementaries and lost souls tending to avichi. All these entities remain in kama-loka until they fade out from it by the complete exhaustion of the effects of the mental and emotional impulses that created these eidolons of human and animal passions and desires. The second death takes place in kama-loka, after the upper duad frees itself of the lower, material human elements before entering devachan. “If, contrariwise, the entity in the kama-loka is so heavy with evil and is so strongly attracted to earth-spheres that the influence of the monad cannot withdraw the Reincarnating Ego from the Kama-rupa, then the latter with its befouled ‘soul’ sinks lower and lower and may even enter the Avichi. If the influence of the monad succeeds, as it usually does, in bringing about the ‘second death,’ then the kama-rupa becomes a mere phantom or kama-rupic spook, and begins instantly to decay and finally vanishes away, its component life-atoms pursuing each one the road whither its attractions draw it” (OG 76). The highest regions of kama-loka blend into the lowest regions of devachan, while the grossest and lowest regions of kama-loka bend into the highest regions of avichi.

Kama-Loka(Sanskrit) ::: A compound which can be translated as "desire world," which is accurate enough, but onlyslightly descriptive. It is a semi-material plane or rather world or realm, subjective and invisible tohuman beings as a rule, which surrounds and also encloses our physical globe. It is the habitat ordwelling-place of the astral forms of dead men and other dead beings -- the realm of the kama-rupas ordesire-bodies of defunct humans. "It is the Hades," as H. P. Blavatsky says, "of the ancient Greeks, andthe Amenti of the Egyptians, the land of Silent Shadows."It is in the kama-loka that the second death takes place, after which the freed upper duad of the humanbeing that was enters the devachan. The highest regions of the kama-loka blend insensibly into the lowestregions or realms of the devachan; and, conversely, the grossest and lowest regions of the kama-lokablend insensibly into the highest regions of the avichi.When the physical body breaks up at death, the astral elements of the excarnate entity remain in thekama-loka or "shadow world," with the same vital centers as in physical life clinging within them, stillvitalizing them; and here certain processes take place. The lower human soul that is befouled withearth-thought and the lower instincts cannot easily rise out of the kama-loka, because it is foul, it isheavy; and its tendency is consequently downwards. It is in the kama-loka that the processes ofseparation of the monad from the kama-rupic spook or phantom take place; and when this separation iscomplete, which is the second death above spoken of, then the monad receives the reincarnating egowithin its bosom, wherein it enjoys its long rest of bliss and recuperation. If, contrariwise, the entity inthe kama-loka is so heavy with evil and is so strongly attracted to earth spheres that the influence of themonad cannot withdraw the reincarnating ego from the kama-rupa, then the latter with its befouled soulsinks lower and lower and may even enter the avichi. If the influence of the monad succeeds, as it usuallydoes, in bringing about the second death, then the kama-rupa becomes a mere phantom or kama-rupicspook, and begins instantly to decay and finally vanishes away, its component life-atoms pursuing eachone the road whither its attractions draw it.

Kama-loka (Sanskrit) Kāma-loka [from kāma desire + loka world, sphere] Desire world; a semi-material plane, subjective and invisible to us, the astral region penetrating and surrounding the earth. It is the original of the Christian purgatory, where the soul undergoes purification from its evil deeds and the material side of its nature. It is equivalent to the Hades of the Greeks and the Amenti of the Egyptians, the land of Silent Shadows.

Kama-manas in the human constitution is conditionally immortal or mortal: if the kama-manas aspires successfully upwards and makes intellectual and emotional union with the buddhi over-enlightening it, the immortality for the manvantara is relatively certain. If, however, the kama-manas is insufficiently illuminated to withstand successfully the attractions of the lower astral and material realms of feeling and thought, it is attracted downwards and becomes enchained in these lower realms, and immortality in this case is lost, for the time being at least.

Kama Rupa: A Sanskrit term used in metaphysics and esoteric philosophy to designate a subjective, astral form which lives on after the death of the physical body; an eidolon. The Kama Rupa is believed to fade away and disintegrate gradually, although necromantic practices and ardent wishes of surviving kin may draw it back into the terrestrial sphere and extend its existence, causing it to become a vampire which feeds on the life force of those who called it back.

Kama-Rupa(Sanskrit) ::: A compound word signifying "desire body." It is that part of man's inner constitution in whichdwell or inhere the various desires, affections, hates, loves -- in short, the various mental and psychicalenergies. After death it becomes the vehicle in the astral worlds of the higher principles of the man thatwas. But these higher principles are nevertheless scarcely conscious of the fact, because the rupture ofthe golden cord of life at the moment of the physical death plunges the cognizing personal entity into amerciful stupor of unconsciousness, in which stupor it remains a longer or shorter period depending uponits qualities of spirituality or materiality. The more spiritual the man was the longer the period ofmerciful unconsciousness lasts, and vice versa.After death, as has been frequently stated elsewhere, there occurs what is called the second death, whichis the separation of the immortal part of the second or intermediate duad from the lower portions of thisduad, which lower portions remain as the kama-rupa in the etheric or higher astral spheres which areintermediate between the devachanic and the earthly spheres. In time this kama-rupa gradually fades outin its turn, its life-atoms at such dissolution passing on to their various and unceasing peregrinations.It is this kama-rupa which legend and story in the various ancient world religions or philosophies speakof as the shade, and which it has been customary in the Occident to call the spook or ghost. It is, in short,all the mortal elements of the human soul that was. The kama-rupa is an exact astral duplicate, inappearance and mannerism, of the man who died; it is his eidolon or "image." (See also Second Death)

Kama (Sanskrit) Kāma [from the verbal root kam to desire] Desire; the fourth substance-principle of which the human constitution is composed: its desire principle or the driving, impelling force. Born from the interaction of atman, buddhi, and manas, kama per se is a colorless force, good or bad according to the way the mind and soul use it. It is the seat of the living electric impulses, desires, aspirations, considered in their energic aspect. When a person follows his lower impulses and centers his consciousness in the body and astral nature, he is directing that force downwards. When he aspires and opens his heart and mind to the influence of his higher manas and buddhi, he is directing that force upwards and thus progressing in evolution.

Kandu represents the age of ethereal or astral humanity, of early nascent, physical first root-race, still mindless and senseless. He, as a race, gives birth to the second root-race, called the sweat-born, through Pramlocha.

Kanya (Sanskrit) Kanyā Virgin; the sixth zodiacal sign, Virgo, which may represent mahamaya or sakti. The saktis or six primary forces in nature (parasakti, jnanasakti, ichchhasakti, kriyasakti, kundalinisakti, and mantrikasakti) together are represented by the astral light, called the heavenly or celestial Virgin by Kabalists and Hermetic philosophers.

Karabtanos (Gnostic) In the Codex Nazaraeus, the spirit of blind or animal desire, son of Spiritus (Anima Mundi or the astral light), and generator, by the astral light as mother, of seven other spirits of his own kind: pure spirit fails at creation, so that it is only when Karabtanos “consents to help his mother, that the ‘Spiritus’ conceives and brings forth ‘Seven Figures,’ and again ‘Seven’ and once more ‘Seven’ (the Seven Virtues, Seven Sins and Seven Worlds” (BCW 6:192n). He is a symbol of matter; also of kama-rupas in the astral world, said to be without sense or judgment.

Karanatman (Sanskrit) Kāraṇātman [from kāraṇa cause + ātman self] The causal self; the divine source of one’s being, from which flow forth in a descending scale in continuously less ethereal grades and qualities the various elements which form the human compound constitution. It is the causal self because from it as the primordial fountain of consciousness and being flow forth all the elements, principles, qualities, characteristics — the svabhava — of any entity undergoing its long evolutionary peregrination in the realms of the manifested universe. It is equivalent to atman, called in Hindu literature Isvara (Lord). The various monads in the human constitution — divine, spiritual, human, animal, and astral-vital — are derivatives from this fundamental or supreme atman in the constitution, its children or offspring. These various monads by their reproductive action actually are the causal principles or instruments of the various and unending series of reimbodiments that any entity during the kosmic manvantara is under karmic necessity of undergoing; and it is, therefore, these various monads in their outer or vehicular aspect which are the respective karanopadhis or karana-sarira.

Karmabandha (Sanskrit) Karmabandha [from karma action, activity + bandha bond, fetter] The bonds of karma or action; the repeated existences of an entity brought about by the karmic bonds of continuation, born of thought, feeling, and action. A being which has no karmabandha has attained freedom from the enthralling chains and attractions of material existence; but such a jivanmukta nevertheless has karma belonging to and suitable to the plane on which it then is. Thus a jivanmukta can rise above karma relative to the lower realms of being; but as long as any entity, however high, endures as an individualized monadic center, it inevitably produces karma of some kind appropriate to its own high sphere of life and activity. For the meaning of karma is action or activity of any kind — spiritual, intellectual, psychological, astral, or physical. We human beings, living in the lower planes, produce karma corresponding to us and our environment; but the gods, because individualized and active beings in their own spheres, produce of necessity karma corresponding with their own lofty state.

Karmendriyas (Sanskrit) Karmendriya-s Organs of action; the innate astral-vital-physical organs of sensation and action on the physical plane — the generative organs, hands, feet, excretory organs, and mouth. They form one of the three classes of indriyas (organs, channels, instruments) given in Hindu philosophy, the others being buddhindriyas (organs of spiritual consciousness, sense, and action) and jnanendriyas (organs of intellectual and psychological consciousness) (FSO 275-6). The karmendriyas also have correspondences with the tanmatras (rudiments), bhutas (elements), and jnanendriyas (sense organs) as well as with the lokas, rupas, and human principles and senses (BCW 12:660-1, 12:667). See also INDRIYA

Ka: The ancient Egyptian term for the astral body (q.v.), conceived of as the guardian and companion of the soul both in the physical body and in the after-life.

Khaba or Khaibit (Egyptian) Khaba or Khaibit. Shade, shadow; many of the deities are represented with two bodies, one often termed the thought-body, corresponding to the mayavi-rupa. There were other Egyptian terms for the mayavi-rupa. Blavatsky made khaba equivalent in the human constitution to the spiritual soul or buddhi, whereas Massey made it equivalent to astral body or linga-sarira (SD 2:632-3). See also KA

Khaibit: In Egyptian occultism, the third member of the higher triad: Ka, the astral body, Ba, the soul, and Khaibit, the shadow.

Kothnoth ‘Or (Hebrew) Kothnōth ‘Ōr [from kuthoneth undergarment, tunic, close coat + ‘ōr skin, whether human or animal] Also Chitonuth-our. Coats of skin; used in Genesis (3:21): “Unto Adam also and to his wife did the Lord God make coats of skin, and clothed them,” referring to the third root-race when truly astral humanity became physicalized or carnalized, thus receiving a body of flesh or coat of skin.

Kwei Shen, Kuei Shen (Chinese) “Man is a product of the beneficial operation of Heaven and Earth, or of the copulation of the Yin and the Yang, and the union of a kwei with a shen; he consists of the finest breath which the five elements contain” (Li yun 3). The mayavi-rupa, which is the combination by the power of thought (or the inner kriyasakti) of the manasic faculty with a tenuous astral garment. The mayavi-rupa, however, is more often made to contain the complete human being minus the lowest triad (body, physical vitality, and linga-sarira); thus only in one sense does the mayavi-rupa correspond with the kwei shen. In the lower parts of the human constitution, it becomes vehicular rather than related to active self-consciousness, and can signify the vital body or linga-sarira.

Lamiae (Latin from Greek) According to classical popular ideas, monsters with the head and breast of a woman and the body of a serpent, alluring and destructive to men; astral vampires haunting human beings of negative and sympathetic character. Also an elementary, an earth-bound astral sorcerer of either sex; in some cases the lamiae are the astral shells.

Lararium (Latin) A shrine for holding the lares (images of the household gods) and similar relics in the houses of ancient Romans. The lares are described as those parts of the human constitution left behind by the immortal monad after death, these remnants being of different classes because belonging to different planes. The Latins grouped them under three general planes: manes, lares, and lemures. The lemures were virtually the kama-lokic shades or shells, and so likewise were the larvae; the lares were at once the ancestral images in a family or of a city, and at the same time more mystically the quasi-personalized astral forces hovering around and thus becoming tutelary influences — a Roman belief difficult to describe; whereas the manes corresponded more closely to excarnate human monads. See also LARVA

Larva: In occultism, a visible manifestation of the astral shell or etheric double (q.v.).

Larva (Latin) A ghost, phantom; used by certain Latin writers, such as Apuleius (2nd century), for the animal souls or astral-vital shells of deceased persons. Those shells which were more or less earth-bound and of grossly material character, and therefore baneful in their influence on living humans, were commonly called larvae, as distinguished from the lares, which were inoffensive or even friendly to the living. Larvae, therefore, are the astral and kamic remnants cast off by the disembodied ego in kama-loka, the shades or spooks, also including elementaries, all to be shunned by imbodied people, as they are without intelligence and conscience and invariably vampirize astrally and vitally those who give them the opportunity of doing so.

Leffas: In occult terminology, the astral bodies (q.v.) of plants.

Lemures (Latin) Shades of the departed; used in archaic Rome for a class of entities of the underworld or the astral light, in an inclusive sense embracing both kama-rupic shells, called larvae, and the higher portions of the human constitution which have separated from the shells and were called lares or manes.

Life-Atom ::: A learning, evolving entity, each one a unit in one or other of the numberless hosts or hierarchies of themwhich exist. A life-atom is a vital individualized vehicle or body of a spiritual monad, which latter is theconsciousness-center, the ultimate, noblest, highest, finest part of us. The heart of every life-atom is aspiritual monad. Life-atoms are young gods, embryo gods, and are, therefore, in a continuous process ofself-expressing themselves on the planes of matter.A life-atom may be briefly said to be the ensouling power in every primary or ultimate particle. An atomof physical matter is ensouled by such a life-atom, which is its pranic-astral-vital primary, the life-atomof it. The life-atom is not the physical atom, which latter is but its garment or vehicle and is compoundedof physical matter only, which breaks up when its term of life has run, and which will return again inorder to reimbody itself anew through the instrumentality and by the innate force or energy latent in itsensouling primary, the life-atom.In other words, the life-atom has a house of life, and this house of life is its body or physical atom; andthe life-atom itself is the lowest expression of the monadic light within that atomic house.

Life-atom In theosophical literature, the vital ensouling power or vital entified unit in every primary or ultimate physical particle, itself a vital quasi-conscious individualized vehicle of the spiritual monad or highest consciousness-center. A life-atom is not the physical atom of science, which is but the vehicle or garment of the former, compounded of physical or physical-astral matter only. This being so, an atom decomposes when its term of expression on this plane is ended, but it reimbodies itself again, doing so by the innate force or life which its ensouling monad (life-atom) radiates. The term does not mean the ultimates or primary particles of prana (life principle or life force). Prana, itself derivative from the jiva, is as an entity quite distinct from the atoms it animates. The physical atoms belong to the lowest or grossest state of matter on our plane, while jiva essentially is an emanation or outpouring from atman or paramatman.

Life-atoms may be said to belong to all planes, functioning within each of the seven principles of which the human composition is built: thus we may speak of divine life-atoms, spiritual life-atoms, intellectual, psychic, vital, astral, and physical life-atoms. During man’s life those which are intimately connected with an individual are in a state of constant flux and reflux, entering and leaving in unceasing rhythms the body of their owner or host; but after death the dominant controlling factor having departed from the lower planes, each group of life-atoms proceeds to peregrinate throughout their respective natural habitats. Thus when the physical body dies, the life-atoms of the body go into the soil, into plants, or into the bodies of beasts or men — through food or by osmosis, or in breathing creatures through the air that is inspired or expired — they are drawn to bodies by magnetic sympathy. This transmigration of the life-atoms is the origin of the theories of the transmigration of the human soul into beasts after death.

Life-wave Each of the different classes or hosts of monads, whether considered as seven, ten, or twelve. Each class consists of monads in seven, ten, or twelve degrees of advancement. The ten classes or life-waves comprise three elemental, the mineral, the vegetable, the animal, the human, and three dhyan-chohanic kingdoms. When the hosts of beings forming a life-wave — entities derived from a former, now-dead planet — feel the impulse arriving for them to enter on their further evolutionary course, they cycle from globe to globe in regular serial order along the entire planetary chain which has been prepared for them by the three classes or hosts of elementals, who may be regarded as the predecessors of the life-waves, or as forming part of them. Each life-wave passes seven times around the seven spheres of the planetary chain, at first during our round cycling down the shadowy arc until the evolutionary bottom of the movement is attained during the middle of the fourth round, and then rising along the luminous arc, such round therefore passing through all the seven elements of the cosmos; each entity, whether divine, spiritual, mental, psychic, astral, and even physical, continuously progressing through the seven cosmic elements towards the source from which the life-wave started. The life-waves follow one another in the order named from globe to globe of the chain; but during the course of the ascent up the luminous arc, and before the seventh globe is reached, the law of retardation operates on the lower kingdoms in such fashion that all the seven classes complete their round more or less at the same time on the last globe. This constitutes a chain-round, and is followed by a chain minor nirvana. The time period during which the life-wave completes its evolution through seven root-races on one globe of the chain is a globe-round.

Life-Wave ::: This is a term which means the collective hosts of monads, of which hosts there are seven or ten,according to the classification adopted. The monad is a spiritual ego, a consciousness-center, being in thespiritual realms of the universal life what the life-atoms are in the lower planes of form. These monadsand life-atoms collectively are the seven (or ten) life-waves -- these monads with the life-atoms in andthrough which they work; these life-atoms having remained, when the former planetary chain went intopralaya, in space as kosmic dust on the physical plane, and as corresponding life-atoms or life-specks ofdifferentiated matter on the intermediate planes above the physical. Out of the working of the monads asthey come down into matter -- or rather through and by the monadic rays permeating the lower planes ofmatter -- are the globes builded. The seven (or ten) life-waves or hosts of monads consist of monads inseven (or ten) degrees of advancement for each host.When the hosts of beings forming the life-wave -- the life-wave being composed of the entities derivedfrom a former but now dead planet, in our case the moon -- find that the time has arrived for them toenter upon their own particular evolutionary course, they cycle downwards as a life-wave along theplanetary chain that has been prepared for them by the three hosts of elementary beings, of the threeprimordial elementary worlds, the forerunners of the life-wave, yet integral parts of it. This life-wavepasses seven times in all around the seven spheres of our planetary chain, at first cycling down theshadowy arc through all the seven elements of the kosmos, gathering experience in each one of them;each particular entity of the life-wave, no matter what its grade or kind -- spiritual, psychic, astral,mental, divine -- advancing, until at the bottom of the arc, when the middle of the fourth round isattained, they feel the end of the downward impulse. Then begins the upward impulse, the reascent alongthe luminous arc upwards, towards the source from which the life-wave originally came.

Lilin (Aramaic) Līlīn. In the Hebrew Qabbalah, a name for those general classes of astral and semi-astral entities who in the early times of the human race, notably during the third root-race, were the offspring of unconscious sorcery arising in intercourse between the unconscious mankind of those times and astral or semi-astral entities lower than man. For this reason in the Qabbalah they are inaccurately but graphically called demons. Referred to as children of Lilith and their descendants.

Lilith or the Liliths in the common Talmudic idea are nocturnal specters or female creatures usually appearing at night and haunting human beings. The Rabbis describe these entities as having the female form, as being elegantly dressed, and as lying in wait for children by night. These Jewish fables,which have direct reference to female elementaries and other denizens of the astral light, and correspond to the Roman and Greek empusas, stringes, and lamiae; the Arabian ghulah (masculine ghul), entities of monstrous character dwelling in the sandy deserts, awaiting men and destroying them if possible; and to the Hindu pramlocha, khados, and dakinis.

linga deha. ::: the astral body; the subtle body

Linga-Sarira(Sanskrit) ::: Linga is a word which means "characteristic mark," hence "model," "pattern." Sarira, "form,"from a verb-root sri, meaning "to molder" or "to waste away," the word thus signifying "impermanence."The sixth substance-principle, counting downwards, of which man's constitution is composed. Themodel-body, popularly called astral body, because it is but slightly more ethereal than the physical body,and is in fact the model or framework around which the physical body is builded, and from which, in asense, the physical body flows or develops as growth proceeds.At death the linga-sarira or model-body remains in the astral realms and finally fades out, dissolving paripassu, atom by atom, with the atoms of the physical corpse. These astral realms are not one single plane,but a series of planes growing gradually more ethereal or spiritual as they approach the inward spheres ofnature's constitution or structure. The linga-sarira is formed before the body is formed, and thus serves asa model or pattern around which the physical body is molded and grows to maturity; it is as mortal as isthe physical body, and disappears with the physical body.

Linga-sarira (Sanskrit) Liṅga-śarīra [from liṅga characteristic mark, model, pattern + śarīra form from the verbal root sri to moulder, waste away] A pattern or model that is impermanent; the model-body or astral body, only slightly more ethereal than the physical body; the second principle in the ascending scale of the sevenfold human constitution. It is the astral model around which the physical body is built, and from which the physical body flows or develops as growth proceeds. “These astral realms are not one single plane, but a series of planes growing gradually more ethereal or spiritual as they approach the inward spheres of Nature’s constitution or structure. The Linga-sarira is formed before the body is formed, and thus serves as a model or pattern around which the physical body is molded and grows to maturity; it is as mortal as is the physical body, and disappears with the physical body” (OG 88), dissolving atom by atom with the atoms of the physical corpse.

Lipika (Sanskrit) Lipika [from the verbal root lip to write] A scribe; divine beings connected with karma, recorders who impress on the astral light a record of every act and thought, great or small, in the phenomenal universe. The lipika are active cosmic karmic intelligences, the highest class of architects, which lay down from manvantara to manvantara the tracks of karmic evolution to be followed by all evolving entities within the manvantara about to begin; and these tracks are rigidly begun, and their direction controlled, by the endpoint of the paths of karmic achievement in the preceding manvantara. They “project into objectivity from the passive Universal Mind the ideal plan of the universe, upon which the ‘Builders’ reconstruct the Kosmos after every Pralaya, . . . it is they who are the direct amanuenses of the Eternal Ideation — or, as called by Plato, the ‘Divine Thought’ ” (SD 1:104). The lipika thus are in every sense the agents of karmic destiny, for they are both the vehicles of divine ideation in their work, and yet the expressions of karmic law arising in the past and projected on the background of the future. Their intelligence and vitality permeate their particular universe and all the beings in it, so that the lipikas are stamped with whatever takes place.

Lipika(s)(Sanskrit) ::: This word comes from the verb-root lip, meaning "to write"; hence the word lipikas means the"scribes." Mystically, they are the celestial recorders, and are intimately connected with the working ofkarma, of which they are the agents. They are the karmic "Recorders or Annalists, who impress on the (tous) invisible tablets of the Astral Light, 'the great picture-gallery of eternity,' a faithful record of everyact, and even thought, of man [and indeed of all other entities and things], of all that was, is, or ever willbe, in the phenomenal Universe" (The Secret Doctrine 1:104).Their action although governed strictly by kosmic consciousness is nevertheless rigidly automatic, fortheir work is as automatic as is the action of karma itself. They are entities as a matter of fact, but entitieswhich work and act with the rigid automatism of the kosmic machinery, rather than like the engineer whosupervises and changes the running of his engines. In one sense they may perhaps better be called kosmicenergies -- a most difficult matter to describe.

Liquor Amnii A serous liquid which appears early and freely in the development of the embryo. Concerning the analogy between the formation of the human body and that of a planet: “This mysterious process of a nine-months’ formation, the Kabalists call the completion of the ‘individual cycle of evolution.’ As the foetus develops amidst the liquor amnii in the womb, so the Earths germinate in the universal ether, or astral fluid, in the womb of the Universe” (SD 2:188).

Lorelei The legendary maiden who sat on a rock in the Rhine between Bingen and Coblentz, combing her beautiful hair and by her entrancing song bewitching sailors on the river to their doom. She belongs to a numerous class of such mythologic maidens, representing mainly the fascinating powers of the astral light over the unwary pilgrim in search of knowledge. The astral light partakes of the “watery” cosmic element, and the nature spirits pertaining to water on this plane were called by medieval European mystics the undines, of whose entrancing beauty and singing many tales are told, such as that of Odysseus and the sirens, or the Scandinavian lake maiden.

Lower quaternary: In occult terminology, the physical body, the etheric double, the astral body, and the mental body (q.v.).

Luminous body: The Pythagorean term for the astral body (q.v.).

Lunar Chain, Moon-Chain The planetary chain of the solar system which, although now dead and in decay, was the former imbodiment of our present earth-chain. When the life forces inherent in a globe of a planetary chain have completed seven rounds on that globe, these life forces progressively pass out into a laya-center which then becomes, after a time period determined by karma, the vital nucleus for the corresponding globe or the next imbodiment of that planetary chain. This took place on the lunar chain as the globes of this chain in the preceding chain-manvantara reached the end of their life-term in manifestation, and died in serial order from the first to the last globe. Thus each globe of the lunar chain as it died became a lunar globe-corpse still infilled with the molecular life of the globe, but deprived of all its higher, more ethereal and spiritual parts — exactly as happens at the death and decay of a human physical body. Though globe D of the moon-chain, as an instance in point, thus passed into invisibility with the disintegration of its molecular components and with the passage of cosmic ages, yet we are able to discern its phantom, our moon, because our senses, correlated to the physical plane of matter of our chain, are also correlated to what on the lunar chain would be astral matter, and thus are able to perceive what is actually the kama-rupa or astral shell of globe D of the lunar chain (our moon). Hence the earth-chain is the child or reimbodiment of the lunar chain.

Mabbul (Hebrew) Mabbūl A flood, deluge, inundation. “Esoterically, the periodical outpourings of astral impurities on to the earth; periods of psychic crimes and iniquities, or of regular moral cataclysms” (TG 211).

Macrocosm ::: The anglicized form of a Greek compound meaning "great arrangement," or more simply the greatordered system of the celestial bodies of all kinds and their various inhabitants, including theall-important idea that this arrangement is the result of interior orderly processes, the effects ofindwelling consciousnesses. In other and more modern phrasing the macrocosm is the vast universe,without definable limits, which surrounds us, and with particular emphasis laid on the interior, invisible,and ethereal planes. In the visioning or view of the ancients the macrocosm was an animate kosmicentity, an "animal" in the Latin sense of this word, as an organism possessing a directing and guidingsoul. But this was only the outward or exoteric view. In the Mystery schools of the archaic ages, themacrocosm was considered to be not only what is hereinbefore just stated, but also to consist moredefinitely and specifically of seven, ten, and even twelve planes or degrees of consciousness-substanceranging from the superdivine through all the intermediate stages to the physical, and even to degreesbelow the physical, these comprised in one kosmic organic unit, or what moderns would call a universe.In this sense of the word macrocosm is but another name for kosmic hierarchy, and it must beremembered in this connection that these hierarchies are simply countless in number and not only fill butactually compose and are indeed the spaces of frontierless SPACE.The macrocosm was considered to be filled full not only with gods, but with innumerable multitudes orarmies of evolving entities, from the fully self-conscious to the quasi-self-conscious downwards throughthe merely conscious to the "unconscious." Note well that in strict usage the term macrocosm was neverapplied to the Boundless, to boundless, frontierless infinitude, what the Qabbalists called Eyn-soph. Inthe archaic wisdom, the macrocosm, belonging in the astral world, considered in its causal aspect, wasvirtually interchangeable with what modern theosophists call the Absolute.

Madan (Tamil) One that looks like a cow; wicked elementals or other astral and subastral sprites or nature spirits, half-brutes or half-monsters. They are particularly helpful to sorcerers of evil intent, as they are used for striking people and cattle with sudden illness and even death.

Magnes (Latin, Greek) Loadstone; used by Paracelsus, medieval theosophists, and alchemists for a mysterious and potent fluid, the spirit of light, whose description answers to the akasa, aether, or the most spiritual parts of the astral light. It thus corresponds to the anima mundi.

Mahatala (Sanskrit) Mahātala [from mahā great + tala sphere, place] Great place, pointing to prevalence or dominance of astral substance; the sixth in the descending scale of the seven talas. The corresponding loka or pole is bhuvarloka. Mahatala among other things corresponds to the elemental beings who are connected with taste, and therefore includes the state of consciousness appertaining to this class. It corresponds in one sense to the pranic activity in man, and in nature to the salamanders and gnomes of the Rosicrucians. Mahatala is the next to the grossest of the cosmic spheres or realms; the grossest or most material of all being patala.

Manas(Sanskrit) ::: The root of this word means "to think," "to cogitate," "to reflect" -- mental activity, in short.The center of the ego-consciousness in man and in any other quasi-self-conscious entity. The thirdsubstance-principle, counting downwards, of which man's constitution is composed.Manas springs forth from buddhi (the second principle) as the fruit from the flower; but manas itself ismortal, goes to pieces at death -- insofar as its lower parts are concerned. All of it that lives after death isonly what is spiritual in it and that can be squeezed out of it, so to say -- the "aroma" of the manas;somewhat as the chemist takes from the rose the attar or essence of roses. The monad or atma-buddhithereupon takes that "all" with it into the devachan, after the second death has taken place. Atman, withbuddhi and with the higher part of manas, becomes thereupon the spiritual monad of man. Strictlyspeaking, this is the divine monad within its vehicle -- atman and buddhi -- combined with the humanego in its higher manasic element; but they are joined into one after death, and are hence spoken of as thespiritual monad.The three principles forming the upper triad exist each on its own plane in consciousness and power; andas human beings we continuously feel their influence despite the enshrouding veils of a psychical andastral-physical character. We know of each principle only what we have so far evolved forth of it. All weknow, for instance, of the third principle (counting from the top), the manas, is what we have so farassimilated of it in this fourth round. The manas will not be fully developed in us until the end of the nextround. What we now call our manas is a generalizing term for the reincarnating ego, the higher manas.

Manes (Latin) [from manus good] Deified ancestral spirits, the benevolent class of shades, as distinguished from the larvae and lemures, which were malevolent. The word seems originally to have denoted a class of titans, kabiri, or dhyanis, and to have ranked in the sequence of patriarchs, heroes, and manes, who acted as divine instructors of earlier races. But far later, in Roman usage, the name became degraded and applied to the better astral shades or denizens in kama-loka, which in so many lands have been propitiated by offerings as is still the case with some peoples. Sometimes they wear a retributive aspect, as in Vergil, where the painful purification of the shades before they can pass to Elysium is described: “Each of us suffers his own Manes” (Aeneid 6:743).

Man ::: Man is in his essence a spark of the central kosmic spiritual fire. Man being an inseparable part of theuniverse of which he is the child -- the organism of graded consciousness and substance which thehuman constitution contains or rather is -- is a copy of the graded organism of consciousnesses andsubstances of the universe in its various planes of being, inner and outer, especially inner as being by farthe more important and larger, because causal.Human beings are one class of "young gods" incarnated in bodies of flesh at the present stage of theirown particular evolutionary journey. The human stage of evolution is about halfway between theundeveloped life-atom and the fully developed kosmic spirit or god.From another point of view, man is a sheaf or bundle of forces or energies. Force and matter, or spiritand substance being fundamentally one, hence, man is de facto a sheaf or bundle of matters of variousand differing grades of ethereality, or of substantiality; and so are all other entities and thingseverywhere.Man's nature, and the nature of the universe likewise, of which man is a reflection or microcosm or "littleworld," is composite of seven stages or grades or degrees of ethereality or of substantiality; or,kosmically speaking, of three generally inclusive degrees: gods, monads, and atoms. And so far as man isconcerned, we may take the New Testament division of the Christians, which gives the same triformconception of man, that he is composed of spirit, soul, body -- remembering, however, that all these threewords are generalizing terms.Man stands at the midway point of the evolutionary ladder of life: below him are the hosts of beings lessthan he is; above him are other hosts greater than he is only because older in experience, riper in wisdom,stronger in spiritual and in intellectual fiber and power. And these beings are such as they are because ofthe evolutionary unfoldment of the inherent faculties and powers immanent in the individuality of theinner god -- the ever-living, inner, individualized spirit.Man, then, like everything else -- entity or what is called "thing" -- is, to use the modern terminology ofphilosophical scientists, an "event," that is to say, the expression of a central consciousness-center ormonad passing through one or another particular phase of its long, long pilgrimage over and throughinfinity, and through eternity. This, therefore, is the reason why the theosophist often speaks of themonadic consciousness-center as the pilgrim of eternity.Man can be considered as a being composed of three essential upadhis or bases: first, the monadic ordivine-spiritual; second, that which is supplied by the Lords of Light, the so-called manasa-dhyanis,meaning the intellectual and intuitive side of man, the element-principle that makes man Man; and thethird upadhi we may call the vital-astral-physical.These three bases spring from three different lines of evolution, from three different and separatehierarchies of being. This is the reason why man is composite. He is not one sole and unmixed entity; heis a composite entity, a "thing" built up of various elements, and hence his principles are to a certainextent separable. Any one of these three bases can be temporarily separated from the two others withoutbringing about the death of the man physically. But the elements that go to form any one of these basescannot be separated without bringing about physical dissolution or inner dissolution.These three lines of evolution, these three aspects or qualities of man, come from three differenthierarchies or states, often spoken of as three different planes of being. The lowest comes from thevital-astral-physical earth, ultimately from the moon, our cosmogonic mother. The middle, the manasicor intellectualintuitional, from the sun. The monadic from the monad of monads, the supreme flower oracme, or rather the supreme seed of the universal hierarchy which forms our kosmical universe oruniversal kosmos.

Man may be considered as having three main bases or upadhis: 1) the monadic or divine-spiritual, emanating from the supreme or cosmic monad of our universe; 2) the mental-intuitional, supplied by the manasa-dhyanis and manifesting from the sun in their evolutionary passage; and 3) the vital-astral-physical, as well as the emotional-psychic, from the moon-chain.

Mayavi-rupa (Sanskrit) Māyāvi-rūpa [from māyāvin illusory from māyā illusion + rūpa form] Illusory body or thought-body, a higher astral-mental form. The projection of thought-consciousness-will power to any distant place while the physical body is left “entranced.” It is the whole man except the sthula-sarira (physical body), the linga-sarira (the astral or model-body) and prana. This projection can assume any form at the will of the adept. This body is called illusory because when it has accomplished its purpose, it is withdrawn and thus disappears. Synonymous with protean soul, the medieval German doppelganger, and the Tibetan hpho-wa.

Mayavi-Rupa(Sanskrit) ::: This is a compound of two words: mayavi, the adjectival form of the word maya, hence"illusory"; rupa, "form"; the mayavi-rupa or thought-body, or illusory-body, a higher astral-mental form.The mayavi can assume all forms or any form, at the will of an Adept. A synonymous philosophical termis protean soul. In Germany medieval mystics called it the doppelganger. There is a very mystical factconnected with the mayavi-rupa: the Adept is enabled to project his consciousness in the mayavi-rupa towhat would seem to the uninitiated incredible distances, while the physical body is left, as it were,intranced. In Tibet this power of projecting the mayavi-rupa is called hpho-wa.

Mediator An agent who stands or goes between, specifically one who acts as the conscious agent or intermediary of special spiritual power and knowledge. Most often applied to highly-evolved characters who mediate, not only between superhuman spiritual entities and ordinary men, but who also themselves consciously unite their own spiritual nature with their merely human souls. Such people attain to this lofty state by the great sanctity and wisdom of their lives, aided by frequent interior ecstatic contemplation. They radiate a pure and beneficent atmosphere which invites, and is congenial to, exalted spiritual beings of the solar system. Evil entities of the astral realms cannot endure their clean and highly magnetic aura, nor are they able to continue obsessing other unfortunate persons if the mediator be present and will their departure, or even approaches the sufferer. This powerful spiritual self-consciousness of the individual who is a mediator reaching upwards to superior spiritual realms, is in sharpest possible contrast with the passive, unconscious, weak-willed medium who, through ignorance or folly, becomes the agent for the use of any astral entity that may be attracted to the entranced body. Apollonius, Iamblichus, Plotinus, and Porphyry are examples of mediators: “but if the temple is defiled by the admission of an evil passion, thought or desire, the mediator falls into the sphere of sorcery. The door is opened; the pure spirits retire and the evil ones rush in. This is still mediatorship, evil as it is; the sorcerer, like the pure magician, forms his own aura and subjects to his will congenial inferior spirits” (IU 1:487).

Medicine was originally a divine science, providing for the well-being of the spiritual, mental, psychic, astral, and physical man. Archaic medicine included a profound knowledge of genuine astrology, of true alchemy, of occult physiology, of the finer forces vibrating as sound, color, form, thought, and feeling, and whatever related man to his home universe of natural law and order. This was the basis of the natural “magic” which tradition has linked with the medical art. This knowledge was dual in its power to work for life or death, for good or evil ends. Its full comprehension required not only a trained intellect, but the intuitive understanding of a pure spiritual nature. Nevertheless, the Atlanteans acquired enough knowledge of the use of dangerous powers that they became — albeit with numerous and noteworthy exceptions — a nation of sorcerers. Then, the white magicians established the Mystery schools in which to safeguard the sacred teachings from evildoers and to protect humanity from their influence. Thus, the deeper truths of the healing art have ever since been entrusted only to pledged disciples and initiates. Such fragments of it as have been rediscovered by intuitive physicians from time to time have usually been in keeping with the general cultural level of their civilization. The exceptions have been men who have frequently been too far ahead of their times to be understood. Such a man was Paracelsus in medieval Europe, persecuted for heretical teachings such as the psychoelectric and magnetic play of sidereal forces which linked man with the stars — the spiritus vitae in man came from the spiritus mundi.

Medium Anything that serves as an intermediate, especially applied by modern spiritualists to a person who, alleged to be under the “control” of some other being, usually invisible, becomes a transmitting medium for phenomenal messages, feelings, or actions. These entities, mistakenly called spirits of the dead, are no part of the spiritual nature of composite man. On the contrary, these communications come from various entities in the astral world which interpenetrates and surrounds the physical earth, just as our astral model-body and aura surround and interpenetrate our physical form, cell for cell. In our present state of evolution, the astral or model-body acts normally only when conjoined to the physical — a natural provision for protection from conditions with which we are as yet evolutionally unprepared to deal. The medium, however, is one who is born with or develops a peculiarly unstable and often actually dislocated state of the elements of his inner constitution. Thereby he becomes at times disorganized physiologically and in his nervous system, which connects the inner man with the outer world, and he suffers, in effect, a psychic dislocation. Then the entranced, unconscious medium functions with magnetic sympathy with currents and entities in the astral light, especially with those in the kama-lokic levels which are nearest the earth. Of these many entities, the types usually manifesting are nature spirits or elements of various kinds; kamic remnants, the shells or spooks of the dead; and elementaries or the imperfect astral remains of excarnate human beings who when alive on earth showed marked tendencies to gross and evil living. Being fated, because of their strongly materialistic biases and appetites, to exist in the astral realm, these last are a peculiarly dangerous and demoralizing influence, especially to people of weak will or of mediumistic temperament. Without physical body or real conscience, the elementaries yet are living entities of the unexpended force of their earth-passions and desires, eager to occupy and use a living body, meantime absorbing its vital essence if they can make psychic contact with it. They are psychomagnetically drawn to such conditions as the seance room usually offers. The delicate tingling on the medium’s skin, supposed to come from angelic fingers, is actually an astral emanation of vitality to form an atmosphere or aura for the besieging control. These feathery touches are like the aurae which often precede convulsive epileptic attacks where the pale, cold, unconscious body of the ousted sufferer becomes temporarily possessed. Each time when the passive medium is controlled, his spiritual will is progressively weakened, his higher mind is blurred, and he becomes an open door for all kinds of uncanny astral influences. It is true that psychic sensitives of clean life and honest purpose, may first attract entities belonging to higher kama-lokic levels. But the finest types of supposed spirit faces that they see are generally reflections from their own mental pictures of beloved ones, or of their own innate ideals.

Medium ::: A word of curiously ill-defined significance, and used mostly if not exclusively by modern Spiritists. Thegeneral sense of the word would seem to be a person of unstable psychical temperament, or constitutionrather, who is supposed to act as a canal or channel of transmission, hence "medium," between humanbeings and the so-called spirits.A medium actually in the theosophical teaching is one whose inner constitution is in unstable balance, orperhaps even dislocated, so that at different times the sheaths of the inner parts of the medium'sconstitution function irregularly and in magnetic sympathy with currents and entities in the astral light,more particularly in kama-loka. It is an exceedingly unfortunate and dangerous condition to be in, despitewhat the Spiritists claim for it.Very different indeed from the medium is the mediator, a human being of relatively highly evolvedspiritual and intellectual and psychical nature who serves as an intermediary or mediator between themembers of the Great Brotherhood, the mahatmas, and ordinary humanity. There are also mediators of astill more lofty type who serve as channels of transmission for the passing down of divine and spiritualand highly intellectual powers to this sphere. Actually, every mahatma is such a mediator of this highertype, and so in even larger degree are the buddhas and the avataras. A mediator is one of highly evolvedconstitution, every portion of which is under the instant and direct control of the spiritual dominating willand the loftiest intelligence which the mediator is capable of exercising. Every human being should striveto be a mediator of this kind between his own inner god and his mere brain-mind. The more he succeeds,the grander he is as a man.Mediator, therefore, and medium are the polar antitheses of each other. The medium is irregular,negative, often irresponsible or quasi-irresponsible, and uncertain, and is not infrequently the victim orplaything of evil and degenerate entities whom theosophists call elementaries, having their habitat in theastral light of the earth; whereas the mediator is one more or less fully insouled or inspirited with divine,spiritual, and intellectual powers and their corresponding faculties and organs.

Mediumship Usually, a peculiarly passive state or condition of a person, due to “disease or to the exuberance of nervous fluid,” either of which disturbs the normal balance of forces in his or her constitution. Thereby, the man or woman, becoming unconscious at times of his natural senses, is then made the automatic agent of various psycho-astral forces and entities, and these last are of several kinds: elementaries, astral shells or spooks, nature sprites, and astral and even physical elementals.

Megacosm: The world of the astral light (q.v.), neither macrocosm (q.v.) nor microcosm (q.v.) but “something between the two.”

Mental body: The “body” in which, according to occult philosophy, the conscious personality of man lives on the mental plane of existence, after “death” on the astral plane. Marc Edmund Jones calls it “the agency by which an individual functions in transcendental realms of idea, or through self-sufficient consciousness.”

Mental plane; mental world: The plane of existence after the astral plane; the plane where man is believed by occultists to live in the mental body after “death” on the astral plane.

Mercury of Nature: See: Astral light.

Mirror The astral light is often referred to as a mirror, as all manifestations are reflected in it. The Logos is also referred to as a mirror, reflecting divine mind, “and the Universe is the mirror of the Logos, though the latter is the esse of that Universe. As the Logos reflects all in the Universe of Pleroma, so man reflects in himself all that he sees and finds in his Universe, the Earth” (SD 2:25).

Monads are the ultimate elements of the universe, spiritual-substantial entities, self-motivated, self-impelled, self-conscious, in infinitely varying degrees. They engender other monads, which in turn engender others, and thus springs up the host of living entities forming the immense variety and unity of the manifested world. As any monad descends into matter, it secretes from itself various veils or vehicles adapted for its self-expression on the various cosmic planes. Thus in man there is the divine monad, the spiritual monad, the higher human or chain monad, the lower human or globe monad, the animal monad, and the astral-physical monad. The following diagram shows the relations between the cosmic principles; the monads, egos and souls in the human being; and the human principles

Moreover, the hypnotizer endangers himself by such intimate linking with the lower mind and feeling of his subject — whose spiritual nature is always beyond another’s control. From the operator’s entrance into, and operation of, the subject’s physico-astral body, there results a mutual infection with each other’s faulty human nature. Whoever thus changes the forces and trend of another’s life, obligates himself to share karmically in those changes to the end.

More than this, they can so condense the ether as to make for themselves tangible bodies which, by their Protean powers, they can cause to assume such likeness as the elementals themselves are at the time impressed to assume, this being caused by their taking automatically as their models the portraits they find stamped in the memory of a person or persons present at a seance. It is not necessary that the sitter should be thinking at the moment of the one represented: the image may have faded many years before. The mind receives indelible impressions even from chance acquaintances. As a few seconds’ exposure of the sensitized photographic plate is all that is requisite to preserve indefinitely the image of the sitter, so is it in incomparably greater degree with the mind. Unable to invent anything or to produce anything of itself, the elemental automatically reflects stamped impressions in the memory of human beings to its very depths; hence the nervous exhaustion and mental oppression of certain sensitive natures at spiritualistic circles. The elemental will bring to light long-forgotten remembrances of the past: forms, images, even familiar sentences, long since faded from memory, but vividly preserved on the astral tablets of the imperishable book of life. The elementals are very imitative, having neither developed will nor intelligence of their own which they self-consciously use, and hence tend automatically to copy forms in all the higher kingdoms. They have therefore many shapes or bodies, some of the more advanced taking even a quasi-human form.

Nadi (Sanskrit) Nāḍi A tube, vessel, or channel; that along which something flows, be it a liquid or the current of a force. Applied indiscriminately to blood vessels and nerves, and to the three mystic channels that really form the spinal column, and which carry vital and other important currents in the human constitution. The nadis are all intimately connected in function and structure with the chakras, being the influent and effluent channels to and fro as between nadi and other nadis and the body generally; for the chakras, although mainly functional in the astral part of the auric body, nevertheless have corresponding organs in the physical body.

Nama-rupa (Sanskrit) Nāma-rūpa [from nāma name + rūpa body, form] The body with a name; personality, the symbol of the unreality of material phenomenal appearances. A highly technical term in Hindu philosophy, particularly in the Vedanta. Philosophically, naman signifies the particular characteristics of the manifesting personality. Every individual has his or its own particular naman, as well as his or its own particular rupa. In consequence nama-rupa is the personality working through its two or three forms or bodies, the kama-rupa, the linga-sarira (astral form), and the sthula-sarira (physical body). This term applies equally well to a manifested entity of any kind, but with particular meaning to the lower grades or classes of manifesting beings or things. The sun, for instance, imbodies a divinity; but the nama-rupa of the sun is not the divinity, but the manifesting personality of the particular sun working through its particular rupa.

Necromancy [from Greek nekros corpse + manteia divination] The art of obtaining information by invoking the image or shade of the departed. The practice is dangerous to the sorcerer and baneful to the astral entity whose fading remnants are thus temporarily revivified and disturbed.

Nehashim (Hebrew) Nĕḥāshīm [from nāḥash to whisper, secrecy, silence, to practice magic, divine the future] Serpents, serpent’s works; the study and practice of occult wisdom and magic. According to the Zohar (iii 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 Elephas Levi, and now by all the modern Occultists” (SD 2:409) — but it likewise shows the luminous zone as the Milky Way. The astral light is often referred to as the great deceiving serpent.

Nephilim (Hebrew) Nĕfīlīm [from nāfal to fall] Giants (cf Genesis 4:4); any being, entity, or thing which falls from a higher to a lower estate, whether in the spirit, the astral, or the physical world. Thus the nephilim signify in one field of thought the manasaputras who fell into incarnation; also the human race at a later date which fell into physical generation; and other meanings implying descent. Termed Fallen Angels and equated with the third root-race and with the fallen ones of the fourth root-race (SD 2:279, 775). Theological tradition associates the nephilim with hairy men or satyrs.

Nevertheless, theosophy postulates the existence of atomic and subatomic ethers of various degrees of tenuity, ranging from physical to spiritual. Collectively these ethers are the different planes or ranges of akasa, the fundamental substratum of the universe and the garment in which the kosmic divinity clothes itself — the various prakritis as outlined especially in the Sankhya philosophy. Any scientific ether is not the akasa or aether, but solely the lowest plane of the akasic plenum, some of the ranges of the astral light, which in one sense is the highest principle of the earth’s atmosphere — a subtle ethereal energy-stuff permeant through and interpenetrating physical matter of all kinds. See also Aether; Ether

Nidana (Sanskrit) Nidāna [from ni down, into + the verbal root dā to bind] That which binds, to earth or to existence, philosophically speaking. Originally meaning bond, rope, halter — that which binds. From this arose the implication of binding cause, or bonds of causation, and hence in Buddhist philosophy it signifies cause of existence, the concatenation of cause and effect. The twelve nidanas given as the chief causes are: 1) jati (birth) according to one of the chatur-yoni, the four modes of entering incarnation, each mode placing the being in one of the six gatis; 2) jara-marana (decrepitude) and death, following the maturity of the skandhas; 3) bhava, which leads every sentient being to be born in this or another mode of existence in the trailokya and gatis; 4) upadana, the creative cause of bhava which thus becomes the cause of jati, and this creative cause is the clinging to life; 5) trishna (thirst for life, love, attachment); 6) vedana (sensation) perception by the senses, the fifth skandha; 7) sparsa (the sense of touch) contact of any kind, whether mental or physical; 8) shadayatana (the organs of sensation) the inner or mental astral seats of the organs of sense; 9) nama-rupa (name-form, personality, a form with a name to it) the symbol of the unreality of material phenomenal appearances; 10) vijnana, the perfect knowledge of every perceptible thing and of all objects in their concatenation and unity; 11) samskara, action on the plane of illusion; and 12) avidya (nescience, ignorance) lack of true perception.

’Ob (Hebrew) ’Ōb Also aub. A necromancer, one who “calls up the dead” in order to learn from them future events; secondarily, the spirit of divination in the necromancer; and thirdly, the apparition, shade, or kama-rupa itself which is raised. ’Ob is “the messenger of death used by the sorcerers, the nefarious evil fluid” (SD 1:76), the lowest aspect of the astral light — “or rather, its pernicious evil currents” (TG 237). As the astral light in its lower aspects was sometimes symbolized by a serpent, so was ’ob often thus symbolized. As signifying the powers of darkness, the denizens in the lower regions of the astral light, and the evil and immoral practices of necromancy, it is the opposite of the Shemitic word ’or (light, glory; to enlighten, inflame with wisdom and knowledge), used also for mystic revelations and the communication of esoteric truth.

Ob: In Hebrew mysticism and occultism, the Spirit of Ob personifies the evil aspects of the astral light (q.v.).

Occultism [from Latin occultus hid] The science of things behind the veils of nature both visible and invisible, things hidden from the multitudes. In theosophy frequently synonymous with the esoteric philosophy or secret doctrine. The study of genuine occultism signifies penetrating deep into the causal mysteries of universal being; the occult arts, by contrast, include psychism, black magic, hypnotism, psychologization, and similar uninstructed or malevolent uses of astral and mental forces.

Odic Chord The astral body, model-body, or linga-sarira is connected with the physical body by an extensible chord of astral-vital substance, which allows the astral to separate locally from the physical for a certain distance, as happens in sleep and trance, without severing the actual connection. When the chord is severed, however, physical death ensues. This chord is called magnetic and odic — words borrowed from the speculations of Reichenbach and the animal magnetists — for want of a better term.

Od is also used, together with the Hebrew words ob (’ob) and aour (’or), by Eliphas Levi to denote aspects of the astral light. Ob is a well-known word for sorcery and necromancy, for a sorcerer or necromancer, as well as occasionally signifying an astral shade or spook. Aour, on the contrary, signifies light, brilliance, and hence revelation and the light of initiation.

Od; Odylic or Odic Force [od poss from Hebrew ’ud to surround, enclose as by a mist, emanation, or cloud] Names given by Baron Karl von Reichenbach, German industrialist and chemist, to a cosmic force or fluid which he believed he had discovered (1845). His extensive experimental investigations on the luminous emanations from the human body, from magnets, plants, and minerals, aroused much interest among students of animal magnetism. But his results depended upon the evidence of sensitives, often invalids and people in the somnambulic condition and, as is usual under such circumstances, do not coordinate well with results obtained by others. This class of phenomena cannot be considered as entirely objective, so much being dependent on the seer. He made too broad generalizations on too narrow a basis; he was, unconsciously to himself, working with effects originating largely on the astral plane and, in spite of its delusiveness, he did discover some facts which can be related to what theosophists call prana and the astral light; but he lacked the power and knowledge to coordinate them and thus to render his researches of practical use.

Of the many types of astral elementals, connection with even those friendly to man are injurious, for they all use part of the living for their automatic actions. Moreover, black magicians who live in their kama-rupas — in the astral world — relatively few though they are, survive by using many of these nature spirits to vampirize vitality from the living. The elementaries who, unfortunately, are galvanized into a fictitious life by devitalizing the medium and the sitters — as clairvoyants have often seen — are making new evil karma, and even inviting final spiritual disaster.

Outside of mere mental images, often projected into quasi-objectivity by unconscious will-force, all phantoms originate in the astral light surrounding our earth and permeating it far more intimately than does the earth’s air or atmosphere. Consequently, phantoms are of many and various kinds. The word is likewise used, although inaccurately, to signify the appearance to a living human being of the mayavi-rupa (thought-projection body) of an adept, the reason being that whether merely astral intrusions or mayavi-rupa, both are appearances and therefore logically classified as phantoms.

Padma (Sanskrit) Padma The lotus, a flower which has been held sacred from remotest antiquity by the Aryan Hindus, as well as revered in other lands such as Egypt. Mystically, it was looked upon as an emblem of productive nature growing between the spiritual sunlight above and the water or the astral light below; or in a more general sense between spirit and matter. It has also other meanings, such as in India, of the prolific earth, and even of Mount Meru. The lotus is “a very ancient and favourite simile for the Kosmos itself, and also for man. The popular reasons given are, firstly, . . . that the Lotus-seed contains within itself a perfect miniature of the future plant, which typifies the fact that the spiritual prototypes of all things exist in the immaterial world before those things become materialised on Earth. Secondly, the fact that the Lotus plant grows up through the water, having its root in the Ilus, or mud, and spreading its flower in the air above. The Lotus thus typifies the life of man and also that of the Kosmos; . . . The root of the Lotus sunk in the mud represents material life, the stalk passing up through the water typifies existence in the astral world, and the flower floating on the water and opening to the sky is emblematical of spiritual being” (SD 1:57-8).

Palingenesy: Greek for re-birth. The transmigration of the life-energy or soul, retaining its identity, in recurrent cycles or phases. The term was employed by the occult philosophers of the seventeenth century to denote the “resurrection of plants,” and the method of achieving their astral appearance after destruction. (L. Spence, An Encyclopaedia of Occultism.)

Panchakosa (Sanskrit) Pañcakośa [from pañca five + kośa sheath] Five sheaths; according to the Vedantic classification of human principles there are five sheaths which enclose the divine monad or atman, which makes the sixth. The highest is the anandamaya-kosa, closely corresponding to the spiritual soul or buddhi; second is the vijnanamaya-kosa, the higher manas; third, the manomaya-kosa, lower manas with kama, making the human soul; fourth, the pranamaya-kosa, the vital-astral soul or prana and linga-sarira; and fifth, the annamaya-kosa, the physical body or sthula-sarira.

Perfect Land: In ancient Egyptian nomenclature, the plane of existence where the true or spirit forms of all things created exist —the astral world or astral plane.

periastral ::: a. --> Among or around the stars.

Perisprit [from Greek peri around, surrounding + Latin spiritus spirit, vital atmosphere] Used by the followers of Allan Kardec, the French spiritualist, and by Eliphas Levi, to denote the human astral double.

Personality ::: Theosophists draw a clear and sharp distinction, not of essence but of quality, between personality andindividuality. Personality comes from the Latin word persona, which means a mask, through which theactor, the spiritual individuality, speaks. The personality is all the lower man: all the psychical and astraland physical impulses and thoughts and tendencies, and what not. It is the reflection in matter of theindividuality; but being a material thing it can lead us downwards, although it is in essence a reflection ofthe highest. Freeing ourselves from the domination of the person, the mask, the veil, through which theindividuality acts, then we show forth all the spiritual and so-called superhuman qualities; and this willhappen in the future, in the far distant aeons of the future, when every human being shall have become abuddha, a christ. Such is the destiny of the human race.In occultism the distinction between the personality and the immortal individuality is that drawn betweenthe lower quaternary or four lower principles of the human constitution and the three higher principles ofthe constitution or higher triad. The higher triad is the individuality; the personality is the lowerquaternary. The combination of these two into a unity during a lifetime on earth produces what we nowcall the human being. The personality comprises within its range all the characteristics and memories andimpulses and karmic attributes of one physical life; whereas the individuality is the aeonic ego,imperishable and deathless for the period of a solar manvantara. It is the individuality through its ray orhuman astral-vital monad which reincarnates time after time and thus clothes itself in one personalityafter another personality.

Phantasma [from Greek phantazo to make visible, become visible] Phantom; Greek equivalent for various astral appearances, not only for the occasional appearance of the linga-sarira to the physical eye, but also for the various astral phantoms or kama-rupas — all originating in the lower regions of the astral light. The notion behind the word is of an image, appearance, eidolon, not the reality but seeming to be so. In this case the physical person was regarded as the reality, as in life; the phantasm was the astral image, as that of the kama-rupa of the dead Hector appearing to Aeneas.

Phantom [from Greek, Latin phantasma apparition] Specter, ghost; sometimes used of the early (astral) races of mankind, sometimes of the astral double, of various denizens of the astral plane, or even of one of the higher human principles (divine phantom).

Phone-voyance: A special form of clairvoyance, discovered and described by V. N. Turvey in 1905: the sensitive can “see” and describe objects and happenings in the physical vicinity of a person with whom he is talking over a telephone, including astral forms or spirits near the latter.

Phosphorus (Greek) phosphoros. Light-bringing; equivalent of Latin Lucifer (the morning star; a torchbearer, e.g., Hecate, a form of the moon). Satan, according to Christian legend, was once Phosphorus, the redeemer. Also a personified aspect of the astral fire and light in the anima mundi. Eliphas Levi speaks of the interior phosphorus, meaning the astral light.

Physical, Physicalization The physical plane of matter is that one of the many planes in universal nature which is coordinated with our physical senses; and the physical plane of consciousness is therefore the plane on which our consciousness functions when we are using those senses. It is characterized by the familiar qualities which science studies under the name of properties of matter. In order to understand biological evolution, it is necessary to admit the existence of the next plane above — the astral plane. The passage of the astral prototypes of organisms from the astral plane to the physical is called physicalization. Differentiation on the physical plane is caused by the psychological and astral life-agents acting in the protyle of the physical plane. Temporary and abnormal physicalization takes place in a spiritualistic materialization.

Pitri(s)(Sanskrit) ::: A word meaning "father." There are seven (or ten) classes of pitris. They are called "fathers"because they are more particularly the actual progenitors of our lower principles; whereas thedhyani-chohans are actually, in one most important sense, our own selves. We were born from them; wewere the monads, we were the atoms, the souls, projected, sent forth, emanated, by the dhyanis.The pitris, for easy understanding, may be divided into two great groups, the solar and lunar. The lunarpitris or barhishads, as the name implies, came from the moon-chain; while the solar pitris whom we maygroup under the expressive name agnishvatta-pitris are those dhyan-chohans which have not the physical"creative fire," because they belong to a much superior sphere of being, but they have all the fires of thespiritual-intellectual realms active or latent within them as the case may be. In preceding manvantarasthey had finished their evolution so far as the realms of astral and physical matter were concerned, andwhen the proper time came in the cycling ages, the agnishvatta-pitris came to the rescue of those whohad only the physical creative fire, or barhishad-pitris, the lunar pitris, inspiring and enlightening theselower pitris with the spiritual and intellectual energies or "fires."In other words, the lunar pitris may briefly be said to be those consciousness-centers in the humanconstitution which feel humanly, which feel instinctually, and which possess the brain-mind mentality.The agnishvatta-pitris are those monadic centers of the human constitution which are of a purely spiritualtype. (See also Agnishvatas, Lunar Pitris)

Planes of existence: All schools of occultism teach that the conscious personality of man lives on after the death of the physical body, and that life in the physical world, in the physical body is merely a plane of existence, after which there follows life on the astral plane and then on the mental plane.

Plane(s) ::: This is a word used in theosophy for the various ranges or steps of the hierarchical ladder of lives whichblend into each other. There are no solutions of continuity in space, either in inner and invisible space orin outward and visible space. The physical world grades off into the astral world, which grades off againinto a world higher than it, the world which is superior to the astral world; and so it continues throughoutthe series of hierarchical steps which compose a universe such as our universe. Remember also that theboundless All is filled full with universes, some so much greater than ours that the utmost reach of ourimagination cannot conceive of them.To quote H. P. Blavatsky in this connection, in her Theosophical Glossary under this same head:"As used in Occultism, the term denotes the range or extent of some state of consciousness,or of the perceptive power of a particular set of senses, or the action of a particular force, orthe state of matter corresponding to any of the above." (See also Hierarchy)

Planetary Spirit(s) ::: Every celestial body in space, of whatever kind or type, is under the overseeing and directing influenceof a hierarchy of spiritual and quasi-spiritual and astral beings, who in their aggregate are generalizedunder the name of celestial spirits. These celestial spirits exist therefore in various stages or degrees ofevolution; but the term planetary spirits is usually restricted to the highest class of these beings whenreferring to a planet.In every case, and whatever the celestial body may be, such a hierarchy of ethereal beings, when themost advanced in evolution of them are considered, in long past cycles of kosmic evolution had evolvedthrough a stage of development corresponding to the humanity of earth. Every planetary spirit therefore,wherever existent, in those far past aeons of kosmic time was a man or a being equivalent to what wehumans on earth call man. The planetary spirits of earth, for instance, are intimately linked with theorigin and destiny of our present humanity, for not only are they our predecessors along the evolutionarypath, but certain classes of them are actually the spiritual guides and instructors of mankind. We humans,in far distant aeons of the future, on a planetary chain which will be the child or grandchild of the presentearth-chain, will be the planetary spirits of that future planetary chain. It is obvious that as H. P.Blavatsky says: "Our Earth, being as yet only in its Fourth Round, is far too young to have produced highPlanetary Spirits"; but when the seventh round of this earth planetary chain shall have reached its end,our present humanity will then have become dhyanchohans of various grades, planetary spirits of onegroup or class, with necessary evolutionary differences as among themselves. The planetary spirits watchover, guide, and lead the hosts of evolving entities inferior to themselves during the various rounds of aplanetary chain. Finally, every celestial globe, whether sun or planet or other celestial body, has as thesummit or acme of its spiritual hierarchy a supreme celestial spirit who is the hierarch of its ownhierarchy. It should not be forgotten that the humanity of today forms a component element or stage ordegree in the hierarchy of this (our) planetary chain.

Planetary Spirits Every celestial body is under the directing influence of a hierarchy of beings, spiritual, quasi-spiritual, and astral, the higher of which may be called celestial spirits; the term planetary spirits is usually restricted to the highest class of these beings pertaining to planets, although the phrase is also used in other senses. These planetary spirits have evolved through past cosmic cycles of evolution from a state equivalent to the human; and the general hierarchy pertaining to each planet is closely linked with the destinies of the present various life-waves of that planet. We ourselves are destined in the future to become planetary spirits of a planetary chain that will be a later imbodiment of our present earth-chain. This earth, being only in its fourth round, has not yet produced high planetary spirits; but it will have begun to do so at the end of the seventh round. At the summit of the hierarchy of planetary spirits is a supreme hierarch.

Plane Used figuratively for “the range or extent of some state of consciousness, or of the perceptive power of a particular set of senses, or the action of a particular force, or the state of matter corresponding to any of the above” (TG 255). Though the cosmic planes are different from one another, they are not separated by gaps, just as the spectral colors are distinct and characteristic yet merge imperceptibly into each other. Nor can it be supposed that at all stages of evolution the scheme of planes was the same as now: we hear of a physico-astral stage of humanity and of other beings which now no longer exist on earth, in much the same way as we find the fossils of types intermediate between existing types but now extinct.

Pranamaya-kosa (Sanskrit) Prāṇamaya-kośa [from prāṇa life, breath + maya built of, formed of from the verbal root mā to measure, form, with a consequent idea of illusion + kośa sheath] The sheath formed of life or breath, the vital-astral soul. According to the Vedantic classification of the human constitution, the fourth of the panchakosa (five sheaths) which enclose the atman or divine monad. It corresponds to prana and linga-sarira in the sevenfold human division.

Prehuman Races In a physical sense, the races from the first root-race to about the middle of the third, before man had a physical form similar to his present one; these races may be called prehuman since they were astral or semi-astral or ethereal. Again, it may refer to abortive attempts to produce beings on their way to future humanity. In another and far higher sense the prehuman races are the seeds of future humanity, these seeds being really lofty spiritual intellectual beings who had been men in a previous manvantara. These seeds have been called Sons of God, mind-born progeny of Brahma, rishis, prajapatis, manus, etc.

Pretas (Sanskrit) Preta-s [from pra away + the verbal root i to go] Gone ahead, departed; the remains in the astral light of the human dead, popularly called spooks or ghosts, and commonly in India signifying evil astral entities. In theosophy, the astral shells of human beings, especially of avaricious and selfish people, and more generally of those who have lived evil lives on earth. Pretas also can be the elementaries reborn as such in the kama-loka. See also BHUTA

Pretyabhava (Sanskrit) Pretyabhāva [from pretya having died, having departed + bhāva existence] The state after death; hence the future state. A very general term, referring in a vague way to the future after death, or more particularly to the temporary sojourn of a departed being in the astral light.

Principles of Man ::: The seven principles of man are a likeness or rather copy of the seven cosmic principles. They areactually the offspring or reflection of the seven cosmic principles, limited in their action in us by theworkings of the law of karma, but running in their origin back into THAT which is beyond: into THATwhich is the essence of the universe or the universal -- above, beyond, within, to the unmanifest, to theunmanifestable, to that first principle which H. P. Blavatsky enunciates as the leading thought of thewisdom-philosophy of The Secret Doctrine.These principles of man are reckoned as seven in the philosophy by which the human spiritual andpsychical economy has been publicly explained to us in the present age. In other ages these principles orparts of man were differently reckoned -- the Christian reckoned them as body, soul, and spirit,generalizing the seven under these three heads.Some of the Indian thinkers divided man into a basic fourfold entity, others into a fivefold. The Jewishphilosophy, as found in the Qabbalah which is the esoteric tradition of the Jews, teaches that man isdivided into four parts: neshamah, ruah, nefesh, and guf.Theosophists for convenience often employ in their current literature a manner of viewing man'scomposite constitution which is the dividing of his nature into a trichotomy, meaning a division intothree, being spirit, soul, and body, which in this respect is identical with the generalized Christianizedtheosophical division. Following this trichotomy, man's three parts, therefore, are: first and highest, thedivine spirit or the divine monad of him, which is rooted in the universe, which spirit is linked with theAll, being in a highly mystical sense a ray of the All; second, the intermediate part, or the spiritualmonad, which in its higher and lower aspects is the spiritual and human souls; then, third, the lowest partof man's composite constitution, the vital-astral-physical part of him, which is composed of material orquasi-material life-atoms. (See also Atman, Buddhi, Manas, Kama, Prana, Linga-sarira, Sthula-sarira)

Projection: In occult terminology, the releasing of the astral body from limitations of time and space. (See: astray projection.)

Prophecy: Foretelling the future. According to occult teachings anyone who is able to prophesy accurately must be psychically equipped to read the Akashic, or astral, records (cf. Akasha). When there is faulty interpretation it is not the astral light which falters but the adept who is not in tune with the vibratory beam.

Protean Soul Any one of the several souls of the different monads or egos in nature and in man, which undergo numerous changes of type and form. More commonly used in theosophical writings to describe the vital-astral-physical part of the lower quaternary. Such souls are in their actions but reflexes of shifting thoughts and moods of the egos which they clothe. The name is taken from the Greek sea god Proteus who could take on all sorts of shapes.

Protean soul: In occult terminology, the superior astral form or body which the thought of an adept can force to assume any form.

Proteus (Greek) The prophetic old man of the sea, a subject or son of Poseidon. Homer places him in the island of Pharos, one day’s journey from the Nile, while Vergil makes him an inhabitant of the Carpathian Sea between Crete and Rhodes. According to legend, he rose from the sea at midday and slept in the shade of the rocks, with sea monsters round him; anyone wishing to consult him must try to seize him at that time. To avoid prophesying, he assumed all sorts of dreadful shapes; if however he saw that his efforts were unavailing, he resumed his usual shape and gave his response. Here is an emblem of the astral light, so deceptive to the unwary and timorous, yet yielding its secrets to him who knows how to control it.

Protoplasm [from Greek protos first + plasma form] The semi-fluid granular substance found in all forms of organic life; the primal type of physical matter which appears as merely homogeneous, amorphous, gelatinous substance, yet with the potentiality of differentiating into every known organized form and function. The biological basis of manifesting life on the physical plane, it is semi-astral matter operating at the level where “the two realms, the lower astral and the ethereal-physical, here melt or merge into each other” (ET 151 3rd & rev ed). As a physicalization of vital astral substance, it interlinks the tangible world of forms to the invisible world of living forces and the root-types in the evolutionary ground plan. “Astral matter, it must be noted, is fourth state matter, having, like our gross matter, its own ‘protyle.’ There are several ‘protyles’ in Nature, corresponding to the various planes of matter” (SD 2:737). This ethereal gradation of substances affords a medium or stairway for the transmission of the living impulses and forces of lofty intelligences which are the vitalizing and directing cause of every protoplasmic seed or center differentiating and evolving, each after its own kind and in its own degree of unfolding. In the lower kingdoms where all forms of plant and animal life begin in this seemingly indifferent substance, their essential nature and instincts operate under the vitalizing influence of a hierarchy of dhyani-chohanic entities who, in the aggregate, represent and are the so-called laws of nature. In addition to this creative supervision, in self-conscious man his own spiritual essence is allied with the operation of the karmic agents in working out his fleshly imbodiments. The fertilized germ-cell of the human embryo is a microscopic copy of the protoplasmic second human root-race, “huge and highly ethereal astral Cells . . . infilled with the astral essence of the lowest of the Dhyani-Chohanic fluids” (ET 151 3rd & rev ed).

Protyle [from Greek protos first + hyle matter] Used by the English chemist Crookes (1832-1919) for a then hypothetical substance of which he believed the chemical elements to be differentiations; used in this sense by Blavatsky and also in a general sense for rudimentary, primordial, or undifferentiated matter. In this wider meaning, there are many protyles, each being the matter of its own plane in the undifferentiated condition; so that the protyle of Crookes would be the undifferentiated basis of physical matter, and therefore quasi-astral. The fundamental cosmic protyle is pradhana or mulaprakriti.

Psychic Powers Powers pertaining to the lower intermediate human nature — i.e, between the mental-emotional and the physical — including powers of perception such as astral vision, the lower clairvoyance and clairaudience, the lower psychometry and seership, etc.; and lower biases or tendencies such as hypnotism, the power to produce minor occult phenomena of many kinds, and in connection with the power of automatic astral projection. In their nature they are morally neutral, being susceptible of use or misuse just as are physical powers. If used with an evil or selfish purpose, the action is black magic; and even if used without such motive or with good intention, they may prove confusing and therefore misleading for one who ventures to use them.

Psychic Powers ::: The lowest powers of the intermediate or soul-nature in the human being, and we are exercising andusing them all the time -- yes, and we cannot even control them properly! Men's emotional thoughts arevagrant, wandering, uncertain, lacking precision, without positive direction, and feebly governed. Theaverage man cannot even keep his emotions and thoughts in the grip of his self-conscious will. Hisweakest passions lead him astray. It is this part of his nature whence flow his "psychic powers." It isman's work to transmute them and to turn them to employment which is good and useful and holy.Indeed, the average man cannot control the ordinary psycho-astral-physical powers that he commonlyuses; and when, forsooth, people talk about cultivating occult powers, by which they mean merelypsychic powers, it simply shows that through ignorance they know not to what they refer. Their mindsare clouded as regards the actual facts. Those who talk so glibly of cultivating occult powers are just thepeople who cannot be trusted as real guides, for before they themselves can crawl in these mysteriousregions of life, they seem to desire to teach other people how to run and to leap. What most people reallymean, apparently, when they speak of cultivating occult powers is "I want to get power over otherpeople." Such individuals are totally unfit to wield occult powers of any kind, for the motive is in mostcases purely selfish, and their minds are beclouded and darkened with ignorance.The so-called psychic powers have the same relation to genuine spiritual powers that baby-talk has to thediscourse of a wise philosopher. Before occult powers of any kind can be cultivated safely, man mustlearn the first lesson of the mystic knowledge, which is to control himself; and all powers that later hegains must be laid on the altar of impersonal service -- on the altar of service to mankind.Psychic powers will come to men as a natural development of their inner faculties, as evolution performsits wonderful work in future ages. New senses, and new organs corresponding to these new senses, bothinterior and exterior, will come into active functioning in the distant future. But it is perilous both tosanity and to health to attempt to force the development of these prematurely, and unless the training anddiscipline be done under the watchful and compassionate eye of a genuine occult teacher who knowswhat he is about. The world even today contains hundreds of thousands of "sensitives" who are the firstfeeble forerunners of what future evolution will make common in the human race; but these sensitivesare usually in a very unfortunate and trying situation, for they themselves misunderstand what is in them,and they are misunderstood by their fellows. (See also Occultism)

Psychography Soul-writing; coined by theosophical writers on occult phenomena for various kinds of inspirational or phenomenally produced writing. In its highest sense it may mean writing under the influence of inspiration from a high source, whether within or without the nature of the writer, as when one writes things which in his ordinary state of mind he would be incapable of rising to. Or it may refer to physical mediumship, where the writing is produced unconsciously by the astrally controlled hand of the medium, and the ideas come from some source in the astral light. It can also include automatic writing of various kinds, and writing by precipitation. As regards the advisability of seeking or cultivating such powers, any practice which involves a surrender of control, either of the mind or the body, to an extraneous influence is detrimental. A writer in full possession of his faculties may by sincere aspiration draw upon higher sources within himself or upon the aid given by those Helpers who stand ready to respond to such aspirations. Self-deception, however, is one of the commonest failings of human nature.

Psychology ::: This word is ordinarily used to signify in our days, and in the seats of learning in the Occident, a studymostly beclouded with doubts and hypotheses, and often actual guesswork, meaning little more than akind of mental physiology, practically nothing more than the working of the brain-mind in the lowestastral-psychical apparatus of the human constitution. But in the theosophical philosophy, the wordpsychology is used to mean something very different and of a far nobler character: we might call itpneumatology, or the science or the study of spirit and its rays, because all the inner faculties and powersof man ultimately spring from his spiritual nature. The term psychology ought really to connote the studyof the inner intermediate economy of man, and the interconnection of his principles and elements orcenters of energy or force -- what the man really is inwardly.In days of the far bygone past, psychology was indeed what the word signifies: "the science of soul"; andupon this science was securely based the collateral and subordinate science of genuine physiology.Today, however, it is physiology which serves as the basis for psychology because of a mistaken view ofman's constitution. It is a case of hysteron proteron -- putting the cart before the horse.

Pudding-bags The name given by Blavatsky to the humans-to-be of the first root-race and the very earliest of the second root-race during the fourth round on globe D; so called because the human structural framework had not as yet begun to manifest by unfolding from within outwards, and because the shape of these still mindless individuals was roughly ovoid or egg-shaped. The consistency of these bodies was astral or condensed astral, verging into ordinary physical stuff of somewhat gelatinous or pudding-like character. As time passed, these pudding-bag bodies very quickly began to unfold into the roughly human form as we now know it, although due to the refining processes of evolution, our present bodies are of much shapelier outline than were the first appearances from the pudding-bags. Thus these pudding-bags in a sense may be truly described as huge astral-physical shells or skins. These early humans propagated themselves by fission, as do individual cells and unicellular organisms today. This procedure is an early evolutionary stage in the process of the bringing forth of the underlying true human structural framework as we now know it; the structure and organization of the pudding-bags, compared with what now they are, were then at a minimum. See also ROOT-RACE, FIRST

Pytho (Greek) The older name for Delphi; also, meaning to rot, make rot, and in this sense equivalent to the Hebrew ‘ob, the pernicious evil currents of the astral light.

Python (Greek) The serpent slain by Apollo, who was therefore also called Pythius. At one time the world was covered with temples to the sun and dragon: the Ophites adopted it from Egypt, whither it had come from India. It is seen in the story of Bel and the Dragon, of St. George or St. Michael and the Dragon, of Osiris and Typhon, Krishna and Kaliya, and the Lord God and the Serpent of Eden. The cosmic dragon represents the shadow side of the logos, and the opposition between these two is the so-called war in heaven. The dual nature of the serpent is seen in Rahu and Ketu, the Dragon’s head and tail; and Typhon or Apophis, slain by Horus is also called Set, who is in one of his permutations Hermes, god of wisdom, and whose name likewise is that of the Biblical Seth and Satan. In initiations the inner enlightened individual had to confront his lower passions, now personified into a veritable astral monster, and to be either its victor or its victim; when victorious he became the spiritual serpent in its other sense of the dragon of wisdom. This double meaning has its correspondence in the fact that snakes shed their skin and reemerge purified, just as the neophyte through training and initiation sheds the Old Person and reemerges from the tests as the New Person.

Reliquiae (Latin) Leavings; the astral shells or spooks of human beings and animals which are left in the lower strata of the astral light after death. Equivalent to the Sanskrit bhuta.

Rephaim (Hebrew) Rĕfā’īm The sons of Raphah, a Canaanite race of giants; also the weak ones, shades or specters, the quiet and wan inhabitants of Hades or the Underworld, which were nevertheless considered beings of gigantic size, and hence the collocation of the meanings of gigantic magnitude coupled with intrinsic weakness. This last refers to the phantom or astral races of early mankind: the first, second, and early third root-races before they were illuminated and inspired by the manasaputric descent (SD 2:279).

Root-race, First of the fourth round on globe D of our earth, composed of emanations of the lunar pitris produced by the processes of chhaya-birth — the ethereal lunar pitris emanated their own “shadows” or vehicles, as colossal ovoid bodies of tenuous astral substance, to us translucent, and having but rudiments or type of color. They were spiritual and ethereal within, and more condensedly ethereal outwardly, as yet possessing latent but not active intelligence, and therefore as yet having no speech; composed of all the elements, but as yet having no living intellectual fire manifest. Their habitat was the “Imperishable Sacred Land” around the region of the north pole, where they first appeared in seven more or less distinct but overlapping localities. Their method of reproduction in the earlier periods was by one form melting into its progeny. Later the race reproduced itself by fission; in all these cases there was no death to individuals, because the individuals became their own descendants, as is exemplified in certain elementary forms of life today. This race inhabited the globe when there was more water than land on the earth, and its destruction was by fire.

Root-race, Second Like the first root-race of the present round on globe D of the earth-chain, the second was astral, though somewhat more concreted, physicalized, or materialized. The bodies were unlike what is now regarded as human, bearing but vaguely the human outline of a gelatinous, filamentoid, jelly-like nature, as yet without evolved bones, organs, hair, or true skin. Reproduction was by budding, as occurs in some lower organisms today. About the middle of the race, these buds became numerous and the process became modified to one analogous to the casting off of spores or seeds, or to the exuding of drops of vital sweat. These beings were mindless and unmoral, innocent, guided unconsciously by their spiritual instincts, nevertheless largely under the sway of lower rather than spiritual impulses, somewhat like the animals of today. For as yet no intellectual fire from the manasaputras (sons of mind) had been communicated to them, so that as yet there was no working bridge of mentality between spirit and matter in them.

Root-types In biology animal or plant species derive from seven, ten, or twelve primeval physico-astral root-types, being in the case of every kingdom the origins of the widely differentiated, greatly specialized individuals now found on earth. “Every new Manvantara brings along with it the renovation of forms, types and species; every type of the preceding organic forms — vegetable, animal and human — changes and is perfected in the next, even to the mineral, which has received in this Round its final opacity and hardness; its softer portions having formed the present vegetation; the astral relics of previous vegetation and fauna having been utilized in the formation of the lower animals, and determining the structure of the primeval Root-Types of the highest mammalia” (SD 2:730). Primeval astral man was the root-type of those early mammalians, from whom the anthropoids sprang by human miscegenation, although this does not apply to the animals beneath the mammals.

Sakti(Sanskrit) ::: A term which may be briefly defined to mean one of what in modern Occultism are called theseven forces of nature, of which six are manifest and the seventh unmanifest, or only partly manifest.Sakti in general may be described as universal energy, and is, as it were, the feminine aspect of fohat. Inpopular Hinduism the various saktis are the wives or consorts of the gods, in other words, the energies oractive powers of the deities represented as feminine influences or energies.These anthropomorphic definitions are unfortunate, because misleading. The saktis of nature are reallythe veils, or sheaths, or vehicular carriers, through which work the inner and ever-active energies. Assubstance and energy, or force and matter, are fundamentally one, as modern science in its researches hasbegun to discover, it becomes apparent that even these saktis or sheaths or veils are themselves energic tolower spheres or realms through which they themselves work.The crown of the astral light, as H. P. Blavatsky puts it, is the generalized sakti of universal nature in so far as our solar system is concerned.

Sanjna, Samjna (Sanskrit) Sañjñā, Saṃjñā [from sam wholly, completely + the verbal root jñā to know] Full knowledge, understanding, comprehension; mystically, spiritual consciousness. According to the Puranas, the daughter of Visvakarman and wife of Surya (the sun). In the Vishnu-Purana (3:2) Sanjna, “ ‘unable to endure the fervours of her lord,’ gave him her chhaya (shadow, image, or astral body), while she herself repaired to the jungle to perform religious devotions, or Tapas. The Sun, supposing the ‘chhaya’ to be his wife begat by her children, like Adam with Lilith — an ethereal shadow also, as in the legend, though an actual living female monster millions of years ago” (SD 2:174). This refers to the creation of the first root-race, the “chhaya-birth, or that primeval mode of sexless procreation, the first-race having eased out, so to say, from the body of the Pitris . . .” (ibid).

Science admits the existence of vast stores of latent energy in the atoms; and considering everything as a question of physical dynamics, it infers that an equivalent quantity of physical energy must have been expended in creating the atom. Energy or life is a fundamental attribute and function of the universe, which has its manifestations on all seven or ten planes of prakriti, appearing as centers of energy which radiate outwards from within. Also used to denote the female potency or sakti (SD 1:l36); aether too is mentioned as the quintessence of energy. Energy expended on the astral plane is far more productive of results than the same amount expended on the physical plane, according to occult dynamics.

Scin-lecca, Scin-laeca, Scin-lac (Anglo-Saxon) [from scinan to shine, quiver with light, flash + lic body; cf Scandinavian skin shining] Shining body; adopted by Bulwer-Lytton in A Strange Story to express an idea similar to the Sanskrit mayavi-rupa, which often signifies merely a doppelganger or astral human form. Blavatsky uses the term both as the astral double of a medium and as a spiritual double of an adept (IU 2:597, 104). In her later writings the term was dropped in favor of Sanskrit terminology.

Sea of Fire In the Stanzas of Dzyan, “the Super-Astral (i.e., noumenal) Light, the first radiation from the Root, the Mulaprakriti, the undifferentiated Cosmic Substance, which becomes Astral Matter. It is also called the ‘Fiery Serpent . . .’ ” (SD 1:75).

Second Sight A Scottish name for natural or cultivated clairvoyance, as found among the Scottish Highlanders. The function partakes of several converging inner powers or attributes, but it generally means seeing in the astral light figures not physically visible, or distant scenes or future events.

Seed The essence or germ of an entity, imbodying its svabhava (essential nature) and determining the forms produced from it, partly by the accretion of various elements but mainly by the emanating stream working from within outwards or above downwards. The seed of a plant is a globule of physical matter, but the actual seed is ultra-physical. All seeds strictly speaking are the vital life-forces working in and through the physical germs, and hence these true seeds are ethereal organisms, structures composed of a higher order of matter (SD 1:201). Thus there is a succession of vital seeds pertaining to one individual entity, each such seed being the ultimate unit of that organism on a particular plane. There is the physical seed of a plant, containing the astral seed — a unit on its own plane containing a still subtler seed belonging to a higher plane, and so forth. Ultimately a seed is a life-atom, in itself the expression on a particular plane of a monad which is a thought in divine ideation.

Seeking for occulf powers is looked on with disfavour for the most part by spiritual teachers in India, because it belongs to the inferior planes and usually pushes the seeker on a path which may lead him very far from the Divine. Especially, a contact mth the forces and beings of the astral (or, as we term it, the vital) plane is attended with great dangers. The beings of this plane are often bosiQc to the true aim of spiritual life and establish contact with the seeker and offer him powers and occult experiences only in order that they may lead him away from the spiritual path or else that they may establish their own control over him or take possession of him for their owm pur- pose. Often, representing themselves as Divine powers they mis- lead, give erring suggestions and impulsions and pervert the inner life. Many are those who, attracted by these powers and beings of the vital plane, bave ended in a definitive spiritual fall or in mental and physical perversion and disorder. One comes ineritably into contact with the vital plane and enters into it in the expansion of consriousness which results from an inner opening, but one ought never to put oneself into the hands of these beings and forces or allow oneself to be led by their sug- gestions and impulsions. This is one of the chief dangers of the spiritual life and to be on one’s guard against it is a necessity for the seeTer if he wishes to arrive at his goal. It is true that many supraphysical or supernonnal powers come with the expansion of the consciousness in the yoga ; to rise out of the body consciousness, to act by subtle means on the supraphysical planes, etc. are natural activities for the yogi- But these powers are not sought after, they come naturally, and they have not the astral character. Also, Aey have to be used on purely spiritual

Seer In its highest sense, one who discerns truths clearly by the use of the real inner vision, the Eye of Siva; who can see throughout the ranges of space and time belonging to a universe — not barring intuitions of the spaces and times of other surrounding universes. But it is also used for a number of varying degrees of ability to see clairvoyantly in the astral light. Swedenborg is sometimes called a seer, which he was in small degree, but because he was untrained, what he saw was mainly peculiar to himself, as is the case with seers of the same class. Instructions for aspirants to wisdom are replete with warnings as to the manifold dangers and deceptions of the astral light, and the obstacles thrown up by the unpurified and undisciplined nature of the disciple. The ability to become a true spiritual seer using the inner eye, means the fruits of many lives of aspiration and training, involving the successful passing of many trials and initiations. The science called gupta-vidya is due to the collaboration and teaching of real seers, whose trained faculties enable them to have direct vision of actualities.

Shadayatana (Sanskrit) Ṣaḍāyatana [from ṣaṣ six + āyatana seat, abode from ā towards + the verbal root yat to rest in or on] Six seats of the human sense organs, each of which has a physical means of expression and of reception: the eyes, nose, ear, tongue, body (for the sense of touch), and brain (the organ of mind). The physical organs of sense themselves are mere vehicles of the living impulses of sense acting from their seats within the astral constitution, these being the shadayatana. Commonly described as the organs of sensation through which consciousness passes to and fro, it is recognized as the eighth of the twelve nidanas.

Shades The astral remnants of the dead, spooks, ghosts, phantoms, lemures, larvae, bhutas, etc. In the singular, also used for the linga-sarira or khaba in the Egyptian enumeration of souls.

Shadows Everything on earth is the shadow or reflection of its prototype in superior and inner spheres; more generally, matter is the shadow of spirit; our sun is the central sun’s shadow. The human linga-sarira (model-body) is called the shadow-body, and similarly the astral light is called the shadow of cosmic substance, both representing the nether pole of their respective higher counterparts. The Gnostics, speaking of good and evil, said that shadow is what enables light to manifest itself by giving to light objective reality; it is the necessary corollary which completes light or good — their creator on earth. Every deity has its accompanying dark aspect of shadow, frequently called its veil, sheath, of vehicle.

Shakers A sect called the United Society of Believers in Christ’s Second Appearing, founded by Ann Lee in England, which afterwards spread to the United States. Their asceticism and religious emotionalism often led to their being seized with violent tremblings, like those of the early Quakers or of the Convulsionnaires among the French Jansenists. In themselves, such exterior physical phenomena are due to a one-sided emotional development, and to the evoking of genuine and powerful forces within a physical organism not properly and duly prepared to deal with and sustain them. Such conditions often lead to reactions which both physically and mentally are dangerous, and in the most extreme cases may render the physical organism peculiarly subject to being influenced by excarnate astral entities.

Shakti: A Sanskrit word, meaning power, strength, might, of feminine gender; in Tantric (see Tantra) literature the female generative power of energy in the universe, worshipped by the religious as the wife of some deity or other, e.g., as Durga, wife of Shiva. (See Shaktism.) In occult terminology, Shakti or Sakti is the crown of the astral light (q.v.).

Shells Derivative from qelippoth in the Hebrew Qabbalah, having the sense of empty form. They are the astral remains of the lower parts of man disintegrating in kama-loka after the death of the physical body and the separation of the higher principles. These shells persist for a short time in the case of the good, and for a long time in the case of the evil; and may be used as vehicles by various evil entities, or endowed with a temporary vitality by the necromancy of the seance room, which enables them in the physical phenomena of the seance room, whereby the ignorant very often pathetically mistake them for the spirits of the dead when they are in fact but astral phantoms.

Sheol has all the attributes of subterranean gloom and wan bloodless activity that characterize the Hades or Orcus of the Greeks and Latins. The dying, without exception, are all spoken of as going down to Sheol, which in most of its aspects corresponds to the modern theosophical astral world or kama-loka.

She’ol-’ob (Hebrew) Shĕ’ol ’ōb [from shĕ’ōl the Hebrew Hades + ’ōb a necromancer] One who raises the phantoms or kama-rupic shades of the dead from Sheol, a necromancer; intercourse or trafficking with the various kinds of inhabitants of the lower realms of the astral light or kama-loka.

shukshma deha. ::: the subtle or astral body, which possess nineteen properties &

sidereal ::: a. --> Relating to the stars; starry; astral; as, sidereal astronomy.
Measuring by the apparent motion of the stars; designated, marked out, or accompanied, by a return to the same position in respect to the stars; as, the sidereal revolution of a planet; a sidereal day.


Simulacra [plural of Latin simulacrum image, likeness, phantom] The kama-rupic images left in the astral light by the reincarnating ego after death, which resemble the former living physical body in appearance but in fact are disintegrating shells only — kama-rupas which all too often are the “spirits” of the departed of the seance room.

Since the middle of the fourth root-race, no monads from the animal kingdom could any longer enter the human kingdom because from that time the earth started on its ascending arc of evolution. Nevertheless, the monads imbodied in the anthropoids will enter the very lowest and least evolved branchlets of the human kingdom during the fifth round. The monads now in anthropoid bodies will disappear from incarnation during the present fifth root-race to enter their inter-round paranirvana, remaining as astral monads until the next (fifth) round. A relatively few individuals among the anthropoids, because of having attained the most advanced degree of evolution in the anthropoid stock, will reach quasi-human status, although still in anthropoid bodies, before the fifth root-race has reached its end. Even these exceptional anthropoids will probably have died out before the fifth root-race is ended or by the early sixth root-race — a period several million years from now.

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“So far as our present Fourth Round terrestrial period is concerned, the mammalian fauna are alone to be regarded as traceable to prototypes shed by Man. The amphibia, birds, reptiles, fishes, etc., are the resultants of the Third Round, astral fossil forms stored up in the auric envelope of the Earth and projected into physical objectivity subsequent to the deposition of the first Laurentian rocks” (SD 2:183, 684).

Some of the later peoples in their initiations actually did use a kind of physical soma which had the effect of bringing about a dulling of the restless brain-mind for the time being, so that the inner powers were temporarily freed from the clogging influences of the astral light and the body.

Sometimes aether is used in translating the Sanskrit akasa, which has the same etymological and philosophical meaning. Here it is an element or principle coming after manas and kama and before the astral light and ether. Again, it is a high aspect of akasa, having itself also seven subordinate aspects. There are in kosmic space at least seven aethers or prakritis, which exist one within the other in a rising scale of spirituality. Collectively they may be called spirit-aether or akasa.

Sometimes called the sacred animals of the Bible, they have been associated by Christians with the four evangelists. In this connection, “each represents one of the four lower classes of worlds or planes, into the similitude of which each personality is cast. Thus the Eagle (associated with St. John) represents cosmic Spirit or Ether, the all-piercing Eye of the Seer; the Bull of St. Luke, the waters of Life, the all-generating element and cosmic strength; the Lion of St. Mark, fierce energy, undaunted courage and cosmic fire; while the human Head or the Angel, which stands near St. Matthew is the synthesis of all three combined in the higher Intellect of man, and in cosmic Spirituality. . . . The Eagle, Bull and Lion-headed gods are plentiful, and all represented the same idea, whether in the Egyptian, Chaldean, Indian or Jewish religions, but beginning with the Astral body they went no higher than the cosmic Spirit or the Higher Manas — Atma-Buddhi, or Absolute Spirit and Spiritual Soul its vehicle, being incapable of being symbolised by concrete images” (TG 121).

Sometimes the astral light is used as a convenient but inaccurate phrase for akasa. In clarifying the difference between these Blavatsky says: “The Astral Light is that which mirrors the three higher planes of consciousness, and is above the lower, or terrestrial plane; therefore it does not extend beyond the fourth plane, where, one may say, the Akasa begins.

Sons of God An idea, containing divine as well as historic events, known among all ancient peoples. In ancient Biblical Hebrew, these sons of the Divine or sons of God are called the Benei ’Elohim (sons of the ’elohim) who in Genesis 6 “descend” in order to gain experience by incarnation in astral-physical bodies. They are the so-called fallen angels, one class of which corresponds to manasaputras. Also used for those evolved beings, or men graduated from lower classes of human experience, who at a primordial period descended and taught humanity the arts and sciences which were preserved and afterwards practiced by the initiates of the different root-races. Again, used of men of the seventh root-race, who are to be born of immaculate parents when they appear ages hence.

Sophia Achamoth In the Gnostic Pistis Sophia, the second or inferior Sophia, the personification of the productive force in nature — which on its lowest plane is the astral light. Sophia Achamoth is shown lost in the waters of chaos on her way to the supreme Light, and as being delivered by Christos — the masculine manifestation of the Cosmic Logos in this case. She was the mother of Ildabaoth, the proud and impure spirit, who rejected the spiritual light of the middle space, offered him by his mother, and set himself to create a world of his own; but he is obliged to call upon his mother to illumine the monsters he has made. In some passages in The Secret Doctrine Sophia-Achamoth is used to mean both aspects together, or sometimes even when the higher Sophia is intended.

Soulless Beings ::: "We elbow soulless men in the streets at every turn," wrote H. P. Blavatsky. This is an actual fact. Thestatement does not mean that those whom we thus elbow have no soul. The significance is that thespiritual part of these human beings is sleeping, not awake. They are animate humans with an animateworking brain-mind, an animal mind, but otherwise "soulless" in the sense that the soul is inactive,sleeping; and this is also just what Pythagoras meant when he spoke of the "living dead." They areeverywhere, these people. We elbow them, just as H. P. Blavatsky says, at every turn. The eyes may bephysically bright, and filled with the vital physical fire, but they lack soul; they lack tenderness, thefervid yet gentle warmth of the living flame of inspiration within. Sometimes impersonal love willawaken the soul in a man or in a woman; sometimes it will kill it if the love become selfish and gross.The streets are filled with such "soulless" people; but the phrase soulless people does not mean "lostsouls." The latter is again something else. The term soulless people therefore is a technical term. It meansmen and women who are still connected, but usually quite unconsciously, with the monad, the spiritualessence within them, but who are not self-consciously so connected. They live very largely in thebrain-mind and in the fields of sensuous consciousness. They turn with pleasure to the frivolities of life.They have the ordinary feelings of honor, etc., because it is conventional and good breeding so to havethem; but the deep inner fire of yearning, the living warmth that comes from being more or less at onewith the god within, they know not. Hence, they are "soulless," because the soul is not working with fieryenergy in and through them.A lost soul, on the other hand, means an entity who through various rebirths, it may be a dozen, or moreor less, has been slowly following the "easy descent to Avernus," and in whom the threads ofcommunication with the spirit within have been snapped one after the other. Vice will do this, continuousvice. Hate snaps these spiritual threads more quickly than anything else perhaps. Selfishness, the parentof hate, is the root of all human evil; and therefore a lost soul is one who is not merely soulless in theordinary theosophical usage of the word, but is one who has lost the last link, the last delicate thread ofconsciousness, connecting him with his inner god. He will continue "the easy descent," passing fromhuman birth to an inferior human birth, and then to one still more inferior, until finally the degenerateastral monad -- all that remains of the human being that once was -- may even enter the body of somebeast to which it feels attracted (and this is one side of the teaching of transmigration, which has been sobadly misunderstood in the Occident); some finally go even to plants perhaps, at the last, and willultimately vanish. The astral monad will then have faded out. Such lost souls are exceedingly rare,fortunately; but they are not what we call soulless people.If the student will remember the fact that when a human being is filled with the living spiritual andintellectual fiery energies flowing into his brain-mind from his inner god, he is then an insouled being, hewill readily understand that when these fiery energies can no longer reach the brain-mind and manifest ina man's life, there is thus produced what is called a soulless being. A good man, honorable, loyal,compassionate, aspiring, gentle, and true-hearted, and a student of wisdom, is an "insouled" man; abuddha is one who is fully, completely insouled; and there are all the intermediate grades between.

Soul of the World Translates the Latin anima mundi. In its highest aspect it is akasa and the seat of nirvanic conditions; in its lower aspects it is the astral light and the physical world — the last both its physical carrier and its grossest expression. See also ANIMA MUNDI

Soul-stuff: Impersonal supernatural power in general, or the subtle, diffuse spiritual essence associated with a particular human being or object. (Cf. astral body, aura.)

Spark, Sacred Used in the Stanzas of Dzyan in reference to the early history of the human race, and particularly to its intellectual evolution. It means the manas principle, which was awakened in man on this globe by the manasaputras at about the midpoint of the third root-race. The fashioners of astral and physical man, the barhishad pitris, had brought the physical human being in evolutionary development to the point where mind could be contained and function therein: beings from an intellectual line of cosmic evolution, the manasaputras, awakened the intellectual spark in early humanity, and man thereafter became a reasoning, thinking, and intellectually and morally responsible entity.

Spirit body: See: Astral body.

Spirit photograph: A photograph, made at a seance, showing what spiritualists believe to be the astral form of a dead person.

Spleen One of the abdominal viscera, located on the left side just below the diaphragm. In medicine, it has been variously studied as a blood-making organ, a special lymph gland, etc., but its exact role has always puzzled the physiologist. However, its intimate relations with the fluidic currents of the vascular, lymphatic, and digestive systems hint at its organic astral character, as the mobile watery or fluid element corresponds to the astral phase of matter. Thus, the spleen is an organic medium or channel for the transference of the pranic life-currents throughout the physical body, and the physical seat of the astral model-body or linga-sarira, the vehicle of the life principle; likewise it is the especial organ through which manifests the svadhishshana chakra. It has a physiological place in the vital borderland of metabolic changes where food stuffs and nature forces are transmuted into the regenerating energy and substance of human or animal tissue. This organ has its own rhythmic action which, as reported, “seems to arise from some intrinsic nervous mechanism.”

Spook [cf German spuk; Dutch spook etc.] A ghost, apparition, or hobgoblin, in theosophical writing applied to elementals elementaries, kama-rupic shells, and astral images.

stellary ::: a. --> Of or pertaining to stars; astral; as, a stellar figure; stellary orbs.
Full of stars; starry; as, stellar regions.


Sthula-sarira (Sanskrit) Sthūla-śarīra [from sthūla coarse, gross, not refined, heavy, bulky, fat in the sense of bigness, conditioned and differentiated matter + śarīra to molder, waste away] A gross body, impermanent because of its wholly compounded character. The physical body, usually considered as the lowest substance-principle of the sevenfold human constitution. This human form is the result of the harmonious coworking on the physical plane of forces and faculties streaming through their astral vehicle or linga-sarira, the pattern or model of the physical body. The sthula-sarira may be considered concreted effluvium or dregs of the linga-sarira. Hence, the sthula-sarira is the vehicle or carrier on this plane of all the other human principles. The physical body is built up of cosmic elements from all parts of the universe. The millions of tiny lives that make up our bodies are much more enduring than is the body itself as a unit. These little lives are constantly undergoing birth and rebirth because constantly changing or evolving, and thus the human body also changes as the years pass by. The physical body is the outermost, and therefore the feeblest, expression of all the wondrous qualities and forces working in man.

Sthulopadhi (Sanskrit) Sthūlopādhi [from sthūla gross + upādhi base, vehicle] The gross base or vehicle in the human constitution, consisting of the physical body (sthula-sarira), the astral model-body (linga-sarira), and the vital activities (prana). According to the Taraka-Raja-Yoga school there are three upadhis (bases) in the human constitution: karanopadhi, sukshmopadhi, and sthulopadhi. The sthulopadhi corresponds to the combination of the annamaya-kosa and pranamaya-kosa of the Vedantic classification.

Striges (Latin) [from Greek] Also strygis. Screech owls or some such nocturnal bird of prey; applied in classical mythology to a species of vampire which sucked the blood of children. A distinct mythologic reference to astral entities more or less earthbound, which can at times come into even physical relation with human beings, whether younger or older, at the time in a state of negative receptivity. Corresponds to the Hindu pisacha.

Sub-astral The lower portions of the astral realms, whether of the solar system or of the constitution of a living being. The astral light is divided into a number of degrees, enumerated as seven, ten, or twelve. More generally the astral is triform — the highest astral, the intermediate astral, and the lowest or sub-astral.

Subtle Bodies In Vedantic philosophy, the five kosas or sheaths, whether of the cosmos, man, or any other being, through which the atman as sutratman (thread-self) passes. In a more restricted and biological sense, the chhayas (shadows) or astral bodies emanated by original humanity to become the vehicles of the future humanities. Those who projected or emanated these chhayas or subtle bodies were the pitris (fathers, progenitors).

Subtler planes: The planes of existence after and above the physical worldly existence (astral plane, mental plane, etc.).

Succubus: A term applied to designate a demon, the astral body of a dead person or of a witch, which takes the form of a woman and has sexual intercourse with mortal men.

Such hybrid symbols may, like the Siren and the Lorelei, likewise signify the astral light and the temptations of the Hall of Delusion, or the incubi and succubi, originating in the Near East and distorted as entities by the monkish imagination of the Middle Ages.

Suicide As an inseparable part of the universe, whether considered as an organism or as a huge animated machine, we cannot violently remove ourselves from the pattern without interfering with the harmonious working of the other parts; and just here enters the immense moral or ethical import of the evil of suicide. But even had we a right to destroy our life, it would be futile. We may destroy the body, but we cannot destroy the mind. The suicide, after the temporary but complete unconsciousness which succeeds death, awakes in kama-loka the same person, in the same state of consciousness, minus only the physical triad (body, astral body, and gross physical vitality). His state of consciousness is one of torture, the repetition over and over of his suicidal act and the emotions that induced and accompanied it; this happens automatically because the mind, like an automaton repeats incessantly perforce the controlling or dominating impulses that governed it when the person took his physical life. And as the higher ego has its own life term, he has to remain in that condition until what would have been the natural term of life on earth is ended, body or no body.

Sukshma-sarira (Sanskrit) Sūkṣma-śarīra [from sūkṣma fine, ethereal, subtle + śarīra body] Subtle body, popularly astral body; often confused with the linga-sarira. Blavatsky remarks that the sukshma-sarira is a “ ‘dream-like’ illusive body, with which are clothed the inferior Dhyanis of the celestial Hierarchy” (SD 1:132).

Sukshmopadhi (Sanskrit) Sūkṣmopādhi [from śukṣma subtle, fine, ethereal + upādhi base, vehicle] The subtle base or vehicle, in the human constitution the combined qualities of the higher manas, the lower manas, the kama-energy, and their astral veil or vehicle infilled with life. According to Taraka-Raja-Yoga there are three upadhis in the human constitution: karanopadhi, sukshmopadhi, and sthulopadhi. The sukshmopadhi comprehends manas in its dual aspect in union with kama and the vital-astral portions in the theosophic sevenfold division of man, and likewise corresponds to the manomaya-kosa of the Vedantic classification. The state of consciousness known as the svapna or sleeping condition is connected causally with the sukshmopadhi. This upadhi when developed and trained in the adept is the seat of a number of remarkable faculties or powers, among them spiritual clairvoyance and clairaudience. In the ordinary person, it is the lower portion of sukshmopadhi which ordinarily acts automatically, producing flashes of unconscious clairvoyant vision, dreams of various kind, and other psychic phenomena.

Summerland Sometimes used by Spiritualists for what they hold to be the abode of departed spirits, which actually exist in astral regions, disintegrating before the second death.

Superastral The Pymander of Hermes speaks of a sea of fire, which is the superastral, the noumenal light, mulaprakriti or undifferentiated matter, the first radiation from the root; afterwards it becomes astral matter (SD 1:75).

Superspiritual Those realms and spheres of the cosmic being and life which are the causal noumena even of the spirit; and hence we may speak of the superspiritual as being the divine, out of which the spiritual flows during the course of cosmic evolution. The spheres of action of the combined forces of evolution and karma are the superspiritual or noumenal, the spiritual, the psychological, the astro-ethereal, the subastral, the vital, and the purely physical. Man in the first round and first root-race on globe D was a highly ethereal being, nonintelligent in our sense, but spiritual, and the offspring of superspiritual monadic essences; and the same rule applied, but less forcibly, in the first root-race of the fourth round.

Surgical patients suffering from fright and fear before or during the induction of an anesthetic take it with more difficulty, and feel more aftereffects, than those who meet it without anxiety. The first stage of general anesthesia, usually not unpleasant, ends with the loss of physical consciousness. Then begins the second, or stage of struggling more or less vigorously, evidently due to the automatic reaction of the physical body, from which its conscious astral soul is being dissociated. In the third stage, the muscles relax and the disturbed heart and lungs settle down to regular rhythm, controlled by the sympathetic nervous system, as in a deep, dreamless sleep. The self-conscious ego, thus withdrawing from its ordinary state of being, enters more or less deeply into the subjective realm of its inner life. It is in a state of what has been called, paradoxically, conscious unconsciousness. The danger here is that the soul may become so far separated from its body that it does not come back again, and then death results.

sutratma. ::: the silver cord in metaphysical literature, also known as the life thread of the antahkarana, refers to a life-giving linkage from the higher Self down to the physical body; it also refers to an extended synthesis of this thread and a second &

tantra. ::: a manual of or a particular path of sadhana laying great stress upon japa of a mantra and other esoteric practices relating to the powers latent in the human complex of physical, astral, and causal bodies in relation to the cosmic power usually thought of as the divine feminine

That the child carries on or transmits many features from his parents cannot be denied, but it is of no greater significance than the fact that he also derives features from a variety of other sources, all which contribute materials and subordinate agents by which the karma of the individual is fulfilled. That karma is the innate character of the individual, as imbodied in the various spiritual, manasic, psychological, or astral vehicles which contribute to the composite human being. Without taking into account these acquired characteristics on the inner planes, what determines the extent or manner in which the character of the offspring will be modified by the modicum of new physical influence derived from the parents cannot be explained. For, “it is . . . unquestionable that in the case of human incarnations the law of Karma, racial or individual, overrides the subordinate tendencies of ‘Heredity,’ its servant” (SD 2:178).

The agnidagdhas, corresponding to the lunar pitris of The Secret Doctrine, are as mysterious as the higher or arupa classes of kumaras or agnishvattas. The agnidagdhas are the vehicles of the arupa classes and, because of their grosser or more materialized essences, are able to coalesce with the forces and substances of nature on more material planes of the solar system. Known also as barhishads, they “kept up the household flame,” and thus were conversant with and living with flames of the material or quasimaterial realms. Such “material” flames are the fiery or magneto-electric forces and substances of the lower worlds, which include the flame of desire and passion as well as the electric fire of the physical universe. They not only equipped man with the lower parts of his constitution, but likewise projected their chhayas (shadows or astral vehicles), thus furnishing the astral-physical vehicle of early humanity.

  “The Akasa is the eternal divine consciousness which cannot differentiate, have qualities, or act; action belongs to that which is reflected or mirrored from it. The unconditioned and infinite can have no relation with the finite and conditioned. . . . We may compare the Akasa and the Astral Light . . . to the germ in the acorn. The latter, besides containing in itself the astral form of the future oak, conceals the germ from which grows a tree containing millions of forms. These forms are contained in the acorn potentially, yet the development of each particular acorn depends upon extraneous circumstances, physical forces, etc.” (TBL 75-6; also IU 1:197).

The alchemical action of the astral light and its intimate connection with the physical sphere explains epidemics, whether physical or psychological. Because it transmits thoughts and emotions, its connection with karma is evident. The astral light is the mother of the physical world, just as akasa is the mother of the astral light.

The analogy is seen in these streams of solar living fire stepped down into vital electricity on earth, and also in the psychic and astral-physical currents of lunar life which influence generation and all terrestrial growth. In chemical composition, the plasma or fluid part of the blood is said to be identical with that of primordial sea water, ocean water having since become more concentrated.

The antithesis of these lofty ideas underlies the widespread prevalence of blood rites. In fact, the many blood ceremonials which mark and mar the records of so many peoples are often gross, cruel, and perverted, violating the sacredness of life by offering animal and human sacrifices. Several groups regard blood as one of the essential elements used in their numerous forms of initiations, oblations, invocations to ancestors and to spirits of various kinds. Their fixed belief that the demons or spirits invoked by these ceremonies are harmful if not propitiated, but will be gratified and nourished by the immaterial essence, savor, or fumes of the foods, alcohols, and blood offerings is not without some basis of fact; for the earth-bound kama-rupic entities and astral elementaries are attracted by, and do abstract the impalpable kama-pranic life-force from, the fumes and emanations of such offerings. These beliefs are consistent with much in the tribal customs and rites which attracts and revivifies evil entities in their own astral atmosphere. Customs like poison ordeals for so-called witches, and evil use of nature forces for injuring or destroying personal enemies, added to frequent evocations, make a vicious circle of cause and effect.

The astral form sustains and permeates the body, containing the real or causal organs corresponding to the physical outer sense organs. It has its own complete system of nerves and arteries for conveying the various astral auric fluids, which are to that body as our blood, nervous energy, and pranic currents are to the physical. Hence, the linga-sarira is the real personal body.

The astral light also plays an enormous part in most dreams. We may witness scenes which cannot have formed part of our waking experience, and evidently in this case are seeing pictures in the astral light which we correctly or erroneously connect with our own personality. Again, with prophetic dreams our vision, untrammeled by physical senses, perceives in the astral light the image of what will later happen on the physical plane, and we may occasionally carry a recollection of what has been seen into the waking state.

The astral light is itself divided into subordinate planes; the lower regions teem with gross emanations from the earth, including psychic remnants from deceased beings, which exert a negative influence on the living, especially when intercourse with these remnants is encouraged by moral and physical weakness or by ignorant experiments.

The astral light is nature’s storehouse of the images of events, and contact with the object puts the psychometer in rapport with the impressions concerned. The psychometer brings his inner self in contact with the “soul” of the object. But as the phenomena involve the properties of planes other than the physical, any attempt to explain them in terms of the physical plane must necessarily be lame. The physical plane limits both the powers of nature and our own faculties, and the psychometer rises to a plane where some of these barriers are removed, for nothing is destroyed and there is unity and intercommunication throughout all nature.

The astral light is the tablet of memory of earth and of its child the animal-man; while akasa is the tablet of memory of the hierarchy of the planetary spirits controlling our chain of globes, and likewise of their child, each spiritual ego. The astral light is simply the dregs or lowers vehicles of akasa. Gautama Buddha held only two things as eternal: akasa and nirvana. In the Chandogya Upanishad (7:12:1-2) akasa (ether, space) is equated with Brahman.

The astral light is virtually the same as the sidereal light of Paracelsus and other medieval mystic philosophers who followed him. The reason for calling this kosmic plane astral or sidereal is that all nature being a vast and intricately interwoven organism, the stars and planets emanate into each other their respective celestial energies and substances. Thus, because there is this constant interchange of starry fluids emanating from the different celestial bodies, the term astral light has a foundation of esoteric scientific fact. It is applied specifically to the second kosmic plane only because it is nearest to the physical and beings living on the physical plane at times become sensible of the existence of the second kosmic plane by means of flashes of starry light or sensations of luminosity. Hence the ancient initiates, knowing the source of this starry substance, properly called it the astral or sidereal light, or by some similar expression. The astral light, finally, is the very dregs of akasa, and is virtually the same as the hypothetical ether of science.

The blood is actively protean in representing on this plane the streams of higher vitality manifesting in body, soul, and spirit. Thus, its pranic oxygen is the agent of the solar fire; its white and red corpuscles represent the psychic life-force and the red kamic energies, all acting together in their material forms. The leucocytes or white corpuscles are formed in the lymphatic glands, in the spleen, and in bone marrow. They correspond in a sense to the lunar chhayas or builders of the ethereal forms of the second and early third root-races which “needed no warm blood, no atmosphere, no feeding” (SD 1:609). These spherical ameboid cells have both the primordial, changeable pudding-bag form and the autogenerative type of propagation. Their relation to the formation of the red cells typifies that of the early astral forms which, gradually becoming physicalized, evolved into the red-blooded, bisexual, manas-endowed beings of the later third root-race. The red cells, without autogenerative nuclei, are born in special leucocyte cells of red bone marrow, where they are produced at the rate the effete red cells are destroyed.

The cataleptic phenomena are sometimes induced in a profound hypnotic state, where the operator’s will manifests through the intermediate nature of his subject. This explains the public hypnotic exhibitions of an unconscious person, rigidly stretched out, with only head and feet supported, while the body sustains excessive weight placed upon it. It is also possible, at times, for a person who is naturally psychic, or who has dabbled in attempts to cultivate psychic phenomena, to become dissociated from his normal physical status and, in a trance-like condition, to manifest the cataleptic state of beclouded consciousness and the wax-like rigidity of body. In such cases there is always danger that the lower quaternary including the unconscious body may be invaded by some astral entity which thus becomes an insidious and injurious link with kama-loka and its denizens.

  “The crown of the astral light, as H. P. Blavatsky puts it, is the generalized Sakti of Universal Nature in so far as our solar system is concerned” (OG 150).

The earliest human root-races were astral protoplasts that reproduced by division as cells do today. The late second and early third root-races, the “sweat-born,” reproduced by throwing off germ cells which then grew into the new entity. Because each cell is an individual being or organism with its own inherent characteristics and possibilities, some of these vital cells thrown off by early human beings were used by the entities that evolved into the higher mammals. Human cells were not as thoroughly dominated by their parent entity as they are today:

The ’elohim, then, correspond to both classes of the pitris mentioned in theosophical literature: the higher or more spiritual-intellectual of the ’elohim are the agnishvatta-pitris, and the lower groups are the barhishad-pitris. As the agnishvatta-pitris are devoid of the astral-vital-physical productive fire because they are too high and distinctly intellectual, they leave the work of production to the lower ’elohim or barhishads, who “being the lunar spirits more closely connected with Earth, became the creative Elohim of form, or the Adam of dust” (SD 2:78).

The evident meaning must be connected with the old occult thought that wine, or the mead of the northern peoples where the grape and soma were unknown or uncultivated, all had the meaning of the inspiration of initiation, a kind of ecstasy of vision and knowledge brought about through initiation, of which the physical intoxication of wine, mead, or the soma juice has all the lower and materialized aspect, every spiritual thing having its material counterpart, every right-hand thought or rule in occultism having its left-hand or sorcerer perversion or counterpart. Thus in the highest initiation, even today and from immemorial time, the holy drink or potation was entirely mystical, and had a dozen of these significances, all bound up together; yet despite this fact, for some of the lower initiations where a student found difficulty in throwing off the physical and astral influences, a harmless — when administered rightly — drug or drink was given which temporarily stupefied the lower quaternary; but it is to be noted that this substitute of the physical drink came about when neophytes began to find it very difficult to do what their more spiritual forerunners had done: raising themselves solely by inner aspiration up to inspiration, by inner insight up to the epopteia or vision.

The filamentoid and boneless structure of the semi-astral human bodies at the end of the second root-race now thickened and condensed, separating itself upon a rapidly developing skeletal form into nervous, muscular, and other systems, combined with the appearance of definite organs, with specific functions, thus constituting the first truly physical human beings. The mode of reproduction at the beginning of the root-race was by the exudation from the surface of the body of vital “sweat” or cells, but with the hardening and specialization of the body itself, the production of the reproductive cells became localized in special organs and the mode of generation became oviparous; later these human eggs were no longer extruded as is the case with fowls today, but shrank greatly in size and were developed and fertilized within the body: first in a virginal manner, and then before true sex appeared there ensued a fairly long period of androgynous reproduction in which androgynous humans occasionally gave birth to individuals in whom one or the other sex predominated; and these occasional appearances, as time passed, became ever more frequent with the recession of androgyny, and the final appearance of true sex as it is understood today. This process extended over hundreds of thousands, and even a number of millions, of years.

The first root-race is called self-born, for the individuals of this race were the astral shadows of their progenitors, and their method of reproduction was by fission. Seven self-born primordial gods emanated from the triadic One. The self-born were the primary creation of seven creations, otherwise emanations of self-born gods, or ’elohim, as the Hebrews call them.

The Greek verb from which psyche is derived also means to chill, make cold; and this has an application to the psyche as the lower part of the human soul and therefore closely connected with the kama-rupa and astral light after death. Hence it is that those who dabble in necromantic experiments, or even in psychic experiences, often refer to a damp, chill, and often clammy sensation in the atmosphere when contact with these kama-rupic entities is made. This should be warning that such contact is not only highly unwholesome, but a danger signal that one is dealing with death and decay.

The Hindu rishi Narada, representing one of the most recondite and still living spiritual influences on earth, is said to have descended in bygone times into the regions of Patala, and to have been delighted with what he found there. On his return to the celestial regions, he gave to the gods a glowing account of the beauties of the hells, stating that they abounded in everything ministering to luxury and sensuous delight. For precisely these reasons, Patala as the lowest of the talas, has been called the infernal regions or hell. To beings evolving in the spheres of matter, these spheres are extremely pleasant despite the pain and suffering that invariably accompany sojourn in all astral spheres, which the talas are. What the evolving entities lose in spiritual power, intellectual bliss, and higher faculty, is compensated for by the attachments and bonds of a sensuous character, tying them temporarily to these realms.

The hippopotamus, the crocodile, and the frog were all either aquatic or amphibious animals, and as all ancient zoocosmology took its figures of speech from the surrounding world, these animals were chosen as symbolic of the early creative action in the waters of space, out of which arose the world. In an equally important sense, however, the hippopotamus has distinct reference to the astral world, and hence so far as the individual is concerned, to the post-mortem peregrination of the latter in kama-loka.

The human body has “Manasic as well as Kamic organs,” so that the cells answer to physical, mental, and spiritual impulses. The higher ego cannot act directly on the body, as its consciousness belongs to another plane of ideation; it has to act through its alter ego — the personal self (BCW 12:368-9; or St in Oc 90-1). The inert physical body is built, cell for cell, upon the invisible substance of the astral model-body or linga-sarira. The latter contains the real organs of the senses and sensations, and it transmits the mental, emotional, and instinctual impulses to which the physical body reacts. The lower mind acts upon the physical organs and their cells; but only the higher mind can influence the atoms in these cells, and arouse the brain to a mental conception of spiritual ideas. That is to say, ideal, mental, and physiological wholeness depend upon the dominance of the atomic, spiritual impulses over the desires of the selfish kama-manasic nature. The personal nature is limited in action to the material, molecular cell. This subtle but practical interplay of his physical and superphysical nature points to the natural unity of purpose in the trend of ethics and physiology. With power to know good and evil, and free will to choose, man is responsible for refining and perfecting his material, personal nature into becoming a responsive and powerful medium for manifesting his spiritual and higher intellectual individuality. The inner man is ever acting with the cosmic evolutionary urge toward perfection of type. It is this reincarnating ego which directs the atomic life of the fertilized germ-cells in upbuilding the body according to pattern; this is the mysterious organizer which eludes all analyses of biological researchers. Likewise, the morally and intellectually irresponsible entities evolving in the lower kingdoms are impulsed, in addition to the urge of each individual entity’s monad, by the instinctual phase of the universal mind which is directed by celestial beings acting with the so-called laws of nature.

The kama-rupic shades, whether mere shells or not, are usually invisible but they are sometimes seen by clairvoyants. The more coherent ones are the shells of gross or wicked people and are influences of sensual or evil trend which instinctively haunt the atmosphere of persons and places whose characters or conditions are congenial to them and therefore magnetically attract them. Even well-meaning sensitives and persons of mediumistic or psychic type, being relatively negative physically because more or less aware on the astral plane, are susceptible, at times, to some of these strangely perverse and obsessing influences. The ancient teachings show why people’s instinctive dread of the ghostly dregs or remnants of the personal self is well founded.

The leukocytes born in the spleen are analogous, in their spherical, nucleated, colorless, ameboid, and regenerating character, to the bloodless, astral, rounded form of the second root-race which reproduced its kind by spores or budding. This early type of racial imbodiment continued through the transition stages which led up to the physicalization of the grosser layers of the astral body when the third root-race evolved into red-blooded, sexual, organized form not unlike the present humanity.

The life-atoms belonging to the astral plane which make up the linga-sarira or model-body of men and beasts, are also liberated at death and follow along the same general lines as the physical life-atoms: they find their way into and out of other astral vehicles with which they are in magnetic sympathy. In this way they help form the astral vehicles of individuals of the three lower kingdoms as well as of the beast and human kingdoms. In similar manner peregrinate the psychic, intellectual, spiritual, and divine life-atoms. In order that the spiritual monad may proceed on its afterdeath journey, all sheaths of the spiritual consciousness must be dropped on their appropriate planes, thus finally permitting the spiritual ego to pursue its upward and inward journey unhampered by the attractions to the lower planes which these life-atoms bring about.

The linga-sarira has great tensile strength. It changes continuously during a lifetime, although these changes never depart from the fundamental human type or pattern, just as the physical body alters every moment. It also possesses the ability to exteriorize itself to a certain distance from its physical encasement, but in no case more than a few feet. It is composed of electromagnetic matter, which is somewhat more refined than the matter of our physical body. The whole world was composed of such matter in far past ages before it became the dense physical sphere it now is. After long ages the astral form had evolved and perfected, so that it has the form that the human races had during the early period of the third root-race — a more or less materialized concretion of the still more ethereal astrals of the first and second root-races. After another long period, during which the cycle of further descent into matter progressed, the gradually thickening astral form oozed forth from itself a coat of skin, corresponding to the Hebrew allegory of the Garden of Eden. Thus the present physical flesh-form of mankind appears.

The modern movement which began about the middle of the 19th century, mainly with the Fox sisters, embraces a large range of differing beliefs, so that any strictures directed against certain phases of it may justly be resented by those to whom such strictures do not apply. But the characteristic doctrine which identifies Spiritualism or astralism as such, is the belief that it is possible for the living to communicate with the departed spirits of the deceased. Theosophy, however, holds that at death the personality disintegrates, the individuality of the person passing into the devachanic state, while its lower components gradually fade out in the kama-loka. It is impossible to obtain communications with the ego in devachan, except when a purely impersonal love of one human being for another reaches into the devachanic condition and comes into spiritual rapport with the devachani. A far lower rapport may be established with the astral or kama-lokic remains which have been left behind to disintegrate in the lower regions of the astral light.

The more subtle forms of force-matter or astral light form the links between the physical earth and the mental state of the living beings upon it; and rapid and more or less violent physical cataclysms may be regarded as the final effects of a sudden release of tension in those higher realms. That unusual psychic conditions perceptible to animals and even to humans precede earthquakes many hours before a shock, and long before the seismographs show the smallest tremor, is well-authenticated. “It is absolutely false, and but an additional demonstration of the great conceit of our age, to assert (as men of science do) that all the great geological changes and terrible convulsions have been produced by ordinary and known physical forces. For these forces were but the tools and final means for the accomplishment of certain purposes, acting periodically, and apparently mechanically, through an inward impulse mixed up with, but beyond their material nature. There is a purpose in every important act of Nature, whose acts are all cyclic and periodical. But spiritual Forces having been usually confused with the purely physical, the former are denied by, and therefore have to remain unknown to Science, because left unexamined” (SD 1:640).

  “The name given to the Hermetists and Alchemists of the Middle Ages, and also to the Rosicrucians. The latter, the successors of the Theurgists, regarded fire as the symbol of Deity. It was the source, not only of material atoms, but the container of the spiritual and psychic Forces energizing them. Broadly analyzed, fire is a triple principle; esoterically, a septenary, as are all the rest of the Elements. As man is composed of Spirit, Soul and Body, plus a fourfold aspect: so is Fire. As in the works of Robert Fludd (de Fluctibus) one of the famous Rosicrucians, Fire contains (1) a visible flame (Body); (2) an invisible, astral fire (Soul); and (3) Spirit. The four aspects are heat (life), light (mind), electricity (Kamic, or molecular powers) and the Synthetic Essence, beyond Spirit, or the radical cause of its existence and manifestation. For the Hermetist or Rosicrucian, when a flame is extinct on the objective plane it has only passed from the seen world unto the unseen, from the knowable into the unknowable” (TG 119-20).

The nebular hypothesis was mainly rejected by the Masters and Blavatsky because of its typical materialistic and mechanical character. It is a fact that the solar system was originally formed from a vast nebula consolidating into the physical world from inner worlds — astral matter becoming physical matter — but guided by innate mind and life; and the various motions within the solar system arise from the innate vitality within it. Furthermore, although the planetary chains were originally born from this nebula, their respective life times are far shorter than that of the solar system itself, so that these planetary chains have their many reimbodiments during the life period of the solar system. Comets, if they survive, are usually destined to become planetary bodies in the solar system in their turn, running their life period, and then dying, to reappear as comets again after long ages of rest in inner worlds.

Theosophy does not hold to the idea of a single-track, end-on evolution from a protoplasmic speck to human being, without inner astral, mental, and spiritual urge from within. Rather, the plan of evolution as represented by the different classes and orders of beings on earth may be represented by a tree, whose main trunk is the human stem, from which (so far as this manvantara is concerned) the various animal types have issued like branches, each of them then entering upon a special unfolding development and differentiation of its own. Indeed, the same observation applies with equal force to the vegetable and mineral kingdoms, although their root-types issued from the human stem long aeons before the animal types appeared on earth.

Theosophy holds that mesmerism is not hypnotism. In hypnotism the subject’s intermediate nature is disjoined from its natural relations with his physical and astral body and put out of the control of the person himself, becoming susceptible to other influences. This process is a reversal of all evolutionary currents which in every being unfold and manifest from conscious centers within. Such a reversal is dangerous and far-reaching in its results, spiritually, mentally, morally, psychically, and physically.

The phenomenon is a variety of black magic, involving both the practice of psychologization and in certain cases the subjection of the victim to astral obsession: either an involuntary astral seizure on the part of a mediumistic person, or a deliberate act of sorcery on the part of a degraded one. The lower realms of the astral light harbor baneful exuviae of various sorts, with which a pernicious commerce may be had through various forms of moral depravity and psychic weakness. It was an exaggerated and specialized form of obsessions which takes place in our day in people transported by passion or afflicted with violent insanity; hence it is often found convenient to describe it simply as a form of insanity, which however does not explain how the appearances of a wolf were caused. In extreme cases, however, the craving for physical life and the dread of personal extinction in a human kama-rupa may be so great that it may seize and enter the body of a living animal.

The point at issue between theosophic teachings and modern evolutionary theory is that species cannot be traced back to a unitary physical origin; instead, a number of types appeared on the physical planes, coming from the astral, through intermediate astro-physical stages, and each type proceeding to differentiate physically in response to physical conditions.

The post-mortem separation of man’s seven principles frees the higher triad, atma-buddhi-manas, for return to, and experience in, the arupa (formless) planes of existence. Then the human-animal soul — kama-manas — composed of the dregs of the selfish personal emotions, desires, and impulses, becomes for a shorter or longer time a coherent astral form, finding its natural level in kama-loka. These shells of the dead, as well as the various nature spirits and other astral entities, are normally invisible to us as we are to them. However, certain conditions attract them and help them to appear. Actual materializations, though rare, are possible, as are various similar phenomenal appearances; yet none are the spirits they are supposed to be by spiritualists. As a rule they all fall into three general classes: 1) the astral body of the living medium detaches itself and assumes the appearance of the so-called spirit by reflecting some invisible image already in the astral light, or in the mind of one or more of the sitters; 2) the astral shell of a deceased person, devoid of all spirit, intellect, and conscience, can become visible and even partially tangible when the condition of the air and ether is such as to alter the molecular vibration of the shell so that it can be seen; and 3) an unseen mass of chemical, magnetic, and electrical material is collected from the atmosphere, the passive medium, and the circle. With this material, the astral entities automatically make a form, which invariably reflects as pictures or portraits the shape or appearance of any desired person, either dead or alive. The astral entities, which are of various kinds, use the mind-pictures or images which crowd the thoughts and auras of those present, as the astral light receives, preserves, and reflects when conditions are right, pictures or portraits of both dead and living, and indeed of all events. The confusion and illusion of it all may be increased by scenes related to the multiple personality of someone present whose aura presents pictured records of past lives.

The power which a serpent has of casting its old skin is analogous to what the earth does at the commencement of each round, and to the clothing of the human jiva with a new body when it enters the womb. Again, the astral light is called a serpent; its lowest strata are dangerous and deceptive, while it extends through all planes up to the highest akasa, the vehicle of divine wisdom.

The practice was ancient and widespread among the lower orders of the Greek and Roman peoples, and is expressly condemned by an uninterrupted testimony dating from archaic times, ancient legislators and philosophers condemning it, for it is a perversion of the real communion of the genuine spiritual theurgist with his own inner god. Modern Spiritualism is an unconscious blundering into necromancy; if the astral remains of the dead are really called up, then the normal processes of their dissolution are interfered with. If they are not called up, then they have been impersonated by still more harmful and dangerous denizens of the lower astral light.

The pranic life-atoms of the human body make an electrical field which, permeating our astral-vital-physical constitution, puts us in contact with the natural flow of ethereal currents of electric and magnetic force. These forces emanate from great cosmic entities who are the intelligent agencies for the karmic action of the so-called laws of nature. They function in the noumenal realm of causes which are due to appear on earth as phenomena of all kinds. These entities, leaving aside solar forces, are the regents of the seven sacred planets, who help to build the body and oversee the destiny of both humanity and the earth. They act automatically and impersonally in harmony with the combined causes and effects of ethereal and terrestrial conditions.

The puzzle of this psychophysiological state is explained by the ability of the different selves of composite human nature to function consciously upon the several planes of his own being. For instance, the ordinary somnambulist may be conscious in his own astral body which then is reflexly stimulating the instinctual cerebellum which presides over bodily movements and functions. Such a case is analogous to the unusual performances of an entranced medium. As in common dreams at night, so in sleep walking, one part of the brain, say the cerebrum, may be asleep, while the cerebellum may be awake and active. In rare cases, however, the somnambulist may so far transcend his usual character that he evidently is functioning above the astral level of his nature.

There are no absolute separations among the planes of the universe, because all of them, while existing distinctly from each other, on their frontiers blend insensibly with the contiguous planes. Thus the lower portions of the superastral blend insensibly with the higher portions of the astral. Astral in a general sense is equivalent to the cosmic astral light, itself composed of numerous subordinate planes ranging from the spiritual through the ethereal, until the lowest subplanes merge into and become the physical world. Thus the cosmic sea of fire spoken of by ancient mystics and philosophers is another way of speaking of pure spirit and the divine or superspirit; out to spirit and superspirit flows in emanational degrees what becomes through another unfolding the astral light.

There is a clear distinction between 1) akasa; 2) the astral light; and 3) ether. Akasa in its higher portions is pure spirit; the astral light is the seventh or highest division of our physical cosmic plane and may even in a sense be called the most subtle part of the terrestrial atmosphere; whereas ether is a material agent or stuff interpenetrating molecular matter, and is therefore even more gross than is the astral light. In one sense these three are the highest, the very low, and the lowest parts of spirit or akasa itself, the physical stuff or body of our plane being its lees or dregs.

  “There is one great difference between the Astral Light and the Akasa which must be remembered. The latter is eternal, the former is periodic. The Astral Light changes not only with the Mahamanvantaras but also with every sub-period and planetary cycle or Round. . . .

The satyrs of tradition represent historically an extinct race of quasi-animal men. The third root-race united themselves with animal beings, thus producing those creatures with which the late Lemurians and early Atlanteans again mated, this unnatural union producing the anthropoids; but the first miscegenation was between races to which the names human and animal did not imply so marked a distinction as they do now, and the union was fertile and not so unnatural as it would be today. The Nephilim (giants) of Genesis 6:4 were late second and third root-race human protoplasts, and vague recollections of the former existence of these mindless races brought about their identification by the early Hebrews with the satyrs. It seems likely that the apparition of nature spirits to country people would be connected by them with the tradition of satyrs; and actual beings of this kind, though extinct as a physical race, persist in astral form.

These elementals are the principal nature forces used by the disimbodied human dead, very real but never visible “shells” mistaken for spirits at seances, and are the producers of all the phenomena except the purely subjective. They may be described as centers of force having instinctive desires but no consciousness as we understand it. Hence their acts may be what we humans call good or bad, indifferently. They have astral forms which partake, to a distinguishing degree, of the element to which they belong and also of the universally encompassing ether. They are a combination of sublimated matter and a purely rudimental mind. Some remain throughout several cycles relatively unchanging, so far as radical change goes, but still have no separate individuality, and usually acting collectively, so to speak. Others, of certain elements and species, change under a fixed law which Qabbalists explain. The most solid of their bodies are ordinarily just immaterial enough to escape perception by our physical eyesight, but not so unsubstantial that they cannot be perfectly recognized by the inner or clairvoyant vision. They not only exist and can all live in ether, but can handle and direct it for the production of physical effects, as readily as we can compress air or water for the same purpose by pneumatic and hydraulic apparatus; in which occupation they are readily helped by the human elementaries or astral shells.

These kumaras are sometimes also called rudras, adityas, gandharvas, asuras, maruts, and vedhas. The seven kumaras — both as groups and as aggregated individuals — are intimately connected with the dhyani-buddhas who watch over the seven rounds of our planetary chain. The four groups of kumaras generally spoken of are connected equally intimately with the four celestial bodhisattvas of the four globes of our round, and by correspondence with the four completed root-races of our earth. They are identical with the angels of the seven planets, and their name shows their connection with the constellation Makara or Capricorn. Makara is connected with the birth of the spiritual microcosm, and the death or dissolution of the physical universe (its passage into the realm of the spiritual) as are the kumaras. Mara is the god of darkness, the Fallen one, and death, i.e., death of every physical thing; but through the karmic lessons learned also the quickener of the birth of the spiritual. The kumaras are connected also with the sage Narada. An allegory in the Puranas says that the kumaras, the first progeny of Brahma, were without desire or passion, inspired with the holy wisdom, and undesirous of progeny. They refused to create, but were compelled later on to complete divine man by incarnating in him. The barhishads or lunar pitris formed the “senseless” astral-physical humanity of the early root-races. Those beings possessing the living spiritual fire were the agnishvattas or solar pitris. The sons of Brahma, the kumaras, being originally themselves unconscious (in our sense) could be of no use in supplying the mental and kamic principles, as they did not possess them: they had attained no individual karmic elevation in merit of their own as had the agnishvattas. The perfection of the kumaras was passive and negative (nirguna). The kumaras eventually “sacrifice” themselves by incarnating in mankind, thus corresponding to the manasaputras and fallen angels cast into hell (material spheres, our earth).

These shells, spooks, elementaries, and evil phantoms of the astral light were known throughout antiquity, universally abhorred and often feared by human beings because of their evil effects on human life. Hebrew and early Christian demonologists personalized them under the head of Belial and his army of imps.

The skandhas are likewise closely connected with the karmic pictures in the astral light, which also is the medium as well as the register of impressions.

  “The ‘Soma’ plant is the asclepias acida, which yields a juice from which that mystic beverage, the Soma drink, is made. Alone the descendants of the Rishis, the Agnihotri (the fire priests) of the great mysteries knew all its powers. But the real property of the true Soma was (and is) to make a new man of the Initiate, after he is reborn, namely once that he begins to live in his astral body . . .; for, his spiritual nature overcoming the physical, he would soon snap it off and part even from that etherealized form. . . .

The Sons of Atri (atrayas or atreyas) are one of the classes of the pitris representing the barhishad pitris (those who were more particularly lunar pitris), the formers and developers of the human physical body and lower principles. After “having given birth to their astral doubles, [they] are reborn as the Sons of Atri” (SD 2:89).

The states of matter give clues by means of correspondence to the understanding of the primary elements. Gases are indefinitely expansible and their particles have great freedom and range of movement and are always in rapid motion. It would seem by analogy that the solid state corresponds to the physical planes, the liquid state to the astral or psychic plane, air to mind, and fire to spirit. Air may be called the vehicle of fire, as mind is the vehicle of spirit. Fire is analogous to points or foci of energy; air, being number two, suggests lines of force or radiation, motion. The air which, according to the teaching of the medieval Fire-philosophers, is the domain of sylphs is certainly not our familiar mixture of oxygen and nitrogen, which is merely a correspondence of the element on our plane; it is when on our own astral air plane that these beings may be encountered.

The sun, moon, planets, earth, and human brain are all magnets in contact with a common network of “live” wires of consciousness. The atoms in the solar system not only probably change their combining equivalents on every planet, but they undergo a certain change in their rapid passage through our atmosphere: concerning “the Spirit, the noumenon of that which becomes in its grossest form oxygen and hydrogen and nitrogen on Earth. . . . Before these gases and fluids become what they are in our atmosphere, they are interstellar Ether; still earlier and on a deeper plane — something else, and so on in infinitum” (SD 1:626). These fluids and gases, then, have been stepped down, plane after plane, bringing to us the karmic influences of the hierarchies of entities which compose the solar organism. They are the tangible carriers of the cosmic electrical fire of divine, spiritual, mental, psychic, astral, and material forces which infill the universe. Here, in brief, are the astrological causative influences in typical epidemics, which are variously operating in other karmic diseases and mental and emotional disorders such as popular uprisings, fanatical movements, and waves of crime and vice. Happily, the same impersonal agents of the karmic law, under the influences of far higher spiritual agents, are equally active and helpful during human cycles of ethical and spiritual aspiration and progress.

The theosophical interpretation of hysteria is that some obsessing astral entity, not always excarnate human or wholly human, is playing upon the human being in unnatural and useless ways. The patient’s unconscious includes his various past lives in which he developed the neurotic tendencies which now attract harmful psychic influences. Among the various types and grades of astral entities from which the normal body and mind are a protection, there are the elementaries dominated and enslaved by some special form or forms of desire. Of such, there may be those with the intense love of attention and the egoism which is so generally marked in hysterical types.

The theosophic study of sterility also throws a strong light upon the origin of the anthropoids. This dates back to hybrids resulting form the union of certain imperfectly evolved groups of the Atlanteans with females of a semi-human, if not quite animal race, itself the progeny of the “sin of the mindless” Lemurians. This took place at the period of the greatest materialization of physical man, when the unnatural union was fertile “because the mammalian types were not remote enough from their Root-type — Primeval Astral Man — to develop the necessary barrier” (SD 2:688-9; cf 195-6). Since then, nature has changed its ways, and the general rule for the crime of human bestiality is a resulting sterility.

The word has been used in theosophy to translate the Sanskrit chakra (wheel, nerve ganglion), but these chakras are better defined as forming centers in the vital-astral constitution of the organism. They are centers or foci of pranic energy, having special qualities which may be correlated to other groupings, such as the seven principles, the seven rays, etc. The seven chakras are: sacral, prostatic, epigastric (solar), cardiac, laryngeal, frontal, and cavernous.

The word is also familiar in its evil side, in the expression evil genius. Human beings hover between the influence of benign and malign powers which have been personified into guardian angels and besetting demons, or good and evil stars. The good and evil genii of the individual are among the karmic conditions which, interacting with free choice, modify his ruling destiny; they are either the heavenly voice of the invisible spiritual prototype, or the lower astral person.

Third eye: That organ which is considered to enable a living human being to see the astral world. Identified by occultists with the glandlike appendage of the brain called the pineal body.

  “This Hindu sacred beverage answers to the Greek Ambrosia or nectar, drunk by the gods of Olympus. A cup of kykeon was also quaffed by the mysta at the Eleusinian initiation. He who drinks it easily reaches Brahma, or the place of splendor (Heaven). The soma-drink known to Europeans is not the genuine beverage, but its substitute; for the initiated priests alone can taste of the real soma; and even kings and rajas, when sacrificing, receive the substitute. . . . We were positively informed that the majority of the sacrificial priests of the Dekkan have lost the secret of the true soma. It can be found neither in the ritual books nor through oral information. The true followers of the primitive Vedic religion are very few; these are the alleged descendants from the Rishis, the real Agnihotris, the initiates of the great Mysteries. The soma-drink is also commemorated in the Hindu Pantheon, for it is called King-Soma. He who drinks of it is made to participate in the heavenly king, because he becomes filled with it, as the Christian apostles and their converts became filled with the Holy Ghost, and purified of their sins. The soma makes a new man of the initiate; he is reborn and transformed, and his spiritual nature overcomes the physical; it gives the divine power of inspiration, and develops the clairvoyant faculty to the utmost. According to the exoteric explanation the soma is a plant, but, at the same time it is an angel. It forcibly connects the inner, highest ‘spirit’ of man, which spirit is an angel like the mystical soma, with his ‘irrational soul,’ or astral body, and thus united by the power of the magic drink, they soar together above physical nature and participate during life in the beatitude and ineffable glories of Heaven.

Thus the question whether the mystical drink was an actual drink, or merely a mystical one, cannot be answered by a simple yes or no. Originally it was entirely mystical, later it remained as mystical as ever, but the body with its grossness, and the astral influences with their terrible power over the men and women of the time, were temporarily reduced to quiescence by a preparation known to initiates to have the power of bringing about the condition required, without any permanent or even long after-effect, very much as a sedative will be given by a physician today. It is of course true that if this drink, however relatively innocent in a single instance, were to be constantly repeated, it would have developed into a drug habit.

Thus we have: atman, the divine monad, giving birth to the divine ego, which latter evolves forth the monadic envelope or divine soul. Jiva, the spiritual monad, has its child, which is the spiritual ego, and this in turn evolves forth the spiritual soul or individual; and the combination of these two, considered as a unit, generally speaking, is atma-buddhi; bhutatman, the human ego — the higher human soul, including the lower buddhi and higher manas; pranatman, the personal ego — the ordinary human soul or person — including manas, kama, and prana; and finally the beast or animal ego — the vital-astral soul: kama and prana.

Trance: A state of apparent unconsciousness, in which the body is susceptible to possession. A trance may be spontaneous or induced (as in hypnotism). Specifically, the mediumistic trance, in which a medium communicates with the astral forms or spirits of the deceased.

Transmigration ::: This word is grossly misunderstood in the modern Occident, as also is the doctrine comprised under theold Greek word metempsychosis, both being modernly supposed to mean, through the commonmisunderstanding of the ancient literatures, that the human soul at some time after death migrates into thebeast realm and is reborn on earth in a beast body. The real meaning of this statement in ancient literaturerefers to the destiny of what theosophists call the life-atoms, but it has absolutely no reference to thedestiny of the human soul, as an entity.Theosophy accepts all aspects of the ancient teaching, but explains and interprets them. Our doctrine inthis respect unless, indeed, we are treating of the case of a "lost soul,"is "once a man, always a man." Thehuman soul can no more migrate over and incarnate in a beast body than can the psychical apparatus of abeast incarnate in human flesh. Why? Because in the former case, the beast vehicle offers to the humansoul no opening at all for the expression of the spiritual and intellectual and psychical powers andfaculties and tendencies which make a man human. Nor can the soul of the beast enter into a humanbody, because the impassable gulf of a psychical and intellectual nature, which separates the twokingdoms, prevents any such passage from the one up into another so much its superior in all respects. Inthe former case, there is no attraction for the man beastwards; and in the latter case there is theimpossibility of the imperfectly developed beast mind and beast soul finding a proper lodgment in whatto it is truly a godlike sphere which it simply cannot enter.Transmigration, however, has a specific meaning when the word is applied to the human soul: the livingentity migrates or passes over from one condition to another condition or state or plane, as the case maybe, whether these latter be in the invisible realms of nature or in the visible realms, and whether the stateor condition be high or low. The specific meaning of this word, therefore, implies nothing more than achange of state or of condition or of plane: a migrating of the living entity from one to the other, butalways in conditions or estates or habitudes appropriate and pertaining to its human dignity.In its application to the life-atoms, to which are to be referred the observations of the ancients withregard to the lower realms of nature, transmigration means briefly that the particular life-atoms, which intheir aggregate compose man's lower principles, at and following the change that men call death migrateor transmigrate or pass into other bodies to which these life-atoms are attracted by similarity ofdevelopment -- be these attractions high or low, and they are usually low, because their own evolutionarydevelopment is as a rule far from being advanced. Nevertheless, it should be remembered that theselife-atoms compose man's inner -- and outer -- vehicles or bodies, and that in consequence there arevarious grades or classes of these life-atoms, from the physical upwards (or inwards if you please) to theastral, purely vital, emotional, mental, and psychical.This is, in general terms, the meaning of transmigration. The word means no more than the specificsenses just outlined, and stops there. But the teaching concerning the destiny of the entity is continuedand developed in the doctrine pertaining to the word metempsychosis.

Umbra: Latin for shadow. In occultism, the astral body or etheric double (q.v.) which lingers about the tomb of the physical body after the death of the latter, kept there by attraction impressed on physical matter by the emanations of the body in its lifetime in the material world.

Umbratiles: In mediumistic terminology, astral appearances which may become visible and occasionally tangible, too, by attracting material elements from the body of a medium or from the surrounding atmosphere.

Under this heading must be included the mischievous pranks of the poltergeist, due to the action of a persistent relic of the psycho-astral nature of a deceased person, in combination with elementals, often again working in conjunction with a mediumistic living individual.

Vahana(Sanskrit) ::: A "vehicle" or carrier. This word has a rather wide currency in philosophical and esoteric andoccult thought. Its signification is a bearer or vehicle of some entity which, through this carrier orvehicle, is enabled to manifest itself on planes or in spheres or worlds hierarchically inferior to its own.Thus the vahana of man is, generally speaking, his body, although indeed man's constitution comprises anumber of vahanas or vehicles, each one belonging to -- and enabling the inner man, or manifestingspiritual or intellectual entity, to express itself on -- the plane where the vahana is native.Vahana is thus seen to have a number of different meanings, or, more accurately, applications. E.g., thevahana of man's spiritual monad is his spiritual soul; the vahana of man's human ego is his human soul;and the vahana of man's psycho-vital-astral monad is the linga-sarira working through its vahana orcarrier, the sthula-sarira or physical body. The wire which carries the current of electricity can be said tobe the vahana of the electric current; or again, the intermolecular ether is the vahana of many of theradioactive forces of the world around us, etc. Every divine being has a vahana or, in fact, a number ofvahanas, through which it works and through which it is enabled to express its divine powers andfunctions on and in worlds and planes below the sphere or world or plane in which it itself lives. (Seealso Soul; Upadhi)

Vampire: The designation of an astral form which lives by drawing vitality and strength from living humans. According to occultists, a vampire may be the astral body of a person still living or that of a dead and buried body to which it still clings and which it tries to nourish and thus to prolong its own existence.

What are technically classified as obsessing ideas and feelings are evidence of the subjective reality of the astral plane and its disimbodied entities. Knowledge of man’s multifold nature, including the parts played by each of its principles both during life and after death, gives a key to many psychological problems in the postmortem survival of the kama-rupa. The differing aspects of obsession result from the varied types of the astral entities — ghosts or shades of the dead, elementaries of suicides and executed criminals, evil sorcerers, nature spirits, etc. The kama-rupic shells alone, being remnants of deceased personalities, differ as the latter had done in their imbodied desires and impulses. The variety of obsessing influences accounts for the medley of typical symptoms in conditions of inert melancholia, of sustained catalepsy, of violent mania and convulsions, of emotional egoism in hysteria, of childish grimaces and erratic muscular contractions in essential chorea, of subjective horrors in delirium tremens, and of the perverted brutality in purposeless, unhuman crimes. Though only a seer’s inner vision could reveal just what entity was active in each case, yet a student of human duality can recognize the unseemly and distorted play of the animal, lower nature, separated from the conscience and higher mind — the kama-rupic condition. Mild types of these disorders frequently are simply the uncontrolled play of the person’s own selfish nature; but these are in danger of drifting into the severer forms, because like attracts like. See also POSSESSION

What did the ancients mean by their gods and goddesses? They were intended to represent the guiding intelligences present within or in back of all invisible secrets, as well as astral and physical manifestations of nature. During the third root-race there were beings who were

When highly developed, this class of people, during incarnation on earth, is known in the East as the Brothers of the Shadow, a title rightly applied also to their astral shades, which are often quite fully conscious in the lower parts of nature, “cunning, low, vindictive, and seeking to retaliate their sufferings upon humanity, they become, until final annihilation, vampires, ghouls, and prominent actors. These are the leading ‘stars’ on the great spiritual stage of ‘materialization,’ which phenomena they perform with the help of the more intelligent of the genuine-born ‘elemental’ creatures, which hover around and welcome them with delight in their own spheres” (IU 1:3l9).

When that period ends he passes again into unconsciousness, undergoes the second death, and all that is spiritual in him passes on to devachan, leaving the lower parts to pursue their own transmigrations. Aside from extremes of mental suffering which he would not otherwise have had to endure, the suicide is deprived of the full fruitage of bliss in devachan, for the latter is in direct ratio to the extent of earthly experiences and their spiritual quality. As he is still alive, his punishment is largely due to the very intensity of that life and to his longing to enjoy earthly contacts. If his life on earth was evil and sensual, this longing tempts them to find some living being or creature through whom he can make contacts that to him were pleasures — to live again by proxy, as it were. Many crimes, obsessions, and manias, such as dipsomania, find their explanation here. Mediums and sensitives are open doors to such contacts; and these suicided astral beings, who are often called earth-walkers and who in many cases actually astral reliquiae, having by their own act severed their connection for the time with their highest principles — the spiritual soul (buddhi) and inner god (atman) — deprived thus of the urge and counsel of these highest principles, too often rush into these “open doors,” and “by so doing, at the expiration of the natural term, they generally lose the monad for ever” (ML 109).

Whereas temples or fanes of initiation were found among all peoples, as much on the plains as in the mountains, it was almost invariably the custom for centers of occult training, especially the higher branches, to be found on the lofty plateaus of mountain chains, and not solely because of the need of separation from the hurly-burly of human life as found in populated districts and their cities. An important reason why mountains or secluded spots are invariably chosen for secret training centers is that the currents and waves of the astral light become quieter and more peaceful the higher one ascends above the surface of the earth.

While karmic conditions may prevent a cure in this life for many cases, many others respond happily when, to the best resources of modern treatment, is added the knowledge of composite human nature with knowledge of its relations to the invisible astral sphere which interpenetrates and influences our world of mind and matter. Most important help may come from the confident, friendly, uplifting influence which emanates from intelligent, earnest, pure-minded attendants who deal with them.

  “With this fish, with the waters in general, and, for the Christians, with the Jordan waters in particular, the whole program of the ancient Mystery-Initiation is connected. The whole of the New Testament is an allegorical representation of the Cycle of Initiation, i.e., the natural birth of man in sin or flesh, and of his second or spiritual birth as an Initiate followed by his resurrection after three days of trance — a mode of purification — during which time his human body or Astral was in Hades or Hell, which is the earth, and his divine Ego in Heaven or the realm of truth” (BCW 11:495).

Words such as sidereal and astral, are used somewhat vaguely in theosophical literature to designate invisible manifested planes of various hierarchical grades both kosmic and human.

Wraith: The astral body (q.v.) of a living person; the apparition of a wraith is generally regarded by occultists as a sign of death.

Yesod: The Archetypal World of the Jewish Kabalistic mystic philosophers, in which the true or spirit forms of all things created exist. Many authors consider this Archetypal World to be the same as the astral world or astral plane of contemporary esoteric philosophy.

Yomi: In Japanese occultism, the spirit world or astral world.



QUOTES [15 / 15 - 196 / 196]


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   3 Peter J Carroll
   2 Manly P Hall
   2 M Alan Kazlev
   2 Dion Fortune
   2 Aleister Crowley
   1 Robert Anton Wilson
   1 Eliphas Levi
   1 Sri Aurobindo
   1 ?

NEW FULL DB (2.4M)

   32 Frederick Lenz
   11 William Walker Atkinson
   11 Paramahansa Yogananda
   10 Manly P Hall
   7 Annie Besant
   6 Sean Platt
   4 Franz Bardon
   3 Rudolf Steiner
   3 Peter J Carroll
   3 Dion Fortune
   3 Candace Knoebel
   3 Anonymous
   2 Van Morrison
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   2 Roshani Chokshi
   2 Philip K Dick
   2 Miguel Serrano
   2 M Alan Kazlev
   2 Lobsang Rampa
   2 Laurie Frankel

1:True nature of the gods is that of magical images shaped out of the astral plane by mankind's thought and influenced by the mind
   ~ Dion Fortune,
2:Human thought creates what it imagines; the phantoms of superstition project their deformities on the astral light, and live upon the same terrors which give them birth.
   ~ Eliphas Levi,
3:However the imagination does not in itself constitute the astral plane. The creative imagination arises at the interface of the astral wave function of reality with the sensitive particle structure in the brain.
   ~ Peter J Carroll, The Octavo,
4:What we are you cannot realise and it is a waste of time to try and do so but you can imagine (italics mine) us on the astral plane and we can contact you through your imagination, and though your mental picture is not real or actual, the results of it are real and actual.
   ~ Dion Fortune, The Cosmic Doctrine,
5:In the natal mist
Across the dangerous haze, the pregnant stir,
He through the astral chaos shore a way
Mid the grey faces of its demon gods,
Questioned by whispers of its flickering ghosts,
Besieged by sorceries of its fluent force. ~ Sri Aurobindo, Savitri, 02.05,
6:But the true black magician does not work through the ethers which are the home of the etheric elementals. He works through the entities who dwell in the astral light or the animal magnetism of the lower astral plane. The true black magician can become (and usually is) clairvoyant, but he can never go any higher than the astral world. To this plane he is tied to his passions, hates, incantations, and the animal nature which is the basis of black magic. ~ Manly P Hall, Magic: A Treatise on Esoteric Ethics,
7:Let the Magician therefore adventure himself upon the Astral Plane with the declared design to penetrate to a sanctuary of discarnate Beings such as are able to instruct and fortify him, also to prove their identity by testimony beyond rebuttal. All explanations other than these are of value only as extending and equilibrating Knowledge, or possibly as supplying Energy to such Magicians as may have found their way to the Sources of Strength. In all cases, naught is worth an obol save as it serve to help the One Great Work" ~ Aleister Crowley, Liber ABA, App 3,
8:There are two kinds of black magicians: (1) those who use the demons of the astral plane for their villainy, which they invoke through necromancy and invocation; and (2) those who create their own demons and launch them against the world. The first group does the greatest harm to the world, but the second injure themselves more. The first group is composed mostly of conscious black magicians, while there are many in the second group who are totally ignorant of what they are doing. Some never learn their mistake until the demons they have created come back to the persons who sent them forth. ~ Manly P Hall, Magic: A Treatise on Esoteric Ethics,
9:My understanding is that these are interdmensional entities that have an objective existence apart from the tripper's consciousness
The narcissistic reductionistism of physicalism assumes that either consciousness is an epiphenomnon of brain activity, or, at best, that brain and consciousness are two different aspects of the same reality (e.g. Neutral Monism, Teilhard, Wilber). While the latter option is more receptive of alternate realities, neither of these options acknowledges entities or consciousness existing apart from the empirical material world.
Ufo researcher John Keel coined the term "ultraterrestrial." A similar phenomenon may be the case here. These are entities that are more "material" than the imaginal ("astral") world.
So, a continuum of being might be something like:
- Transcendent
- Mind or psyche apart from matter
- Imaginal world (sensu Henry Corbin, = Collective Unconscious of Jung)
- Interdimensional, Ultraterrestrial, ufos, drug vision entities, high strangeness
- Orgone (Reich), linga sharira (Blavatsky), Etheric body
- Empirical material reality ~ M Alan Kazlev, Facebook 2020-09-14,
10:Central to shamanism is the perception of an otherworld or series of otherworlds. This type of astral or aetheric dimension containing various powers entities and forces allows real effects to be created in this world. The shaman's soul journeys through this dimension while in ecstatic or drug-induced state of trance. The journey may be undertaken for divinatory knowledge, to cure sickness, to deliver a blow to enemies, or to find game animals. Prospective shamans are usually selected from those with a nervous disposition. They may either be assigned to shamanic instruction or are driven to it by a power present in the shamanic culture. Initiation invokes a journey into the otherworld, a meeting with spirits and a death-rebirth experience. In the deathrebirth experience, the candidate has a vision of his body being dismembered, often by fantastic beings or animal spirits, and then reassembled from the wreckage. The new body invariably contains an extra part often described as an additional bone or an inclusion of magical quartz stones or sometimes an animal spirit. This experience graphically symbolizes the location of the aetheric force field within the body or the addition of various extra powers to it.
   ~ Peter J Carroll, Liber Null,
11:To prepare for Astral Magic a temple or series of temples needs to be erected on the plane of visualized imagination. Such temples can take any convenient form although some magicians prefer to work with an exact simulacrum of their physical temple. The astral temple is visualized in fine detail and should contain all the equipment required for ritual or at least cupboards where any required instruments can be found.
   Any objects visualized into the temple should always remain there for subsequent inspection unless specifically dissolved or removed. The most important object in the temple is the magician's image of himself working in it. At first it may seem that he is merely manipulating a puppet of himself in the temple but with persistence this should give way to a feeling of actually being there. Before beginning Astral Magic proper, the required temple and instruments together with an image of the magician moving about in it should be built up by a repeated series of visualizations until all the details are perfect. Only when this is complete should the magician begin to use the temple. Each conjuration that is performed should be planned in advance with the same attention to detail as in Ritual Magic. The various acts of astral evocation, divination, enchantment, invocation and illumination take on a similar general form to the acts of Ritual Magic which the magician adapts for astral work. ~ Peter J Carroll, Liber Kaos [T2],
12:subtle ::: In Vedanta (Mandukya Upanishad and later teachings - e.g. Advaita - based on it) "subtle" is used to designate the "dream state" of consciousness, and in Advaita this also includes the Prana, Manas, and Vijnana koshas (= the vehicles of vital force, mind, and higher consciousness) re-interpreted from of the Taittiriya Upanishad.

In Tibetan and Tantric Buddhism it refers to an intermediate grade between the "gross" and "very subtle" "minds" and "winds" (vayu = prana).

The Sukshma Sthula or Subtle Body is one of the seven principles of man in Blavatskian Theosophy; it is also called the "astral body" (this has little similarity with the astral body of Out of Body experience, because it cannot move far from the gross physical vehicle, it seems to correspond to what Robert Monroe calls the "second body", and identified with the Double or Ka

In Sant Mat / Radhasoami cosmology - the Anda (Cosmic Egg) / Sahans-dal Kanwal (Crown Chakra) is sometimes called the Subtle; hence Subtle = Astral

The term Subtle Physical is used somewhat generically by Sri Aurobindo (in Letters on Yoga) to refer to a wider reality behind the external physical.

Ken Wilber uses the term Subtle to indicate the yogic and mystic holonic-evolutionary level intermediate between "Psychic" (in his series = Nature Mysticism) and "Causal" (=Realisation"); it includes many psychic and occult experiences and can be considered as pertaining to the Subtle as defined here (although it also includes other realities and experiences that might also be interpreted as "Inner Gross" - e.g. Kundalini as a classic example). ~ M Alan Kazlev, Kheper, planes/subtle,
13:In the Judeo-Christian tradition, it is called 'the resurrection body ' and 'the glorified body.' The prophet Isaiah said, 'The dead shall live, their bodies shall rise' (Isa. 26:19). St. Paul called it 'the celestial body' or 'spiritual body ' (soma pneumatikon) (I Corinthians 15:40). In Sufism it is called 'the most sacred body ' (wujud al-aqdas) and 'supracelestial body ' (jism asli haqiqi). In Taoism, it is called 'the diamond body,' and those who have attained it are called 'the immortals' and 'the cloudwalkers.' In Tibetan Buddhism it is called 'the light body.' In Tantrism and some schools of yoga, it is called 'the vajra body,' 'the adamantine body,' and 'the divine body.' In Kriya yoga it is called 'the body of bliss.' In Vedanta it is called 'the superconductive body.' In Gnosticism and Neoplatonism, it is called 'the radiant body.' In the alchemical tradition, the Emerald Tablet calls it 'the Glory of the Whole Universe' and 'the golden body.' The alchemist Paracelsus called it 'the astral body.' In the Hermetic Corpus, it is called 'the immortal body ' (soma athanaton). In some mystery schools, it is called 'the solar body.' In Rosicrucianism, it is called 'the diamond body of the temple of God.' In ancient Egypt it was called 'the luminous body or being' (akh). In Old Persia it was called 'the indwelling divine potential' (fravashi or fravarti). In the Mithraic liturgy it was called 'the perfect body ' (soma teilion). In the philosophy of Sri Aurobindo, it is called 'the divine body,' composed of supramental substance. In the philosophy of Teilhard de Chardin, it is called 'the ultrahuman'.
   ~ ?, http://herebedragons.weebly.com/homo-lumen.html,
14:The general characteristics and attributions of these Grades are indicated by their correspondences on the Tree of Life, as may be studied in detail in the Book 777.
   Student. -- His business is to acquire a general intellectual knowledge of all systems of attainment, as declared in the prescribed books. (See curriculum in Appendix I.) {231}
   Probationer. -- His principal business is to begin such practices as he my prefer, and to write a careful record of the same for one year.
   Neophyte. -- Has to acquire perfect control of the Astral Plane.
   Zelator. -- His main work is to achieve complete success in Asana and Pranayama. He also begins to study the formula of the Rosy Cross.
   Practicus. -- Is expected to complete his intellectual training, and in particular to study the Qabalah.
   Philosophus. -- Is expected to complete his moral training. He is tested in Devotion to the Order.
   Dominus Liminis. -- Is expected to show mastery of Pratyahara and Dharana.
   Adeptus (without). -- is expected to perform the Great Work and to attain the Knowledge and Conversation of the Holy Guardian Angel.
   Adeptus (within). -- Is admitted to the practice of the formula of the Rosy Cross on entering the College of the Holy Ghost.
   Adeptus (Major). -- Obtains a general mastery of practical Magick, though without comprehension.
   Adeptus (Exemptus). -- Completes in perfection all these matters. He then either ("a") becomes a Brother of the Left Hand Path or, ("b") is stripped of all his attainments and of himself as well, even of his Holy Guardian Angel, and becomes a babe of the Abyss, who, having transcended the Reason, does nothing but grow in the womb of its mother. It then finds itself a
   Magister Templi. -- (Master of the Temple): whose functions are fully described in Liber 418, as is this whole initiation from Adeptus Exemptus. See also "Aha!". His principal business is to tend his "garden" of disciples, and to obtain a perfect understanding of the Universe. He is a Master of Samadhi. {232}
   Magus. -- Attains to wisdom, declares his law (See Liber I, vel Magi) and is a Master of all Magick in its greatest and highest sense.
   Ipsissimus. -- Is beyond all this and beyond all comprehension of those of lower degrees. ~ Aleister Crowley, Liber ABA,
15:For instance, a popular game with California occultists-I do not know its inventor-involves a Magic Room, much like the Pleasure Dome discussed earlier except that this Magic Room contains an Omniscient Computer.
   To play this game, you simply "astrally project" into the Magic Room. Do not ask what "astral projection" means, and do not assume it is metaphysical (and therefore either impossible, if you are a materialist, or very difficult, if you are a mystic). Just assume this is a gedankenexperiment, a "mind game." Project yourself, in imagination, into this Magic Room and visualize vividly the Omniscient Computer, using the details you need to make such a super-information-processor real to your fantasy. You do not need any knowledge of programming to handle this astral computer. It exists early in the next century; you are getting to use it by a species of time-travel, if that metaphor is amusing and helpful to you. It is so built that it responds immediately to human brain-waves, "reading" them and decoding their meaning. (Crude prototypes of such computers already exist.) So, when you are in this magic room, you can ask this Computer anything, just by thinking of what you want to know. It will read your thought, and project into your brain, by a laser ray, the correct answer.
   There is one slight problem. The computer is very sensitive to all brain-waves. If you have any doubts, it registers them as negative commands, meaning "Do not answer my question." So, the way to use it is to start simply, with "easy" questions. Ask it to dig out of the archives the name of your second-grade teacher. (Almost everybody remembers the name of their first grade teacher-imprint vulnerability again-but that of the second grade teacher tends to get lost.)
   When the computer has dug out the name of your second grade teacher, try it on a harder question, but not one that is too hard. It is very easy to sabotage this machine, but you don't want to sabotage it during these experiments. You want to see how well it can be made to perform.
   It is wise to ask only one question at a time, since it requires concentration to keep this magic computer real on the field of your perception. Do not exhaust your capacities for imagination and visualization on your first trial runs.
   After a few trivial experiments of the second-grade-teacher variety, you can try more interesting programs. Take a person toward whom you have negative feelings, such as anger, disappointment, feeling-of-betrayal, jealousy or whatever interferes with the smooth, tranquil operation of your own bio-computer. Ask the Magic Computer to explain that other person to you; to translate you into their reality-tunnel long enough for you to understand how events seem to them. Especially, ask how you seem to them.
   This computer will do that job for you; but be prepared for some shocks which might be disagreeable at first. This super-brain can also perform exegesis on ideas that seem obscure, paradoxical or enigmatic to us. For instance, early experiments with this computer can very profitably turn on asking it to explain some of the propositions in this book which may seem inexplicable or perversely wrong-headed to you, such as "We are all greater artists than we realize" or "What the Thinker thinks, the Prover proves" or "mind and its contents are functionally identical."
   This computer is much more powerful and scientifically advanced than the rapture-machine in the neurosomatic circuit. It has total access to all the earlier, primitive circuits, and overrules any of them. That is, if you put a meta-programming instruction into this computer; it will relay it downward to the old circuits and cancel contradictory programs left over from the past. For instance, try feeding it on such meta-programming instructions as: 1. I am at cause over my body. 2. I am at cause over my imagination. 3.1 am at cause over my future. 4. My mind abounds with beauty and power. 5.1 like people, and people like me.
   Remember that this computer is only a few decades ahead of present technology, so it cannot "understand" your commands if you harbor any doubts about them. Doubts tell it not to perform. Work always from what you can believe in, extending the area of belief only as results encourage you to try for more dramatic transformations of your past reality-tunnels.
   This represents cybernetic consciousness; the programmer becoming self-programmer, self-metaprogrammer, meta-metaprogrammer, etc. Just as the emotional compulsions of the second circuit seem primitive, mechanical and, ultimately, silly to the neurosomatic consciousness, so, too, the reality maps of the third circuit become comic, relativistic, game-like to the metaprogrammer. "Whatever you say it is, it isn't, " Korzybski, the semanticist, repeated endlessly in his seminars, trying to make clear that third-circuit semantic maps are not the territories they represent; that we can always make maps of our maps, revisions of our revisions, meta-selves of our selves. "Neti, neti" (not that, not that), Hindu teachers traditionally say when asked what "God" is or what "Reality" is. Yogis, mathematicians and musicians seem more inclined to develop meta-programming consciousness than most of humanity. Korzybski even claimed that the use of mathematical scripts is an aid to developing this circuit, for as soon as you think of your mind as mind 1 , and the mind which contemplates that mind as mind2 and the mind which contemplates mind2 contemplating mind 1 as mind3, you are well on your way to meta-programming awareness. Alice in Wonderland is a masterful guide to the metaprogramming circuit (written by one of the founders of mathematical logic) and Aleister Crowley soberly urged its study upon all students of yoga. ~ Robert Anton Wilson, Prometheus Rising,

*** WISDOM TROVE ***

1:Some people travel to other dimensions in their astral bodies when they meditate. ~ frederick-lenz, @wisdomtrove
2:If Aims impel these Astral Ones The ones allowed to know Know that which makes them as forgot As Dawn forgets them now ~ emily-dickinson, @wisdomtrove
3:Subtle astral colors... are hidden in everything around you. Could you but see, you would be amazed at their beauty. ~ paramahansa-yogananda, @wisdomtrove
4:Everything is a state of mind. Astral travel is the ability to wander through different states of mind and develop psychic perceptions. ~ frederick-lenz, @wisdomtrove
5:Knowledge of life in the astral world leads us to a conclusion of fundamental importance, namely that the physical world is the product of the astral world. ~ rudolf-steiner, @wisdomtrove
6:During the Atlantean Cycle, the earth's aura, the invisible astral energy field that surrounds and protects our planet and through which all psychic perception flows, was very pure. ~ frederick-lenz, @wisdomtrove
7:We create the possibility for a better human form in our next life if during our jamaloca existence after death, when we still have an astral body, we can have memories connected with music. ~ rudolf-steiner, @wisdomtrove
8:I am at the Continental Divide with the astral beings. They're most beautiful. They're most luminous. They have many shapes and sometimes their shape changes constantly,  All kinds of colors. ~ frederick-lenz, @wisdomtrove
9:Channeling is a practice that is very popular right now. It is very dangerous. It is a process in which you are opening yourself up to astral entities and inviting them to come into you. This is silly. ~ frederick-lenz, @wisdomtrove
10:Your understanding of the astral dimensions can help you alter structures in the physical dimensions. It is in and through the medium of the astral dimensions that all of the siddha powers function and work. ~ frederick-lenz, @wisdomtrove
11:Some astral dimensions are bright and filled with ecstasy. Advanced cosmic beings live in them. But there are also very dark astral dimensions, often inhabited by beings that are filled with hate and despair. ~ frederick-lenz, @wisdomtrove
12:A lot of people profess to have power and it is very minor astral power. They do get power over you, not because they have any intrinsic power, but because your fear immobilizes you and makes you do a bad job. ~ frederick-lenz, @wisdomtrove
13:Those interested in celestial navigation are advised to first obtain a rudimentary knowledge of integral calculus, phlebotomy, astral physics and related subjects. The use of liquor is strictly forbidden on interplanetary flights. ~ henry-miller, @wisdomtrove
14:The members of the Atlantean Mystery School were the earliest human explorers of the frontiers of inner space. Through their meditative journeys and explorations, they discovered many secret astral passageways that led to an infinite variety of other worlds and dimensions. ~ frederick-lenz, @wisdomtrove
15:The disembodied soul does not part with Nature when it leaves the earth; life but, rather, it rises to a plane of Nature which is fuller, richer and sweeter in every way than the best of which the earth dwelling soul dreams. The dross of materiality burned away by the astral vibrations, the soul blossoms and bears spiritual fruit in the new life. ~ william-walker-atkinson, @wisdomtrove
16:At physical death man loses his consciousness of the flesh and becomes conscious of his astral body in the astral world. Thus physical death is astral birth. Later, he passes from the consciousness of luminous astral birth to the consciousness of dark astral death and awakens in a new physical body. Thus astral death is physical birth. These recurrent cycles of physical and astral encasements are the ineluctable destiny of all unenlightened men. ~ paramahansa-yogananda, @wisdomtrove
17:Death is not a blotting-out of existence, a final escape from life; nor is death the door to immortality. He who has fled his Self in earthly joys will not recapture It amidst the gossamer charms of an astral world. There he merely accumulates finer perceptions and more sensitive responses to the beautiful and the good, which are one. It is on the anvil of this gross earth that struggling man must hammer out the imperishable gold of spiritual identity. ~ paramahansa-yogananda, @wisdomtrove
18:In diabetes mellitus the case is as follows: the ego-organization, as it submerges in the astral and etheric realm, is so weakened that it can no longer effectively accomplish its action upon the sugar-substance. The sugar then undergoes the processes in the astral and etheric realms which should take place in the ego-organization... . From all this we see that a real healing process for diabetes mellitus can only be initiated if we are in a position to strengthen the ego-organization of the patient. ~ rudolf-steiner, @wisdomtrove

*** NEWFULLDB 2.4M ***

1:I'll tell him I astral-projected. Butt-head. ~ Scott Westerfeld,
2:The astral is the supporting ground for the physical dimension. ~ Frederick Lenz,
3:The trick to being happy is getting beyond the body and the astral realms. ~ Frederick Lenz,
4:I didn't know what some of the stuff on Astral Weeks was about until years later. ~ Van Morrison,
5:Unlike flying or astral projection, walking through walls is an earthbound pursuit. ~ Chris Rock,
6:Some people travel to other dimensions in their astral bodies when they meditate. ~ Frederick Lenz,
7:See, I agree with what Cassidy says - once you have sex you'll always be sewn together with an astral thread. ~ Tim Tharp,
8:You are the first of your kind. Books will be written about you. Be the legend you are meant to be. - Astral ~ Candace Knoebel,
9:Every man needs a shadow to reveal his light, to always be that close, ever present, bonded forever in astral allegiance. ~ Poppet,
10:It is possible to modify your awareness to perceive what plants perceive, birds, beings in the astral, the causal. ~ Frederick Lenz,
11:There's really no pain in the realm of the higher astral. A lot of spirits are playing mini-golf having a good time. ~ Frederick Lenz,
12:If Aims impel these Astral Ones The ones allowed to know Know that which makes them as forgot As Dawn forgets them now ~ Emily Dickinson,
13:To my mind, that’s a bigger and brighter idea than sitting at a lonely center surrounded by cold and distant astral lamps. ~ David Eagleman,
14:Subtle astral colors... are hidden in everything around you. Could you but see, you would be amazed at their beauty. ~ Paramahansa Yogananda,
15:We come together,
Like drops of water, like astral bodies.
We oppose each other,
Like magnets, like the colors of skin. ~ Tite Kubo,
16:Fly me high through the starry skies or maybe to an astral plane, cross the highways of fantasy, help me to forget today's pain. ~ Gary Wright,
17:The astral world is full of excellent unexpressed thoughts waiting for the one who will express them and use them up. ~ William Walker Atkinson,
18:True nature of the gods is that of magical images shaped out of the astral plane by mankind's thought and influenced by the mind
   ~ Dion Fortune,
19:The true nature of the gods is that of magical images shaped out of the astral plane by mankind's thought, and influenced by the mind. ~ Dion Fortune,
20:Kundalini energy passes through the shushumna, which is a Sanskrit name for an astral nerve channel that runs along the spinal column. ~ Frederick Lenz,
21:I think I opened up an area with Astral Weeks that hit a lot of peoples' nerves. But you can't really say that they're my favorite songs. ~ Van Morrison,
22:Everything is a state of mind. Astral travel is the ability to wander through different states of mind and develop psychic perceptions. ~ Frederick Lenz,
23:In a distant and secondhand set of dimensions, in an astral plane that was never meant to fly, the curling starmists waver and part . . . ~ Terry Pratchett,
24:The shushumna is a tube. It is an astral tube, like a reed. It runs from the base of the spine to between the eyebrows and a little bit above. ~ Frederick Lenz,
25:When we mediate, we are raising the kundalini through focus, through concentration. There is a metaphysical astral process that's taking place. ~ Frederick Lenz,
26:YOU ARE SUCH
THAT BESIDES THIS (PHYSICAL) BODY
YOU HAVE ANOTHER (ASTRAL) BODY.
DO NOT THEREFORE BE AFRAID
OF GETTING OUT
OF THE MORTAL FRAME. ~ Rumi,
27:You can move in and through the astral worlds once you have gained control of your subtle body. The astral worlds are the back corridors of eternity! ~ Frederick Lenz,
28:My astrologer predicted a year of successful enterprise and good fortune. So what went wrong? Had there been some ghastly beaureaucratic astral mix up? ~ Tyne O Connell,
29:Knowledge of life in the astral world leads us to a conclusion of fundamental importance, namely that the physical world is the product of the astral world. ~ Rudolf Steiner,
30:You know,' I called, 'you're the one that's going to have to explain to Max how you got your blender back.'
I'll tell him I astral-projected. Butt-head. ~ Scott Westerfeld,
31:A body - physical, astral, dead - might be treated as an object, might be adored and hated. So this story has emerged from the material that the body is. ~ Malgorzata Szumowska,
32:The astral dimensions afford you opportunities to have experiences and gain insights into the structural nature of how dimensions are made up and phased together. ~ Frederick Lenz,
33:Beyond the astral dimensions are the causal dimensions. They are not spatial or time oriented. They are planes of light, and they make up the outer limits of nirvana. ~ Frederick Lenz,
34:Outside of nirvana, the planes begin, the subtlest planes of light that vibrate fastest, all the way on down through the astral realms through the physical and so on. ~ Frederick Lenz,
35:The moment that men began to claim to be Gods – to personalise the divine power as manifested through astral and elemental forces – was the moment that men ceased to be Gods. ~ Anonymous,
36:They want to take you away from me. They want to take away your right to follow your path. I can’t let that happen. I must protect you. You must remain hidden.” -Astral ~ Candace Knoebel,
37:Human thought creates what it imagines; the phantoms of superstition project their deformities on the astral light, and live upon the same terrors which give them birth.
   ~ Eliphas Levi,
38:The worlds in which man is evolving as he treads the circle of births and deaths are three: the physical world, the astral or intermediate world, the mental or heavenly world. ~ Annie Besant,
39:If you could stretch a given minute, what would you find between its unstuck components? Probably some kind of astral madness. A bleak comprehension of the final size of things. ~ Don DeLillo,
40:Cosmic systems intertwine, astral bodies drip like wine, all of nature ebbs and flows. Comets shoot across the sky, can't explain the reasons why, this is how creation goes. ~ Madonna Ciccone,
41:The experiences that you have in astral dimensions are not essentially all that different from the experiences you have here in the physical dimension. They are all transient. ~ Frederick Lenz,
42:During the Atlantean Cycle, the earth's aura, the invisible astral energy field that surrounds and protects our planet and through which all psychic perception flows, was very pure. ~ Frederick Lenz,
43:The "kingdom of heaven" to which he referred was the state of God-consciousness, not the beautiful astral heavens that most people visualize, where virtuous souls go after death. ~ Goswami Kriyananda,
44:To see someone manifest all the astral lights, to be surrounded by light, to have light emanating from their body, pulsing waves of gold light - this is the miracle of enlightenment. ~ Frederick Lenz,
45:After death we live for some time in the astral world in the astral body used during our life on earth, and the more we learn to control and use it wisely now the better for us after death. ~ Annie Besant,
46:The causal body is the part of a person that lives forever. It is what you would call the soul. It doesn't dissolve along with the physical and astral bodies at the end of an incarnation. ~ Frederick Lenz,
47:I always thought it would be really cool to be playing the drums in the show and then have your astral body or whatever travel all through the audience and dig whatever it's like out there. ~ Bill Kreutzmann,
48:We create the possibility for a better human form in our next life if during our jamaloca existence after death, when we still have an astral body, we can have memories connected with music. ~ Rudolf Steiner,
49:When you die, i.e., when your physical body is finished with this earth ... and your astral entity goes on to the astral world ... it has to stand alone and answer for successes and failures. ~ Lobsang Rampa,
50:I am at the Continental Divide with the astral beings. They're most beautiful. They're most luminous. They have many shapes and sometimes their shape changes constantly, All kinds of colors. ~ Frederick Lenz,
51:Tinitiations ritual or astral voyage that is imbedded in the occult traditions of every culture."65 Thus, "the structure of abduction stories is identical to that of occult initiation rituals. ~ Jacques Vallee,
52:Beings with un-redeemed earthly karma are not permitted after astral death to go to the high causal sphere of cosmic ideas , but must shuttle to and fro from the physical and astral worlds. ~ Sri Yukteswar Giri,
53:Defining moment in new telepathist's life, moment when intuitive individual learns most of society isn't telepathic, doesn't see auras,doesn't know what life on ethereal astral plane is like. ~ Christina Westover,
54:... All these preparations clearly show that a human being must perfect himself in the physical world through his magical development in order to be prepared for the higher astral world after death. ~ Franz Bardon,
55:A teacher will have an initial contact at some point with someone. It happens inwardly first. Before you ever meet an advanced teacher, they have somehow traveled inwardly along the astral planes. ~ Frederick Lenz,
56:Channeling is a practice that is very popular right now. It is very dangerous. It is a process in which you are opening yourself up to astral entities and inviting them to come into you. This is silly. ~ Frederick Lenz,
57:Clairvoyants can see flashes of colour, constantly changing, in the aura that surrounds every person: each thought, each feeling, thus translating itself in the astral world, visible to the astral sight. ~ Annie Besant,
58:There are many universes, countless universes, and many of them are invisible. We call these the astral planes, but they are as real as this world is and they're filled with beings that have life spans. ~ Frederick Lenz,
59:Siddha powers are a type of occult power, but occult powers come in many shapes and forms. The Siddha powers that you most commonly hear about are things like levitation, telepathy, and astral projection. ~ Frederick Lenz,
60:Beside him, the world was a soft, pulsing and bright thing, alive with hidden angles that we could uncover one by one. It was more than magic. It was life turned relentless and astral. And I reveled in it. ~ Roshani Chokshi,
61:Some astral dimensions are bright and filled with ecstasy. Advanced cosmic beings live in them. But there are also very dark astral dimensions, often inhabited by beings that are filled with hate and despair. ~ Frederick Lenz,
62:Your understanding of the astral dimensions can help you alter structures in the physical dimensions. It is in and through the medium of the astral dimensions that all of the siddha powers function and work. ~ Frederick Lenz,
63:A lot of people profess to have power and it is very minor astral power. They do get power over you, not because they have any intrinsic power, but because your fear immobilizes you and makes you do a bad job. ~ Frederick Lenz,
64:In the realm of the higher astral, it's just fun. We're on the honeymoon and we love each other so much that we can't keep our hands off each other and everything is wonderful. It doesn't last; it's a honeymoon. ~ Frederick Lenz,
65:Some people travel to other dimensions in their astral bodies when they meditate. But astral traveling doesn't bring a person lasting happiness. If astral traveling is not done properly, it can be quite dangerous. ~ Frederick Lenz,
66:And despite the fact that the basis of this mathematical way of thinking in art is in reason, its dynamic content is able to launch us on astral flights which soar into unknown and still uncharted regions of the imagination. ~ Max Bill,
67:The ship lowered.  But whatever the healthy-seeming Meyer didn’t know or couldn’t see about the Astral collective, it didn’t extend to the details of connecting their shuttle to a pit in the ground, beneath the stone arch. ~ Sean Platt,
68:One of the great advantages of cremation - apart from all sanitary conditions - lies in the swift restoration to Mother Nature of the material elements composing the physical and astral corpses, brought about by the burning. ~ Annie Besant,
69:However the imagination does not in itself constitute the astral plane. The creative imagination arises at the interface of the astral wave function of reality with the sensitive particle structure in the brain.
   ~ Peter J Carroll, The Octavo,
70:The Sun and planets represent the spiritual consciousness in the heaven world ; the signs of the zodiac represent the astral or psychic consciousness ; and the houses of the horoscope as a whole, represent the physical consciousness. ~ Alan Leo,
71:There is a large difference between spacing out in the lower occult astral planes, weird, junky, fuzzy energy, and meditation. Meditation is sharp, clear, precise, perfect, luminous, shiny, happy, etheric, cosmic, and dissolute. ~ Frederick Lenz,
72:Those interested in celestial navigation are advised to first obtain a rudimentary knowledge of integral calculus, phlebotomy, astral physics and related subjects. The use of liquor is strictly forbidden on interplanetary flights. ~ Henry Miller,
73:You can experience ecstasy in any dimension and at any time. Enlightenment is not related to where your physical or astral body may be, or to any experiences that you may be having with them. Enlightenment is beyond dimensionality ~ Frederick Lenz,
74:How rich are we that we can look on these worlds with the perspective of modern science ... that we do not have to wonder as did former men whether stars are jewels hanging from celestial drapery or peepholes in the astral skin of creation! ~ Guy Murchie,
75:All things that ever were, that are, or that will be, having; their record upon the astral light, or tablet of the unseen universe, the initiated adept, by using the vision of his own spirit, can know all that has been known or can be known. ~ H P Blavatsky,
76:Like a luminous spiderweb, Popo. The threads of that web connect everything that exists. I can’t explain it to you. When you die, you’re going to travel like that comet, and I’ll be right behind, attached to your tail.” “We’ll be astral dust. ~ Isabel Allende,
77:Lightly Stepped A Yellow Star
Lightly stepped a yellow star
To its lofty place Loosed the Moon her silver hat
From her lustral Face All of Evening softly lit
As an Astral Hall Father, I observed to Heaven,
You are punctual.
~ Emily Dickinson,
78:Meditation is not this kind of spacey stuff that makes it difficult to orient your life. If that's your experience of meditation, you're not meditating. You're tapping into the lower astral planes, which is not a healthy place for human beings to tap. ~ Frederick Lenz,
79:Premonitions, presentiments, the sensing of unseen presences and many allied experiences are due to the activity of the astral body and its reaction on the physical; their ever-increasing frequency is merely the result of its evolution among educated people. ~ Annie Besant,
80:I’m only going say this—love is a wild creature that cannot
be tamed. It’s unconditional. And although it sometimes makes you
feel like one small person against this big old world, you must remember
you are the world to one particular person. - Astral ~ Candace Knoebel,
81:Moreover, the occult imagination saved rock and roll from sugary teenybopper purgatory and urged musicians, engineers, and producers to look beyond the conventional toward the possibility of raising the collective spiritual consciousness into the astral planes. ~ Peter Bebergal,
82:This new thing between them it was... Astral. It reshaped the air, and it was in her, too—a warming and softening, a pull—and for that moment, her hands in his, Karou felt as powerless as starlight tugged toward the sun in the huge, strange warp of space. ~ Laini Taylor,
83:Life is not about making money. It is about enhancing the quality of life for every single being so that they go from physical satisfaction to astral satisfaction to mental satisfaction to growing spiritual satisfaction, up and up and up, all the way. It's all spiritual. ~ Benjamin Creme,
84:The members of the Atlantean Mystery School were the earliest human explorers of the frontiers of inner space. Through their meditative journeys and explorations, they discovered many secret astral passageways that led to an infinite variety of other worlds and dimensions. ~ Frederick Lenz,
85:Just as persons on the cinema screen appear to move and act through a series of light pictures, and do not actually breathe, so the astral beings walk and work as intelligently guided and coordinated images of light, without the necessity of drawing power from oxygen. ~ Paramahansa Yogananda,
86:Billy suddenly began to feel decidedly unreal—outside of himself, as if he were having one of those Fate magazine instances of astral projection. Names—Heidi, Penschley, Linda, Houston—seemed suddenly to ring false and tinny, like names made up on the spur of the moment for a bad story. ~ Anonymous,
87:The seven principles of man, as known to the Yogi philosophy, are herewith stated, English terms being substituted for Sanscrit words, so far as may be: 7. Spirit. 6. Spiritual-Mind. 5. Intellect. 4. Instinctive-Mind. 3. Prana, or Vital Force. 2. Astral Body. 1. Physical Body. ~ William Walker Atkinson,
88:I once used "Astral Travel" in the ad... I'd come up with nothing, other than a few scary people... I really didn't have the heart to tell that one girl that Charles Manson wasn't dead yet, even though she really looked the part, right down to the swastika on her forehead and the beard. ~ Phaedra Weldon,
89:The mental body, like the astral, varies much in different people; it is composed of coarser or of finer matter, according to the needs of the more or less unfolded consciousness connected with it. In the educated it is active and well-defined; in the undeveloped it is cloudy and inchoate. ~ Annie Besant,
90:In the natal mist
Across the dangerous haze, the pregnant stir,
He through the astral chaos shore a way
Mid the grey faces of its demon gods,
Questioned by whispers of its flickering ghosts,
Besieged by sorceries of its fluent force. ~ Sri Aurobindo, Savitri, The Godheads of the Little Life,
91:What we are you cannot realise and it is a waste of time to try and do so but you can imagine (italics mine) us on the astral plane and we can contact you through your imagination, and though your mental picture is not real or actual, the results of it are real and actual.
   ~ Dion Fortune, The Cosmic Doctrine,
92:All this so-called esoteric knowledge about chakras, energy field, kundalini, astral bodies, is dangerous as knowledge.
As an experience, it is totally different thing.
Don't acquire it as knowledge.
If it is needed for your spiritual growth, it will come to you in its right time, and then it will be an experience. ~ Osho,
93:Enlightened teachers get all sorts of assignments. Sometimes we end up in the higher astral; sometimes we end up in the realm of pure spirit; sometimes we end up in the desire realms. Sometimes we go down to the lower astral to teach, you don't really teach there, you just sort of are, because everybody is confused. ~ Frederick Lenz,
94:So,” Lauren said. “You help ghosts with unfulfilled wishes cross over to the astral plane for judgment.”
“Yes.”
“And you hunt demons.”
“Yes.”
“And you’re married to an angel.”
“Yes.”
She paused. “…so basically, you’re Dean Winchester.”
I made an exasperated sound. “I am NOT.”
She smirked. “Yeah, sure. ~ Kyoko M,
95:Telepathy is simply a matter of the transmission and receiving of waves of vibratory force which have travelled along the ether between two persons. But clairvoyance or astral-telepathy is something like your mind being extended out until it actually touches the mind of the other person and sees what is there. ~ William Walker Atkinson,
96:The human body is constantly undergoing a process of decay and of reconstruction. First builded into the astral form in the womb of the mother, it is built up continually by the insetting of fresh materials. With every moment tiny molecules are passing away from it; with every moment tiny molecules are streaming into it. ~ Annie Besant,
97:I transmit astral plane harmonies through my brushes into the physical plane. These otherworld colours are reflected in the alphabet of nature, a grammar in which the symbols are plants, animals, birds, fishes, earth and sky. I am merely a channel for the spirit to utilize, and it is needed by a spirit starved society. ~ Norval Morrisseau,
98:Where our knowledge of beauty harmonizes with the ludus naturae, sorcery begins.

No, not spoon-bending or horoscopy, not the Golden Dawn or make-believe shamanism, astral projection or the Satanic Mass--if it's mumbo jumbo you want go for the real stuff, banking, politics, social science--not that weak blavatskian crap. ~ Hakim Bey,
99:In dreams the images in the mind, in the subconscious, merge with and obliterate the perceptions from the astral senses, in a similar way that in daily life the subconscious causes the external world to be perceived with the colorations of thoughts, feelings, images, and emotions; in other words, we daydream or get lost in thoughts. ~ Belsebuub,
100:We are individualized aspects of that oversoul, and the individualized soul - yours and mine and everyone else's on the planet - incarnates over and over and over again in a physical body, emotional astral body and mental body. These three bodies are temporary bodies that the soul creates and uses for a given time, long or short. ~ Benjamin Creme,
101:A superior atmosphere exists, in which we all know each other; and there is a mysterious truth – deeper far than the material truth - to which we at once have recourse, when we try to form a conception of a stranger. Have we not all experienced these things, which take place in the impenetrable regions of almost astral humanity? ~ Maurice Maeterlinck,
102:Anyone can leave the body and do astral traveling, but they have to believe that ' they can do ' this. It is quite useless for a person to put out repelling thoughts of disbelief, or thoughts such as 'I cannot do' such a thing. Actually, it is remarkably easy to Astral Travel when one gets over the first hurdle of fear. Fear is the great brake. ~ Lobsang Rampa,
103:Betsy: You gentlemen stand around and look tough while I do an astral reconnaissance.
Fantomex: I confess to feeling inferior in the company of such a gifted telepath. But for you, Warren, to be so.. dependent. It must be emasculating.
Warren: Oh yeah, it's a real hardship. Worst part is all the sex it leads to. Terrible stuff to endure. ~ Rick Remender,
104:The Bible soundly condemns every form of occult practice (Deuteronomy 18:9-14), which includes modern practices such as fortune-telling, Eastern meditation, reading palms and tarot cards, channeling, astral projection, astrology, Ouija boards, séances, crystal balls, or any other similar activities. Acts 16:16-18 and 19:11-20 link the occult to demonism. ~ Mark Hitchcock,
105:The disembodied soul does not part with Nature when it leaves the earth; life but, rather, it rises to a plane of Nature which is fuller, richer and sweeter in every way than the best of which the earth dwelling soul dreams. The dross of materiality burned away by the astral vibrations, the soul blossoms and bears spiritual fruit in the new life. ~ William Walker Atkinson,
106:Human beings find limitation and resistance in three-dimensional matter. When man’s desire to live is severely shaken by disease or other causes, death arrives; the heavy overcoat of the flesh is temporarily shed. The soul, however, remains encased in the astral and causal bodies.9 The cohesive force by which all three bodies are held together is desire. ~ Paramahansa Yogananda,
107:The body was the slave of the vortex; but the slave has become the master; and we must free ourselves from that tyranny. It is this stuff [ indicating her body ], this flesh and blood and bone and all the rest of it, that is intolerable. Even prehistoric man dreamed of what he called an astral body, and asked who would deliver him from the body of this death. ~ George Bernard Shaw,
108:the Ancient Doctrine. The Egyptians held that there was "Ka," the divine spirit in man; "Ab," the intellect or will; "Hati," the vitality; "Tet," the astral body; "Sahu," the etheric double; and "Xa," the physical body (some authorities forming a slightly different arrangement), which correspond to the various "bodies of man" as recognized by occultists to-day. ~ William Walker Atkinson,
109:The sphere ... which is located beyond our physical world is called the earth zone. It is also known as the zone girdling the earth. This zone has varying degrees of density, the so-called sub-planes, into which human beings enter after they leave their physical bodies. This is the astral world that individuals enter into with their astral bodies after their physical death. ~ Franz Bardon,
110:I don't know much about contemporary music. I do have an iPod but I listen to a lot of old blues. I listen to John Lee Hooker and Elmore James. I have been listening to them for years. I was obsessed with Van Morrison for years. I went to see him recently where he performed Astral Weeks. I just spent the entire night crying, but I was really obsessed with Van Morrison. ~ Robert Pattinson,
111:The symbolic display seen by the abductees is identical to the type of initiation ritual or astral voyage that is imbedded in the [occult] traditions of every culture...the structure of abduction stories is identical to that of occult initiation rituals...the UFO beings of today belong to the same class of manifestation as the [occult] entities that were described in centuries past. ~ Jacques Vallee,
112:The anaesthetic effect of custom being destroyed, I would begin to think and to feel very melancholy things. The door-handle of my room, which was different to me from all the other doorhandles in the world, inasmuch as it seemed to open of its own accord and without my having to turn it, so unconscious had its manipulation become; lo and behold, it was now an astral body for Golo. And ~ Marcel Proust,
113:But this narrative of prophecy would eventually be subverted by the enemies of Elohim, who transformed it into an entire substitute system of astral worship where stars were considered as controlling powers over the lives of men. Though there was no actual power in the stars, it served the purpose of the gods to divert mankind’s attention from the true God of history into a god of one’s own utility. ~ Brian Godawa,
114:Man is a far more complete being than is generally imagined. He has not only a body and a soul, but he is a spirit possessing a soul, which soul has several vehicles for expression, these several vehicles being of different degrees of density, the body being the lowest form of expression. These different vehicles manifest upon different "planes," such as the "physical plane," the "astral plane, ~ William Walker Atkinson,
115:Prepare yourself for the coming astral journey of death by daily riding in the balloon of God-perception. Through delusion you are perceiving yourself as a bundle of flesh and bones, which at best is a nest of troubles. Meditate unceasingly, that you may quickly behold yourself as the Infinite Essence, free from every form of misery. Cease being a prisoner of the body; using the secret key of KRIYA, learn to escape into Spirit. ~ Lahiri Mahasaya,
116:While thought-forms are often sent out unconsciously by men of selfish desires and aims and many are affected by them, we wish to say that there need be no fear of any one being affected against his own good if he will maintain a mental atmosphere of Love and Confidence. These two conditions will repel the strongest thought-wave which may either be directed against one or which may be encountered in the astral atmosphere ~ William Walker Atkinson,
117:The activities and effects of the Fire and Air elements in the astral sphere call forth the astral-electric fluid, and the activities and effects of the Water and Earth elements call forth the astral-magnetic fluid. The spirit-beings use these fluids to create the effects or rather the causes in our physical world. The Akasha Principle of the astral sphere maintains the harmonious equilibrium of the elements in the entire astral sphere. ~ Franz Bardon,
118:Vitality, or Prana-Jiva; (3) Astral Body, or Linga-Sharira; (4) Animal Soul, or Kama-Rupa; (5) Human Soul, Manas; (6) Spiritual Soul, or Buddhi; and (7) Spirit, or Atma. Of these seven principles, the last or higher Three, namely, the Atma, Buddhi, and Manas, compose the higher Trinity of the Soul—the part of man which persists; while the lower Four principles, namely, Rupa, Prana-Jiva, Linga-Sharira, and Kama-Rupa, respectively, are ~ William Walker Atkinson,
119:There are some whose Karma is such as to enable them to develop the purely spiritual faculties first of all -- to overleap the astral plane for the time, as it were; and when afterwards they make its acquaintance they have, if their spiritual development has been perfect, the immense advantage of dipping into it from above, with the aid of a spiritual insight which cannot be deceived and a spiritual strength which nothing can resist. ~ Charles Webster Leadbeater,
120:We are all one, I mean communication, just the realisation of human love reciprocated, it's such a gas, it's a good vibration which makes you feel good. These vibrations that you get through Yoga, Cosmic chants and things like that. I mean it's such a buzz, it buzzes you out of everywhere. It's nothing to do with pills or anything like that. It's just in your own head, the realisation, it's such a buzz, it buzzes you right into the astral plane. ~ George Harrison,
121:At physical death man loses his consciousness of the flesh and becomes conscious of his astral body in the astral world. Thus physical death is astral birth. Later, he passes from the consciousness of luminous astral birth to the consciousness of dark astral death and awakens in a new physical body. Thus astral death is physical birth. These recurrent cycles of physical and astral encasements are the ineluctable destiny of all unenlightened men. ~ Paramahansa Yogananda,
122:Man is a far more complete being than is generally imagined. He has not only a body and a soul, but he is a spirit possessing a soul, which soul has several vehicles for expression, these several vehicles being of different degrees of density, the body being the lowest form of expression. These different vehicles manifest upon different "planes," such as the "physical plane," the "astral plane," etc., all of which will be explained as we proceed. ~ William Walker Atkinson,
123:Death is not a blotting-out of existence, a final escape from life; nor is death the door to immortality. He who has fled his Self in earthly joys will not recapture It amidst the gossamer charms of an astral world. There he merely accumulates finer perceptions and more sensitive responses to the beautiful and the good, which are one. It is on the anvil of this gross earth that struggling man must hammer out the imperishable gold of spiritual identity. ~ Paramahansa Yogananda,
124:The astral body is the best counterpart of the physical body and may be separated from it under certain circumstances. Ordinarily, conscious separation is a matter of considerable difficulty, but in persons of a certain degree of psychical development the astral body may be detached and often goes on journeys. To the clairvoyant vision the astral body is seen looking exactly like its counterpart, the physical body, and united to it by a slender silken cord. ~ William Walker Atkinson,
125:The revival of magical beliefs is possible today because it no longer represents a social threat. The mechanization of the body is so constitutive of the individual that, at least in industrialized countries, giving space to the belief in occult forces does not jeopardize the regularity of social behavior. Astrology too can be allowed to return, with the certainty that even the most devoted consumer of astral charts will automatically consult the watch before going to work. ~ Silvia Federici,
126:But the true black magician does not work through the ethers which are the home of the etheric elementals. He works through the entities who dwell in the astral light or the animal magnetism of the lower astral plane. The true black magician can become (and usually is) clairvoyant, but he can never go any higher than the astral world. To this plane he is tied to his passions, hates, incantations, and the animal nature which is the basis of black magic. ~ Manly P Hall, Magic: A Treatise on Esoteric Ethics,
127:But the true black magician does not work through the ethers which are the home of the etheric elementals. He works through the entities who dwell in the astral light or the animal magnetism of the lower astral plane. The true black magician can become (and usually is) clairvoyant, but he can never go any higher than the astral world. To this plane he is tied to his passions, hates, incantations, and the animal nature which is the basis of black magic. ~ Manly P Hall, Magic: A Treatise on Esoteric Ethics,
128:In reality, good and evil do not exist, because Divine Providence created nothing that is bad and disharmonious; this is only a human concept. From the hermetic point of view, one type of being has to bring forth positive influences, whereas another type has to bring forth negative influences. In an astral respect these beings are the tools of the effects on our physical world. They are also the cause of all effects in the astral body of every human being, whether they are initiated or not. ~ Franz Bardon,
129:In diabetes mellitus the case is as follows: the ego-organization, as it submerges in the astral and etheric realm, is so weakened that it can no longer effectively accomplish its action upon the sugar-substance. The sugar then undergoes the processes in the astral and etheric realms which should take place in the ego-organization.... From all this we see that a real healing process for diabetes mellitus can only be initiated if we are in a position to strengthen the ego-organization of the patient. ~ Rudolf Steiner,
130:By this it is understood that the animal excesses of man build, on the lower planes of the astral world, strange creatures, some resembling debased human beings, and others shaped like animals, lizards, snakes, and other reptiles. The power of the black magician lies in his ability to direct these soulless creatures, which, while not in reality individualized things, still have tremendous power over their own essences, both in the body of nature and of individuals. ~ Manly P Hall, Magic: A Treatise on Esoteric Ethics,
131:Lines ran this way and that from every direction… and simultaneously came from no direction. They vibrated with harmonics and shimmering spectrums, with laughter, cannon booms, howling hurricane, whispers; wind and rain, wasp stings, and kisses brushed my face as sensation passed through me; memories came and went too, mine, others, fragments of thoughts from long-dead gods, and things my mind refused to comprehend lest it be crushed—all mingled with my astral soul in a glorious choir that sang the hymn of the multiverse. ~ Eric S Nylund,
132:The black magician, becoming a conscious channel for these forces, launches a stream of hell-demons into the world. In so doing, he sells his own soul (for these forces must pass through his own astral body) in exchange for the powers that these demons will give him over his fellow men. The powers of these elemental creatures are practically unlimited, and there are many depraved souls who are glad to barter their immortal spirits for the power which these demons give them over the material world. ~ Manly P Hall, Magic: A Treatise on Esoteric Ethics,
133:Let the Magician therefore adventure himself upon the Astral Plane with the declared design to penetrate to a sanctuary of discarnate Beings such as are able to instruct and fortify him, also to prove their identity by testimony beyond rebuttal. All explanations other than these are of value only as extending and equilibrating Knowledge, or possibly as supplying Energy to such Magicians as may have found their way to the Sources of Strength. In all cases, naught is worth an obol save as it serve to help the One Great Work" ~ Aleister Crowley, Liber ABA, App 3,
134:Sonechka, meanwhile, placid soul that she was—cocooned by the thousand volumes of her reading, lulled by the hazy murmurings of the Greek myths, the hypnotically shrill recorder fluting of the Middle Ages, the misty windswept yearning of Ibsen, the minutely detailed tedium of Balzac, the astral music of Dante, the siren song of the piercing voices of Rilke and Novalis, seduced by the moralistic despair of the great Russian writers calling out to the heart of heaven itself—this placid soul had no awareness that her great moment was at hand. ~ Lyudmila Ulitskaya,
135:Two realms there are, upper and lower. The upper, derived from hyperuniverse I or Yang, Form I of Parmenides, is sentient and volitional. The lower realm, or Yin, Form II of Parmenides, is mechanical, driven by blind, efficient cause, deterministic and without intelligence, since it emanates from a dead source. In ancient times it was termed ‘astral determinism.’ We are trapped, by and large, in the lower realm, but are, through the sacraments, by means of the plasmate, extricated. Until astral determinism is broken, we are not even aware of it, so occluded are we. ~ Philip K Dick,
136:On the Samael Qlipha, the magician makes a pact with the dark forces and realizes the invitation of Friedrich Neitzsche to re-evaluate old values. Insanity becomes wisdom; death becomes life. Samael is the 'Poison of God.' Here is where illusions are poisoned, and all categories and conceptions are deconstructed until nothing is left. The dark side of the astral plane could be compared to a chalice filled with poison or an intoxicating fluid. While Gamaliel is the chalice, Samael is the elixir and the following lower Qlipha, A'arab Zaraq, is where the magician experiences the effect. ~ Thomas Karlsson,
137:Myths and legends tell us of a third eye possessed by giants. The eye of Polyphemus, of Buddha. With this eye one can contemplate the other world and its 'astral' beings, the aura of those beings. Its counterpart in the physical body is the pineal gland, astrally calcified for lack of use and by the exclusive development of the rational mind. Initiation can reopen the third eye, transforming the hero into a giant, into Vîra, into Divya, to use words of tantric esotericism. Into superman, into Sonnenmensch. To cut the lunar current, to be solar again. (With the Black Sun.) To recapture Vril. ~ Miguel Serrano,
138:We today can recognize the antiquity of astrology in words such as disaster, which is Greek for “bad star,” influenza, Italian for (astral) “influence”; mazeltov, Hebrew—and, ultimately, Babylonian—for “good constellation,” or the Yiddish word shlamazel, applied to someone plagued by relentless ill-fortune, which again traces to the Babylonian astronomical lexicon. According to Pliny, there were Romans considered sideratio, “planet-struck.” Planets were widely thought to be a direct cause of death. Or consider consider: it means “with the planets,” evidently a prerequisite for serious reflection. ~ Carl Sagan,
139:Dear Earth-dweller: Please use your BRAIN! As anyone KNOWS in this SCIENTIFIC age, the origin of the races is now WELL UNDERSTOOD! Africans traveled here after the DELUGE from Mercury, Asians from Venus, Caucasians from Mars, and the people of the Pacific islands from assorted asteroids. If you don’t have the NECESSARY OCCULT SKILLS to project rays from the continents to the ASTRAL PLANE to verify this, a simple analysis of TEMPERAMENT and APPEARANCE should make this obvious even to YOU! But please don’t put WORDS into MY mouth! Just because we’re all from different PLANETS doesn’t mean we can’t still be FRIENDS. ~ Greg Egan,
140:There are two kinds of black magicians: (1) those who use the demons of the astral plane for their villainy, which they invoke through necromancy and invocation; and (2) those who create their own demons and launch them against the world. The first group does the greatest harm to the world, but the second injure themselves more. The first group is composed mostly of conscious black magicians, while there are many in the second group who are totally ignorant of what they are doing. Some never learn their mistake until the demons they have created come back to the persons who sent them forth. ~ Manly P Hall, Magic: A Treatise on Esoteric Ethics,
141:There are two kinds of black magicians: (1) those who use the demons of the astral plane for their villainy, which they invoke through necromancy and invocation; and (2) those who create their own demons and launch them against the world. The first group does the greatest harm to the world, but the second injure themselves more. The first group is composed mostly of conscious black magicians, while there are many in the second group who are totally ignorant of what they are doing. Some never learn their mistake until the demons they have created come back to the persons who sent them forth. ~ Manly P Hall, Magic: A Treatise on Esoteric Ethics,
142:Magic carpet rides, rune magic, Ali Baba and visions of the Holy Mother, astral travel and the future in the dregs of a glass of red wine. Buddha. Frodo's journey into Mordor. The transubstantiation of the sacrament. Dorothy and Toto. The Easter Bunny. Space aliens. The Thing in the closet. The Resur-rection and the Life at the turn of a card ... I've believed them all at one time or another. Or pretended to. Or pretended not to.
And now? What do I believe right now?
'I believe that being happy is the only important thing,' I told him at last.
Happiness. Simple as a glass of chocolate or tortuous as the hear. Bitter. Sweet. Alive. ~ Joanne Harris,
143:He had a harder time helping her out though. He was asleep while she was doing stars. Without wings, he couldn't reach anyways. In the end though what he could give her was better than magic wands and magic frogs and magic lamps. Better and more magical. What he gave her was moral support and unconditional love. He promised to be there for her always, even times when the sky proved too vast and the night was dark because she couldn't kindle all the stars. He would light her way instead, he promised. He would be her Polaris, her celestial navigator, her astral guide. And whenever she cam back to Earth, Grumwald promised, he would be there, waiting. ~ Laurie Frankel,
144:He had a harder time helping her out though. He was asleep while she was doing stars. Without wings, he couldn't reach anyways. In the end though what he could give her was better than magic wands and magic frogs and magic lamps. Better and more magical. What he gave her was moral support and unconditional love. He promised to be there for her always, even times when the sky proved too vast and the night was dark because she couldn't kindle all the stars. He would light her way instead, he promised. He would be her Polaris, her celestial navigator, her astral guide. And whenever she came back to Earth, Grumwald promised, he would be there, waiting ~ Laurie Frankel,
145:A Similitude
FAIR as the night—when all the astral fires
Of heaven are burning in the clear expanse,
My love is; and her eyes like star-depths glance
Lustrous with glowing thoughts and pure desires,
And that mysterious pathos which inspires
All moods divine in mortal passion’s trance—
All that its earthly music doth enhance
As with the rapture of seraphic lyres!
I gaze upon her till the atmosphere
Sweetens intensely, and to my charmed sight
All fair associated forms appear
Swimming in joy, as swim yon orbs in light—
And all sweet sounds, though common to mine ear,
Chime up like silver-wingèd dreams in flight.
~ Charles Harpur,
146:Through the mental body, man secures that reflection and thought which make him greater than the animal; through the astral body, he secures those qualities of motion and emotion--sense, color and feeling, and any other qualities--the expression of which makes the animal superior to the plant; through the etheric body, he gains the power of reproducing his species and also the functions of assimilation and excretion, for in these things the plant is greater than the mineral. Of course, the mineral, by its actual existence, proves its superiority over the myriads of swirling gaseous, formless essences which have not yet even the power of appearing in the physical world. ~ Manly P Hall, Magic: A Treatise on Esoteric Ethics,
147:Que somos las larvas de un ser astral nos lo demuestra nuestro tronco cerebro-espinal. Con la médula espinal a modo de raíz y los dos hemisferios cerebrales como dos cotiledones carnosos, el cerebro guarda un parecido perfecto con los primeros estados de una plantita después de brotar. La carne es la tierra donde ha sido sembrada y cuyos recursos agotará; así también el cerebro será consumido y se arrugará como una nuez para convertirse en un fruto seco, y del centro brotarán, tiernas y luminosas, las dos hojitas, las alas del alma, las alas del espíritu, que abandonarán el semillero de este mundo para, revestidas de la gloria de un cuerpo celestial, ser plantadas en una tierra nueva, bao un cielo nuevo. ~ Mircea C rt rescu,
148:Nothing can exist permanently unless it is observed because it is Mind that influences and shapes Quanta of Energy, without which Quanta would once again become a ―potential‖ for something else.If, for example, everyone in the world were to cease observing everything in the world that was created by humans by ceasing to focus on its perceived existence, then everything on Earth that was man-made would cease to physically exist and would dissipate back into formless Energy. There would be no thought Energy to perpetuate the illusion of its existence. This is why everything on Earth and indeed the Astral worlds are referred to in some cultures as ―maya‖ or illusion, due to its inherent transient and ephemeral nature. ~ Anonymous,
149:Vowels
Black A, white E, red I, green U, blue O - vowels,
Some day I will open your silent pregnancies:
A, black belt, hairy with burst flies,
Bumbling and buzzing over stinking cruelties,
Pits of night; E, candour of sand pavilions,
High glacial spears, white kings, trembling Queen
Anne's lace;
I, bloody spittle, laughter dribbling from a face
In wild denial or in anger, vermilions;
U,…divine movement of viridian seas,
Peace of pastures animal-strewn, peace of calm lines
Drawn on foreheads worn with heavy alchemies;
O, supreme Trumpet, harsh with strange stridencies,
Silences traced in angels and astral designs:
O…Omega…the violet light of His Eyes!
~ Arthur Rimbaud,
150:Are you sure of that? Baptism into the Christian Faith doesn’t ensure one going to Heaven, why should this other sprinkling be a guarantee of anyone going to Hell?’ ‘It’s such a big question, Rex, but briefly it is like this. Heaven and Hell are only symbolical of growth to Light or disintegration to Darkness. By Christian, or any other true religious baptism, we renounce the Devil and all his Works, thereby erecting a barrier which it is difficult for Evil forces to surmount, but anyone who accepts Satanic baptism does exactly the reverse. They wilfully destroy the barrier of Astral Light which is our natural protection and offer themselves as a medium through which the powers of Darkness may operate on mankind. ~ Dennis Wheatley,
151:The Cover Of The Book
The cover of the book
is astral violet,
& within it
are poems,
most of them
earthbound,
but for one
to the poet's
daughter
which soars
into
the empyrean
on umbilical wings.
Oh we poets
are so afraid
of making babies& yet
of all
the fleshly chains
that bind us,
our children
are the chains
that bind
most closely
to heaven.
How can that be?
Poetry
is an astral
affliction.
Poets are always
saving themselves
for their poems.
Yet in that saving
there is no grace,
while in the child
198
there is distraction,
chaos, disorder
& through that fleshly chaos
peace.
~ Erica Jong,
152:The nineteen elements of the astral body are mental, emotional, and lifetronic. The nineteen components are intelligence; ego; feeling; mind (sense-consciousness); five instruments of knowledge, the subtle counterparts of the senses of sight, hearing, smell, taste, touch; five instruments of action, the mental correspondence for the executive abilities to procreate, excrete, talk, walk, and exercise manual skill; and five instruments of life force, those empowered to perform the crystallizing, assimilating, eliminating, metabolizing, and circulating functions of the body. This subtle astral encasement of nineteen elements survives the death of the physical body, which is made of sixteen gross metallic and nonmetallic elements. ~ Paramahansa Yogananda,
153:Why are you stupefied at all this? The subtle unity of the phenomenal world is not hidden from true yogis. I instantly see and converse with my disciples in distant Calcutta. They can similarly transcend at will every obstacle of gross matter.” It was probably in an effort to stir spiritual ardour in my young breast that the swami had condescended to tell me of his powers of astral radio and television. But instead of enthusiasm, I experienced only an awe-stricken fear. Inasmuch as I was destined to undertake my divine search through one particular guru—Sri Yukteswar, whom I had not yet met—I felt no inclination to accept Pranabananda as my teacher. I glanced at him doubtfully, wondering if it were he or his counterpart before me. ~ Paramahansa Yogananda,
154:Fairy
For Helen, in the virgin shadows and the
impassive radiance in astral silence,
ornamental saps conspired.
Summer's ardour was confided
to silent birds and due indolence
to a priceless mourning boat
through gulfs of dead loves
and fallen perfumes.
-After the moment of the woods women's song
to the rumble of the torrent in the ruin of the wood,
of the tinkle of the cowbells to the echo of the vales,
and the cries of the steppes.
- For Helen's childhood, furs and shadows trembled,
and the breast of the poor and the legends of heaven.
And her eyes and her dance superior
even to the precious radiance,
to cold influences, to the pleasure of the unique
setting and the unique hour.
~ Arthur Rimbaud,
155:We seldom realize that our passions and hates create these demoniacal beings in the superphysical world, but this is one of the secretes of black magic. Every evil or debased thought or emotion of man helps to build these tearing, rending creatures, the innate qualities of which become, in the hands of those who know, agencies for the destruction of the powers of light. It also seems part of the plan that those who chain these demons shall themselves, fall victims to their own slaves, for one after another, the black magicians are sucked into the maelstrom of the astral hell. The lower planes of the astral world are the three hells of religion, and are the homes of these excess-created beings that battle each other with never-ending fury. ~ Manly P Hall, Magic: A Treatise on Esoteric Ethics,
156:Astral Weeks,” insofar as it can be pinned down, is a record about people stunned by life, completely overwhelmed, stalled in their skins, their ages and selves, paralyzed by the enormity of what in one moment of vision they can comprehend. It is a precious and terrible gift, born of a terrible truth, because what they see is both infinitely beautiful and terminally horrifying: the unlimited human ability to create or destroy, according to whim. It’s no Eastern mystic or psychedelic vision of the emerald beyond, nor is it some Baudelairean perception of the beauty of sleaze and grotesquerie. Maybe what it boils down to is one moment’s knowledge of the miracle of life, with its inevitable concomitant, a vertiginous glimpse of the capacity to be hurt, and the capacity to inflict that hurt. ~ Lester Bangs,
157:omnipresent wings. Like all other God-inspired prophets, Lahiri Mahasaya gave new hope to the outcasts and the downtrodden of society. “Remember that you belong to no one and that no one belongs to you. Reflect that some day you will suddenly have to leave everything in this world—so make the acquaintance of God now,” the great guru told his disciples. “Prepare yourself for the coming astral journey of death by riding daily in a balloon of divine perception. Through delusion you are perceiving yourself as a bundle of flesh and bones, which at best is a nest of troubles. 12 Meditate unceasingly, that you quickly behold yourself as the Infinite Essence, free from every form of misery. Cease being a prisoner of the body; using the secret key of Kriya, learn to escape into Spirit.” The ~ Paramahansa Yogananda,
158:Fides, Spes

Joy is come to the little
Everywhere;
Pink to the peach and pink to the apple,
White to the pear.
Stars are come to the dogwood,
Astral, pale;
Mists are pink on the red-bud,
Veil after veil.
Flutes for the feathery locusts,
Soft as spray;
Tongues of the lovers for chestnuts, poplars,
Babbling May.
Yellow plumes for the willows’
Wind-blown hair;
Oak trees and sycamores only
Comfortless bare.
Sore from steel and the watching,
Somber and old,—
Wooing robes for the beeches, larches,
Splashed with gold;
Breath o’ love to the lilac,
Warm with noon.—
Great hearts cold when the little
Beat mad so soon.
What is their faith to bear it
Till it come,
Waiting with rain-cloud and swallow,
Frozen, dumb? ~ Willa Cather,
159:That right will ultimately triumph, is undeniable; and that the black magician will fall victim to his own excess, is a literal truth; but many must bow their heads to the tyrant while he passes, and only those who are strong are in safety. Individuals who have mastered nature's forces to such a degree that they can stop the heartbeat of a person on the other side of the earth with a mental ray, or burn a two-inch hole through a foot and a half of ebony with astral fire, are dangerous whenever met, and the average so-called good person has absolutely no chance of withstanding the blows of black magic. Only fools underestimate this danger; wise men protect themselves against it, for an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. The white ray places the shield of David between them and the dark forces, and in this way they protect themselves,
160:Quickly, I slid into the rifts between stars. I imagined the space as a sphere bedizened with little astral ornaments, and soon those heavy celestial bodies became small as candies held in one’s palms. The thread easily looped them together.
I grinned, turning to Amar. Between us was a sphere thick with stars and around us twined soft shadows like cats weaving between ankles.
“Magnificent,” he said.
His gaze was full of awe, but I saw something else in his eyes. Longing. Then, he reached into the sphere, drawing out the string with the three stars. He twisted them between his hands, fashioning a constellation no larger than a sparrow. Amar stepped forward, sliding the stars above my ear. It cast a glow that turned his face silvery and beautiful.
“There, my queen,” he said. “A constellation to wear in your hair. ~ Roshani Chokshi,
161:Even in rainier areas, where dust is less inexorable and submits to brooms and rags, it is generally detested, because dust is not organized and is therefore considered aesthetically bankrupt. Our light is not kind to faint diffuse spreading things. Our soft comfortable light flatters carefully organized, formally structured things like wedding cakes with their scrolls and overlapping flounces.
It takes the mortal storms of a star to transform dust into something incandescent. Our dust, shambling and subtractive as it is, would be radiant, if we were close enough to such a star, to that deep and dangerous light, and we would be ravished by the vision—emerald shreds veined in gold, diamond bursts fraught with deep-red flashes, aqua and violet and icy-green astral manifestations, splintery blinking harbor of light, dust as it can be, the quintessence of dust. ~ Amy Leach,
162:Man, by his actions, is gradually unfolding the possibilities lying latent in his physical body. By his conservation of energy, he is gradually unfolding sequentially the centers of his vital consciousness. This end can be attained only through intelligent living, for the vitality is extracted from the atmosphere, from the sun's rays, from our food, and from other sources. Through gradual purification and regeneration of his emotions and feelings--control of his fire-mist body with its outbursts and excesses--man gradually raises the vibratory rates and unfolds the latent possibilities of the astral body, thus redeeming the animal soul. By his thoughts, ideals, and aspirations, aided by the twin faculties of logic and reason, man gradually gains control of that seething mental vortex which will later put him in harmony with the divine mind of the solar God. ~ Manly P Hall, Magic: A Treatise on Esoteric Ethics,
163:Man is a little world--a microcosm inside the great universe. Like a fetus, he is suspended, by all his three spirits, in the matrix of the macrocosmos; and while his terrestrial body is in constant sympathy with its parent earth, his astral soul lives in unison with the sidereal anima mundi. He is in it, as it is in him, for the world-pervading element fills all space, and is space itself, only shoreless and infinite. As to his third spirit, the divine, what is it but an infinitesimal ray, one of the countless radiations proceeding directly from the Highest Cause--the Spiritual Light of the World? This is the trinity of organic and inorganic nature--the spiritual and the physical, which are three in one, and of which Proclus says that 'The first monad is the Eternal God; the second, eternity; the third, the paradigm, or pattern of the universe;' the three constituting the Intelligible Triad. ~ Helena Petrovna Blavatsky,
164:On the physical plane, man, in order to see things beyond his normal vision, must make use of the telescope. Likewise, on the astral plane, he must call into operation some assistance to the simple astral vision, in order to receive a clear impression of things far off. This assistance, however, comes from within his own astral organism, and consists of a peculiar astral faculty which acts as the lens of a telescope and magnifies the rays received from afar, rendering them sufficiently large to be distinguished by the mind. This power is "telescopic" in effect, although it is really by a variation of that "miscroscopic" faculty noted under the head of simple clairvoyance. This telescopic faculty varies very much in psychics, some being able to see but a few miles, while others receive impressions just as easily from all parts of the earth, and a few have been able to occasionally perceive scenes on other planets. ~ William Walker Atkinson,
165:Some people can have out-of-body experiences without severe harm to their health. This happened to Gram a few times, though she never made it all the way to Heaven. When Gram was pregnant with my mom, she remembered fainting from anemia and seeing her grandmother who’d died. She was about to go to her, but she heard her mom calling her name and said to her grandma, “I gotta go! My mom’s calling!”--and she came to. Many years later, Gram was lying on the sofa and felt her soul rise out of her body. When she told my mom about it, Mom said she could have had an out-of-body experience like astral projection, where the soul separates from the physical body and travels around. Shortly after, Gram was napping and felt like she was coming out of her body, this time from her back, and recognized what was happening. “Whoa, where do you think you’re going?” she said to herself. With that, everything went back to normal. ~ Theresa Caputo,
166:This place...is it a different planet? Where are we, compared to my home?" Not that an explanation of astral geography would help much. She should have paid more attention in astronomy class.
"Yes, this is a separate world -- Alaia. Alaia and your world are... very close, in one sense."
"Meaning..."
He looked away as if organizing his thoughts. "One could say we share the same sun."
"That's impossible. We know all the planets around our sun. There's no other one that has life, or temperatures like Earth's. Besides, if our years match in length like Varene said, we'd be on the same orbit."
"In a sense, we are Earth."
"What?" She shook her head. "Start over, please."
"Perhaps you'd call it a different dimension, or an alternate plane. Our worlds share the sun but we don't exist at the same time. We are each other's shadow. While on your world, you can't see ours. And on ours, we can't see yours. Our Old Letters hint of your world, though cryptically. ~ Cate Rowan,
167:The old Jewish Mysteries declare the serpent to be a symbol of Samael, the archangel of Mars and the master of the astral light. In scriptural writings serpents are frequently used to represent currents or waves of force moving in space. The Midgard Snake of the Nordic Eddas, and the Orphic serpent twined about the Egg of the Year, are both symbols of the zodiac and the serpentine course of the sun. The erect serpent of Egypt, and the hooded Naga of India and Cambodia, signify the spinal fire in man. The winged serpents of Gobi, and the Taoist dragons of China, represent both the psychic forces of the soul and the initiates, or sky-men. The Indians of the Southwest of America have serpent symbols of similar significance; and the Quetzalcoatl, or Feathered Snake of Central America, is a symbol of the initiate or high priest. The Druid priests of Britain and Gaul called themselves serpents; and these too are the snakes that St. Patrick is said to have driven from Ireland. ~ Manly P Hall, How to Understand Your Bible,
168:Just as hunger, not greed, has a legitimate purpose, so the sexual instinct has been implanted by Nature solely for the propagation of the species, not for the kindling of insatiable longings,” he said. “Destroy wrong desires now; otherwise they will remain with you after the astral body has been separated from its physical casing. Even when the flesh is weak, the mind should be constantly resistant. If temptation assails you with cruel force, overcome it by impersonal analysis and indomitable will. Every natural passion can be mastered. “Conserve your powers. Be like the capacious ocean, absorbing quietly all the tributary rivers of the senses. Daily renewed sense yearnings sap your inner peace; they are like openings in a reservoir that permit vital waters to be wasted in the desert soil of materialism. The forceful, activating impulse of wrong desire is the greatest enemy to the happiness of man. Roam in the world as a lion of self-control; don’t let the frogs of sense weakness kick you around!” A ~ Paramahansa Yogananda,
169:It all had to do with time. "Time can be overcome," Mircea Eliade wrote. That's what it's all about. The great mystery of Eleusis, of the Orphies, of the early Christians, of Sarpis, of the Greco-Roman mystery religions, of Hermes Trismegistos, of the Renaissance Hermetic Alchemists, of the Rose Cross Brotherhood, of Apollonius of Tyana, of Simon Magus, of Asklepios, of Paracelsus, of Bruno, consists of the abolition of time. The techniques are there. Dante discusses them in the Comedy. It has to do with the loss of amnesia; when forgetfulness is lost, true memory spreads out backward and forward, into the past and into the future, and also, oddly, into alternate universes; it is orthogonal as well as linear.

This is why Elijah could be said correctly to be immortal; he had entered the Upper Realm (as Fat calls it) and is no longer subject to time. Time equals what the ancients called "astral determinism." The purpose of the mysteries was to free the initate from astral determinism, which roughly equals fate. ~ Philip K Dick,
170:She said, You cannot hide forever, though you may try. I’ve seen you in the kitchen, in the garden. I’ve seen the things you have sewn — curtains of dawn, twilight blankets and dresses for the sisters like a garden of stars. I have heard the stories you tell. You are the one who transforms, who creates. You can go out into the world and show others. They will feel less alone because of you, they will feel understood, unburdened by you, awakened by you, freed of guilt and shame and sorrow. But to share with them you must wear shoes you must go out you must not hide you must dance and it will be harder you must face jealousy and sometimes rage and desire and love which can hurt most of all because of what can then be taken away. So make that astral dress to fit your own body this time. And here are glass shoes made from your words, the stories you have told like a blower -with her torch forming the thinnest, most translucent sheets of light out of what was once sand. But be careful; sand is already broken but glass breaks. The shoes are for dancing, not for running away. ~ Francesca Lia Block,
171:Those who abdicate the empire of reason and permit their wills to wander in pursuit of reflections in the Astral Light, are subject to alternations of mania and melancholy which have originated all the marvels of demoniacal possession, though it is true, at the same time, that by means of these reflections impure spirits can act upon such souls, make use of them as docile instruments and even habitually torment their organism, wherein they enter and reside by obsession, or embryonically. These kabalistic terms are explained in the Hebrew book of the Revolution of Souls, of which our thirteenth chapter will contain a succinct analysis. It is therefore extremely dangerous to make sport of the Mysteries of Magic; it is above all excessively rash to practice its rites from curiosity, by way of experiment and as if to exploit higher forces. The inquisitive who, without being adepts, busy themselves with evocations or occult magnetism, are like children playing with fire in the neighborhood of a cask of gunpowder; sooner or later they will fall victims to some terrible explosion. ~ liphas L vi,
172:Shaver’s worldview was a deeply paranoid one in which pretty much everything of importance was traced back to evil deros and sinister machines in the hollow earth. He did not believe in God, an afterlife, a spiritual world, or paranormal powers: all such htings were the purely physical and totally illusory effects of the ray machines of the deros. We have all been duped, and we are constantly being zapped in our dreams, diseases, and disasters. “The unseen world beneath our feet, malignant and horrible, is complete in its mastery of Earth,” he declared with not a doubt or qualification in sight. So, too, there is no such thing as astral travel or spirits. The spirits seen in séances are in fact projections of the machines controlled again by entirely physical creatures seething and scheming below us. Like other hollow earthers before him, Richard Shaver was what Palmer called “an extreme materialist.” He knew nothing of the psychology of projection, and he seemed completely incapable of thinking symbolically or metaphorically, which I take as a fairly clear symptom of whatever psychological condition he suffered. ~ Jeffrey J Kripal,
173:My understanding is that these are interdmensional entities that have an objective existence apart from the tripper's consciousness
The narcissistic reductionistism of physicalism assumes that either consciousness is an epiphenomnon of brain activity, or, at best, that brain and consciousness are two different aspects of the same reality (e.g. Neutral Monism, Teilhard, Wilber). While the latter option is more receptive of alternate realities, neither of these options acknowledges entities or consciousness existing apart from the empirical material world.
Ufo researcher John Keel coined the term "ultraterrestrial." A similar phenomenon may be the case here. These are entities that are more "material" than the imaginal ("astral") world.
So, a continuum of being might be something like:
- Transcendent
- Mind or psyche apart from matter
- Imaginal world (sensu Henry Corbin, = Collective Unconscious of Jung)
- Interdimensional, Ultraterrestrial, ufos, drug vision entities, high strangeness
- Orgone (Reich), linga sharira (Blavatsky), Etheric body
- Empirical material reality ~ M Alan Kazlev, Facebook 2020-09-14,
174:more enhanced state of Consciousness and its corresponding environment. These are the dimensions often described as Heaven worlds. Nothing negative can exist here because the vibrational structures are too fine and too sublime. The matter of this world is extremely pliable, our Consciousness achieves a boost in clarity and sharpness which is unimaginable on the physical or Astral levels. Even this state pales into insignificance once we understand how to transcend this phase even further into new levels of super-awareness, transcending into cosmic Consciousness until we arrive at the shores of a world that is pure Singularity and totally beyond anything that can be described with words. The reports gathered here will give testimony of these worlds limited by the author’s rather modest exposure, and will most likely fail to do it justice. At our current stage of evolution we are still living in the dark ages and have barely risen out of a primordial slime of Consciousness. My modest testimony, I hope, will give an insight into what is possible to perceive and experience. I had already accepted, when entering these states, that I had only scratched the ~ Jurgen Ziewe,
175:So you want to see me?” Adonis prodded.
The light in Ivy’s eyes dimmed, but only slightly. Part of Adonis waited for her to brush him off, to pretend she didn’t care one way or another. Surely she couldn’t really be as open as she seemed?
She met his eyes with a surprising calm. “If I did, would you come?”
Where? Back to her? Heat flared inside him as he remembered the feel of her body against his, the taste of her mouth, her skin. More than that, he remembered the wonder she’d greeted the astral plane with and the debilitating fear that had twisted the dream of his home world into a nightmare. For a moment he’d had the overwhelming urge to banish that terror, to hold her hand and show her the world, all of it. Her mother had tattooed the world with darkness, but Adonis knew he could change that. He could show her all the wonders that existed outside her tower and then they could paint together, capturing all the— And that’s why he’d had to leave. Foolish urges like those would only hurt them both. He couldn’t see her again.
“Of course I would come.”
Right, so I’ve lost my wits completely then. Good to know.
-Adonis and Ivy. ~ Jennifer Blackstream,
176:The interpenetration of man’s three bodies is expressed in many ways through his threefold nature,” my great guru went on. “In the wakeful state on earth a human being is conscious more or less of his three vehicles. When he is sensuously intent on tasting, smelling, touching, listening, or seeing, he is working principally through his physical body. Visualizing or willing, he is working mainly through his astral body. His causal being finds expression when man is thinking or diving deep in introspection or meditation; the cosmical thoughts of genius come to the man who habitually contacts his causal body. In this sense an individual may be classified broadly as ‘a material man,’ ‘an energetic man,’ or ‘an intellectual man.’ “A man identifies himself about sixteen hours daily with his physical vehicle. Then he sleeps; if he dreams, he remains in his astral body, effortlessly creating any object even as do the astral beings. If man’s sleep be deep and dreamless, for several hours he is able to transfer his consciousness, or sense of I-ness, to the causal body; such sleep is revivifying. A dreamer is contacting his astral and not his causal body; his sleep is not fully refreshing. ~ Paramahansa Yogananda,
177:Central to shamanism is the perception of an otherworld or series of otherworlds. This type of astral or aetheric dimension containing various powers entities and forces allows real effects to be created in this world. The shaman's soul journeys through this dimension while in ecstatic or drug-induced state of trance. The journey may be undertaken for divinatory knowledge, to cure sickness, to deliver a blow to enemies, or to find game animals. Prospective shamans are usually selected from those with a nervous disposition. They may either be assigned to shamanic instruction or are driven to it by a power present in the shamanic culture. Initiation invokes a journey into the otherworld, a meeting with spirits and a death-rebirth experience. In the deathrebirth experience, the candidate has a vision of his body being dismembered, often by fantastic beings or animal spirits, and then reassembled from the wreckage. The new body invariably contains an extra part often described as an additional bone or an inclusion of magical quartz stones or sometimes an animal spirit. This experience graphically symbolizes the location of the aetheric force field within the body or the addition of various extra powers to it.
   ~ Peter J Carroll, Liber Null,
178:The purity of the initiate has nothing to do with the Judeo-Christian sense of sin, the hatred and resentment of slaves. The existing earth must be transmuted, nature transfigured, the Twilight of the Gods make way for the Resurrection of the Gods. And this is another thing. It is an alchemical transmutation, sublimation, a spiritualization of matter. More, it is not for all, only for the initiated, for the Aryan, in the center of a hierarchy of castes. In Aryan India the initiate, the tantric yogi of the 'Right Hand,' must guard chastity. As well as the Platonic troubadour in the Initiation of A-Mor, which we shall explain in the fourth part of this work. For my Maestro chastity acquires fundamental importance in the path of our Warrior Initiation. I only saw him angry once. It was when I told him I was going to marry. He exclaimed: 'You are throwing chains on your feet…!' And added: 'Advice counts for nothing, each one must learn by themselves'.

I said that before I married I lived surrounded by presences ('of ghosts, of ghosts, in order to think,' as the Chilean poet Omar Caceres would say), rumours of another world. I was in close contact with the astral. That 'body,' or expectant embryo, kept developing its own 'senses'. ~ Miguel Serrano,
179:Why did we come back this way instead of popping up somewhere less…cramped?” I asked, substituting the word cramped for creepy. I was trying not to feel weirded out that I was in my boyfriend’s crypt. It was only a building, after all.
A very unpleasant one.
“This is a portal,” he said, as if that explained everything.
“A what?”
“A portal,” John whispered. “A direct link from here to the Underworld. That’s why you don’t feel dizzy this time.”
I hadn’t even noticed, but he was right. I didn’t feel sick, for once, though we’d just jumped between astral planes.
“This is a doorway through which the souls of the departed enter the world of the dead after they pass,” John explained softly. “The doorway closes behind the dead once they enter. They can never leave again-“
“Unless they escape,” I interrupted. Because this was what had happened to me.
He glanced down at me with a teasing smile. “Unless I choose to let them escape,” he said, “because they seem to want their mothers so badly.”
“That was two years ago,” I reminded him. I shouldn’t have mentioned the thing that morning about being inexperienced with men, even if it was technically true. He was never going to let me help him if he always thought of me as someone he had to protect. “And do I have to remind you that you didn’t let me escape, I-“
“Shhh.” He held up a hand. “Someone’s coming. ~ Meg Cabot,
180:To prepare for Astral Magic a temple or series of temples needs to be erected on the plane of visualized imagination. Such temples can take any convenient form although some magicians prefer to work with an exact simulacrum of their physical temple. The astral temple is visualized in fine detail and should contain all the equipment required for ritual or at least cupboards where any required instruments can be found.
   Any objects visualized into the temple should always remain there for subsequent inspection unless specifically dissolved or removed. The most important object in the temple is the magician's image of himself working in it. At first it may seem that he is merely manipulating a puppet of himself in the temple but with persistence this should give way to a feeling of actually being there. Before beginning Astral Magic proper, the required temple and instruments together with an image of the magician moving about in it should be built up by a repeated series of visualizations until all the details are perfect. Only when this is complete should the magician begin to use the temple. Each conjuration that is performed should be planned in advance with the same attention to detail as in Ritual Magic. The various acts of astral evocation, divination, enchantment, invocation and illumination take on a similar general form to the acts of Ritual Magic which the magician adapts for astral work. ~ Peter J Carroll, Liber Kaos [T2],
181:They taught that men have two souls, of separate and quite different natures: the one perishable--the Astral Soul, or the inner, fluidic body--the other incorruptible and immortal--the Augoeides, or portion of the Divine Spirit; that the mortal or Astral Soul perishes at each gradual change at the threshold of every new sphere, becoming with every transmigration more purified. The astral man, intangible and invisible as he might be to our mortal, earthly senses, is still constituted of matter, though sublimated. Aristotle, notwithstanding that for political reasons of his own he maintained a prudent silence as to certain esoteric matters, expressed very clearly his opinion on the subject. It was his belief that human souls are emanations of God, that are finally re-absorbed into Divinity. Zeno, the founder of the Stoics, taught that there are "two eternal qualities throughout nature: the one active, or male; the other passive, or female: that the former is pure, subtile ether, or Divine Spirit; the other entirely inert in itself till united with the active principle. That the Divine Spirit acting upon matter produced fire, water, earth, and air; and that it is the sole efficient principle by which all nature is moved. The Stoics, like the Hindu sages, believed in the final absorption. St. Justin believed in the emanation of these souls from Divinity, and Tatian, the Assyrian, his disciple, declared that "man was as immortal as God himself." * ~ Helena Petrovna Blavatsky,
182:The Wine Of Song
WITHIN Fancy's halls I sit and quaff
Rich draughts of the wine of Song,
And I drink and drink
To the very brink
Of delirium wild and strong,
Till I lose all sense of the outer world
And see not the human throng.
The lyral chords of each rising thought
Are swept by a hand unseen,
And I glide and glide
With my music bride,
Where few spiritless souls have been;
And I soar afar on wings of sound
With my fair Æolian queen.
Deep, deeper still, from the springs of Thought
I quaff till the fount is dry,
And I climb and climb
To a height sublime
Up the stars of some lyric sky,
Where I seem to rise upon airs that melt
Into song as they pass by.
Millennial rounds of bliss I live,
Withdrawn from my cumbrous clay,
As I sweep and sweep
Through infinite deep
On deep of that starry spray;
Myself a sound on its world-wide round,
A tone on its spheral way.
And wheresoe'er through the wondrous space
My soul wings its noiseless flight,
On their astral rounds
Float divinest sounds,
Unseen, save by spirit-sight,
Obeying some wise, eternal law,
174
As fixed as the law of light.
But, oh, when my cup of dainty bliss
Is drained of the wine of Song,
How I fall and fall
At the sober call
Of the body that waiteth long
To hurry me back to its cares terrene,
And earth's spiritless human throng!
~ Charles Sangster,
183:Although neither an alchemist, magician, nor astrologer, but simply a great philosopher, Henry More, of Cambridge University — a man universally esteemed, may be named as a shrewd logician, scientist, and metaphysician... His faith in immortality and able arguments in demonstration of the survival of man's spirit after death are all based on the Pythagorean system... and other mystics. The infinite and uncreated spirit that we usually call God, a substance of the highest virtue and excellency, produced everything else by emanative causality. God thus is the primary substance... He...stoutly defended the theory of the individuality of every soul in which "personality, memory, and conscience will surely continue in the future state." He divided the astral spirit of man after its exit from the body into two distinct entities: the "aerial" and the "aethereal vehicle." During the time that a disembodied man moves in its aerial clothing, he is subject to Fate -- i.e., evil and temptation, attached to its earthly interests, and therefore is not utterly pure; it is only when he casts off this garb of the first spheres and becomes ethereal that he becomes sure of his immortality. "For what shadow can that body cast that is a pure and transparent light, such as the ethereal vehicle is? And therefore that oracle is then fulfilled, when the soul has ascended into that condition we have already described, in which alone it is out of the reach of fate and mortality." ~ H.P. Blavatsky, Isis Unveiled: A Master-Key to the Mysteries of Ancient and Modern Science and Theology, Vol. I, Before the Veil, (1877),
184:subtle ::: In Vedanta (Mandukya Upanishad and later teachings - e.g. Advaita - based on it) "subtle" is used to designate the "dream state" of consciousness, and in Advaita this also includes the Prana, Manas, and Vijnana koshas (= the vehicles of vital force, mind, and higher consciousness) re-interpreted from of the Taittiriya Upanishad.

In Tibetan and Tantric Buddhism it refers to an intermediate grade between the "gross" and "very subtle" "minds" and "winds" (vayu = prana).

The Sukshma Sthula or Subtle Body is one of the seven principles of man in Blavatskian Theosophy; it is also called the "astral body" (this has little similarity with the astral body of Out of Body experience, because it cannot move far from the gross physical vehicle, it seems to correspond to what Robert Monroe calls the "second body", and identified with the Double or Ka

In Sant Mat / Radhasoami cosmology - the Anda (Cosmic Egg) / Sahans-dal Kanwal (Crown Chakra) is sometimes called the Subtle; hence Subtle = Astral

The term Subtle Physical is used somewhat generically by Sri Aurobindo (in Letters on Yoga) to refer to a wider reality behind the external physical.

Ken Wilber uses the term Subtle to indicate the yogic and mystic holonic-evolutionary level intermediate between "Psychic" (in his series = Nature Mysticism) and "Causal" (=Realisation"); it includes many psychic and occult experiences and can be considered as pertaining to the Subtle as defined here (although it also includes other realities and experiences that might also be interpreted as "Inner Gross" - e.g. Kundalini as a classic example). ~ M Alan Kazlev, Kheper, planes/subtle,
185:In the Judeo-Christian tradition, it is called 'the resurrection body ' and 'the glorified body.' The prophet Isaiah said, 'The dead shall live, their bodies shall rise' (Isa. 26:19). St. Paul called it 'the celestial body' or 'spiritual body ' (soma pneumatikon) (I Corinthians 15:40). In Sufism it is called 'the most sacred body ' (wujud al-aqdas) and 'supracelestial body ' (jism asli haqiqi). In Taoism, it is called 'the diamond body,' and those who have attained it are called 'the immortals' and 'the cloudwalkers.' In Tibetan Buddhism it is called 'the light body.' In Tantrism and some schools of yoga, it is called 'the vajra body,' 'the adamantine body,' and 'the divine body.' In Kriya yoga it is called 'the body of bliss.' In Vedanta it is called 'the superconductive body.' In Gnosticism and Neoplatonism, it is called 'the radiant body.' In the alchemical tradition, the Emerald Tablet calls it 'the Glory of the Whole Universe' and 'the golden body.' The alchemist Paracelsus called it 'the astral body.' In the Hermetic Corpus, it is called 'the immortal body ' (soma athanaton). In some mystery schools, it is called 'the solar body.' In Rosicrucianism, it is called 'the diamond body of the temple of God.' In ancient Egypt it was called 'the luminous body or being' (akh). In Old Persia it was called 'the indwelling divine potential' (fravashi or fravarti). In the Mithraic liturgy it was called 'the perfect body ' (soma teilion). In the philosophy of Sri Aurobindo, it is called 'the divine body,' composed of supramental substance. In the philosophy of Teilhard de Chardin, it is called 'the ultrahuman'.
   ~ ?, http://herebedragons.weebly.com/homo-lumen.html,
186:This is the work of a lifetime, here on earth: To invent the astral body, to create it. giving it our consciousness. Thus one will survive death. One could also die when one chooses… And on dying, not lose the awareness 'from here.'

What has happened to you is a detachment of your astral body while your physical body sleeps. This occurs to vîras; it's an automatic unconscious process. Sometimes, by simple chance, a glimmer of consciousness reaches this fine body and then, on suddenly awakening or the next day, one gets the impression of experiencing something much more real than physical reality. The deja-vu of psychologists has its explanation in this phenomena of detachment.

Have you seen those children who elevate a kite and send messages with little rolls of paper that go slowly up to the kite? So it is, more or less, with that other. The astral body breaks away, still attached to the physical body by a string which has been called a 'silver cord' that is only cut at death. Thanks to this cord we can go immeasurable distances without losing the connection with our physical bodies. It always returns. So it reaches consciousness, like those messages of children with their kite. Yes, we must become like children to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven… with our astral bodies. Pay attention to this other analogy: As a child finds itself joined to its mother by the umbilical cord, so the astral body is joined to its father, the physical body, by a silver cord. The child cries and despairs at birth, when the cord connecting him to his mother is cut. He thinks this is death, but it is a new life. The same befalls the vîra when he dies; when the silver cord is cut he enters into another life. Death is a new life. All this is archetypal. Only those events expressing archetypes have ontological reality. ~ Miguel Serrano,
187:Man as an individualised soul is essentially causal-bodied,” my guru explained. “That body is a matrix of the thirty-five ideas required by God as the basic or causal thought forces from which He later formed the subtle astral body of nineteen elements and the gross physical body of sixteen elements. “The nineteen elements of the astral body are mental, emotional, and lifetronic. The nineteen components are intelligence; ego; feeling; mind (sense-consciousness); five instruments of knowledge, the subtle counterparts of the senses of sight, hearing, smell, taste, touch; five instruments of action, the mental correspondence for the executive abilities to procreate, excrete, talk, walk, and exercise manual skill; and five instruments of life force, those empowered to perform the crystallising, assimilating, eliminating, metabolising, and circulating functions of the body. This subtle astral encasement of nineteen elements survives the death of the physical body, which is made of sixteen gross chemical elements. “God thought out different ideas within Himself and projected them into dreams. Lady Cosmic Dream thus sprang out decorated in all her colossal endless ornaments of relativity. “In thirty-five thought categories of the causal body, God elaborated all the complexities of man’s nineteen astral and sixteen physical counterparts. By condensation of vibratory forces, first subtle, then gross, He produced man’s astral body and finally his physical form. According to the law of relativity, by which the Prime Simplicity has become the bewildering manifold, the causal cosmos and causal body are different from the astral cosmos and astral body; the physical cosmos and physical body are likewise characteristically at variance with the other forms of creation. “The fleshly body is made of the fixed, objectified dreams of the Creator. The dualities are ever present on earth: disease and health, pain and pleasure, loss and gain. ~ Paramahansa Yogananda,
188:transient and in the context of eternity ephemeral, only perceived as having such characteristics as ―solidity‖, ―liquidity‖, ―form‖ and other physically discernible characteristics through the mediation of the five physical senses, which in turn perpetuate these illusions. Earth Herself, the suns, planets, galaxies and other creations in the physical Universe were created by the Mind of The Source during an act of creation that commenced with The Source, The First Cause, God, projecting outwards with ever decreasing vibration and increasing density, until finally differentiating into matter, finally resulting in the formation of the physical Universe.Nevertheless, the physical Universe is still transient to the extent they can only exist in its present form while The Source chooses to continue to maintain the Thought Forms that constitute the physical Universe and all its manifestations. The discovery of the characteristics of Quanta further underlines the extremely important fact that everyone without exception creates their own reality. These factors equally apply to the inner worlds, including the Astral worlds to where most people will transition after physical death, and where anything can be manifested instantly through the focused powers of the Mind in the form of thoughts, intent and imagination. We will discuss manifestation with the power of the Mind in much more detail in later sections of this book. The Astral and inner dimensions or spheres of reality exist at a much higher level of vibration or Energy than the physical world, and Quanta of Energy, identical to vibration or Light in the Universal sense, are much more easily influenced by the power of the Mind―the inner spheres of life being ―Mind worlds‖. Physicist Nick Herbert likened the behaviour of Quanta to ―a radically ambiguous and ceaselessly flowing quantum soup‖. Nick Herbert goes on to observe that ―humans can never experience the true nature of quantum reality, Life, the Universe and Destiny of Mankind 74 ~ Anonymous,
189:Já repeti o antigo encantamento,
E a grande Deusa aos olhos se negou.
Já repeti, nas pausas do amplo vento,
As orações cuja alma é um ser fecundo.
Nada me o abismo deu ou o céu mostrou.
Só o vento volta onde estou toda e só,
E tudo dorme no confuso mundo.

"Outrora meu condão fadava, as sarças
E a minha evocação do solo erguia
Presenças concentradas das que esparsas
Dormem nas formas naturais das coisas.
Outrora a minha voz acontecia.
Fadas e elfos, se eu chamasse, via.
E as folhas da floresta eram lustrosas.

"Minha varinha, com que da vontade
Falava às existências essenciais,
Já não conhece a minha realidade.
Já, se o círculo traço, não há nada.
Murmura o vento alheio extintos ais,
E ao luar que sobe além dos matagais
Não sou mais do que os bosques ou a estrada.

"Já me falece o dom com que me amavam.
Já me não torno a forma e o fim da vida
A quantos que, buscando-os, me buscavam.
Já, praia, o mar dos braços não me inunda.
Nem já me vejo ao sol saudado ergUida,
Ou, em êxtase mágico perdida,
Ao luar, à boca da caverna funda.

"Já as sacras potências infernais,
Que, dormentes sem deuses nem destino,
À substância das coisas são iguais,
Não ouvem minha voz ou os nomes seus.
A música partiu-se do meu hino.
Já meu furor astral não é divino
Nem meu corpo pensado é já um deus.

"E as longínquas deidades do atro poço,
Que tantas vezes, pálida, evoquei
Com a raiva de amar em alvoroço,
lnevocadas hoje ante mim estão.
Como, sem que as amasse, eu as chamei,
Agora, que não amo, as tenho, e sei
Que meu vendido ser consumirão.

"Tu, porém, Sol, cujo ouro me foi presa,
Tu, Lua, cuja prata converti,
Se já não podeis dar-me essa beleza
Que tantas vezes tive por querer,
Ao menos meu ser findo dividi
Meu ser essencial se perca em si,
Só meu corpo sem mim fique alma e ser!

"Converta-me a minha última magia
Numa estátua de mim em corpo vivo!
Morra quem sou, mas quem me fiz e havia,
Anônima presença que se beija,
Carne do meu abstrato amor cativo,
Seja a morte de mim em que revivo;
E tal qual fui, não sendo nada, eu seja! ~ Fernando Pessoa,
190:Mystic Moon Dreaming Pillows Sometimes, when we are in need of extra rest, or when we just want to reach a deeper sleep state, we can achieve this by the use of dreaming pillows—small sachet like pillows that we can tuck inside of our pillow cases. Depending on the herbs, the pillows can encourage vivid dreams, astral work, or restful sleep. This recipe is designed to help promote peaceful slumber, since so many of us don’t get enough time in bed in this fast-paced world. You will need: 2 seven-inch squares of sturdy, purple material—linen works well Gold thread and needle or sewing machine Cotton batting 1/2 cup each: dried lavender mugwort rose petals lemon balm chamomile valerian root 3 drops lavender essential oil 3 drops lemon essential oil 2 drops rosemary essential oil Small spike of quartz crystal Mix herbs together in a bowl, focusing on your desire to encourage deep slumber and to work with your Higher Self while asleep. Focus on the nature of dreams, how they can solve problems, and ask that this energy infuse the herbs and bring out their natural magical tendencies. Add drops of essential oil and mix again. Place quartz spike in the middle of the herbs and set aside (in a bottle with a lid if you are going to wait to finish this charm). Place cloth pieces together, wrong sides out, and sew to form a pouch (use a 3/8” seam allowance), leaving on side open. Iron seams open, then reverse so pouch is right side out. Fill halfway with cotton batting. Add herb mixture and crystal, then pack with rest of cotton batting. Sew the end shut. Place this inside your pillowcase at night and, before you go to bed, focus on some thought you’d like to explore in the dream-state, then go to sleep as usual. Write down your dreams when you wake up and eventually, you should see them responding to your requests. You can recharge this pillow by adding two drops each of lavender oil, lemon oil, and rosemary oil when the fragrance starts to fade. Remember: It is up to us to solve our own problems, but we can call on the power of our Higher Self when we need help, or when we seek more information on a subject. Eventually, through focus and determination, we can enter the Dream-Time and learn to hear our inner guidance when we’re awake, not just during our sleep. ~ Yasmine Galenorn,
191:The general characteristics and attributions of these Grades are indicated by their correspondences on the Tree of Life, as may be studied in detail in the Book 777.
   Student. -- His business is to acquire a general intellectual knowledge of all systems of attainment, as declared in the prescribed books. (See curriculum in Appendix I.) {231}
   Probationer. -- His principal business is to begin such practices as he my prefer, and to write a careful record of the same for one year.
   Neophyte. -- Has to acquire perfect control of the Astral Plane.
   Zelator. -- His main work is to achieve complete success in Asana and Pranayama. He also begins to study the formula of the Rosy Cross.
   Practicus. -- Is expected to complete his intellectual training, and in particular to study the Qabalah.
   Philosophus. -- Is expected to complete his moral training. He is tested in Devotion to the Order.
   Dominus Liminis. -- Is expected to show mastery of Pratyahara and Dharana.
   Adeptus (without). -- is expected to perform the Great Work and to attain the Knowledge and Conversation of the Holy Guardian Angel.
   Adeptus (within). -- Is admitted to the practice of the formula of the Rosy Cross on entering the College of the Holy Ghost.
   Adeptus (Major). -- Obtains a general mastery of practical Magick, though without comprehension.
   Adeptus (Exemptus). -- Completes in perfection all these matters. He then either ("a") becomes a Brother of the Left Hand Path or, ("b") is stripped of all his attainments and of himself as well, even of his Holy Guardian Angel, and becomes a babe of the Abyss, who, having transcended the Reason, does nothing but grow in the womb of its mother. It then finds itself a
   Magister Templi. -- (Master of the Temple): whose functions are fully described in Liber 418, as is this whole initiation from Adeptus Exemptus. See also "Aha!". His principal business is to tend his "garden" of disciples, and to obtain a perfect understanding of the Universe. He is a Master of Samadhi. {232}
   Magus. -- Attains to wisdom, declares his law (See Liber I, vel Magi) and is a Master of all Magick in its greatest and highest sense.
   Ipsissimus. -- Is beyond all this and beyond all comprehension of those of lower degrees. ~ Aleister Crowley, Liber ABA,
192:Techniques Phase 1 Night is the time to practice this technique, as you will require deep, undisturbed concentration, and the airways are less likely to be cluttered during the dark of the day. You will be using the visualization function initially, but instead of retaining internalization, you are going to externalize your consciousness (as in shapeshifting). Seat yourself in your usual working position. Go into meditation to center yourself. Visualize yourself standing directly in front of where you are. Observe the back of your head, your height, your stance—everything about yourself that you can see. It is not possible to observe your own face in this context, just as it is not possible to observe your own physical form (except in a mirror), as we are aware only of our internalized externalization of image and not the way we appear to an observer. Next you are to project your consciousness into your body. By this I mean that you are no longer the person observing, but the person being observed. Look around your immediate environment. Go to the doorway and walk around the room, looking at everything: look behind objects, inside cupboards and boxes, look closely at books, pictures, everything. Continue this exercise nightly until you are familiar with your immediate surroundings. Always reenter your prone material body the way you left. Phase 2 Begin with meditation. Go with the process of projecting into the externalized image of yourself. You may now proceed to leave the room with which you have oriented yourself over the preceding nights and travel around the house in which you live, observing at all times and remaining aware of all things your senses perceive. If there are other people in the house, you may pick up on their emotions, moods, dream patterns, etc., but at this stage, do not work at having them become aware of your presence (they may become aware of you anyway, especially if they are asleep and traveling close to their physical habitat). Continue with this exercise until you are familiar with the process. Phase 3 Begin with meditation. Project your consciousness into your self-image. You can now leave the house and move around outside. Be aware of the time. Observe all that is around you. Now you can begin the process of expanding your entity. If you bend your knees and jump, you will discover that you are weightless and can keep rising into the atmosphere as long as you desire. You can also think your astral body from one place to another without necessarily following a familiar route. Practice this often, but don’t forget to follow the return-to-body procedure! I tend to stress this like a mother-hen. I’ve had horrible postastral dysfunction occur due to both interruption and lack of experience, and it has sometimes been days before I stopped feeling dizzy and/or nauseous and disoriented. Sleeping lots tends to fix it, though. ~ Ly de Angeles,
193:Plegaria
Spanish
–Eros: acaso no sentiste nunca
Piedad de las estatuas?
Se dirían crisálidas de piedra
De yo no sé qué formidable raza
En una eterna espera inenarrable.
Los cráteres dormidos de sus bocas
Dan la ceniza negra del Silencio,
Mana de las columnas de sus hombros
La mortaja copiosa de la Calma
Y fluye de sus órbitas la noche;
Victimas del Futuro o del Misterio,
En capullos terribles y magníficos
Esperan a la Vida o a la Muerte.
Eros: acaso no sentiste nunca
Piedad de las estatuas?–
Piedad para las vidas
Que no doran a fuego tus bonanzas
Ni riegan o desgajan tus tormentas;
Piedad para los cuerpos revestidos
Del armiño solemne de la Calma,
Y las frentes en luz que sobrellevan
Grandes lirios marmóreos de pureza,
Pesados y glaciales como témpanos;
Piedad para las manos enguantadas
De hielo, que no arrancan
Los frutos deleitosos de la Carne
Ni las flores fantásticas del alma;
Piedad para los ojos que aletean
Espirituales párpados:
Escamas de misterio,
Negros telones de visiones rosas...
Nunca ven nada por mirar tan lejos!
Piedad para las pulcras cabelleras
–Misticas aureolas–
Peinadas como lagos
Que nunca airea el abanico negro,
Negro y enorme de la tempestad;
26
Piedad para los ínclitos espiritus
Tallados en diamante,
Altos, claros, extáticos
Pararrayos de cúpulas morales;
Piedad para los labios como engarces
Celestes donde fulge
Invisible la perla de la Hostia;
–Labios que nunca fueron,
Que no apresaron nunca
Un vampiro de fuego
Con más sed y más hambre que un abismo.–
Piedad para los sexos sacrosantos
Que acoraza de una
Hoja de viña astral la Castidad;
Piedad para las plantas imantadas
De eternidad que arrastran
Por el eterno azur
Las sandalias quemantes de sus llagas;
Piedad, piedad, piedad
Para todas las vidas que defiende
De tus maravillosas intemperies
El mirador enhiesto del Orgullo;
Apuntales tus soles o tus rayos!
Eros: acaso no sentiste nunca
Piedad de las estatuas?...
English
–Eros: have you never felt
Piety for the statues?
These chrysalides of stone,
Some formidable race
In an eternal, unutterable hope.
The sleeping craters of their mouths
Utter the black ash of silence;
A copious shroud of Calm
Falls from the columns of their arms,
And night flows from their eyesockets;
Victims of Destiny or Mystery,
In magnificent and terrible cocoons,
27
They wait for Life or Death.
Eros: have you never perhaps felt
Piety for the statues?
Piety for the lives
That will not strew nor rend your battles
Nor gild your fiery truces;
Piety for the bodies clothed
In the solemn ermine of Calm,
The luminous foreheads that endure
Their marble wreaths, grand and pure,
Weighty and glacial as icebergs;
Piety for the gloved hands of ice
That cannot uproot
The delicious fruits of the Flesh,
The fantastic flowers of the soul;
Piety for the eyes that flutter
Their spiritual eyelids:
Mysterious fish scales,
Dark curtains on rose visions...
For looking so far, they never see!
Piety for the tidy heads of hair
–Mystical haloes–
Gently combed like lakes
Which the storm’s black fan,
Black and enormous, never thrashes;
Piety for the spirits, illustrious,
Carved of diamonds,
High, clear, ecstatic
Lightning rods on pious domes;
Piety for the lips like celestial settings
Where the invisible pearls of the Host gleam;
–Lips that never existed,
Never seized anything,
A fiery vampire
With more thirst and hunger than an abyss.
Piety for the sacrosanct sexes
That armor themselves with sheaths
From the astral vineyards of Chastity;
Piety for the magnetized footsoles
Who eternally drag
Sandals burning with sores
Through the eternal azure;
28
Piety, piety, pity
For all the lives defended
By the lighthouse of Pride
From your marvelous raw weathers:
Aim your suns and rays at them!
Eros: have you never perhaps felt
Pity for the statues?
~ Delmira Agustini,
194: ON THE LAND

OF EDUCATION

I flew too far into the future: dread overcame me.
and when I looked around, behold, time was my sole
contemporary. Then I flew back toward home, faster
and faster; and thus I came to you, 0 men of today,
and into the land of education. For the first time I
really had eyes for you, and a genuine desire; verily, it
was with longing in my heart that I came.
But what happened to me? For all my anxiety I had
to laugh. Never had my eyes beheld anything so dappled and motley. I laughed and laughed while my foot
was still trembling, and my heart no less. "This is
clearly the home of all paint pots," I said.
With fifty blotches painted on your faces and limbs
you were sitting there, and I was amazed, you men of
today. And with fifty mirrors around you to flatter and
echo your color display! Verily, you could wear no better masks, you men of today, than your own faces! Who
could possibly find you out?
With the characters of the past written all over you,
and these characters in turn painted over with new
characters: thus have you concealed yourselves perfectly from all interpreters of characters. And even if
one could try the reins, who would be fool enough to
believe that you have reins? You seem baked out of
colors and pasted notes. Motley, all ages and peoples
120
peek out of your veils; motley, all customs and faiths
speak out of your gestures.
If one took the veils and wraps and colors and
gestures away from you, just enough would be left to
scare away the crows. Verily, I myself am the scared
crow who once saw you naked and without color;
and I flew away when the skeleton beckoned to me
lovingly. Rather would I be a day laborer in Hades
among the shades of the past! Even the underworldly
are plumper and fuller than you.
This, indeed this, is bitterness for my bowels, that
I can endure you neither naked nor clothed, you men
of today. All that is uncanny in the future and all that
has ever made fugitive birds shudder is surely more
comfortable and cozy than your "reality." For thus you
speak: "Real are we entirely, and without belief or
superstition." Thus you stick out your chests-but alas,
they are hollow! Indeed, how should you be capable
of any belief, being so dappled and motley-you who
are paintings of all that men have ever believed? You
are walking refutations of all belief, and you break the
limbs of all thought. Unbelievable: thus I call you, for
all your pride in being real!
All ages prate against each other in your spirits; and
the dreams and ratings of all ages were yet more real
than your waking. You are sterile: that is why you lack
faith. But whoever had to create also had his prophetic
dreams and astral signs-and had faith in faith. You are
half-open gates at which the gravediggers wait. And
this is your reality: "Everything deserves to perish."
How you stand there, you who are sterile, how thin
around the ribsl And some among you probably realized
this and said, "Probably some god secretly took something from me while I slept. Verily, enough to make
121
himself a little female! Strange is the poverty of my
ribs." Thus have some men of today already spoken.
Indeed, you make me laugh, you men of today, and
particularly when you are amazed at yourselves. And 1
should be in a sorry plight if I could not laugh at your
amazement and had to drink down everything disgusting out of your bowls. But I shall take you more lightly,
for I have a heavy burden; and what does it matter to
me if bugs and winged worms still light on my bundle?
Verily, that will not make it heavier. And not from
you, you men of today, shall the great weariness come
over me.
Alas, where shall I climb now with my longing? From
all mountains I look out for fatherlands and motherlands. But home I found nowhere; a fugitive am I in
all cities and a departure at all gates. Strange and a
mockery to me are the men of today to whom my heart
recently drew me; and I am driven out of fatherlands
and motherlands. Thus I now love only my children's
land, yet undiscovered, in the farthest sea: for this I
bid my sails search and search.
In my children I want to make up for being the child
of my fathers-and to all the future, for this today.
Thus spoke Zarathustra.
~ Friedrich Nietzsche, ON THE LAND OF EDUCATION
,
195:For instance, a popular game with California occultists-I do not know its inventor-involves a Magic Room, much like the Pleasure Dome discussed earlier except that this Magic Room contains an Omniscient Computer.
   To play this game, you simply "astrally project" into the Magic Room. Do not ask what "astral projection" means, and do not assume it is metaphysical (and therefore either impossible, if you are a materialist, or very difficult, if you are a mystic). Just assume this is a gedankenexperiment, a "mind game." Project yourself, in imagination, into this Magic Room and visualize vividly the Omniscient Computer, using the details you need to make such a super-information-processor real to your fantasy. You do not need any knowledge of programming to handle this astral computer. It exists early in the next century; you are getting to use it by a species of time-travel, if that metaphor is amusing and helpful to you. It is so built that it responds immediately to human brain-waves, "reading" them and decoding their meaning. (Crude prototypes of such computers already exist.) So, when you are in this magic room, you can ask this Computer anything, just by thinking of what you want to know. It will read your thought, and project into your brain, by a laser ray, the correct answer.
   There is one slight problem. The computer is very sensitive to all brain-waves. If you have any doubts, it registers them as negative commands, meaning "Do not answer my question." So, the way to use it is to start simply, with "easy" questions. Ask it to dig out of the archives the name of your second-grade teacher. (Almost everybody remembers the name of their first grade teacher-imprint vulnerability again-but that of the second grade teacher tends to get lost.)
   When the computer has dug out the name of your second grade teacher, try it on a harder question, but not one that is too hard. It is very easy to sabotage this machine, but you don't want to sabotage it during these experiments. You want to see how well it can be made to perform.
   It is wise to ask only one question at a time, since it requires concentration to keep this magic computer real on the field of your perception. Do not exhaust your capacities for imagination and visualization on your first trial runs.
   After a few trivial experiments of the second-grade-teacher variety, you can try more interesting programs. Take a person toward whom you have negative feelings, such as anger, disappointment, feeling-of-betrayal, jealousy or whatever interferes with the smooth, tranquil operation of your own bio-computer. Ask the Magic Computer to explain that other person to you; to translate you into their reality-tunnel long enough for you to understand how events seem to them. Especially, ask how you seem to them.
   This computer will do that job for you; but be prepared for some shocks which might be disagreeable at first. This super-brain can also perform exegesis on ideas that seem obscure, paradoxical or enigmatic to us. For instance, early experiments with this computer can very profitably turn on asking it to explain some of the propositions in this book which may seem inexplicable or perversely wrong-headed to you, such as "We are all greater artists than we realize" or "What the Thinker thinks, the Prover proves" or "mind and its contents are functionally identical."
   This computer is much more powerful and scientifically advanced than the rapture-machine in the neurosomatic circuit. It has total access to all the earlier, primitive circuits, and overrules any of them. That is, if you put a meta-programming instruction into this computer; it will relay it downward to the old circuits and cancel contradictory programs left over from the past. For instance, try feeding it on such meta-programming instructions as: 1. I am at cause over my body. 2. I am at cause over my imagination. 3.1 am at cause over my future. 4. My mind abounds with beauty and power. 5.1 like people, and people like me.
   Remember that this computer is only a few decades ahead of present technology, so it cannot "understand" your commands if you harbor any doubts about them. Doubts tell it not to perform. Work always from what you can believe in, extending the area of belief only as results encourage you to try for more dramatic transformations of your past reality-tunnels.
   This represents cybernetic consciousness; the programmer becoming self-programmer, self-metaprogrammer, meta-metaprogrammer, etc. Just as the emotional compulsions of the second circuit seem primitive, mechanical and, ultimately, silly to the neurosomatic consciousness, so, too, the reality maps of the third circuit become comic, relativistic, game-like to the metaprogrammer. "Whatever you say it is, it isn't, " Korzybski, the semanticist, repeated endlessly in his seminars, trying to make clear that third-circuit semantic maps are not the territories they represent; that we can always make maps of our maps, revisions of our revisions, meta-selves of our selves. "Neti, neti" (not that, not that), Hindu teachers traditionally say when asked what "God" is or what "Reality" is. Yogis, mathematicians and musicians seem more inclined to develop meta-programming consciousness than most of humanity. Korzybski even claimed that the use of mathematical scripts is an aid to developing this circuit, for as soon as you think of your mind as mind 1 , and the mind which contemplates that mind as mind2 and the mind which contemplates mind2 contemplating mind 1 as mind3, you are well on your way to meta-programming awareness. Alice in Wonderland is a masterful guide to the metaprogramming circuit (written by one of the founders of mathematical logic) and Aleister Crowley soberly urged its study upon all students of yoga. ~ Robert Anton Wilson, Prometheus Rising,
196:Love Sonnets
I.
HOW beautiful doth the morning rise
O’er the hills, as from her bower a bride
Comes brightened—blushing with the shame-faced pride
Of love that now consummated supplies
All her full heart can wish, and to the eyes
Dear are the flowers then, in their green haunts spied,
Glist ning with dew: pleasant at noon the side
Of shadowy mountains ridging to the skies:
At eve ’tis sweet to hear the breeze advance
Through the responding forest dense and tall;
And sweeter in the moonlight is the dance
And natural music of the waterfall:
And yet we feel not the full charm of all,
Till love be near us with his magic glance.
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II.

WHY tower my spirits, and what means this wild

Commotion at my heart—this dreamy chase

Of possible joys that glow like stars in space?

Now feel I even to all things reconciled,

As all were one in spirit. Rudely up-piled

Brown hills grow beautiful; a novel grace

Exalts the moorland’s once unmeaning face;

The river that, like a pure mind beguiled,

Grows purer for its errors, and the trees

That fringe its margin with a dusky shade,

Seem robed in fairy wonder; and are these

Exalted thus because with me surveyed

By one sweet sould whom well they seem to please

Here at my side—an almost stranger maid?

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92

III.

NOW sunny, as the noontide heavens, are

The eyes of my sweet friend, and now serene

And chastely shadowy in their maiden mien;

Or dream-power, sparkling like a brilliant star

Fills all their blue depths, taking me afar

To where, in the rich past, through song is seen

Some sovereign beauty, knighthood’s mystic queen,

Pluming with love the iron brows of war!

Bright eyes before, with subtle lightning glance

Have kindled all my being into one

Wild tumult; but a charm thus to enhance

My heart’s love-loyalty till now had none!

And can this witchery be the work of chance?

I know not—I but know my rest is gone.

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IV.

A VAST and shadowy hope breaks up my rest

Unspoken; nor dares even my pen to write

How my pent spirit pineth day and night

For one fair love with whom I might be blest!

And ever with vague jealousies possessed

The more I languish, feeling these may so

Oppress affection that for very woe

She longs at last to die deep buried in my breast!

O for a beaker of the wine of love,

Or a deep draught of the Lethèan wave!

The power a mutual passion to emove,

Or that repose which sealeth up the grave!

Yet these my bonds are blameless; one more wise

Had dreamt away his freedom, dreaming of her eyes.

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V.

93

HER image haunts me! Lo! I muse at even,

And straight it gathers from the gloom, to make

My soul its mirror; which (as some still lake

Holds pictured in its depths the face of heaven)

Through the hushed night retains it: when ’tis given

To take a warmer presence and incline

A glowing cheek burning with love to mine,

Saying—“The heart for which thou long hast stiven

With looks so fancy-pale, I grant thee now;

And if for ruth, yet more for love’s sweet sake,

My lips shall seal this promise on thy brow. ”

Thus blest in sleep—oh! Who would care to wake,

When the cold real from his belief must shake

Such vows, like blossoms from a shattered bough?

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VI.

SHE loves me! From her own bliss-breathing lips

The live confession came, like rich perfume

From crimson petals bursting into bloom!

And still my heart at the remembrance skips

Like a young lion, and my tongue too trips

As drunk with joy! While very object seen

In life’s diurnal round wears in its mien

A clear assurance that no doubts eclipse.

And if the common things of nature now

Are like old faces flushed with new delight,

Much more the consciousness of that rich vow

Deepens the beauteous, and refines the bright,

While throned I seem on love’s divinest height

Mid all the glories glowing round its brow.

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VII.

FAIR as the day—a genial day serene

Of early summer, when the vital air

94

Breathes as ’twere God’s own breath, and blossoms rare

Fill many a bush, or nestle in between

The heapy folds of nature’s mantle green,

As they were happier for the joint joy there

Of birds and bees;—so genial, and so fair

And rich in pleasure, is my life’s sole queen.

My spirit in the sunshine of her grace

Glows with intenser being, and my veins

Fill as with nectar! In your pride of place

Ye mighty, boast! Ye rich, heap gold space!

I envy nor your grandeur nor your gains,

Thus gazing at the heaven of her face!

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VIII.

FAIR as the night—when all the astral fires

Of heaven are burning in the clear expanse,

My love is, and her eyes like star-depths glance

Lustrous with glowing thoughts and pure desires,

And that mysterious pathos which inspires

All moods divine in mortal passion’s trance—

All that its earthly music doth enhance

As with the rapture of seraphic lyres!

I gaze upon her till the atmosphere

Sweetens intensely, and to my charmed sight

All fair associated forms appear

Swimming in joy, as swim yon orbs in light—

And all sweet sounds, though common, to mine ear

Chime up like silver-winged dreams in flight.

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IX.

TO-DAY we part! I far away to dwell

From this the scene that saw our bud of love

Bloom into rosehood. The blue heavens above—

These hills and valleys, with each rocky dell,

95

Echo’s dim hold,—shall these retain no spell

Of foregone passion? Shall they speak no tale

Of grief they shrouded in this shaded vale?

Shall they of all our joy the story tell?

To-morrow—and the sun shall climb yon hill

Bright as before; all winged things shall wake

To song as glad as if we listened still;

The stream as mirthfully its wild way make.

But I, pursuing fortune’s wandering star,

Shall see and hear them not—from thee and them afar.

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X.

ABSENCE

NIGHTLY I watch the moon with silvery sheen

Flaking the city house-tops—till I feel

Thy memory, dear one, like a presence steal

Down in her light; for always in her mien

Thy soul’s similitude my soul hath seen!

And as she seemeth now—a guardian seal

On heaven’s far bliss, upon my future weal

Even such thy truth is—radiantly serene.

But long my fancy may not entertain

These bright resemblances—for lo! A cloud

Blots her away! And in my breast the pain

Of absent love recurring pines aloud!

When shall I look in thy bright eyes again?

O my beloved with like sadness bowed!

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XI.

THERE is a trying spirit in the drift

Of human life, apportioning the prize

(In that true quality wherein it lies)

That each one seeketh, to that seeker’s gift.

Hence must he suffer many a perilous shift

96

Who unto fame by martial deeds would rise;

Hence look at liberty with lion-eyes

Must he who’d make the march of man more swift:

Hence heaven’s best crown, more glorious than the sun,

Is only gained by dying for our kind;

And hence, too, true love’s highest meed is won

Only through agonies of heart and mind.

Such, dear one, is the fate (and therefore ours)

Of all whom love would crown with faith’s divinest flowers.

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XII.

THE VOYAGE to that haven of true love

Was ever stormy since the world began,

Or story from its earliest fountain ran;

Teaching us truly that the gods approve,

In the superior destinies of man,

Only what most the noblest hearts shall move:

Hence was Leander’s life so brief a span,

Who, weltering a mortal while above

The bursting wave, sent on his soul to where

The Maid of Sestos from her watch-tower’s height

Looked for his coming through the troubled air,

Nor knew that he had died for her that night!

Hence Sappho’s fatal leap! (The cause the same)

Hence too was Petrarch’s heart the martyr of his flame!

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XIII.

LOSS follows gain, and sadness waits on mirth,

And much is wasted where too much is given;

We cannot fully have our joy on earth

Without diminishing our joy in heaven.

Envy dogs merit; madness neighbours wit;

Stale is their gladness who were never sad;

And Dives in this fleshly life, ’tis writ,

97

Received his good things, Lazarus his bad.

Thus, dearest, o’er the waves of many things

My troubled mind, even like a ship, is tossed,

And from the quest this only inference brings:

That true love in its earthly course is crossed,

Lest by dull worldly usage it should be

Too worldly cramped to soar in large eternity.

~ Charles Harpur,

IN CHAPTERS [99/99]



   53 Occultism
   8 Theosophy
   6 Integral Yoga
   4 Yoga
   4 Christianity
   3 Poetry
   3 Integral Theory
   2 Philosophy
   1 Science
   1 Psychology
   1 Fiction
   1 Alchemy


   24 Aleister Crowley
   16 Franz Bardon
   9 Rudolf Steiner
   5 Sri Aurobindo
   5 Alice Bailey
   4 Pierre Teilhard de Chardin
   2 Swami Sivananda Saraswati
   2 Sri Ramakrishna
   2 A B Purani


   16 Magick Without Tears
   10 The Practice of Magical Evocation
   8 Liber ABA
   6 The Secret Doctrine
   6 Knowledge of the Higher Worlds
   6 Initiation Into Hermetics
   5 A Treatise on Cosmic Fire
   5 A Garden of Pomegranates - An Outline of the Qabalah
   3 The Phenomenon of Man
   3 Theosophy
   2 Talks
   2 Record of Yoga
   2 Evening Talks With Sri Aurobindo
   2 Amrita Gita
   2 Advanced Dungeons and Dragons 2E


02.05 - The Godheads of the Little Life, #Savitri, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  He through the astral chaos shore a way
  Mid the grey faces of its demon gods,

1.00a - DIVISION A - THE INTERNAL FIRES OF THE SHEATHS., #A Treatise on Cosmic Fire, #Alice Bailey, #Occultism
  From the very use of the term "sheath" it will be noted that we are considering those fires which manifest through the medium of those externalities, of those veils of substance which hide and conceal the inner Reality. We shall not here take up the subject of the sheaths on the higher planes, but simply deal with the fires that animate the three lower vehicles,the physical body in its two divisions (etheric and dense), the emotional or astral body, and the mental sheath. It is frequently overlooked by the casual student that both the astral and the mental bodies are material, and just as material in their own way, as is the dense physical body, and also that the substance of which they are composed is animated by a triple fire, as is the physical.
  In the physical body we have the fires of the lower nature (the animal plane) centralised at the base of the spine. They are situated at a spot which stands in relation to the physical body as the physical sun to the solar system. This central point of heat radiates in all directions, using the spinal column as its main artery, but working in close connection with certain central ganglia, wherever located, and having a special association with the spleen.
  --
  We must remember that in both the astral and the mental sheaths there exist the counterparts of the centres as found in the physical body. These centres concern matter and its evolution. One fundamental statement can be laid down anent the internal fires of all these four (sun, planet, man, and atom):
  There exists in the Sun, in the planet, in man, and in the atom, a central point of heat, or ((if I might use so limiting and inappropriate a term) a central cavern of fire, or nucleus of heat, and this central nucleus reaches the bounds of its sphere of influence, its ring-pass-not by means of a threefold channel. [xvii]17
  --
  It might be wise here to point out that this triple manifestation of fire demonstrates in the astral and mental bodies likewise, having to do with the substance of those bodies. We might express this fire in its triple manifestation as the sumtotal of the essential fire, or life activity of the third Logos. It should be carefully borne [62] in mind that the manifestation of the work of the three Logoi is the expression of the mind of some cosmic Entity. In the same way, the seven planetary Entities, the seven Heavenly Men, are seven Logoi (likewise cosmic Beings) Who in Their totality form the Body of the threefold Logos. We have, therefore:
  1. The undifferentiated Logosa cosmic Entity.
  --
  The blending of the three fires, the merging of the three Rays, and the co-operation of the three Logoi have in view (at this time and within this solar system) the development of the Essence of the cosmic Lord of Love, the second Person in the logoic trinity. Earlier it was not so, later it will not be, but now it is. When viewed from the cosmic mental plane these Three constitute the PERSONALITY OF THE LOGOS, and are seen functioning as one. Hence the secret (well recognised as fact, though not understood) of the excessive heat, occultly expressed, of the astral or central body of the triple personality. It animates and controls the physical body, and its desires hold sway in the majority of cases; it demonstrates in time and space the correspondence of the temporary union of spirit and matter, the fires of cosmic love and the fires of matter blended. A similar analogy is found in the heat apparent in this second solar system.
  d. The Atom. The inner fires of the atom can likewise be seen functioning along similar lines, their demonstration being already somewhat recognised by science. This being so there exists no necessity for further elaboration. [xxi]21
  --
  Certain facts are known in connection with the fire spirits (if so they may be termed). The fundamental fact that should here be emphasised is that AGNI, the Lord of Fire, rules over all the fire elementals and devas on the three planes of human evolution, the physical, the astral, and the mental, and rules over them not only on this planet, called the Earth, but on the three planes in all parts of the system. He is one of the seven Brothers (to use an expression familiar to students of the Secret Doctrine) Who each embody one of the seven principles, or Who are in Themselves the seven centres in the body of the cosmic Lord of Fire, called by H. P. B. "Fohat." He is that active fiery Intelligence, Who is the basis of the internal fires of the solar system. On each plane one of these Brothers holds sway, and the three elder Brothers (for always the three will be seen, and later the seven, who eventually merge into the primary three) rule on the first, third and the fifth planes, or on the plane of adi, of atma [xxii]22 and of manas. It is urgent that we here remember that They are fire viewed [66] in its third aspect, the fire of matter. In Their totality these seven Lords form the essence of the cosmic Lord, called in the occult books, Fohat. [xxiii]23
  This is so in the same sense as the seven Chohans, [xxiv]24 with Their affiliated groups of pupils, form the essence or centres in the body of one of the Heavenly Men, one of the planetary Logoi. These seven again in Their turn form the essence of the Logos.
  --
  2. The astral Plane.
  The fiery essences of this plane are more difficult for us to comprehend, having not, as yet, the seeing eye upon that plane. They are in themselves the warmth and heat of the emotional body, and of the body of feeling. They are of a low order when upon the path of desire, and of a high order when upon the path of aspiration, for the elemental is then transmuted into the deva.
  Their grades and ranks are many, but their names matter not save in one instance. It may be of interest to know the appellation applied to the devas of fire whose part it is to tend the fires that will later destroy the causal body. We need to remember that it is the upspringing of the latent fire of matter and its merging with two other fires that causes destruction. These elementals and devas are called the Agnisuryans, and in [68] their totality are the fiery essences of buddhi, hence their lowest manifestation is on the sixth plane, the astral.
  Further information concerning these deva lives will be found further on in the Treatise, where they are dealt with at some length.

1.00a - Introduction, #Magick Without Tears, #Aleister Crowley, #Philosophy
  IV. In initiation from the grade of Neophyte to that of Zelator, one passes by this way. The main work is to obtain admission to, and control of, the astral plane.
  Your expressions about "purifying the feelings" and so on are rather vague to enter into a scientific system like ours. The result which you doubtless refer to is attained automatically in the course of your experiments. Your very soon discover the sort of state of mind which is favourable or unfavourable to the work, and you also discover what is helpful and harmful to these states in your way of life. For instance, the practice like the non-receiving of gifts is all right for a Hindu whose mind is branded for ten thousand incarnations by the shock of accepting a cigarette or a cup of tea. Incidentally, most of the Eastern cults fall down when they come West, simply because they make no allowance for our different temperaments. Also they set tasks which are completely unsuitable to Europeans an immense amount of disappointment has been caused by failure to recognize these facts.
  --
  It occurs to me that so far we have done nothing about the astral plane and this path of Tau of which you speak. Have you had any experience of travelling in the astral? If not, do you think that you can begin by yourself on the lines laid down in Liber O, sections 5 and 6? (See Magick, pp. 387-9). If not you had better let me take you through the first gates. The question of noise instantly arises; I think we should have to do it not earlier than nine o'clock at night, and I don't know whether you can manage this.
  Love is the law, love under will.
  --
   astral travel development of the astral Body is essential to research; and, above all, to the attainment of "the Knowledge and Conversation of the Holy Guardian Angel."
  You ought to demonstrate your performance of the Pentagram Ritual to me; you are probably making any number of mistakes. I will, of course, take you carefully through the O.T.O. rituals to III as soon as you are fairly familiar with them. The plan of the grades is this:
  --
  2. Most people in my experience either cook up a hell-broth of self-induced obstacles to success in astral traveling, or else shoot forth on the wings of romantic imagination and fool themselves for the rest of their lives in the manner of the Village Idiot. Yours, luckily, is the former trouble.
  But is it plain obstinacy? you do not exercise the sublime Art of Guru-bullying. You should have made one frenzied leap to my dying bed, thrust aside the cohorts of Mourning Archimandrites, and wrung my nose until I made you do it.
  --
  In a word: do fix a convenient season for going on the astral Plane under my eye: half an hour (with a bit of luck) on not more than four evenings would put you in a very different frame of mind. You will soon "feel your feet" and then "get your sea-legs" and then, much sooner than you think
  "Afloat in the aethyr, O my God! my God!" . . . . . "White swan, bear thou ever me up between thy wings!"

1.00b - DIVISION B - THE PERSONALITY RAY AND FIRE BY FRICTION, #A Treatise on Cosmic Fire, #Alice Bailey, #Occultism
  Eventually transmutation took place, or (to word it otherwise) the polarisation eventually shifted into the three permanent atoms of the Triad, and out of the three permanent atoms of the lower triangle. The physical permanent atom is transcended and the polarisation becomes manasic or mental, the astral permanent atom is transcended and the polarisation becomes buddhic, while the mental unit is superseded by the permanent [71] atom, of the fifth plane, the atmic. This is all brought about by the action of the three rays upon the atoms and upon the life within each atom. The relationship between these three rays and the permanent atoms might be summarised as follows:
  The Personality Ray has direct action upon the physical permanent atom.
  The Egoic Ray has a similar action upon the astral permanent atom.
  The Monadic Ray has a close connection with the mental unit.
  The effect which they have is threefold, but is not simultaneous; they work ever, as do all things in Nature, in ordered cycles. The stimulation, for instance, that is the result of the action of the monadic Ray upon the mental unit is only felt when the aspirant treads the Path, or after he has taken the first Initiation. The action of the egoic Ray upon the astral permanent atom is felt as soon as the Ego can make good connection with the physical brain; when this is so the egoic ray is beginning to affect the atom powerfully and continuously; this occurs when a man is highly evolved and is nearing the Path. This threefold force is felt in the following way:
  First. It plays upon the wall of the atom as an external force and affects its rotary and vibratory action.
  --
  The karma of form is likewise a vast subject, too [76] involved for average comprehension but a factor of real importance which should not be overlooked in connection with the evolution of a world, a synthesis of worlds, or of a system when viewed from higher levels. Everything is, in its totality, the result of action taken by cosmic Essences and Entities in earlier solar systems, which is working out through the individual atoms, and through those congeries of atoms which we call forms. The effect of the personality Ray upon the internal fires is therefore, in effect, the result of the influence of the planetary Logos of whatever ray is implicated, as He works out that portion of Karma which falls to His share in any one cycle, greater or lesser. He thus brings about and eventually transmutes, the effects of causes which He set in motion earlier in relation to His six Brothers, the other planetary Logoi. We get an illustrative parallel in the effect which one individual will have upon another in worldly contact, in moulding and influencing, in stimulating or retarding. We have to remember that all fundamental influence and effects are felt on the astral plane and work thence through the etheric to the dense physical thereby bringing matter under its sphere of influence, yet not itself originating on the physical plane.
  [77]

1.00c - DIVISION C - THE ETHERIC BODY AND PRANA, #A Treatise on Cosmic Fire, #Alice Bailey, #Occultism
  Thus the etheric body forms the archetypal plane in relation to the dense physical body. The thinker on his own plane stands, in relation to the physical, as the Logos to His system. In the synthesis of thought it might be expressed thus: The thinker on the astral plane, the plane of desire and of necessity, stands to the physical body as the Logos on the cosmic astral plane stands to His system.
  As we continue the study we will work out the correspondence in the cosmos, the system, and in the three worlds, for we need to remember that the analogy must be perfect.
  --
  Fifth. This etheric web, during incarnation, forms a barrier between the physical and astral planes, which can only be transcended when consciousness is sufficiently developed to permit of escape. This can be seen in both the microcosm and the macrocosm. When a man has, through meditation and concentration, expanded his consciousness to a certain point he is enabled to include the subtler planes, and to escape beyond the limits of the dividing web.
  PHYSICAL SUB-PLANES
  --
  a. Physical man, and the emotional or astral plane.
  b. Planetary Man, and essential emotional quality.
  c. The Logos, the grand Heavenly Man, and the cosmic astral plane.
  We might now narrow the subject down to the consideration of the etheric body of the human being and not touch upon correspondences to things systemic or cosmic at all, though it may be necessary to remind ourselves that for the wise student the line along which wisdom [88] comes is the interpretative one; he who knows himself (in objective manifestation, essential quality, and comprehensive development) knows likewise the Lord of his Ray, and the Logos of his system. It is only then a matter of application, conscious expansion, and intelligent interpretation, coupled to a wise abstention from dogmatic assertion, and a recognition that the correspondence lies in quality and method more than in detailed adherence to a specified action at any given time in evolution.
  --
  make, if one could but see it, a radiant etheric triangle, which triangle is the originating impulse for the later pranic circulation throughout the entire system. The etheric body is really a net-work of fine channels, which are the component parts of one interlacing fine cord,one portion of this cord being the magnetic link which unites the physical and the astral bodies and which is snapped or broken after the withdrawal of the etheric body from the dense physical body at the time of death. The silver cord is loosed, as the Bible expresses it [xlv]44 and this is the basis of the legend of the fateful sister who cuts the thread of life with the dreaded shears.
  The etheric web is composed of the intricate weaving of this vitalised cord, and apart from the seven centres [99] within the web (which correspond to the sacred centres, and of which the spleen is frequently counted as one) it has the two above mentioned, which makewith the spleena triangle of activity. The etheric web of the solar system is of an analogous nature, and likewise has its three receptive centres for cosmic prana. The mysterious band in the heavens, which we call the Milky Way, (S. D. II.250) is closely connected with cosmic prana, or that cosmic vitality or nourishment which vitalises the solar etheric system.
  --
  c. Static, and thereby affecting the web, when viewed solely from the angle of providing a physical ring-pass-not, and acting as a separator between the physical and the astral.
  These three different groups of functions or purposes are each of paramount interest, lead to totally different results, and react in a different manner both outwardly and inwardly.
  --
  Destruction of tissue may lead to insanity of many kinds, especially those kinds deemed incurable. The burning of the web may let in extraneous astral currents against which man is helpless; the brain tissue may be literally destroyed by this pressure, and serious trouble be caused through the etheric ring-pass-not having been destroyed in some one place.
  In connection with the planet a similar state of affairs may be found. Later information may be forthcoming, which is at present withheld; this will show that whole races have been influenced, and certain kingdoms of nature troubled by planetary etheric congestion, or the destruction of planetary etheric tissue.
  --
  c. Microcosmic static disorders, or a consideration of the etheric body in connection with its work of providing a ring-pass-not from the purely physical to the astral. As has been said, both here and in the books of H. P. B., the ring-pass-not [l]48a is that confining barrier which acts as a separator or a division between a system and that which is external to that system. This, as may well be seen, has its interesting correlations when the subject is viewed (as we must consistently endeavour to view it) from the point of view of a human being, a planet and a system, remembering always that in dealing with the [111] etheric body we are dealing with physical matter. This must ever be borne carefully in mind. Therefore, one paramount factor will be found in all groups and formations, and this is the fact that the ring-pass-not acts only as a hindrance to that which is of small attainment in evolution, but forms no barrier to the more progressed. The whole question depends upon two things, which are the karma of the man, the planetary Logos, and the solar Logos, and the dominance of the spiritual indwelling entity over its vehicle.
  IV. MACROCOSMIC AND MICROCOSMIC ETHERS
  --
  When man begins in a small sense to co-ordinate the buddhic vehicle or, to express it otherwise, when he has developed the power to contact ever so slightly the buddhic plane, then he begins simultaneously and consciously to achieve the ability to escape from the etheric web on the physical plane. Later he escapes from its correspondence on the astral plane, and finally from the correspondence on the fourth subplane of the mental plane this time via the mental unit. This leads eventually to causal functioning, or to the ability to dwell, and to be active in, the vehicle of the Ego, who is the embodiment of the love and wisdom aspect of the Monad. Note here the correspondence to that proved fact, that many can even now escape from the etheric body, and function in their [114] astral sheath, which is the personality reflection of that same second aspect.
  When a man takes the fourth Initiation, he functions in the fourth plane vehicle, the buddhic, and has escaped permanently from the personality ring-pass-not, on the fourth subplane of the mental. There is naught to hold him to the three worlds. At the first Initiation he escapes from the ring-pass-not in a more temporary sense, but he has yet to escape from the three higher mental levels, which are the mental correspondences to the higher ethers, and to develop full consciousness on these three higher subplanes. We have here a correspondence to the work to be done by the initiate after he has achieved the fourth solar plane, the buddhic. There yet remains the development of full consciousness on the three higher planes of spirit before he can escape from the solar ring-pass-not, which is achieved at the seventh Initiation, taken somewhere in the system, or in its cosmic correspondence reached by the cosmic sutratma, or cosmic thread of life [liii]51
  --
  A further chain of ideas may be followed up in the remembrance that the fourth ether is even now being studied and developed by the average scientist, and is already somewhat harnessed to the service of man; that the fourth subplane of the astral plane is the normal functioning ground of the average man and that in this round escape from the etheric vehicle is being achieved; that the fourth subplane of the mental plane is the present goal of endeavor of one-fourth of the human family; that the fourth manvantara will see the solar ring-pass-not offering avenues of escape to those who have reached the necessary point; that the four planetary Logoi will perfect Their escape from Their planetary environment, and will function with greater ease on the cosmic astral plane, paralleling on cosmic levels the achievement of the human units who are the cells in Their bodies.
  Our solar Logos, being a Logos of the fourth order, will begin to co-ordinate His cosmic buddhic body, and as He develops cosmic mind He will gradually achieve, by the aid of that mind, the ability to touch the cosmic buddhic plane.
  --
  On the fourth physical ether man begins to co-ordinate his astral, or emotional body, and to escape at ever more frequent intervals into that vehicle. Continuity of consciousness is achieved when a man has mastered the four ethers.
  On the fourth subplane of the mental plane, man begins to control his causal or egoic body, and to polarise his consciousness therein until the polarisation is complete. He functions then consciously on it when he has mastered the correspondences to the ethers on the mental plane.
  --
  j. On these etheric levels, therefore, the Logos of our [121] system repeats, as a grand totality, the experiences of His tiny reflections on the physical planes; He co-ordinates His cosmic astral body, and attains continuity of consciousness when He has mastered the three cosmic ethers.
  k. It is to be observed that just as in man the dense physical body in its three gradesdense, liquid and gaseousis not recognised as a principle, so in the cosmic sense the physical (dense) astral (liquid) and mental (gaseous) levels are likewise regarded as non-existing, and the solar system has its location on the fourth ether. The seven sacred planets are composed of matter of this fourth ether, and the seven Heavenly Men, whose bodies they are, function normally on the fourth plane of the system, the buddhic or the fourth cosmic ether. When man has attained the consciousness of the buddhic plane, he has raised his consciousness to that of the Heavenly Man in whose body he is a cell. This is achieved at the fourth Initiation, the liberating initiation. At the fifth Initiation he ascends with the Heavenly Man on to the fifth plane (from the human standpoint), the atmic, and at the sixth he has dominated the second cosmic ether and has monadic consciousness and continuity of function. At the seventh Initiation he dominates the entire sphere of matter contained in the lowest cosmic plane, escapes from all etheric contact, and functions on the cosmic astral plane.
  The past solar system saw the surmounting of the three lowest cosmic physical planes viewed from the matter standpoint and the co-ordination of the dense threefold physical form in which all life is found, dense matter, liquid matter, gaseous matter. A correspondence may be seen here in the work achieved in the first three rootraces. [lviii]56, [lix]57
  --
  First. The etheric web acts as a separator or a dividing web between the astral and the dense physical body.
  Second. It circulates the inflowing vitality or pranic fluid and carries on its work in three stages.
  --
  The downrush of Spirit, and the uprising of the inner fires of matter (controlled and directed by the conscious action of the fire of mind) produce corresponding results on the same levels on the astral and mental planes, so that a paralleling contact is brought about, and the great work of liberation proceeds in an ordered manner.
  The three first initiations see these results perfected, [126] and lead to the fourth, where the intensity of the united fires results in the complete burning away of all barriers, and the liberation of the Spirit by conscious directed effort from out its threefold lower sheath. Man has consciously to bring about his own liberation. These results are self-induced by the man himself, as he is emancipated from the three worlds, and has broken the wheel of rebirth himself instead of being broken upon it.

1.00e - DIVISION E - MOTION ON THE PHYSICAL AND ASTRAL PLANES, #A Treatise on Cosmic Fire, #Alice Bailey, #Occultism
  object:1.00e - DIVISION E - MOTION ON THE PHYSICAL AND astral PLANES
  subject class:Occultism
  --
  DIVISION E - MOTION ON THE PHYSICAL AND astral PLANES - Part 1
  [141]
  --
  The first Logos embodies the "will to live" and it was through His instrumentality that the Manasaputras came into objective existence in relation to the human and deva hierarchies. In this system, the blending of the Divine Ray of Wisdom and the Primordial Ray of intelligent matter forms the great dual evolution; back of both these cosmic Entities stands another Entity Who is the embodiment of Will, and Who is the utiliser of formsthough not the forms of any other than the Greater Building devas and the human hierarchies in time and space. He is the animating principle; the will-to-live aspect of the seven Hierarchies. Nevertheless these seven Hierarchies are (as says H. P. B.) the sevenfold ray of wisdom, the dragon in its seven forms. [lxviii]66, [lxix]67, [lxx]68 This is a [147] deep mystery, and only a clue to it all can be found at this time by man in the contemplation of his own nature in the three worlds of his manifestation. Just as our Logos is seeking objectivity through His solar system in its threefold form of which the present is the second, so man seeks objectivity through his three bodiesphysical, astral and mental. At this time he is polarised in his astral body, or in his second aspect in like manner as the undifferentiated Logos is polarised in His second aspect. In time and space as we now conceive it, the sum total of jivas are governed by feeling, emotion, and desire, and not by the will, yet at the same time the will aspect governs manifestation, for the Ego who is the source of personality shows in manifestation the will to love.
  The difficulty lies in the inability of the finite mind to grasp the significance of this threefold manifestation, but by thoughtful brooding over the Personality and its relation to the Ego, who is the love aspect and who nevertheless in relation to manifestation in the three worlds is the will aspect likewise, will come some faint light upon the same problems raised to Deity, or expanded from microcosmic to macrocosmic spheres.
  --
  2. The emotional or astral plane,
  3. The mental plane,
  --
  2. That situated at the solar plexus, the most important one in the body from the standpoint of the astral plane.
  3. That found at the throat, the most important from the standpoint of the mental plane.
  --
  This force originates on cosmic mental levels, from certain great foci there, descends to the cosmic astral, forming corresponding cosmic focal points, and on the fourth cosmic etheric level (the buddhic plane of our solar system) finds its outlet in certain great centres. These [166] centres are again reflected or reproduced in the three worlds of human endeavor. The Heavenly Men, therefore, have centres on three solar planes, a fact to be remembered.
  a. On the monadic plane, the plane of the seven Rays.
  --
  DIVISION E - MOTION ON THE PHYSICAL AND astral PLANES - Part 2
  Here again we can trace the microcosmic correspondence: In the human being the centres are found on the mental plane from which originates the impulse for physical plane existence, or the will to incarnate; from thence they can be traced to the astral level, and eventually to the etheric levels, to the fourth ether, where they practically go through the same evolution that the planetary centres went through, and are instrumental in bringing about objectivity,being the force centres.
  The centres are formed entirely of streams of force, pouring down from the Ego, who transmits it from the Monad. In this we have the secret of the gradual vibratory quickening of the centres as the Ego first comes into control, or activity, and later (after initiation) the Monad, thus bringing about changes and increased vitality within these spheres of fire or of pure life force.
  --
  The other two centres have to do primarily with the etheric body and with the astral plane. The throat centre synthesises the entire personality life, and is definitely connected with the mental plane,the three planes, and the two higher planes, and the three centres with the two other centres, the heart and head. Yet, we must not forget that the centre at the base of the spine is also a synthesiser, as would normally be expected, if it is recognised that the lowest plane of all manifestation is the point of deepest reflection. This lowest centre, by synthesising the fire of kundalini and the pranic fires, eventually blends and merges with the fire of mind, and later with the fire of Spirit, producing thus consummation.
  We must disabuse our minds of the idea that these centres are physical things. They are whirlpools of force that swirl etheric, astral and mental matter into activity of some kind. Because the action is rotary, the result produced in matter is a circular effect that can be seen by the clairvoyant as fiery wheels situated:
  1. In the region of the spine, the lowest part.
  --
  2. Man controlled from the astral plane.
  a. The base of the spine.
  --
  These are an ability to expand our mental concept and to build the antaskarana, or that bridge which all who seek to function in the buddhic vehicle must build between higher and lower mind; hence the necessity for the use of the imagination (which is the astral equivalent to mental discrimination), and its ultimate transmutation into intuition.
  All teachers, who have taken pupils in hand for training, and who seek to use them in world service, follow the method of imparting a fact (oft veiled in words and blinded by symbol) and then of leaving the pupil to follow his own deductions. Discrimination is thereby developed, and discrimination is the main method whereby the Spirit effects its liberation from the trammels of matter, and discerns between illusion and that which is veiled by it.
  --
  The answer lies here: The egoic ray can always be one of the seven, but we need to remember that, in this astral-buddhic solar system, wherein love and wisdom are being brought into objectivity, the bulk of the monads are on the love-wisdom ray. The fact, therefore, of its being the synthetic ray has a vast significance. This is the system of the SON, whose name is Love. This is the divine incarnation of Vishnu. The Dragon of Wisdom is in manifestation, and He brings into incarnation those cosmic Entities who are in essence identical with Himself. After the third Initiation all human beings find themselves on their monadic ray, on one of the three major rays, and the fact that Masters and Initiates are found on all the rays is due to the following two factors:
  First. Each major ray has its subrays, which correspond to all the seven.
  --
  e. Kundalini, as it is aroused, steadily increases the vibratory action, not only of the centres, but of every atom of matter in all the bodiese theric, astral and mental. This quickening of activity has a dual effect of great interest:
  1. It causes the elimination of all matter that is coarse and unsuitable, and casts it off in exactly the same way as a rapidly rotating wheel casts off or rejects from its surface.
  --
  2. astral
  Touch or feeling.
  --
  In the two lower planes in the three worlds the astral and the physical the five subplanes of human endeavour are the five highest. The two lowest subplanes, the sixth and seventh, are what we might express as "below the threshold," and concern forms of life beneath the human altogether. We have a corroborating analogy in the fact that the two earliest root-races in this round are not definitely human, and that it is the third root-race which is really human for the first time. Counting, therefore, from the bottom upwards it is only the third subplane on the physical and the astral planes which mark the commencement of human effort, leaving five subplanes to be subdued. On the mental plane the five lower subplanes have to be subjugated during purely human evolution. When the consciousness is centred on the fifth subplane (counting from below upwards) then the planes of abstractionfrom the standpoint of man in the three worldssupervene the two subplanes of synthesis, demonstrating through the synthesis of the five senses. In the evolution of the Heavenly Man we have exactly the same thing: the five planes of endeavour, the five lower planes of the solar system, and the two higher planes of abstraction, the spiritual or monadic and the divine, or logoic.
  [188]
  --
  DIVISION E - MOTION ON THE PHYSICAL AND astral PLANES - Part 3
  It can be noted that we have not summed up the two planes of abstraction on the atmic and the buddhic planes, the reason being that they mark a degree of realisation which is the property of initiates of higher degree [189] than that of the adept, and which is beyond the concept of the evolving human unit, for whom this treatise is written.
  --
  b. On the astral plane he finds his brother's note; through identity of emotion he comes to the recognition of his brother's identity.
  [191]
  --
  Hearing on the astral plane is commonly called clairaudience, and means the ability to hear the sounds of the astral plane. It is a faculty that demonstrates throughout the entire astral body, and a man hears all over his vehicle and not only through the specialised organs, the ears, the product of physical plane action and reaction. This would necessarily be so, owing to the fluidic nature of the astral body. Man on the physical plane hears at the same time a certain range of sounds, and only a small and particular gamut of vibrations impinges upon his ears. There are many of the lesser sounds of nature which entirely escape him, while the major group sounds are not differentiated at all. As evolution proceeds and the inner sense of hearing becomes acute, these other physical plane sounds will likewise swing into his ken, and he will be acutely conscious of all sounds on the astral, and the physical planea thing, which if possible now, would result in the shattering of the body. If the note of nature, for instance, were to strike but once upon the ear of a man (a note made up of the totality of vibrations produced by all dense material forms) his physical body would be completely disrupted. [192] He is not ready yet for such a happening; the inner ear is not duly prepared. Only when the threefold hearing is consummated will completed hearing on the physical plane be likewise permitted.
  Hearing on the mental plane is simply an extension of the faculty of differentiating sound. The hearing dealt with on all these planes is the hearing that has to do with the form, that concerns the vibration of matter, and that is occupied with the not-self. It has not to do with the psyche, or the telepathic communication that proceeds from mind to mind, but with the sound of the form or that power whereby one separated unit of consciousness is aware of another unit who is not himself. Bear this carefully in mind. When the extension of hearing becomes such that it concerns the psyche, then we call it telepathy or that wordless communication that is the synthesis of hearing on all the three lower planes and which is known by the Ego in the causal body on the formless levels of the mental plane.
  --
  b. Touch. In taking up the subject of the second sense, that of touch, we must note that this sense is pre-eminently the sense of very great importance in this, the second, solar systema system of astral-buddhic consciousness. [lxxxiii]81 Each of these senses, after having reached a certain point, begins to synthesise with the others in such a way that it is almost impossible to know where one begins and the other ends. Touch is that innate recognition of contact through the exercise of manas or mind in a threefold manner:
  As recognition.
  --
  b. That these senses for all purposes of present manifestation, have their focal point on the astral plane and are therefore largely under the stimulating action of the solar plexus that great focal point in the centre of the body which is the stimulating agent for most of the human family at this time.
  c. That as the higher triangle comes into play and the polarisation steps up to the higher centres, the senses begin to make themselves felt on the mental level and [203] man becomes aware on that plane. We have in the human body an interesting reflection of the transference of the polarisation from the Personality to the Ego, or into the causal body, in the division that exists between the higher and the lower mental planes, and the dividing line of the diaphragm between the higher and the lower portions of the body. Below the diaphragm we have the four lower centres:
  --
  Second. The awakening on the astral plane, and the gradually increasing activity of the centres, until the first Initiation is reached. This is paralleled by the tremendously keen use of the senses for the purposes of discriminating between the Self and the not-self.
  [204]
  --
  This development is paralleled on the two higher planes simultaneously as in the lower, and as the astral senses come into perfected activity, the corresponding centres of force on the buddhic plane begin to function until the vibratory interplay between the two is consummated, and the force of the Triad can be felt definitely in the Personality via the astral.
  Again the corresponding vortices on the atmic level come into active vibration as the mental centres become fourth dimensional, till we have a wonderful fiery activity demonstrating on all the three planes.
  --
  c. By the application of the Rod of Initiation the downflow of force from the Ego to the personality is tripled, the direction of that force being dependent upon whether the centres receiving attention are the etheric, or the astral at the first and second Initiations, or whether the initiate is standing before the LORD OF THE WORLD. In the latter case, his mental centres or their corresponding force vortices on higher levels, will receive stimulation. When the World Teacher initiates at the first and second Initiations, the direction of the Triadal force is turned to the vivification of the heart, and throat centres, and the ability to synthesise the force of the lower centres is greatly increased. When the One Initiator applies the Rod of His Power, the downflow is from the Monad, and though the throat and heart intensify vibration as a response, the main direction of the force is to the seven head centres, and finally (at liberation) to the radiant head centre above, and synthesising the lesser seven head centres.
  d. The centres at initiation receive a fresh access of [209] vibratory capacity and of power, and this results, in the exoteric life, as:

1.00 - INTRODUCTORY REMARKS, #A Treatise on Cosmic Fire, #Alice Bailey, #Occultism
  It likewise demonstrates, as yet imperfectly, as the vitalising factor in the thought forms fabricated by the thinker. As yet but few thought forms, comparatively, can be said to be constructed by the center of consciousness, the thinker, the Ego. Few people as yet are in such close touch with their higher self, or Ego, that they can build the matter of the mental plane into a form which can be truly said to be an expression of the thoughts, purpose or desire of their Ego, functioning through the physical brain. Most of the thought forms at present in circulation may be said to be aggregations of matter, built into form with the aid of kama-manas (or of desire faintly tinged with mind producing thus an admixture of astral and mental matter, mostly astral), and largely due to reflex elemental action.
  These dualities of expression are:
  --
  It is necessary to differentiate between this radiation from the etheric, which is a radiation of prana, and magnetism, which is an emanation from a subtler body (usually the astral), and has to do with the manifestation of [54] the Divine Flame within the material sheaths. The Divine Flame is formed on the second plane, the monadic, and magnetism (which is a method of demonstrating radiatory fire) is therefore felt paramountly on the fourth and sixth planes, or through the buddhic and astral vehicles. These are, as we know, closely allied to the second plane. This distinction is of importance and should be carefully recognised.
  Having, therefore, made the above statements, we can proceed to take up somewhat in greater detail the interior fires of the systems, microcosmic and macrocosmic.

1.01 - THE STUFF OF THE UNIVERSE, #The Phenomenon of Man, #Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, #Christianity
  hesitate over the structure to be assigned to the astral immensities.
  In the meantime one thing is certain and is enough to guide our

1.02 - The Magic Circle, #The Practice of Magical Evocation, #Franz Bardon, #Occultism
  The effect of such a circle on the mental or astral plane, indirectly also on this material world, depends, in this case, on the grade and strenght of such an imagination. The binding force of the circle is generally known in magnetic magic. Moreover, a magic circle may be produced by the accumulation of elements or the condensation of light. When practising evocations or invocation of beings, it is desirable to draw within the centre of the circle in which one is to stand another smaller circle or a pentagram with one of its points upwards, the symbol representing man. This is then the symbolization of the small world, of man as genuine magician.
  The books dealing with the construction of the magic circle clearly state that during the act of invocation the magician must not leave the circle, which, in its magic sense, means nothing else but that the consciousness of, or contact with, the Absolute, (i. e. the macrocosm), must not be interrupted. Needless to say that the magician, during his magic operation with the help of a magic circle and with the being standing in front of him, must not step out of the circle with his physical body, unless he has finished his experiment and dismissed the relevant being.

1.02 - The Stages of Initiation, #Knowledge of the Higher Worlds, #Rudolf Steiner, #Theosophy
   moon on the horizon. Both these feelings are forces which, when duly cultivated and developed to ever increasing intensity, lead to the most significant spiritual results. A new world is opened to the student if he systematically and deliberately surrenders himself to such feelings. The soul-world, the so-called astral plane, begins to dawn upon him. Growth and decay are no longer facts which make indefinite impressions on him as of old, but rather they form themselves into spiritual lines and figures of which he had previously suspected nothing. And these lines and figures have, for the different phenomena, different forms. A blooming flower, an animal in the process of growth, a tree that is decaying, evoke in his soul different lines. The soul world ( astral plane) broadens out slowly before him. These lines and figures are in no sense arbitrary. Two students who have reached the corresponding stage of development will always see the same lines and figures under the same conditions. Just as a round table will be seen as round by two normal persons, and not as round by one and square by the other, so too, at the sight of a flower, the same spiritual figure is presented to the soul. And just as the
   p. 41
  --
   time. The attempt will most likely fail hundreds and hundreds of times. It is just a question of not losing patience. After many attempts you will succeed in experiencing a feeling In your soul corresponding to the state of soul of the person observed, and you will begin to notice that through this feeling a power grows in your soul that leads to spiritual insight into the state of soul of the other. A picture experienced as luminous appears in your field of vision. This spiritually luminous picture is the so-called astral embodiment of the desire observed in that soul. Again the impression of this picture may be described as flame-like, yellowish-red in the center, and reddish-blue or lilac at the edges. Much depends on treating such spiritual experiences with great delicacy. The best thing is not to speak to anyone about them except to your teacher, if you have one. Attempted descriptions of such experiences in inappropriate words usually only lead to gross self-deception. Ordinary terms are employed which are not intended for such things, and are therefore too gross and clumsy. The consequence is that in the attempt to clo the the experience in words we are misled into blending the actual experience
   p. 71

1.02 - The Three European Worlds, #The Ever-Present Origin, #Jean Gebser, #Integral
  We shall examine the question of time in detail later in our discussion; here we wish to point out that there is a forgotten but essential interconnection between time and the psyche. The closed horizons of antiquity's celestial cave-like vault express a soul not yet awakened to spatial time-consciousness and temporal quantification. The "heaven of the heart" mentioned by Origen was likewise a self-contained inner heaven first exteriorized into the heavenly landscapes of the frescoes by the brothers Ambrogio and Pietro Lorenzetti in the church of St. Francesco in Assisi (ca. 1327-28). One should note that these early renderings of landscape and sky, which include a realistic rather than symbolic astral-mythical moon, are not merely accidental pictures with nocturnal themes. In contrast to the earlier vaulted sky, the heaven of these frescoes is no longer an enclosure; it is now rendered from the vantage point of the artist and expresses the incipient perspectivity of a confrontation with space, rather than an unperspectival immersion or inherence in it. Man is henceforth not just in the world but begins to possess it; no longer possessed by heaven, he becomes a conscious possessor if not of the heavens, at least of the earth. This shift is, of course, a gain as well as a loss.
  There is a document extant that unforgettably mirrors this gain and loss, this surrender and beginning; in a few sentences it depicts the struggle of a man caught between two worlds. We refer to the remarkable letter of the thirty-two year old Petrarch to Francesco Dionigidi Borgo San Sepolcro in 1336 (the first letter of his Familiari, vol. 4), in which he describes his ascent of Mount Ventoux. For his time, his description is an epochal event and signifies no less than the discovery of landscape: the first dawning of an awareness of space that resulted in a fundamental alteration of European man's attitude in and toward the world.

1.035 - The Recitation of Mantra, #The Study and Practice of Yoga, #Swami Krishnananda, #Yoga
  Simultaneously with this feeling of a subtle thrill in the system when the chanting of pranava is done properly, there is a feeling that a loss of body-consciousness is gradually taking place. We will not feel that we exist at all. We will be aware of a non-objective something, and it is this non-objective awareness, which is the effect of the chanting of pranava, which also creates the feeling of levitation. We are not actually getting lifted up physically, but we will feel as if we are lifted up from the earth and moving in the air, as it were. Though we are on the ground and not moving in the air physically, the mind will feel as if it is lifted up, and this is the astral body getting stirred because of the harmonious vibration that is being produced. Though the physical body is not moving in the air, the subtle body is trying to get up, and that is why we feel as if we are moving in the air. The feeling of levitation is generated by the effect produced upon the subtle body, by the chanting of the mantra. The subtle body is ordinarily so intimately connected with the physical body that we cannot isolate one from the other. When we are intensely conscious of the physical body, the subtle body gets impregnated with the notion of the physical body, and we cannot forget that we are anything but the body.
  This difficulty one has in getting tethered to the notion of the physical body alone arises on account of a distracted, inharmonious movement of the mind and the pranas. If we want to draw the mind or the subtle body away from its contact with or attachment to the physical body, the first thing we should do is to create a system of harmonious feeling in the mind, as well as to very, very carefully isolate every component of the subtle body from its contact with the physical body by a new type of vibration altogether. Sometimes sticking plasters cannot be removed from the finger immediately. If we pull them off, the skin is removed and we feel much pain. So doctors and nurses try to remove a sticking plaster from a wound very, very slowly by pouring some solution over the sticking plaster, and this detaches the plaster automatically by the smoothness and softness produced by the application of the solution.

1.03 - THE EARTH IN ITS EARLY STAGES, #The Phenomenon of Man, #Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, #Christianity
  by a regular process of astral evolution, but as the result of some
  unbelievable accident (a brush with another star ? an internal

1.03 - The Sephiros, #A Garden of Pomegranates - An Outline of the Qabalah, #Israel Regardie, #Occultism
  Eliphaz Levi Zahed and Madame Blavatsky it is the astral
  Plane, which in one sense being passive and reflecting the energies from above, is lunar J>, even as the moon reflects the light from the sun. The astral Light is an omnipresent and all-permeating fluid or medium of extremely subtile matter ; substance in a highly tenuous state, electric and magnetic in constitution, which is the model upon which the physical world is built. It is the endless, changeless, ebb and flow of the world's forces that, in the last resort, guarantee the stability of the world and provides its foundation. Yesod is this stable foundation, this change- less ebb and flow of astral forces, and the universal repro- ductive power in Nature. " Everything shall return to its foundation, from which it has proceeded. All marrow, seed, and energy are gathered in this place. Hence all the potentialities which exist go out through this " (Zohar),
  Its Egyptian God is Shu, who was the God of Space, represented as lifting up Nuit, the Queen of Heaven, from off the body of Seb, the Earth. Its Hindu equivalent is
  --
  Roman Temples represented the moon. The general conception of Yesod is of change with stability. Some writers have referred to the astral Light which is the sphere of Yesod as the Anima Mundi, the Soul of the World. The psycho-analyst Jung has a very similar concept which he terms the Collective Unconscious which, as I see it, differs in no wise from the Qabalistic idea.
  Its plants are the Mandrake and Damiana, both of whose aphrodisiac qualities are well known. Its perfume is Jas- mine, also a sexual excitant ; its colour Purple ; its Sepher

1.04 - Body, Soul and Spirit, #Theosophy, #Alice Bailey, #Occultism
  as the two members united to form the bearer of the I, and this I as their kernel, one can divide man into physical body, life-body, astral-body, and I. The expression astral-body designates here what is formed by soul-body and sentient-soul together, although the sentient-soul is in a certain respect energized by the I. When now the I penetrates itself with spirit-self, this spirit-self comes into evidence in the transmutation of the astral-body by a force within the soul. In the astral-body there are primarily active the impulses, desires, and passions of man, in so far as they are felt by him; the physical perceptions also take effect in it. Physical perceptions arise through the soul-body as a member in man which comes to him from the external world. Impulses, desires, and passions, etc., arise in the sentient-soul, in so far as it is energized by the soul before the latter has yielded itself to the spirit. If the I penetrates itself with spirit-self, the soul proceeds to energize the astral-body with this spirit-self. This expresses itself in the illumination of the impulses, desires, and passions by what the I has received from the spirit. The I has
  p. 57
  then, through the power it gains as partaker of the spiritual world, become ruler in the world of impulses, desires, etc. In proportion to the extent to which it has become this the spirit-self appears in the astral-body. And the astral-body becomes thereby transmuted. The astral-body itself then becomes visible as a two-membered body, an untransmuted and a transmuted. One can therefore designate the spirit-self, as manifested in man, as transmuted astral-body.
  A similar process takes place in a person when he receives the life spirit into his I. The Life-body then becomes transmuted. It becomes penetrated with the life-spirit. And the Life-spirit reveals itself in that the life-body becomes quite other than it was. For this reason one can also say that life-spirit is transmuted life-body. And if the I receives the spirit-man, it thereby receives the strong force with which to penetrate the physical body. Naturally, that part of the physical body thus transmuted is not perceptible to the physical senses. It is, in fact, just that part of the physical body which has been spiritualized that has become the spirit-man.
  --
  3. astral-body.
  4. I, as soul kernel.
  5. Spirit-self as transmuted astral-body.
  6. Life-spirit "   "    life-body.

1.04 - The Conditions of Esoteric Training, #Knowledge of the Higher Worlds, #Rudolf Steiner, #Theosophy
  This brings to an end the indications to be given in connection with the attainment of knowledge of higher worlds. In the following chapter, and in further connection with the above, it will be shown how this development affects the higher elements of the human organism (the soul-organism or astral body, and the spirit or thought-body.) In this way the indications here given will be placed in a new light, and it will be possible to penetrate them in a deeper sense.

1.04 - The Paths, #A Garden of Pomegranates - An Outline of the Qabalah, #Israel Regardie, #Occultism
  This Path is a very difficult one to describe, as it un- doubtedly refers to some aspect of the astral Plane ; and it is, also, a phallic symbol, the fish referring to the spermatozoa swimming in the foundations of one's being. Its Hindu attri bution is Vishnu as the Matsu or Fish Avatara.
  Neptune and Poseidon, insofar as their realm of govern- ment includes the dominion wherein fish dwell ; and
  --
  Its sacred creature is the Dolphin, its colour Buff, and its jewel the Pearl. The Pearl is referred to Pisces be- cause of its cloudy brilliance as contrasted with the trans- parency of other jewels, thus reminding one somewhat of the astral plane with its cloudy forms and semi-opaque visions as opposed to the flashes of formless light apper- taining to purely spiritual planes.
  XVIII. - The Moon, is its Tarot card, describing a mid- night landscape on which the moon is shining. Standing between two towers a jackal and a wolf, with muzzles

1.04 - The Qabalah The Best Training for Memory, #Magick Without Tears, #Aleister Crowley, #Philosophy
  For a start, of course, you should put down the words that are bound to come in your way in any case: numbers like 11, 13, 31, 37, and their multiples; the names of God and the principal angels; the planetary and geomantic names; and your own private and particular name with its branches. After that, let your work on the astral Plane guide you. When investigating the name and other words communicated to you by such beings as you meet there, or invoke, many more will come up in their proper connections. Very soon you will have quite a nice little Sepher Sephiroth of your very own. Remember to aim, above all things, at coherence.
  It is excellent practice, but the way, to do some mental arithmetic on your walks; acquire the habit of adding up any names that you have come across in your morning's reading. Nietzsche has well observed that the best thoughts come by walking; and it has happened to me, more than once or twice, that really important correspondences have come, as by a flashlight, when I was padding the old hoof.

1.05 - Adam Kadmon, #A Garden of Pomegranates - An Outline of the Qabalah, #Israel Regardie, #Occultism
  Yoga, it is the Karanopadhi or the Causal instrument or vehicle. Its Chakra or astral nerve centre is the Ajna, two- petalled, situate in the skull in or near the pineal gland, which some occultists claim is an atrophied third eye, the physical organ of true spiritual clairvoyance or intuition.
  98
  --
  Sukshmopadhi or subtle body. Its astral chakra is the
  Anahata, which exists in or near the physical heart.
  --
  (b) the astral body ( tselern ). They are considered together in the Qabalah under the title of Nephesch, because the action of prana is unknown and impossible without the medium of the astral body. There is a Zoharic section dealing with the garments with which the Soul or the In- corporeal is clothed, and it speaks of the astral body in very peculiar terms :
  " One outside garment which exists and does not exist ; is seen and not seen. In that garment, the Nephesch is clothed and she goes and flies in it, to and fro in the world."
  In another place there are unmistakable postulates of the astral body :
  " In the Book of King Solomon is to be found : That at the time of the accomplishment of the union below, the
  --
  The postulate of the astral body grows out of the con- sideration that in the physical body we find a " some- thing " besides matter ; something changing, it is true, but undoubtedly one and the same thing from birth to death.
  The Nephesch is in Yesod, Luna, the foundation whose attri bute is Stability in Change. This "something" referred to is the Nephesch, on which the physical body is
  --
   moulded, for the Qabalah regards the body as impermanent and in a condition of perpetual flux. It is never the same from one moment to another, and within a period of seven years it has a completely new set of particles. But despite this constant throwing off of atoms, etc., there is something persisting from birth to death, changing its aspect a little, but remaining the same, giving the body a more or less con- sistent appearance during its life. This astral double or
  Body of Light, as it is also called, is composed of matter in an altogether different state from the physical body, being subtile, magnetic, and electric. The Nephesch forms a link between the body and the Ruach, and if we try to picture in our own minds the image of a man from birth to death, the image incorporating all the traits and peculiarities of childhood, maturity, and senility, all extended in time, that concept will convey the idea of an astral body, or the
  Pranamayakosa of the Vedanta.

1.05 - Some Results of Initiation, #Knowledge of the Higher Worlds, #Rudolf Steiner, #Theosophy
  The exercises described in the preceding chapters, if practiced in the right way, involve certain changes in the organism of the soul ( astral body). The latter is only perceptible to the clairvoyant, and may be compared to a cloud, psycho-spiritually luminous to a certain degree, in the center of which the physical body is discernible. (A description will be found in the author's book, Theosophy.) In this astral body desires, lusts, passions, and ideas become visible in a spiritual way. Sensual appetites, for instance, create the impression of a dark red radiance with a definite shape; a pure and noble thought finds its expression in a reddish-violet radiance; the clear-cut concept of the logical thinker is experienced as a yellowish figure with sharply defined outline; the confused thought of the muddled head appears as a figure with vague outline. The thoughts of a person with one-sided, queer views appear sharply outlined but immobile, while the
   p. 133
  --
  The further the student advances in his inner development, the more regular will be the differentiation within his astral body. The latter is confused and undifferentiated in the case of a person of undeveloped inner life; yet the clairvoyant can perceive even the unorganized astral body as a figure standing out distinctly from its environment. It extends from the center of the head to the middle of the physical body, and appears like an independent body possessing certain organs. The organs now to be considered are perceptible to the clairvoyant near the following parts of the
   p. 134
  --
   clairvoyance begins. For these flowers are the sense-organs of the soul, and their revolutions express the fact that the clairvoyant perceives supersensibly. What was said previously concerning spiritual seeing applies equally to these revolutions and even to the lotus flowers themselves. No one can perceive the supersensible until he has developed his astral senses in this way. Thanks to the spiritual organ situated in the vicinity of the larynx, it becomes possible to survey clairvoyantly the thoughts and mentality of other beings, and to obtain a deeper insight into the true laws of natural phenomena. The organ situated near the heart permits of clairvoyant knowledge of the sentiments and disposition of other souls. When developed, this organ also makes it possible to observe certain deeper forces in animals and plants. By means of the organ in the so-called pit of the stomach, knowledge is acquired of the talents and capacities of souls; by its means, too, the part played by animals, plants, stones, metals, atmospheric phenomena and so on in the household of nature becomes apparent.
  The organ in the vicinity of the larynx has
  --
   permits intercourse with beings of higher worlds, though only when their existence is manifested in the astral or soul-world. The development of this lotus flower, however, is not advisable unless the student has made great progress on that path of esoteric development which enables him to raise his spirit into a still higher world. This entry into the spiritual world proper must always run parallel with the development of the lotus flowers, otherwise the student will fall into error and confusion. He would undoubtedly be able to see, but he would remain incapable of forming a correct estimate of what he saw. Now, the development of the six-petalled lotus flower itself provides a certain security against confusion and instability, for no one can be easily confused who has attained perfect equilibrium between sense (or body), passion (or soul), and idea (or spirit). And yet, something more than this security is required when, through the development of the six-petalled lotus flower, living beings of independent existence are revealed to his spirit, beings belonging to a world so completely different from the world known to his physical senses. The development
   p. 162
  --
  When esoteric development has progressed so far that the lotus flowers begin to stir, much has already been achieved by the student which can result in the formation of certain quite definite currents and movements in his etheric body. The object of this development is the formation of a kind of center in the region of the physical heart, from which radiate currents and movements in the greatest possible variety of colors and forms. The center is in reality not a mere point, but a most complicated structure, a most wonderful organ. It glows and shimmers with every shade of color and displays forms of great symmetry, capable of rapid transformation. Other forms and streams of color radiate from this organ to the other parts of the body, and beyond it to the astral body, completely penetrating and illuminating
   p. 166
  --
  The center in the head, once duly fixed, is then moved lower down, to the region of the larynx. This is effected by further exercises in concentration. Then the currents of the etheric body radiate from this point and illumine the astral space surrounding the individual.
  Continued practice enables the student to determine for himself the position of this etheric body. Hitherto this position depended upon external forces proceeding from the physical body. Through further development the student is able to turn his etheric body to all sides. This faculty is effected by currents moving approximately

1.06 - LIFE AND THE PLANETS, #The Future of Man, #Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, #Christianity
  normal and orthodox evolution of astral matter; with the exasper-
  ating result that we know nothing for certain about the existence
  --
  having established, ON the basis of complexity, the astral
  preeminence of the planets in the sidereal system, and particularly

1.06 - The Transformation of Dream Life, #Knowledge of the Higher Worlds, #Rudolf Steiner, #Theosophy
  Spiritual vision at this stage extends to the spiritual counterparts of the physical world, so far as these exist in the so-called astral world. There everything is found which in its nature is similar to human instincts, feelings, desires, and passions. For powers related to all these human characteristics are associated with all physical objects. A crystal, for instance, is cast in its form by powers which, seen from a higher standpoint, appear as an active human impulse. Similar forces drive the sap through the capillaries of the plant, cause the blossoms to unfold and the seed vessels to burst. To developed spiritual organs of perception all these forces appear gifted with form and color, just as the objects of the physical world have form and color for physical eyes. At this
   p. 199
   stage in his development the student sees not only the crystal and the plant, but also the spiritual forces mentioned above. Animal and human impulses are perceptible to him not only through their physical manifestation in the individual, but directly as objects; he perceives them just as he perceives tables and chairs in the physical world. The whole range of instincts, impulses, desires and passions, both of an animal and of a human being, constitute the astral cloud or aura in which the being is enveloped.
  Furthermore, the clairvoyant can at this stage perceive things which are almost or entirely withheld from the senses. He can, for instance, tell the astral difference between a room full of low or of high-minded people. Not only the physical but also the spiritual atmosphere of a hospital differs from that of a ballroom. A commercial town has a different astral air from that of a university town. In the initial stages of clairvoyance this perceptive faculty is but slightly developed; its relation to the objects in question is similar to the relation of dream consciousness to waking consciousness in ordinary life; it will, however, become fully awakened at this stage as well.
   p. 200
  The highest achievement of a clairvoyant who has attained the degree of vision described above is that in which the astral counter-effects of animal and human impulses and passions are revealed to him. A loving action is accompanied by quite a different astral concomitant from one inspired by hate. Senseless desire gives rise to an ugly astral counterpart, while a feeling evoked by a high ideal creates one that is beautiful. These astral images are but faintly perceptible during physical life, for their strength is diminished by life in the physical world. The desire for an object, for example, produces a counterpart of this sort in addition to the semblance of the desire itself in the astral world. If, however, the object be attained and the desire satisfied, or if, at any rate, the possibility of satisfaction is forthcoming, the corresponding image will show but faintly. It only attains its full force after the death of the individual human being, when the soul in accordance with her nature still harbors such desires, but can no longer satisfy them, because the object and the physical organ are both lacking. The gourmand, for instance, will still retain, after death, the desire to please his palate; but there is
   p. 201

1.07 - The Literal Qabalah (continued), #A Garden of Pomegranates - An Outline of the Qabalah, #Israel Regardie, #Occultism
  Formation, consisting of the fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh, eighth, and ninth Sephiros. The World of Formation con- stitutes the astral Plane, comprising various degrees of subtle and electric matter and energy. The whole is syn- thesized in the physical world, Malkus, the tenth Sephirah, which is, in this mode of consideration, Olam Assiah.
  The Zohar, moreover, takes the name YIIVH, which is
  --
  In the Formative World, which is the plane of the astral forces, the ideas are projected still further, being clothed here in a design or model form of electric and magnetic matter. The astral substance is an omnipresent and all- permeating fluid of extremely subtile matter, of substance in a highly tenuous state, and in the process of further evolution, it produces, and acts as the substratum to, the material world, which is a copy of the astral in more dense and gross material.
  In this manner, should a large number of triads be re- quired for comparative purposes - such as may be required for the attri buting of the triadic categories of the Hegelian
  --
   astral Plane is attri buted, and the astral substance is by definition magnetic, subtile, and electric in its nature.
  Although the term " radio-activity " was not used in the last quarter of the nineteenth century, nevertheless the reader will be able to ascertain without difficulty that the description of the qualities of astral matter are: almost identical with those given by present-day scientific investi- gators to those elements which are said to be radio-active.
  Enough has been stated above, I think, to show the reader on what lines to proceed in making use of the

1.07 - The Magic Wand, #The Practice of Magical Evocation, #Franz Bardon, #Occultism
  After some time load the wand again in the same manner, and every time you repeat the cerem.ony you must increase the intensity of your imagination. Never forget that your whole spiritual will is embodied in the wand. It is important that you limit the time and if possible, also the space of the power concentrated in the wand; that is, concentrate your willpower into the wand with the idea that as long as it will exist it will represent all your will, all your power, and remain effective. A wand charged in this way will remain effective till you die, or should it be your special wish, even beyond your physical death, that is, it will remain a 47 magic wand. It may even last for centuries, and its influence may even increase with time, providing you have charged it with the wish that its power should grow from one day to the next. The effectiveness of the wand will first work on the mental sphere, then, after some time and repeated charging, on the astral sphere, and finally even on the physical world. The time required until a wand, first effective on the mental world, becomes effective in the physical world depends on the magician's maturity, training and power of imagination, and also on what he is striving for. The magician who is well acquainted with quabbalah will know that to bring about a realization from the mental sphere into the physical world, usually about 462 repetitions are necessary; by then the influence from the mental sphere takes shape, that is becomes condensed in the physical world. This, however, does not mean that the magician may not be able to bring about the same kind of success earlier than this. As already pointed out, the magic wand's power of realisation depends on the intention and purpose for which it has been made and charged. One could query whether the rod needs to be charged at all, since the magician's will should suffice. The magician, however, will not always be in a position to expand his mental exertion in the manner necessary for the transfer of one's will. There will be situations which will exhaust even the best magician, who then would be incapable of concentrating to his fullest power of expansion.
  However, a skillfully charged magic wand will also have its effect at moments when the magician is not using his will-power, but is just concentrating his thoughts on the realization of his wish, using his magic wand for this purpose. There is, of course, in this case a slight danger that a blasphemous person may get hold of the magic wand in order to realize his own desires, which, if it happened, would go on the cost of the magician and his rodvoltage. Therefore a magician will always do well not to tell any person, not even his best friend, for which purpose, in which respect, and in which manner he has charged his magic wand.
  This way of charging a magic wand with one's will-power will generally serve to influence beings, spirits, human beings and animals which are to act according to the magician's absolute will 48 and which are to obey the magician's magical power, no matter whether in this physical world or on the mental or astral planes.
  The influence of the magician is not at all restricted to living entities; it will also work on dead matter if this has been taken into consideration at the time of its being charged.
  --
  Under charging the wand with certain universal qualities is understood qualities such as omnipotence or other specific ones which the magician needs for his realizations in the mental, astral or physical planes and which are concentrated into the rod in the same manner as described above. It is possible (similar to the charge with the magician's will) when charging the wand with a certain quality, to impel the quality into the wand not only by embodying one's consciousness into it and by condensing the power, but also by pulling the quality down from the universe by means of one's imagination and concentration of will-power, thereby condensing the quality in the wand, thus charging it.
  Constant condensing of a certain quality will make the relevant spiritual power if concentrated in the wand a direct physical power. This means that with the wand the magician is in possession of an accumulator equivalent to a battery powerfully charged with electricity. That then one and the same power may be used for good as well as for bad purposes is true, but a magician, having proceeded as far as this in his individual training, will never think of any evil motives or try to put them into action, since he, at all times, is anxious to be regarded as a true and faithful servant by Divine Providence.
  --
  The same procedure is to be followed as described in the preceding chapter. It is recommended, however, to achieve the storing of power in the wand without transferring one's consciousness into it. This can be effected by mere imagination, by means of the magician's body or directly from the universe. In 49 this case, too, the magician must not forget to set limits to the power transformed into the wand. He must also, by force of imagination, concentrate on the purpose he wishes the wand to serve. Repeated charge of the wand will make it not only effective in the mental and astral planes, but also in the physical world.
  The experienced magician need not be told again that the power then dwelling in the wand will radiate to the furthest distances. If he introduces the Akasha-principle between himself and his object, he will be able to bridge time and space, and the power in question will immediately, by using the wand, work on the person concerned with the same kind of influence, intensity and success as it would be if the person were standing right in front of him. Charged with life-force or magnetism, with the right idea of setting limits or conditions (that is, in this case, with the idea that the life-force or magnetism in the wand will be automatically intensified from one day to the other) the wand will easily enable the magician to call into existence any phenomena that can be effected by life-force. With a rod charged in this way, even an unexperienced person could work miracles, providing he knew how to use it. Therefore it is in the magician's own interest to keep well the secret of his magic wand. He may also charge his wand in a manner that it will automatically, without any effort on part of the will-power of the magician, bring to him a piece of life-force from the universe, which will then radiate from the wand. This kind of charging the wand with magnetism - biomagnetism - is preferred for curative operations. A magician working in the medical field may like to make use of this method and heal people far away from him by force of his wand charged in the above mentioned manner. In the hands of a magician, a wand charged in this manner, which can heal people miraculously over the widest distances, is, no doubt, a blessing for the suffering man.
  --
  The magician will charge a rod with the electrical or the magnetic, or both fluids, if he wants to make his influence work by the help of these fluids on objects nearby or far away, regardless of their being subject to the Akasha or existent in either the mental, astral or physical world. Special variations of operations, for instance such as volting or treating sick people, or bearing of certain imaginations, will not be dealt with here, for the person having carefully studied up to this point will now be able to work out for himself his individual working methods.
  Regarding Point 4: the charge with elements:
  --
  2. The other way to charge the wand with elements is as follows: The magician draws the element which he wants to use for his work directly from the universe, that is, its particular Iphere, by force of the imagination, and dynamically accumulates it in the wand. When working with this kind of loaded wand, the results wanted are not caused by the beings of the elements, but directly by the magician himself. The advantage of this way of charging a wand is that it will give the magician a strong feeling of latisfaction, because he is the immediate cause of the magical effect. It is necessary, however, that a separate rod be manufactured for each of the elements and the wands must be stored apart from each other. To prevent the magician from mixing them up, he must be sure that he can easily differentiate between them by their outside appearance. Each wand may, for this purpose, have the colour of the relevant element. At the beginning the results will only occur on the mental plane, but prolonged use and repeated charging will make it work also on the astral plane, and eventually also on the physical world. This kind of wand will enable its owner to influence all manners of spirits, men, animals, even inanimate nature, by the element, similar to the influence of the electromagnetic fluid. Good magicians are able to cause, by the force of such a wand, marvelous natural phenomena, for in Itance, change of weather, acceleration of the growth of plants, and many other things of that nature.
  Regarding Point 5: Charge with the Akasha-principle:
  When applying this principle, the charge of the magic wand is possible, but not any kind of accumulation, since the Akashaprinciple cannot be intensified. But repeated meditation on the qualities of the Akasha-principle with all its aspects in the magic wand will finally enable the magician to create causes in the Akasha-principle, which will itself realize in the mental and astral planes, and also in the physical plane. Using a rod charged in the manner described, the magician will be able to impel, by force of imagination, a power or quality via the wand into the Akasha, which then, like a volt created by an electromagnetic fluid, will have direct influence on the three-dimensional world from above.
  Such a wand will be regarded with awe by positive intelligences and will have a frightening effect on negative beings. A wand charged in this fashion is usually preferred by magicians working with negative beings, so-called demons, in order to make them pliant. For further details on this subject see the chapter dealing with necromancy.
  --
  Not only will the magician be able to work, with the help of the wand, in the physical world; he will also be in position to transfer, with his mental or astral hand, or with both, the mental and astral sphape of the wand into the relevant plane and will have his influence work in these planes without having to hold the wand in his physical hand. In case of the exteriorisation of his 54 whole mental body, he can take with him not only the mental shape of his magic wand with all its qualities into the mental plane but also the mental shape of all magic implements and aids, and there he is able to operate as if he were present with his whole physical body to carry out the operations. Never should the magician forget that the wand represents his true will in its completeness, absoluteness and power, which may well be compared with a magical oath, and therefore many magicians have their magic wand symbolize not only their will-power, but also the magical oath, which, from the hermetic point of view, may never and can never be broken. Many magicians carve into their wand the symbols appropriate to their will-power and the charge of the wand. Universal symbols, signs, seals of intelligences, divine names, and the like, may serve this purpose as far as they represent the true will-power of the magician. The details of this particular matter are left entirely to the magician's individuality.
  The magician will know from these instructions how he has to go about reaching his aim, and it is up to him to provide, if he likes, his wand with a secret name standing for his will-power. It will also be clear to the practising magician that such a name must be kept a secret and must never, under any circumstance, be spoken.

1.08a - The Ladder, #A Garden of Pomegranates - An Outline of the Qabalah, #Israel Regardie, #Occultism
  The student is considered to be in Malkus, after having passed through a Probationary period during which he has familiarized himself with the various techniques to be used in his next grade. As a Neophyte, his particular task is to obtain complete control of what is termed the astral Plane, proceeding to Yesod by means of the thirty-second Path of
  Tav. It will be helpful to consult the chart of the Tree of
  Life, on page 19, to facilitate explanations. The idea of an astral body will not be altogether foreign to the reader who has understood the propositions of the chapter entitled
  Adam Kadmon. This body must be completely formu- lated, streng thened and purified, until it can function independently of the physical body, as a bright, glittering, and clear-cut organism, well able to deal with the phantoms of that plane. He is examined in his ability to see clearly and accurately on this plane by interpreting, in a vision, a symbol absolutely unknown and unintelligible to him. It must be described in a manner so precise, as if he had read concerning it in the book from which it was chosen.

1.08 - The Magic Sword, Dagger and Trident, #The Practice of Magical Evocation, #Franz Bardon, #Occultism
  When evoking demons and lower spirits, the sword or dagger may be replaced by a trident which has to be mounted on a long wooden shaft, similar to a wooden fork. The trident, like the sword or dagger, is a means of coercion. Grimoires, on top of that, recommend ornamenting the trident with engravings of divine names. This is left to the magician's individual taste and depends on the purpose of the evocation and the magician's attitude. The trident is also an enlarged symbol of the magic sword: the three points symbolize our three-dimensional world, and the magician can force the beings to fulfill his desire not only in the mental or astral world, but also in this physical world, or, if the magician likes, in all three planes. Regarding this, the fact that demons usually turn up with a trident and are pictured with a tri56 dent, should be mentioned. This does not mean that they run this trident through the souls in hell, as is sometimes wrongly assumed by foolish people, but that their influence works on all three worlds: the mental, astral and physical.
  The points of magic swords, daggers or tridents may also be employed for breaking or killing unevoked and unwanted beings like phantoms, larvae, elementals, elementaries, and the like, which may try to hinder the magician in his work. And yet another way of using these implements must be mentioned here since it is hardly known to anybody: a magic sword or dagger, not so much a trident, may do good service as a magical lightningconductor.
  --
  Of course, the wire has to be drawn with the wish in the magician's mind, that it will form a circle and that no being or any unfavourable influence will be able to get inside the bed and that every influence, no matter from which being it may come, will be conducted into the earth. In such a magically sheltered bed provided with a magic lightning-conductor the magician will sleep undisturbed, and he may rest assured that no influence, no matter from which sphere it may come, will never have any effect upon him, or will ever be able to surprise and overwhelm him. If the magician has no sword or dagger handy at the moment, or if he has to use it for other purposes, a new knife which, in this case, must not be used for any other purposes, will fulfill the same function. This magic lightning conductor will also protect the magician against influences of black magic, especially during the hours of sleep. A well-trained, fully developed magician may be able to do without this implement, for he may draw a magic circle around his bed by force of imagination, mentally or astrally, thereby using his wand, sword or dagger. This will also give him full protection against any unwanted influences.
  The way in which a magic sword is manufactured depends on the magician's individuality. Several books instruct the magician to use a sword which has formerly been used for cutting off a man's head. This is obviously suggested to raise, in the heart of the magician, a certain feeling of awe, or a certain stress as soon as he takes hold of the sword. Usually those magicians who make use of such a sword are those who need such superficialities to get into the right state of mind. From the hermetic point of view such or similar pre-conditions are not necessary, providing that all other faculties necessarily exist. A sword made of the best kind of steel (refined steel) will fully serve its purpose. If the magician cannot produce such a sword himself he may have it made by a smith or another metal expert. The length of the sword may vary between two or three feet depending on the magician's height.

1.08 - The Splitting of the Human Personality during Spiritual Training, #Knowledge of the Higher Worlds, #Rudolf Steiner, #Theosophy
  DURING sleep no impressions are conveyed to the human soul through the instrumentality of the physical sense-organs. The impressions from the ordinary outer world do not find their way to the soul when in that condition. In certain respects the soul is actually outside the part of the human being-the so-called physical body-which in waking life is the medium for sense perceptions and thought. The soul is then only connected with the finer bodies (the etheric body and the astral body), which are beyond the scope of physical sense observation. But the activity of these finer bodies does not cease during sleep. Just as the physical body is connected and lives with the things and beings of the physical world, affecting them and being affected by them,
   p. 216

1.09 - Kundalini Yoga, #Amrita Gita, #Swami Sivananda Saraswati, #Hinduism
  19. Kanda is situated between the anus and the root of the reproductive organ. It is like the shape of an egg. It is the centre of the astral body. The Yoga-Nadis spring from Kanda.
  20. Nadis are the astral tubes made up of astral matter. They carry Pranic currents.
  21. There are 72,000 Nadis. Of these, three are most important. They are Ida, Pingala and Sushumna.

1.09 - The Guardian of the Threshold, #Knowledge of the Higher Worlds, #Rudolf Steiner, #Theosophy
  THE important experiences marking the student's ascent into the higher worlds include his meeting with the Guardian of the Threshold. Strictly speaking, there are two Guardians: a lesser and a greater. The student meets the lesser Guardian when the threads connecting willing, feeling, and thinking within the finer astral and etheric bodies begin to loosen, in the way described in the foregoing chapter. The greater Guardian is encountered when this sundering of the connections extends to the physical parts of the body, that is, at first to the brain. The lesser Guardian is a sovereign being. He does not come into existence, as far as the student is concerned, until the latter has reached the requisite stage of
   p. 232

1.10 - Mantra Yoga, #Amrita Gita, #Swami Sivananda Saraswati, #Hinduism
  12. Chronic diseases can be cured by Mantras. Chanting of Mantras generate potent spiritual waves or divine vibrations. They penetrate the physical and astral bodies of the patients and remove the root causes of sufferings. They fill the cells with pure Sattva or divine energy. They destroy the microbes and vivify the cells and tissues. They are best, most potent antiseptics and germicides. They are more potent than ultra-violet rays or Roentgen rays.
  13. Mantra Siddhi should not be misused for the destruction of others. Those who misuse the Mantra power for destroying others are themselves destroyed in the end.

1.10 - The Magical Garment, #The Practice of Magical Evocation, #Franz Bardon, #Occultism
  This is to be treated in the same manner as the cap or magusband. The magical gament is a long robe made of silk, buttoned from the neck to the toes. The sleeves of the robe end at the wrists. The robe looks like the vestment of a clergyman and symbolizes the absolute purity of all ideas, and the purity of the magician's soul. It is also the symbol of protection. Just as a common garment protects a man's physical body from outside influences, rain, cold etc. so the magical garment of the magician shelters him from outside influences which may attact his body through its astral or mental matrix. As already mentioned several times, silk is the best insulating material against any astral or mental influences. A robe made of silk is therefore an excellent means of in61 sulation and may also be successfully used for other operations not directly connected with ritual magic; for instance, protection of the astral or physical body when projecting the mental or astral body so that no being can take possession of the magician's astral or physical body without his approval. A magic robe may also be successfully used for similar operations for which the insulation of the mental, astral and physical body is necessary. It is, however, up to the magician which possible variations he wants to make use of. Under no circumstances may the magician use a garment for ritual magic or evocations which has been used for common purposes such as, for example, training, or current magical operations. A special robe must be taken for this special kind of magic, and its colour must suit the purpose. Here I should point out that for common mental and astral operations or experiments, the insulating garment may be put on top of any other clothes; for evocations and ritual magic; however, the magical garment is to be worn over the naked body. The magician may, however, in cold weather, put on a shirt or pants made of pure silk und put the robe over them, but the pants or shirt must be of the same colour as the robe. The magician may use house-shoes of the same colour as the robe. The soles of the shoes can be made of leather or rubber.
  The colour of the robe corresponds to the work, idea and purpose the magician wishes to carry out. He may choose one of the three universal colours: white, violet or black. Violet is equivalent to the Akasha-colour and may be used for nearly all magical operations. White is chosen for the robe only, when dealing with high and good beings. Black is the appropriate colour for negative powers and beings. The magician is able to carry out almost all ritual operations with these colours. If he can afford the expense, he can have three robes made, one of each colour. A wealthy magician may choose, for his robes, colours analogous to the individual spheres of the planets he works with. Thus he will take for:

1.11 - The Soul or the Astral Body, #Initiation Into Hermetics, #Franz Bardon, #Occultism
  object:1.11 - The Soul or the astral Body
  class:chapter
  --
  11.The Soul or the astral Body ~
  Through subtler vibrations of the elements, through the electric and the magnetic fluid of their polarity, the man proper, the soul has proceeded from the akasa principle or the finer etheric vibrations. In the same way as the elements are functioning in the material body, the soul or the so-called astral body will behave. The four-pole magnet, with its specific qualities, connects or amalgamates the soul with the body. This amalgamation takes place, with analogy to the body, by the electromagnetic influence of the elements. We, the adepts, call the astral matrix or life this active behavior of the elements or the so-called electromagnetic fluid of the soul. This astral matrix or the so-called electromagnetic fluid of the soul is not identical with the occultists aura I shall speak of later. The astral matrix or the electromagnetic fluid is the connecting link between the body and soul. The fiery principle causes in the soul what is constructive, the principle of water causes the animating, the principle of air is balancing, and the earth principle causes what is thriving, compound and preserving in the soul. The astral body is performing exactly the same functions as the material body.
  Man has been fitted with the five senses corresponding to the five elements, of which the astral body or the soul, with the help of the bodily senses, makes use to receive perceptions of the physical world. Our immortal spirit realizes this receiving and operating of the five senses through the astral and the material body. Why this spirit is immortal will be explained in a later chapter. Without any activity of the spirit in the soul, the astral body would be without life and dissolve itself into its components.
  As the spirit would not be able to operate without the intervention of the soul, the astral body is the seat of all the qualities the immortal spirit has. According to its development and maturity, spirit has a different electric or magnetic fluid vibration, which becomes outwardly patent, in soul, in the four temperaments. In accordance with the predominant elements, we distinguish the choleric, the sanguine, the melancholic, and the phlegmatic temper. The choleric temper is due to the element of air, the sanguine temper is due to the element of air, the melancholic temper is born from the water element, and the phlegmatic one is ascribed to the earthy element. The strength and vibration of the respective element corresponds in the various properties to the strength, vigour, and expansion of the respective fluid vibrations.
  Each of these four elements, which determine mans temper, in the active form, owns the good properties, and in its passive form, the contrary or bad qualities. It would be too prolix to inform here about the effects of the elements, and it is better for the incipient adept to find out himself further effects by his own meditation. This manner also has a very special reason, on the path to initiation. Here I shall a few examples only:
  --
  Therefore this kind of aura is not to be compared with the astral matrix, because between these two conceptions there is a thumping difference. The astral matrix is the connecting substance between body and soul, whilst the aura is the emanation of the action o the elements in the various qualities, having its origin either in the active or in the passive form. This emanation in the whole soul produces a certain vibration corresponding to a certain colour. On the grounds of this colour, the adept can exactly recognize his own aura of that of another being with the astral eyes. Backed by this aura, the seer can establish not only a mans basic character, but he also can perceive the action or the polarity of the souls vibration, and influence it eventually. I shall speak of these problems in a more detailed way in a separate chapter relating to introspection. Hence, a mans temperament influences his character, and both together, in their effect as total result, are creating the emanation of the soul or the aura. This is also the reason for high adepts or saints always being represented in the images with a halo identical to the aura we have described.
  Besides the character, the temperament and the activity of the electromagnetic fluid, the astral body still has two centres in the brain, the cerebrum being the seat of normal consciousness, whilst in the cerebellum, there is the opposite to the normal consciousness, the sub-conscious. As to their functions, see the chapter concerning the Spirit.
  As it has been said before, according to the elements, the soul is divided in exactly the same way as the body. The psychic functions, powers and properties also have their seat respectively in the soul and certain centres analogous to all the elements, which the Indian philosophy designates as charkas. The awakening of these charkas is named Kundalini yoga in the Indian doctrine. I desist, however, from a comment on these lotuses or centres, because the student interested in this problem will find all the necessary enlightenment in the respective literature. I will touch on it only slightly and say that the lowest centre is the so-called Muladhara or earth centre, having its seat in the lowest part of the soul. The next centre is that of the water, with its seat in the region of the sexual organs and designated in the Indian terminology as Swadisthana. The centre of fire, as centre of the soul, is in the umbilical region and is named Manipura. The centre of air as compensatory element is in the region of the heart and is termed Anahata. The centre of the ether or principle of akasa is found in the region of the neck and is named Visudha. Another centre, that of volition and intellect, is between the eyebrows and is called Ajna. As the supreme and most divine centre is regarded as the thousand-petaled lotus, named Sahasrara from which derive and are influenced all the other powers of the centres. Beginning at the top, from the supreme centre, along the neck, down to the lowest centre, like a channel runs the socalled Susumna or the akasa-principle already known to us, liable for the connection and control of the entire centres. Later on, I shall come back to the problem of the evocation of the snake-power in the single centres. In describing the soul, the principal task will be to establish the connection of the elements with their positive and negative polarities in the soul, and give a neat idea of it. One will see that the body, as well as the soul, with their effects are alive and working, that their preservation and destruction are subject to the immutable laws of the four-pole magnet, i.e., the secret of the tetragrammaton, and governed by them. If he who is to be initiated will attentively meditate about it, he will win a clear idea not only of the bodily functions, but also of those of the soul, and come to a sound notion of the mutual interaction according to the original laws.

1.12 - The Astral Plane, #Initiation Into Hermetics, #Franz Bardon, #Occultism
  object:1.12 - The astral Plane
  class:chapter
  --
  12.The astral Plane ~
  The astral plane, often designated as the fourth dimensio n, has not been created out of the four elements, but it is a density-degree of the akasa principle, consequently of all that up to now, I the material world occurred, is actually occurring and will occur, and has its origin, regulation and existence. As said before, akasa in its most subtle form is the ether, well known to all of us, in which, amongst other vibrations, electric as well as magnetic ones are propagating. Consequently this vibration-sphere is the origin of light, sound, colour , rhythm, and life in all tings created. As akasa is the origin of all existing things, all that ever was produced, is being produced and will be produced in the future is reflected in it. Therefore, in the astral plane there is to be seen an emanation of the eternal, having neither a beginning nor an end, as it is timeless and spaceless. The adept who sees his way about this plane may find everything here, no matter if the point in question be in the past, the present or the future. How far this perception will reach depends on the degree of his perfection.
  Occultists and spiritualists and most of religions name the astral pane the World beyond. However, the adept knows very well that there is no such thing as Hence and
  Beyond and feels no fear of death, which concept is quite strange to him. If, by the disintegrating work of the elements or a sudden breakup, the astral matrix which is connecting matter between the grossly material body and the astral body has got loose, then will happen what we commonly call death, which, however, in reality is nothing else but a passage from the terrestrial world to the astral world. Backed up by this law, the adept knows no fear of death, being convinced that he will not approach uncertainty. Through his control of the elements, besides many other things, he also can achieve a slackening of the astral matrix, which will result I a spontaneous separation of the astral body from the mortal frame. Thus he will be able to visit the remotest regions, transfer himself into various planes in the form of his astral body.
  This is the positive explanation of so many tales in which saints have been seen at the same time in different places and even have been working there.
  The astral plane has various kinds of inhabitants. First of all, there are the deceased ones who having left the earth are abiding in the corresponding density-degree, according to their spiritual maturity, which is designated by various religions as heaven or hell, the adepts seeing only symbols therein. The nobler, purer and the more perfect an entity happens to be, all the purer and finer will be the density-degree of the inhabited astral plane. Little by little, the astral body is dissolving, until it has become suitable to the degree of vibrations of the respective step of the astral level, or identical with it. As you see, this identification depends on the maturity and the spiritual perfection the entity concerned achieved on this earth.
  Besides, the astral plane is inhabited by many other beings of which I am mentioning only some species here. There are to so-called elementaries, entities with one or only very few qualities, according to the dominant vibrations of the elements. They are living on the similar vibrations proper to man and transmitted by him into the astral plane. Among them, there are some which have already reached a certain degree of intelligence, and some magicians are using these low-powered beings for their selfish purposes. Another kind of being is the larvae, which have been brought into life consciously or unconsciously, by intense sensorial thinking, through the astral matrix.
  They are not real beings, but only forms thriving on the passions of the animal world, on the lowest step of the astral level. Their instinct of self-preservation carries them into the sphere of those men whose passions are responsive to them. They will try, directly or indirectly, to raise and kindle the passions slumbering in man. If these forms are succeeding in seducing men to give in to their suitable passion, they are feeding and thriving on the emanation of this passion produced in man. Man laden with many passions will attract a host of such larvae in the lowest sphere of his astral plane. A great fight takes place and, in the problem of magic, this fact plays an important role. More about it is to be founding the chapter dealing with introspection.
  There are also other elementaries and larvae, which can be produced in the artificial magic way. As to further details, see the practical part of this book.
  Another kind of being the adept often has to deal with in the astral plane must not be overlooked, namely the beings of the four pure elements. In the element of fire, their name is salamander; in the air element they are the sylphs, in the water element, they are called mermaids or undines, and in the element of earth there are the gnomes or goblins. These beings represent, as it were, the connection between the astral plane and the earthly elements. How to establish the connection with these beings, how to control them, what can be achieved with their help, all will be reserved to the practical part of the present book to which I shall dedicate the special chapter, Magic of the
  Elements.
  Furthermore, there is a host of other beings such as satyrs, woodmaidens, watergoblins, etc., who could be specified. Even if all this sounds like a fairy tale, on the astral plane the previously described beings are the very same realities as all the other earthly beings. The adepts clairvoyant eyes can see all of them, if he desires so, and is able to establish the connection with them, so excluding any doubt of the existence of these beings right from the beginning. That is why the adept has to first and learn to examine, before being able to judge.

1.13 - The Pentacle, Lamen or Seal, #The Practice of Magical Evocation, #Franz Bardon, #Occultism
  1. The traditional seals which have either been found by clairvoyance or have been reproduced by spirit beings during astral visits to the various spheres. Beings will only react to this kind of seal if the magician knows how to transfer himself into their sphere of power. Due to a constant increase of the magician's reservoir of power, caused by frequent use of one and the same seal, he will also increase his influence and be able to make it work on the being in question.
  The copying and reproduction of seals, however, has been the source of many errors, and the seals have often been corrupted.
  Sometimes this has been done deliberately in order to make the magician's work more difficult and his success with this material less probable or even totally impossible. A magician with an open mind for astral operations may, if he likes, check the genuineness of the seal by use of the Akasha-principle, or trance, and by placing his total concentration on the seal. By doing this, he will also be able to correct the seal.
  2. There also exist universal seals which not only symbolize the qualities and range of action of beings but also their other characteristics. By applying the laws of analogy one may produce graphic constructions of such seals and charge them with the qualities of the relevant spirits by force of imagination. The being will have to react to such seals without resistance.

1.14 - The Book of Magic Formulae, #The Practice of Magical Evocation, #Franz Bardon, #Occultism
  First of all the book of formulae is not to be understood in a literal sense, for the expression "magic spells" or "magical formulae" used in the grimoires has served as a cloak for certain ideas. In other cases its object has been to take away the magician's consciousness from its normal state by barbaric words, names and expressions, and thus bring him into a state of ecstasy in which, it is assumed, he is able to influence a being. But generally speaking, the only success that untrained persons will have in this case, is hallucinations, phantoms or delusions, or incomplete, mediumistic results which need not be dealt with here. Usually such mediumistic results are, provided that they are genuine at all, the outcome of the extoriorisation of the person's unconsciousness. Sometimes elementals, and, should the person concerned have a strong capability for emanation, even elementaries might be formed which the genuine magician has already been informed about in "Initiation into Hermetics". These elementaries are falsely regarded as the beings which are the object of evocation, and a person whose astral senses have not yet been sufficiently developed is not able to tell the difference or to control the situation. Therefore readers are warned against trying to practise ritual magic without necessary training. Apart from disappointments, the disturbances in the person's spirit and soul could have most regrettable consequences for the health. A genuine magician who has completed his magical training, may, however, without any danger whatever, safely practise ritual magic. This field of magic is no place for dabbler's experiments but a scheme of operation which facilitates the magical labour for the mature magician with already developed powers.
  The book of formulae, sometimes wrongly called the book of spirits, is the genuine magical diary of the magician practising ritual magic, in which he enters, step by step, the procedures of his ritual in order to be able to follow every point conscientiously up to his goal. Some readers might wish to know how mutilated charms, furmulae for incantation etc. could ever develop? From the days of yore the secret of magic has been restricted to high castes, potentates, kings and high priests. In order that the real truth, that true ideas and spiritual facts might never be known by the public, many code-words and secret formulae have been introduced, the deciphering of which has been reserved to the mature. The key for these codes was only transferred upon mature persons by word of mouth, and their profanation was punished with death. This is the reason why this science has remained a secret up to our time and it will continue to remain an occult and mystic science even if it is directly published, as the immature und profane person will regard it all as delusion or fantastic nonsense and, depending on his grade of maturity and psychic receptivity, will always have at hand an individual interpretation or view of this science. The most secret matters will thus never lose their occult tradition and there will always be but a few people who will profit by it. If a person who is not an initiate gets such a book of magic formulae in his hands and does not know the key to it, he will take everything in its literal sense without knowing that the particular words and formulae are nothing but aids for the magician's memory and that it is a schematic layout for the ritual work of a true magician. This makes it clear why sometimes the most senseless words have been used as magic charms to evoke a certain being. But the book of formulae is a proper note-book in which the genuine magician writes the whole procedure of his magic operations from beginning to end. If he is not sure that his book will never fall into the hands of another person, he will have to use, point by point, code-names. I can only give here a few instructions. These will, however, enable the magician to procede according to his own taste and ideas.

1.14 - The Mental Plane, #Initiation Into Hermetics, #Franz Bardon, #Occultism
  As the body ahs its earthly plane, and the astral body or the soul owns the astral plane, the spirit too has its own plane, the so-called mental plane or mental sphere. This is the mental sphere with all its virtues.
  Both these spheres, the material as well as the astral one have been born from the akasa or original principle of the respective sphere, through the four elements, and also the mental sphe re is built upon the same foundation, and therefore likewise a product of the akasa principle of the spirit. Similar to the spirit, developing in a fourpole magnet by corresponding work and showing an electromagnetic fluid analogous to the astral body, on account of the effect of the elements, as a secondary phenomenon of the polarity on the outside, the mental body develops in the mental or spiritual sphere. Just in the same way as the astral body, through the electromagnetic fluid of the astral world, fo rms an astral matrix, the so-called astral od, the electromagnetic fluid of the mental world forms a mental matrix linking the mental body to the astral body. This mental matrix or the mental od, the so-called mental substance, is the subtlest form of akasa which controls and preserves the spiritual activity in the astral body.
  At the same time, this mental substance is electromagnetic and is regarded as leaser of the ideas to the consciousness of the spirit, from where it is put into activity through the astral and the roughly material body. So this mental matrix or the mental od, with its double-pole fluid, is the subtlest substance we can imagine in the human body.
  Simultaneously, the mental sphere is the sphere of thoughts which have their origin in the world of ideas, consequently in the spiritual akasa. Each thought is preceded by a basic idea which, according to its property, accepts a definite form, and arrives to the consciousness of the ego through the etheric principle, consequently the mental matrix, as expression of the thought in the shape of a plastic picture. Therefore Man himself is not the founder of the thoughts, but the origin of each thought is to be sought in the supreme akasa sphere or the mental plane. Mans spirit, as it were, is the receiver, the antenna of thoughts from the world of ideas, according to the situation in which Man happens to be. The world of ideas being all in all, each new idea, new invention -- in short, all Man believes to have created by himself -- has been brought out of this world of ideas. This production of new ideas depends on the maturity and attitude of the spirit. Each thought involves an absolutely pure element, especially if the thought implies abstract ideas. If the thought is based on several combinations of the ideal world, different elements are effective in their form as well as in their mutual emanation. Only abstract ideas have pure elements and pure polar emanations, as they descend directly from the causal world of an idea.
  --
  The material plane is bound to time and space. The astral plane, sphere of the perishable or mutable spirit, is bound to space, the mental plane being timeless and spaceless. The very same thing happens with all the mental properties. The reception of a thought in the mental body, through the link of the astral and mental matrix bound to space and time in the total form, needs a certain amount of time to become fully conscious of this thought. According to the mental maturity, the train of thoughts is different in each individual. The more advanced, the more cultured man is, the faster thoughts will develop in mind.
  Likewise as the astral plane is inhabited, so too is the mental plane. Besides the ideal forms, there are principally the deceased ones whose astral bodies have been dissolved by the elements in the course of their ripening, and allotted, according to the degree of perfection, to regions corresponding to their mental sphere.
  Besides the mental sphere is the sphere of the so-called elementals, beings created consciously or unconsciously by man as a result of repeated and intense thinking. An elemental being is not yet so condensed to form or to assume any astral shape for itself. Its influence is therefore limited to the mental sphere. The difference between an ideal form and an elemental lies in the fact that the ideal form is based on one or several ideas. On the other hand, the elemental is equipped with a certain quantity of consciousness and therefore with the instinct of preservation, but otherwise it does not much distinguish from other mental living beings, and it can even take the same shape as the ideal form. The adept often resorts to these elemental beings. The problem of how to create such an elemental, how to preserve it and how to utilize it for certain purposes, will be approached in the practical section of this book.
  There would still be quite a lot to be said about the particular, specific properties of some beings. But all that we have pointed out previously should be sufficient to stimulate the work and contri bute to a succinct enlightenment about the mental plane.

1.15 - In the Domain of the Spirit Beings, #The Practice of Magical Evocation, #Franz Bardon, #Occultism
  2. The next higher sphere existing above the physical world is the earth zone, the zone girdling the earth. This zone has various grades of density, so-called sub-zones into which man proceeds after having put off his earthly shape. This is the so-called astral world; in its lower grades of density dwell the average persons in their astral bodies after their physical death, in its higher spheres are also initiates, depending on their state of maturity. The more mature, more developed, more ethical a magician is, the more subtle is the zone layer in which he comes after his death. His place in the astral world will depend on how far he advanced during his life in this physical world. There is no heaven or hell in the astral world; these are merely the outcome of silly religious opinions and the object of the teachings of some religions which, due to their ignorance, separate life in the astral world into life in heaven or hell. If one regards the lower, rougher spheres of the astral world as being the hell, the brighter, higher spheres as the heaven, part of these religious beliefs could be true. The magician who knows how to interpret such symbols and ideas will find his own explanation for the expressions "hell", "heaven" and
  "purgatory" .
  It would go too far to tell the reader all about life in the astral world. Many books could be written on this subject. I will, nevertheless, give a few hints of interest to the magician. The magician will have experienced during his mental and astral wanderings, when his mental and astral body was split off, that in the astral sphere the ideas of time and space do not exist for him, so that in one single moment he is able to travel any distance and on his way there are no material hindrances which he would not be able to penetrate with his mental and astral body. Every human being will have the same experience after his physical death. The initiate, however, has the advantage of getting acquainted with this fact during his lifetime, and that already in this material world he is liberated of one sorrow: the fear of death. He knows well in which astral sphere he will live after his death, and for him the putting away of his physical body is only a transition from the physical world into a more subtle one, similar to changing his place of re~idence.
  The magician will experience yet another thing here on earth: all interests that are normal with an average, that is an undeveloped, non-initiated person in this physical world, will cease in the astral plane. Therefore it is not at all surprising that a genuine magician, who is equally familiar with the conditions here and there, that is in the physical and the astral world, loses his interests in this physical world, as far as he does not regard it as the means for his personal development. He will already learn here on earth that fame, honour, riches and all other earthly advantages cannot be taken from here to the astral world and are therefore useless. A true magician will therefore never cry for mortal things. His interest will constantly be directed to using the time which he has at his disposal in this physical sphere to the best of his abilities for his personal development.
  It is therefore quite clear that all bonds like love, fidelity etc. which might keep a human being in this physical world come to nothing there. People who have loved each other here, but have not kept the same pace in their psychic and mental development cannot, after dying, live in the same sphere and they will no longer feel the same affection for each other as they have done here. If, for instance, a man and a woman are equally developed they can move in the same sphere of the astral world after their death and will be connected by an inner band of sympathy to each other, but, in spite of this, they will not experience the same kind of love as they did in the physical world. In the astral world there exists nothing like the instinct for self-preservation, the instinct for carnal, sexual love and sexual lust. In the higher spheres a different feeling of affection than on earth connects two equally developed beings by a subtle band of vibration. In our physical world the sympathy or attraction of two beings is usually caused by external stimulation and maintained by the same factors.
  Naturally, this is not so in the astral world. The idea of beauty in the astral world, too, is quite different from the idea of beauty in this physical world. Since a deceased person is no longer subject to time and space when entering the astral sphere and thus in that world loses the means to measure its degree of perfection, it longs to return to the earth. The human being not only longs to return because he must equalize, by force of the Law of Karma of cause and effect, the errors he made during his lifetime but he also longs to come back to have another chance of development in the physical world and to gather further experiences, in his spirit, for the higher spheres of the astral world.
  Every human being, after having died, will realise yet another fact in the astral world: having only a low degree of development, he will not be able to communicate with beings who, during their lifetime, have reached a higher degree of development, because these beings will stay in a higher, more subtle sphere of the astral world, and he himself will not be able to travel to their sphere of light. Even if he were able to move to those higher spheres he would not be able to stand the elevated vibration there and would drop back, that is he would soon find himself transferred to that astral sphere in which he belongs on account of his degree of development. A person with a high degree of perfection, however, is able to place himself into a lower sphere by accomodating the vibration of that sphere in his spirit.
  If, therefore, a spirit with a low degree of development wants to get into contact with a spirit of a higher degree of development, the former must ask the latter, by force of imagination, to come to his sphere. Whether the higher developed being will fulfill the wish of the lower being, always depends on the purpose for which the lower being calls the higher one. This clearly shows that a lower being is not capable of moving to the higher spheres of the astral world. The contrary, however, is quite possible. A magician with a good degree of development is able to place himself iilto any sphere, for he is capable of accomodating and creating every kind of vibration and any form of every sphere he wants to get into touch with. Many a reader will here remember the words of the Bible and perceive its meaning:
  "And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not".
  The experienced magician knows that the physical body is sustained by food (that is: condensed elements) and that the breath connects the astral with the physical body by the so-called astral band. Therefore he is also aware of the fact that as soon as, at the moment of dying, a person's breath stops, the separation of the astral and mental body from the physical body takes place. He will also find it quite logical that whenever, due to his magical training, he consciously separates not only the mental but also the astral body from his physical body, he will be put into a state of ecstasy or apparent death during which his breath has also stopped, with the only difference that his physical body, during this state of ecstasy, is not subject to decay, and a connection is still maintained with the mental and astral body. Since the magician can have power over life and death, if approved by Divine
  Providence, he is able to restore this connecting link in order to make a dead person live again, similar to the saints, who, as we know from history, have been able to do the same. I have already dealt with this matter in detail in "Initiation into Hermetics".
  If the magician has experienced his physical death, there is no reason why he should return to the physical world, and he is not desirous of restoring the band between the material and astral worlds. Of course, there are also magicians and sorcerers of lower degree, who consciously try, from the astral world, to build again the link between their astral and their physical bodies. But because they lack the necessary perfection enabling them to condense the light sufficiently, their success must remain a partial one. Usually such beings, clinging to their physical shape, try to evade the pre-conditions for such a realisation and vampirise the electro-magnetic fluid (vital energy) from living bodies in order to accumulate it in their abandoned physical bodies, assuming that in the course of time they will be able to revive them. The physical body laid aside by such a being in the manner indicated may be saved from decay for centuries. History gives us many examples of the conservation of deceased persons, and science cannot yet give any satisfactory explanation for this. Such vampires are, from the hermetic point of view, to be pitied, and the religious belief of those days did well in destroying such bodies which did not decay. Usually only by this destruction, such a body was usually pierced with a wooden spear or its head cut off and the body itself burned, was the spirit of such a body freed from its bondage. The sagas of the werewolves, too, can be explained from the hermetic point of view. The procedure was the same, only that at the moment of vampirizing, the astral body took on the shape of an animal in order to evade recognition by the possibly sensitive person who was vampirized.
  In summing up: in the physical world the physical and the astral bodies are kept together by food and breath and all the three parts - body, soul and spirit - are streng thened from the higher spheres by more subtle material elements during the sleep.
  In the astral world, on the other hand, the astral body is enlivened by the impressions it gets by material vibrations in the astral sphere. If a human being is returning from the astral world into the physical world, then the band between the astral and the mental bodies rends so that the being dies there to be reborn in our physical world. The act of dying there is similar to physical death; the astral body is no longer fed by the mental body with impressions from the astral world.
  The process of decay of an astral body takes much longer than that of a physical body, and an astral body may go on to exist for many years, according to our chronology, without being maintained by the respective spirit. Other beings, usually demons, like to take possession of such corpses in order to play tricks with them. During numerous spiritistic sessions the astral bodies of dead people have appeared which were abandoned by the spirits of those dead people a long time ago and have since been controlled and used by a demon. Only a well trained clairvoyant who is able to distinguish an astral body from a mental body by the help of his well developed mental senses can discover the truth. Such demons like to fool people, play tricks on them and make all kinds of mischief. All imps and spooks, phantoms, hobgoblins, and the like, proceed in the same manner.
  I have already discussed this matter thoroughly in "Initiation into Hermetics". Normally, an astral body slowly dissolves to its elements, the so-called astral corpse is sucked up by the elements, becomes more and more transparent, similar to a sieve, until it finally totally decays into the material of the individual elements.
  Besides man, who after his death betakes himself to the astral plane, many other beings dwell in the earth-zone. Apart from those already mentioned, for instance elementals, larvae, phantoms, goblins, there also exist, in that zone, the beings of the elements. I shall deal more with these individual beings of the elements and their heads in the chapter dealing with hierarchies.
  Each spirit which wants to declare itself in one way or another must pass through the astral world, regardless from which sphere it comes, even if it should live in the highest spheres. For the zone lirdling the earth is the first zone beyond the physical world. In quabbalah, this zone is also called Malkuth; that means Kingdom.
  I shall have more to say about this in "The Key to the True Quabbalah" .
  In the astral world of the zone girdling the earth the same powers exist and are at work as in the physical world; they are, however, more subtle. Also there dominates the element of the fire with its salamanders or spirits of fire, the element of water with its water-spirits and undines, the element of the air with its fairies and sylphs or spirits of the air, and the element of the earth with its gnomes or spirits of the earth. All the beings in the astral sphere of the earth-zone move about in their respective elements just as the fish in the waters of the earth moves about correspondingly in its element. Each element has positive and negative beings so that we may talk of good as well as of evil salamanders.
  The same is true of the beings of the other elements. In reality, however, there exists neither good nor evil, for Divine Providence created nothing bad or inharmonious, it is only a human comprehension to assume this. From the hermetic point of view the one kind of beings have good the other bad influences, thus have its good and bad effects respectively. These beings are, in the astral world, the tools for the things that happen in our physical world. They are the cause of all effects in the astral body of each being, no matter whether initiate or non-initiate.
  The actions and doings of the element of air and the element of fire in the astral sphere cause the astral-electric fluid; the actions and doings of the water-element and the element of the earth cause the astral-magnetic fluid. The beings use the fluids in order to create the effects, or, better said, the causes in our physical world. The Akasha-principle of the astral sphere keeps all the elements of the astral sphere in harmonious equilibrium. If a being of the astral sphere wants to influence our physical world, no matter whether it be a spirit of the elements or a human being, it must be capable of condensing both fluids, the electric as well as the magnetic, in such a manner that they are realized in the physical world. A well-trained magician who has a good comm and of the elements and fluids is able to carry out this act of condensing quite by himself, by the help of the imagination.
  When taking no active part in the work himself, he may have the condensation carried out by a medium from whom in this case, the spirits will extract, like vampires, the electric and magnetic fluid necessary to bring about the desired effect.
  As is well known, the difference between a being of the elements and a human being lies in the fact that a being of the elements consists of only one element, whereas a human being is composed of all four elements, plus a fifth one: the Akashaprinciple. An elemental being can only work with the element and the fluid to which it appertains; a human being, however, may become acquainted with all powers and may learn to control them. But in both cases, whether being of elements or human being, Divine Providence or the Akasha-principle is the determining factor. However, a human being is capable of incarnation, a being of the elements is not able to do this by itself. The astral body of a being of the elements breaks up into its element; a human astral body dissolves into the four elements. Another difference is the fact that with the moment of death an elemental being ceases to exist, for its spirit is mortal; man, who is something like a small macrocosm, possesses, since he has been created in
  God's image, an immortal individual spirit. Although it is possible to make, out of a being computed of only one element, a fourelement-being by special magical operations and to give it an immortal spirit, a true magician will do this very seldom, and never without special reasons which must be valid enough to be justified before Divine Providence.
  The Akasha-principle of the astral sphere determines also the re-incarnation into the physical world of a human being living in the astral world. The astral material of light, usually called astral light, is the most divine emanation in the astral world. To initiates who see the divine principle of the astral world this lightprinciple appears as bright as the light of the burning sun or as the sun itself, provided they were in the physical world able to behold Divine Providence in the Light without having their deity transformed into a particular shape. The individual religion of a person has its due place in the astral world insomuch as he has attributed a certain shape and name to his deity according to his religious views in the physical world. Atheists feel no necessity for a God even in the astral world and are therefore not able to form an idea of the deity there. Nevertheless, they long for something higher, much like a thirsty man longs for water. People who have believed in several religions or deities during their existance on earth will find chaotic conditions. They will have a difficult time there, if they are not able to make up their minds to follow a certain form. However, during their course of development in the astral world their conception of God will be clarified so that finally they will believe in the deity which was really best for them. This conception of God then usually determines the place of their re-incarnation.
  A magician having explored during his lifetime, the astral sphere of the zone girdling the earth will know from his own experience, how the powers and beings of the astral sphere operate and what they do, but he may also learn it from those beings with which he is working magically.
  Just the same as the not yet fully developed magician in the physical world uses a spiritual guide for his training and likes to be taught by him, either by passive communication or automatic writing etc., a not yet perfect human being too will find his guides in the astral world. These guides will teach him from time to time and assist him whenever necessary. Highly developed spiritual beings of the zone girdling the earth condense themselves in their appropriate astral sphere and thus become the guides of individuals, or of groups of individuals, and initiate the astral beings of lower perfection into the higher laws. Such guides must never be compelled to do their work in the astral world; they are commissioned by Divine Providence to offer assistance to any astral being, depending on its maturity and state of perfection. In the astral world, the guide, one may also call him genius loci, not only teaches his protege the laws, but assists him in his whole development. It sometimes happens that an astral man wants to do something at his own accord, but is warned at the critical moment by his guide or genius not to do anything arbitrarily. The genius will intervene especially in those cases where an astral human being with a low degree of development is about to do something contrary to the laws of Divine Providence. The guide informs his protege about the laws of the physical world and prepares him for his rebirth. This clearly shows how necessary it is that the magical development of a human being during his time in the physical world leads him towards perfection in order to be prepared for life in a higher sphere.
  All blows of fate that are apt to purify a man's spirit in the physical world and that will help him to get the kind of experience necessary for his spiritual development are already prepared and determined by Divine Providence in the astral world for each individual according to his maturity and degree of development. The human being knows before his embodiment about the matter of teaching in the physical world and not only agrees to it, but even longs to get through it. At the moment of his rebirth he loses his knowledge about everything that Divine
  Providence has planned for him. If an individual living in this world could know in advance everything he has to go through, he would no longer have a free will in the physical world. Such an individual would be equivalent to a mere robot in all his doings or an automaton, and the task which he would have to complete in this world would become impracticable. Only an initiate of higher degree, being master over Karma, that is over cause and effect, and feeling equally familiar with the physical as well as the astral world is mature enough to know everything in advance without having to fear any disadvantageous influences on his free will.
  Beings incarnate themselves from the astral world into the physical sphere of our planet, bordered by time and space, in order to work on their development, since the material laws of this plane put far more hindrances in front of every individual than is the case in the astral sphere. The impediments of the physical world streng then the spirit and enable it to grow more rapidly in its development than it would be possible in the astral world. Therefore the human beings of the astral world are urged to achieve re-incarnation in this world as soon as possible, and are ready to accept even the toughest conditions in order to be able to continue their spiritual development.
  Every man can reach perfection, for the evolution of the whole of mankind leads towards it. The spiritual guide designated to each individual by Divine Providence for his initiation into the astral world leads and controls the spiritual development of his protege and in many cases carries on with his commission after his protege has re-incarnated in the physical world. The magician should therefore try at the very beginning of his development to get into contact with his genius. How this is achieved has already been told in "Initiation into Hermetics". It sometimes happens that people who have already reached a high degree of perfection here on earth are able to continue their spiritual development in the astral world up to perfection, but these are selected by Divine
  Providence to fulfill one or more missions on earth. Such spiritual leaders are then magicians or initiates by birth who at a certain phase of the physical development of their human bodies, usually shortly after the period of puberty, become suddenly aware of their state, their degree of spiritual development, and just need a little more to be mature enough for their divine mission. Such missions need not always be of a magical or spiritual nature, they may also have to do with other aspects of this world.
  This explains the birth of human genii and inventors in all fields of material knowledge. The magician knows that all this is planned and controlled by Divine Providence, that is on the principles of Akasha in the astral world, and that nothing can take place which, from the magician's point of view, could not be explained by the universal laws.
  This has been a rough sketch of the most important aspects of the astral sphere of the so-called earth-zone or zone girdling the earth, which is the zone next to our physical world. The earthzone is, according to human thinking, not the most condensed form of sphere in spite of its being placed above us, since in it there exist the most various intensities of light, or vibration, in accordance with the degree of maturity of each individual human being. This earth-zone is by no means bordered in any way; it stretches out over the cosmos, not only over the ball of the earth.
  The laws ruling this zone have nothing to do with the idea of space, however, as they go for the whole microcosm and macrocosm and their analogous connection. This is the reason why man can only reach his perfection, his ultimate magical maturity, and his genuine connection with the deity, in this zone girdling the earth. This clearly shows that, from the point of view of magic, the earth-zone is the lowest sphere, but at the same time also the sphere with the highest emanation of the Divine Princi86 p Ie. I shall show further that there exist further spheres belonging to this hierarchy which the magician is able to contact, but he is able to live in the earth-zone also as a being of perfection, as the true image of God. In this zone girdling the earth the whole creation from the highest perfection of the deity down to the lowest and roughest form is manifested. A human being may get into contact with all kinds of spheres which lie above the earth-zone, but he cannot become their constant inhabitant, because the earth-zone is the reflecting mirror of the whole creation. It is the manifested world of all degrees of condensation. The old Quabbalists knew this truth and therefore called the earth-zone
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  The analogies and the hierarchy of each zone are dealt with in the next chapter. Each sphere lying above the zone girdling the earth, between the Moon and Saturn, has a threefold effect: firstly on the mental, secondly on the astral and thirdly on the physical world. Depending on the question in which sphere of the earthzone a certain effect should be caused, the creation of the cause for such an effect must be considered in that zone. Since the zones mentioned above have certain individual influences on our earthzone the magician operating with beings of such zones must have a clear picture of the analogy of the laws of each zone regarding his own microcosm and the microcosm of any other human being. Each analogy of the zones to the micro- and macrocosm must be quite clear to him and he must know how to create the cause corresponding to the analogies with the help of the beings. In the magician's conception each zone will not be a limited plane beyond the earth-zone, but all zones run into one another in the microcosm as well as in the macrocosm. The zones bear astrological names, but do not have directly to do with the constructions of the stars of the universe, although there exists some relation between the stars and their constellations, enabling the astrologers to draw their conclusions for mantic purposes or to find out unfavourable influences. I have already given some hints about the synthesis of astrology.
  Each zone is inhabited in just the same way as the earth-zone already known to us. The beings of the zones have their special commissions and are subject to the laws of their zone, as far as causes and effects are concerned. In our opinion there exist millions of beings in each zone. It is impossible to grade these beings categorically. Each of these beings has reached a certain degree in its spiritual development, a certain degree of maturity, and a commission has been transferred upon it according to this degree.
  A person without any magical development and without the necessary maturity is not able to proceed beyond this material world in order to get into contact with astral beings, not to mention getting into contact with the beings of superior spheres.
  There are only a few people in our physical world, who, with their spirit, are able to penetrate the borders of human existence and to proceed to other zones. People who are able to do this consciously are called initiates from the point of view of hermetics.
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  The magician will realize that these names for ranks and titles symbolise the degree of maturity of a being and certainly will not regard them as earthly ranks. Therefore, only the leaders, the initiates of the individual zones, are able to influence, with their causes and effects, our spheres, no matter whether mental, astral or physical. The way in which each individual being may in89 fluence our world will be dealt with analogously step by step in a further chapter on the hierarchy of the beings. Just the same as, in our opinion, there exist in the earth-zone positive and negative, that is good and evil beings, so is the situation the same in all other zones. The good or positive powers and beings are generally called angels or archangels, the negative ones demons or archdemons. The same kind of hierarchy is to be found with the negative beings: there are common demons, barons, counts, etc.
  The average person will have a conception of these beings corresponding to his power of understanding. In his imagination angels and archangels will have wings, demons and archdemons will have horns. But the person well acquainted with the symbolism will be able to interpret this conception according to true hermetics. A magician knows that an angel has no wings in the literal sense of the word and will see the analogy in these wings: the wings are an analogy to the birds who move about freely in the air above us. The wings are the symbol of what is superior to us, the symbol of agility, liberty, freedom and at the same time the principle of floating above us in the air, the element which is lightest and penetrates everything. The negative beings or demons are usually symbolized by animals with horns and tails, or by creatures that are half human and half animal. Their symbolism, on the contrary, stands for the opposite of what is good: the inferior, incomplete, defective, etc. The question of whether these beings, positive or negative, in their own spheres actually have the shapes attri buted to them by men, and meet each other in these shapes, may be left undecided to the non-initiate. The magician who is capable of visiting these zones by mental and astral travelling and who is able to influence himself with the vibration of these zones so that for the time of his stay he is like an inhabitant of the respective sphere, will have found out that this is not so. Without losing his individuality, he will find quite different .shapes there, which cannot be expressed by words. He will not find personified beings and their leaders there, but powers and vibrations that are analogous to the names and qualities. If he tried to concretise, from his individual point of view, one of these powers, or give it a shape according to his power of understanding, that power would appear in to him in a shape equivalent to his power of symbolic comprehension, no matter whether positive power, alias angel, or negative power, alias demon. A magician working with beings will make the beings perform the causes in that zone in which he exercises his influence. The work of a quabbalist is different. The latter places himself, with his spirit, into the zone in which a certain cause and effect is intended. Though he, too, masters the laws of the zone, he does not need the interposition of the beings for his purposes, but does everything by himself with the help of the quabbalistic word. There will be more about in my next work "The Key to the True Quabbalah".
  The principles of the quabbalist's work are quite different. The magician, however, in his present state of development, cannot, for the time being, do otherwise than go on making use of beings up to the point where he has reached a higher degree of development. Each quabbalist must first have become a magician, in order to be able to work differently and more advantageous by later.
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  If a being of another zone wishes to enter the earth-zone or our physical world because Divine Providence has ordered it to do so or because it is its personal desire, no matter whether in a mental, astral or physical way, then such a being or head, irrelevant of its rank, must take on the shape appropriate to the qualities of the sphere from which it comes. An angel, for instance, who has love as its main quality, will appear as a perfect beauty; a being whose qualities are severity and strictness will have to appear in the shape appropriate to these qualities. It is exactly the same with beings of negative qualities: depending on the negative qualities they represent, they will have to take on, when appearing in the earthzone or on our physical earth, the shapes which symbolize these qualities. The appearing shapes of these beings, no matter whether good or evil or from whatever zone they come, will enable the magician who is well acquainted with symbolism to tell their qualities. The qualities of a being, its appearance and symbolic representation, is fully appropriate to its name, and according to the Law of Analogy, so that even a being of the highest rank is not able to give itself a name unsuitable to its qualities.
  The magician, especially if acquainted with quabbalah, is capable of thoroughly checking the analogies according to the law of analogy and of determining whether the assertion of a being is true or not. No being, not even the worst and most deceitful type, will ever dare to tell the genuine magician a name which it does not really possess, and it will never dare to appear in a shape other than the one corresponding to its qualities. The genuine magician, however, is naturally free to order the being who has appeared in its true shape to change its shape into one desired by him. He will always be obeyed by the being concerned, for the genuine magician, as repeatedly stated before, is a perfect authority, is a God-man.
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  The magician might also be interested to learn how a being of another zone is able to bring about the desired effect in our physical world, be it mentally, astrally or physically. Since the will and desire of the magician is analogous to the qualities of the zones which he is dealing with, the commissioned being prepares the causes necessary for the effect in the world of causes of its own zone with the help of the electric and magnetic fluid, similar to the procedure of volting, as described in "Initiation into
  Hermetics", or directly by word-power (cosmic language) and leads it through the world of causes of the relevant zone into the world of causes of the earth-zone, condensed by imagination, and from here, depending on the kind of effect it should cause, into the mental, astral or physical sphere. This is the actual procedure in respect of the beings capable of making their influence work from their zone into our sphere. A spirit being, however, is not able to do anything on its own accord or by its own will to influence our sphere. Only the strict order of a magician given with his absolute authority enables a being to influence our sphere effectively from its zone; by doing so the being cannot be made responsible for anything; every responsibility lies with the magician. To make it yet clearer: the work done by a being is the same kind of work which a servant does for his master.
  Of course, a true magician will never dare ask a being, especially a negative being, to do things causing negative effects, for although he has become the master of life and death, the master of the laws, Divine Providence still controls him, and he would have to atone immensely for evil deeds which he could not account for.
  One might now ask why a magician uses an elemental, elementary, astral or physical being mentally, astrally or physically, for his operations in our world or sphere, or in another sphere, and why he does not prefer to work with the power he has himself acquired and so to cause the desired magical effect. He is, in fact, able to cause certain effects when operating in the mental sphere by elementals or volts, that is by electromagnetic fluids, and he is also able to generate a certain physical power by various operations with elementaries and to bring about in this way some physical effect. The difference in the procedure lies in the fact that the powers, beings, elementals, elementaries etc. generated by him cannot operate independently, since they possess no intellect; the beings of any other zone, however, are, because they are intelligent creatures, able to carry out jobs for which a certain degree of intelligence is necessary. In those cases where a magician can do without any such being in obtaining his goal, he will naturally desist from employing a being from another zone to fulfill his purposes. He will, above all, evoke beings in case 1. he wants do demonstrate his authority over the beings and 2. in order to get full information on the zones from which the beings come.
  Every experienced magician who leaves the physical world either with his mental or with his astral body to visit the various spheres of the earth-zone, or even to visit other zones, will realize that the beings of all zones, irrespective of their qualities and faculties, speak a universal language, called "metaphoricallanguage", i. e. the language of imagination. This is the reason why all beings can make themselves understood by another. Any average person may moreover experience this the moment he leaves his physical body, for he is then able to converse with any person amongst the dead, no matter to which nation he may have belonged before. If a magician whishes to say something in a sphere lying outside our physical world, that is if he wants to form ideas there, he will also do that by way of mouth, but no sounds will come out of his mouth; in place of sound vibrations pictures manifest themselves which then can be perceived by any being.
  If, however, a spirit being is embodied in our physical world, that is if it has left its zone to get adequately condensed in order to be visible and audible, then this metaphorical language is at once translated into the language the magician knows. This means that should a magician call, by condensation, from the earth-zone into the physical world, a person who before his death was of Chinese, Indian or any other nationality, he will find that such a spirit has a perfect comm and of the language the magician himself speaks. A religious person will remember that the apostles and disciples of Christ who, after the death of the
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  "filled with the Holy Ghost" clearly means that the apostles, the disciples of Christ, were, by the enlightment of the Holy Ghost, at that moment in the astral world and therefore able to translate the metaphorical language into any other desired language. This is no miracle, for it lies in the faculties of every being. Every person who has some idea about hermetics will know that the metaphorical language is the language of the universe, and that the ancient peoples made abundant use of this metaphorical or cosmic language. The hieroglyphs of the old Egyptians are a striking example for this fact. That the words expressed by the metaphorical language had a strong magic effect, cannot be doubted. And it is not without purpose that the people of the
  Orient and others made so much use of the metaphorical language, for within the borders of their countries stood the cradle of all hermetic sciences.

1.15 - Truth, #Initiation Into Hermetics, #Franz Bardon, #Occultism
  Let us now leave the microcosm, I mean to say, man with his earthly, astral and mental bodies, and turn to other problems which also are imminent to be solved by the incipient adept. First of all, there is the problem of truth. A great many philosophers have already paid serious attention to this problem, and we also will have to approach this task.
  We shall deal here only with such kinds of truth about which we must be thoroughly informed. Truth depends on the insight of each individual. And as we cannot all have the same insight or perception, it is impossible to generalize the problem of truth.
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  There is a wide difference between knowledge and wisdom and it is much easier to win knowledge than wisdom. Wisdom depends, not in the least, on knowledge, although both are identical up to a certain degree. The source of wisdom is in God, that is to say, in the causal principle (the akasa) on all planes of the material, astral, and mental worlds. Therefore wisdom does not depend on mind and memory but on the maturity, purity and perfection of the individual personality. Wisdom could also be considered as a developmental stage of the ego. Therefore, insights are not passed on thought the mind, but and this particularly through intuition or inspiration. The degree of wisdom is therefore determined by the state of development of the individual.
  This will not mean, of course, that we ought to neglect knowledge; on the contrary, knowledge and wisdom must go hand in hand. The adept will therefore endeavour to get on in knowledge as well as in wisdom, for neither of the two must lag behind in development.

1.16 - Advantages and Disadvantages of Evocational Magic, #The Practice of Magical Evocation, #Franz Bardon, #Occultism
  If a necromancer or sorcerer has a relatively high power of imagination and is able partially to raise up his consciousness, it may happen that, by using magic though barbarous names, he succeeds in having one of his evocations translated into the language of the being and the being he is evoking hears his voice. The next question to arise is whether the being reacts to the evocation and intends to do what the sorcerer wants him to do. For the being at once realizes whether the sorcerer is mature enough and developed enough to be able to exercise coercion or whether it can go easily in opposition. If a positive, good being is involved, it will pity the sorcerer. If the sorcerer has evoked an indifferent and less active being and if the sorcerer's desire, if it were realised, would not harm him, it might, now and then, give a token of sympathy and do what the sorcerer wants done. But if the sorcerer desires anything that might harm him or any other person without being able to take the full responsibility for this, then the being will not react to the sorcerer's evocation. All means of coercion mentioned in various books for the sorcerer's use in order to have the beings to work for him are ineffectual and but mere phrases with only a slight or no effect at all on astral beings. Negative beings, on the other hand, prefer to react to negative and evil intentions and try to help the sorcerer in their realization. But a head of demons also knows quite well that he need not do what the sorcerer wants, if the sorcerer desires something which would debit him too much karmically or which he could not take responsibility for from the karmic point of view. In such a case not even a demon would dare to fulfill the sorcerer's wish, for this being, even though it be a negative one, depends on Divine Providence. It cannot, on its own accord, create vibrations which would cause a chaotic tate in the harmony of a sphere. Therefore it is necessary to point out again and again that a certain degree of magical development and perfection is absolutely necessary for the evocation of the beings of any sphere and in order to be able to place one's consciousness into the relevant sphere or zone and to translate one's thoughts into the metaphorical language or cosmic language so that a being understands them.
  With these points in mind the magician will realize the true value of the book of charms which he has started for his personal use, and that the book actually is a language book of the cosmic language in which he will enter all the procedures of his art of magical evocation translated into symbolic picture-language. A necromancer or sorcerer working according to the worst rituals and carrying out the most barbarous invocations and evocations is by no means able to practise invocations in a systematic order, that is, to start a conversation with the being concerned, not to mention the authority he should be able to represent, for he is lacking the necessary magical maturity and perfection. A necromancer might, at the most, put himself into an ecstatic state during his operations, which is not more than a cry into the zone in question, even if his citations are most terrifying and appear to him very promising.
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  The head, with whom the contract has been made, usually employs a deceased sorcerer as a messenger to the astral, mental or physical sphere of the earth-zone where he has to carry out commissions for his master, corresponding to the negative sphere of that being. Such a head likes to get into connection with a sorcerer because the latter has been created as the image of God and therefore has four poles and consequently many more possibilities than the being itself. In most cases the head's servant, in this case a human being, is made into a spiritus familiaris or factotum and put at the disposal of other similar sorcerers. In the function of a spiritus familiaris the sorcerer then is given all the power the head itself possesses, since from that moment he is deputizing for the being. The transfer of power upon the sorcerer is effected either by an Ankhur from the head or the principal of demons or by influencing him with zone power so that he can either bring about the ordered effects by himself and secure the results wanted, or he is supplied with other servants to help him carry out his commissions. But whether such servants are true inhabitants of the zone and, as such, mere subordinates of their masters, or whether they really are victims as described above, is difficult to determine, for such beings are not allowed to tell anybody anything about themselves. It is also possible that unwanted phases in the memory or consciousness of such spirits have been deleted, either by a magic spell or other practices. And so the sorcerer, in spite of the qualities he has on account of his four-pole nature, becomes dependent on the head's sphere, that is on his master's sphere, and that prevents him from freeing himself of the ties with his head and from living his own life. He becomes a will-less instrument of the head and must do everything the latter wants.
  After having sealed the contract or pact the sorcerer cannot do any work for weeks or months. During this time he is taught by his head various practices and is initiated into the use of his powers. The sealing of such a pact is actually not much different from what is stated in the grimoires or magic books. There is, however, a little difference hardly known to anybody: the pact itself is not compiled by the spirit being, but is, in fact, drawn up and written by the sorcerer himself, like the book of charms. The text of the pact is written down in ordinary ink. Special ink, however, may be used for this purpose, depending on the rituals applied, but this is not so important. The contract clearly states what services have to be rendered by the being which wishes it will fulfill, which possibilities are given the sorcerer with this pact, including other conditions which must be fulfilled by the being on behalf of the sorcerer. On another page of the contract the duties are laid down which, on the one hand, the sorcerer must carry out for the being and which, on the other hand, the being orders itself to carry out. It further states in which manner the head can be called and whether it has to appear visibly or invisibly; how servants, put at the sorcerer's disposal, have to be treated, etc. The most important point is the period for which the contract is valid and that after the expiration date of the contract the sorcerer is obliged to travel to the sphere of the demon. Also the way in which the sorcerer will die in the physical world and how he will move over into the sphere of the head is fixed by contract. All points and conditioned are agreed to by both parties, and the being usually signs the contract by its own seal, using the sorcerer's hand as a medium, and the mutual agreement is countersigned. It is also quite possible that the being asks for, or insists on, the sorcerer's signing the contract with his own blood.
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  The restoration of the harmony in a body destroyed by such diseases would take much effort. At the moment the linking thread between body, soul and spirit rends and the life-matrix is interrupted, the being gets hold of the human body and is able to build up a new thread between itself and the human body by doing what I have already described in "Initiation into Hermetics", that is by employing the light fluid. It is quite clear that the being - before uniting itself with the physical body - must form its astral body according to the shape and size of the human body concerned, using for this purpose the matter of the elements, in order to get into a harmonious unity of the two lifethreads: the mental and astral matrix.
  The being who has taken possession of a human body in the described way becomes itself a human being in a borrowed body.
  The relatives and onlookers form the opinion that the dying person after having been in agony has come to life again as if by miracle and finally recovered from the disease. This is how the relatives and those persons, who are not able to observe by clairvoyance the leaving of the astral body from the physical body, look on the event. Since the being possesses a miraculous degree of adaptibility and maintains all faculties and powers of the astral world and since it knows everything, it continues playing the role of the person who actually died, but it will try to disappear from the surroundings of the relatives of the deceased person and to get into contact with the sorcerer without attracting attention. The being keeps all its abilities of its former sphere in the new body and puts itself at the disposal of the sorcerer. With the exception of a true magician nobody will ever find out the true facts and nobody will find anything suspicious in two friends or a boy friend and girl friend meeting each other, and the people around the two will never find out about the true relations of the two.
  The services which the being may render the sorcerer during his physical existence are exactly the same as if the sorcerer had got into contact with another being of that sphere. If the sorcerer wants to have his influence work on the astral or mental world via this being, then the latter puts itself into a state of trance und so can fulfill the sorcerer's wishes.
  The question of carnal contact is usually discussed at the moment of the first citation or meeting with the sorcerer and the sorcerer is well informed about the whole procedure. That the sorcerer must never say a word to anybody about the matter is only too clear, for otherwise he would have to pay with his life for his communicativeness.
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  Apart from spiritism there is another kind of evocation of spirits called necromancy. The difference between a sorcerer and a necromancer is the following: the sorcerer usually tries to get into contact with higher beings of the earth-zone, with the heads of the elements or with the heads of other zones; the necromancer, on the other hand, merely practices the evocation of deceased persons. The method of necromancy is quite simple and a magician who has not yet reached perfection is able to apply this method with more success than a sorcerer practicing evocations. A necromancer faces the same kind of dangers as the sorcerer since a deceased human being may also take full possession of the necromancer and make him completely dependent. If a necromancer becomes so dependent on an astral being that he cannot do anything without the advice and help of the being, then we may also talk of a sort of pact in this case, though this kind of contract may not have the same tragical consequences as the pacts dealt with before.
  The magician is able to call any being from the astral world without any danger, without becoming dependent on it and without becoming a victim of necromancy. A necromancer is a person with a low degree of spiritual and magical development, whose main object is to get into contact with astral beings of the earth-zone, preferably with dead people. The necromancer will in most cases try to make use of a being from the astral sphere, that is he will either require of such a being certain magical duties in the physical, astral or mental plane or merely try to satisfy his curiosity. For this purpose the necromancer will choose a human being after his physical death who during his life on earth busied himself with any of the secret sciences and who possibly has reached a certain degree of perfection in this. If such a person happens to be a true magician who has followed the true path of initiation and has learned all its laws here on earth, having thus acquired a certain degree of perfection, who noble-minded strove for positive aims and controlled the negative powers, he will, if he thinks it beneficial, appear to the necromancer and point out to him the advantages or disadvantages of his projects and intentions. A true magician will, however, never keep up a constant connection with a necromancer, nor will he try to influence the necromancer in such a manner that he becomes dependent on him. He will always be prepared to warn the necromancer and will give him permission to call him in case of emergency. Furthermore, he will give good advice to the necromancer and initiate him into the laws of the astral sphere, but he will never be prepared to serve the necromancer, or to do whatever he wants, or to fulfill his material desires. Only bad magicians with little experience and an affection for negative powers or mere sorcery will try to maintain a contact with a necromancer or assist him in realizing his desires and to satisfying his curiosity. If the necromancer gets into the sphere and under the control of such a being, he will acquire the same kind of vibration as that being has in the earth-zone and thus becomes a fellow-sufferer. The astral being will then prevent the necromancer from making any progress in his spiritual and magical development and will see that he is never enlightened or blessed with personal advance. The being will then be full of malicious pleasure because it has succeeded in being troublesome to a human being on earth. It remembers the days of its own life on earth, its difficulties and troubles there, the temptations it could not resist, the powers it misused and the lack of chances for its true initiation, and it will also try to hinder the necromancer in his development. The danger that arises for the necromancer in such a case need not be analysed. I will, however, mention the fact that the necromancer may easily be vampirised by such a being and that the being will try to realize in the astral world its own egocentric plans by help of the vampirised powers of the necromancer.
  Therefore every scholar is warned not to take up any such contacts and not to make himself dependent on any being. The manner in which a necromancer calls a being from the astral plane rests on two methods. One method is spiritistic: the being is asked to reveal itself by help of mediums; that is by mediumistic writing or by mediums put into a state of trance. This method requires great perseverance until the being is able to take up a direct contact and to appear to the necromancer. The other method is that of evocation: the necromancer takes up contact with the being by help of a picture of the spirit's previous incarnation or by enlivening such a picture until finally the being steps out of it like an elementary, taking on its previous shape. A necromancer does not usually succeed at once, but if he goes on with his work persistently he might, depending on his maturity, development, willpower and imagination, force the being to appear to him visibly.
  A necromancer can hardly differentiatewhe ther, in such a case, his power of imagination plays the main role, or if he has created an elementary, or if the visible connection with the being has in fact taken place. But a narrow-minded necromancer does not care who has brought about the connection or what has actually caused the disired effect, if it has been his power of imagination (phantasy), or if repeated stressing of his nerves has created an elementary or if the being evoked really has appeared from the astral world.
  Should the necromancer have a predeliction for negative powers, his evocation and his endeavours to cause a projection in the astral world will possibly be readily answered by a so-called black-magician who will himself try to get into contact with such a necromancer. All of the necromancer's appetite for instructions, practices, satisfying of his curiosity, fulfillment of his desires, will then be quenched by that being. The necromancer is responsible for all that happens and he will thus charge his Karma to his account, especially if he wants to see desires realized which he can in no way justify. That the end of such a necromancer cannot be other than tragic need not be stressed. Necromancers usually die an unnatural death or suddenly of an incurable disease.
  I should also mention the fact that there is also possible a passive relationship with beings of the astral plane and with beings of higher zones. This passive intercourse, however, is not so effective and does not give such great magical results as the practice of evocation. Also in this case an unexpected pact could be the final outcome, and the person taking up the connection by this passive intercourse is sometimes even worse off than the sorcerer or necromancer, since he has no control at allover the being with which he has taken up connection, or over the effects caused by it.
  There are two principle kinds of this passive intercourse: the first is a spiritistic one: the spiritist himself is the medium for the contact and intercourse with the being, either by medial clairvoyance, clairaudience, automatic writing etc; the second possibility for passive intercourse is that a hypnotist or a mesmerist takes up the connection with the being by means of a somnambulant medium and maintains the contact continously, for satisfaction of his curiosity or for certain tasks in the mentel, astral or physical worlds. If the hypnotist or spiritist has not undergone any magic training and if, therefore, has not the necessary degree of magical development and maturity, the health of the medium is endangered in both cases. Many mediums and spiritists who have been in constant connection with a single being and have often made use of it, so that they finally became dependent on that being - which actually results in an indirect pact - have had to pay for it with severe diseases of the mental, astral and physical body. Many a lunatic asylum could bear witness for such deplorable cases.
  All I have said above especially applies to the work of sorcerers and necromancers with negative powers and the dangers involved.

1.17 - Astral Journey Example, How to do it, How to Verify your Experience, #Magick Without Tears, #Aleister Crowley, #Philosophy
  object:1.17 - astral Journey Example, How to do it, How to Verify your Experience
  class:chapter
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  Let us suppose that you have been making an invocation, or shall we call it an investigation, and suppose you want to interpret a passage of Bach. To play this is the principal weapon of your ceremony. In the course of your operation, you assume your astral body and rise far above the terrestrial atmosphere, while the music continues softly in the background. You open your eyes, and find that it is night. Dark clouds are on the horizon; but in the zenith is a crown of constellations. This light helps you, especially as your eyes become accustomed to the gloom, to take in your surroundings. It is a bleak and barren landscape. Terrific mountains rim the world. In the midst looms a cluster of blue-black crags. Now there appears from their recesses a gigantic being. His strength, especially in his hands and in his loins, it terrifying. He suggests a combination of lion, mountain goat and serpent; and you instantly jump to the idea that this is one of the rare beings which the Greeks called Chimaera. So formidable is his appearance that you consider it prudent to assume an appropriate god-form. But who is the appropriate god? You may perhaps consider it best, in view of your complete ignorance as to who he is and where you are, to assume the god-form of Harpocrates, as being good defence in any case; but of course this will not take you very far. If you are sufficiently curious and bold, you will make up your mind rapidly on this point. This is where your daily practice of the Qabalah will come in useful. You run through in your mind the seven sacred planets. The very first of them seems quite consonant with what you have so far seen. Everything suits Saturn well enough. To be on the safe side, you go through the others; but this is a very obvious case Saturn is the only planet that agrees with everything. The only other possibility will be the Moon; but there is no trace noticeable of any of her more amiable characteristics. You will therefore make up your mind that it is a Saturnian god-form that you need. Fortunate indeed for you that you have practiced daily the assumption of such forms! Very firmly, very steadily, very slowly, very quietly, you transform your normal astral appearance into that of Sebek. The Chimaera, recognizing your divine authority, becomes less formidable and menacing in appearance. He may, in some way, indicate his willingness to serve you. Very good, so far; but it is of course the first essential to make sure of his integrity. Accordingly you begin by asking his name. This is vital; because if he tells you the truth, it gives you power over him. But if, on the other hand, he tells you a lie, he abandons for good and all his fortress. He becomes rather like a submarine whose base has been destroyed. He may do you a lot of mischief in the meantime, of course, so look out!
  Well then, he tells you that his name is Ottillia. Shall we try to spell it in Greek or in Hebrew. By the sound of the name and perhaps to some extent by his appearance one might plump for the former; but after all the Greek Qabalah is so unsatisfactory. We give Hebrew the first chance we start with Ayin Teth Yod Lamed Yod Aleph H. Let us try this lettering for a start. It adds up to 135. I daresay that you don't remember what the Sepher Sephiroth tells you about the number; but as luck will have it, there is no need to inquire; for 135 = 3 x 45. Three is the number, is the first number of Saturn, and 45 the last. (The sum of the numbers in the magic square of Saturn is 45.) That corresponds beautifully with everything you have got so far; but then of course you must know if he is "one of the beliving Jinn." Briefly, is he a friend or an enemy? You accordingly say to him "The word of the Law is " It turns out that he doesn't understand Greek at all, so you were certainly right in choosing Hebrew. You put it to him, "What is the word of the Law?" and he replies darkly. "The word of the Law is Thora." That means nothing to you; any one might know as much as that, Thora being the ordinary word for the Sacred Law of Israel, and you accordingly ask him to spell it to make sure you have heard aright; and he gives you the letters, perhaps by speaking them, perhaps by showing them: Teth, Resh, Ayin. You add these up and get 279. This again is divisible by the Saturnian 3, and the result is 93; in other words, he has been precisely right. On the plane of Saturn one may multiply by three and therefore he has given you the correct word "Thelema" in a form unfamiliar to you. You man now consider yourself satisfied of his good faith, and may proceed to inspect him more closely. The stars above his head suggest the influence of Binah, whose number also is three, while the most striking thing about him is the core of his being: the letter Yod. (One does not count the termination "AH": being a divine suffix it represents the inmost light and the outermost light.) This Yod, this spark of intense brilliance, is of the pale greenish gold which one sees (in this world) in the fine gold leaf of Tibet. It glows with ever greater intensity as you concentrate upon observing him, which you could not do while you were preoccupied with investigating his credentials.

1.17 - God, #Initiation Into Hermetics, #Franz Bardon, #Occultism
  It is evident that true initiation knows neither a mystic nor a magic path. There is only one initiation linking both conceptions, in opposition to most of the mystic and spiritual schools which are dealing with the very highest problems, through meditation or other spiritual exercises, without having gone through the first steps at first. This would be very similar to somebody starting with the university studies without having gone through the elementary classes first. The results of such a onesided training, in some cases, are disastrous, sometimes even drastic, according to the individual talents. Generally the error is to be found in the fact that most of the matter comes from the Orient, where the material as well as the astral world is regarded as maya (illusion), and consequently little attention is paid to it. It is impossible to point out the details, for this would overstep the frame of this book. Sticking to a carefully planned, step-by-step development, there will be neither a mishap nor a failure nor bad consequences, for the simple reason that ripening takes place slowly but surely. It is quite an individual matter whether the adept will choose as his idea of God, Christ, Buddha, Brahma, Allah, or someone else. All depends on the idea, in the initiation.
  The pure mystic wishes to approach his God only in the all-embracing love. The yogi, too, walks toward one single aspect of God. The bhakti- yogi keeps to the road of love and devotion, the raja and hatha yogi choose the path of self-control or volition, the jnana yogi will follow that of wisdom and cognition.

1.18 - Asceticism, #Initiation Into Hermetics, #Franz Bardon, #Occultism
  In the interest of his mago-mystic development, the magician must be moderate in eating and drinking, and observe a reasonable mode of life. It is impossible to fix precise rules or prescriptions, the magic way of life being quite individual. Each and all must know best what agrees or disagrees with them. It is a sacred duty to keep the balance everywhere. There are three kinds of asceticism: (1), intellectual or mental asceticism, (2) psychic or astral asceticism, 93) physical or material asceticism. The first kind has to do with the discipline of thoughts, the second kind is engaged in ennobling the soul through control of passions and instincts, and the third kind is concerned with harmonizing the body through a moderate and natural way of life.
  Without these three kinds of asceticism, which must be developed at the same tie and parallel to each other, a correct magical rise is unthinkable. To avoid any one-sided development, none of the three kinds may be neglected, and none of them may prevail. Further information about how to accomplish this task will be given in the practical training course of this book.
  Before bringing the theoretical part to an end which has illustrated the principles, I advise everybody that this part should not only be read, but must become the mental possession of the concerned person by means of intense reflection and meditation. He who is going to be a magician will recognize that life is dependent on the work of the elements in the various planes and spheres. It is to be seen in great and in small things, in the microcosm as well as in the macrocosm, temporarily and eternally, everywhere there are powers in action. Starting from this point of cognition, you will find that there is no death at all, in the true sense of the word, but everything goes on living, transmuting and becoming perfect according to primitive laws. Therefore a magician is not afraid of death, for he believes the physical death to be only a transition to a subtler sphere, the astral plane, and from there to the spiritual level, and so on. Consequently he will not believe in heaven nor in hell. The priests of the various religions stick to these fancies solely to keep their kids to the point. Their moralizing serves only to provoke fear of the hell or the purgatory and to promise heaven to morally good people. Average people, as far as they are religiously inclined, are favorably influenced by such a point of view for, from fear of hell, they will try to be good.
  But as for the magician, he sees the purpose of the moral laws in ennobling the mind and the soul, for it is in an ennobled soul only that the universal powers can do their work, especially if body, mind and soul have been equally trained and developed.

1.18 - Evocation, #The Practice of Magical Evocation, #Franz Bardon, #Occultism
  I shall give - from the hermetic point of view - a full description of everything absolutely necessary for a successful evocation, i. e. the actual magical connection with beings of any sphere. Above all, the magician or the person intending to busy himself with magical evocation should know that without the development of one's astral senses, especially those of clairvoyance and clairaudience, a successful evocation cannot be thought of. It would be the same as if a blind man wanted to follow an unknown street without a guide. Clairvoyance and clairaudience is the first condition for consciously getting into contact with a being by the help of active magic. If the magician does not care for this condition, or if a person dares to try an evocation without having his astral senses trained accordingly, he can be sure that he will, like all other operators, be disappointed and have no success at all. At the same time he is in danger of being degraded to a necromancer or sorcerer if, during an exalted state, he should have any partial success of whatever sort, regardless of the fact that his plans and intentions rest on good motives.
  The magician must, under all conditions, be able to make use of his astral senses during his operation, because then he is able to control exactly the whole procedure and is not in danger of being deceived or of working without success. A magician whose astral senses are well developed knows at once whether the being involved is merely a creation of imagination or whether it is the being he wanted to appear from a certain sphere. An evocation, from the hermetic point of view, is therefore the conscious getting into contact with a certain being, not effected by passive intercourse - as described in "Initiation into Hermetics" in the chapter dealing with the conscious passive connection with beings - the magician being used as a medium, but outside of his body.
  The being or power of any sphere which is to be evoked outside the body of the magician, may either be called into the magic triangle, or the magic mirror, or onto a material impregnated with a fluid condenser to be condensed there. At the beginning the magician will not be able to do without the magic implements. Later, as soon as he has enough experience and as soon as he has a certain sphere under his complete control, i. e. as soon as the beings of that sphere are fully under his power, pay him obedience and loyalty and, by that, acknowledge his magical authority, he can do without magical aids. The experienced magician then is in the position to call any being of the sphere he has under his power and to work with it, without using magical aids.
  --
  A genuine magician will not experience any unwanted accompanying phenomena, and his evocations will run as smoothly as if he were carrying out any other physical, astral or spiritual actions. In the beginning a magician will do well not to ask a being too many questions, but to address it with only a few concrete questions. They should refer to the sphere from which the being has come. No questions should be asked that would infringe upon the dignity of the being. At a later date a being, an intelligence, a head or the servants set at the magician's disposal, may be asked to play an active part; they need not be used for the conveyance of knowledge only. The beings, in general, like to serve a genuine magician and help him in an unselfish manner as much as lies in their power. A magician certainly will never be so silly as to ask a spirit being to bring him treasures or to do for him heavy physical work, since the effect of the being's display of power in our physical world depends on the fuel (i. e. the material used for its materialisation) that the magician puts at its disposal.
  At first the beings will only be able to do mental work. Later, when the magician has enough experience, they will do astral and after some time also physical work for him, though the magician is recommended not to burden a spirit being with physical jobs, for it would have to carry out such duties in exactly the same manner as the magician with his acquired magic faculties. The beings make use of the same powers that are used by the magician for his personal operations. This means that to do physical work they need the fluids of elements, i. e. the electrical or magnetic fluid, and take into account the Akasha-principle, just as the magician himself. The beings usually draw the matter or substance and the power out of the atmosphere of the magician. Therefore a magician should always bear in mind that every evocation is done at his own cost. This is reason enough for the magician not to carry out an evocation for the mere satisfaction of other people's curiosity, and he will, as already mentioned, practise an evocation first of all to help his fellow-men, or to increase his power over beings and elements and so acquire more personal experience.
  For the actual evocation of beings no spells or similar nonsense is necessary. Since, during the whole time of the evocation, the magician is in an elevated state, in a true relationship with God, he places himself with his consciousness into the sphere of the chosen being and, after having called out its name, asks the being to appear to him. The being hears the magician, at once reacts to his call, and quite willingly comes near him. A true magician will never be obliged to threaten a being or do anything of that sort in order to make the being obedient to his will. This may only happen with stubborn demons to whom the magician demonstrates the power of his relationship to God. In the case of a true relationship to God, hardly any being, no matter what rank it may have, will ever dare to place itself in opposition to the divinity, for the divinity is the power by which the being was created, and therefore it must be respected.

1.19 - The Practice of Magical Evocation, #The Practice of Magical Evocation, #Franz Bardon, #Occultism
  You follow the same procedure when re-drawing the triangle, which represents the three dimensional world, i. e. the mental, astral and physical world. In order that the intelligence you intend to evoke should appear not only in its mental, but also in its astral and physical shape, you must include this wish when you concentrate on your meditative attitude towards the triangle.
  Your imagination at the moment of drawing (i. e. re-drawing) the magic triangle is as important and essential as the drawing (i. e. redrawing) of the magic circle. The magician determines the shape and the range of effectivity of the intelligence that is to appear. If he omits this, Hagiel will only appear to him in her mental shape and will consequently, only be present in the magician's mind.
  --
  Hagiel is already in your astral atmosphere, that she is already present in your room. If your operations have been successfully carried on up to this moment where Hagiel has come to your place of working, above the seal, then call in an undertone, or even aloud, that Hagiel should appear to you physically. At the moment of transition from the astral to the physical world never forget to convince yourself of the three forms of existence of your personality, so that you feel yourself allied to the astral body as a spirit and that you are with both these bodies at the same time in your physical body. This act of self-control is to help the being to follow the course of your thoughts and to betake itself from its own sphere into the sphere which you have prepared for it in your room. This means that the being appears in its mental and astral shape and that, depending on your power to materialize, it also assumes a physically condensed body.
  You can now see and hear Hagiel in your magic triangle, or, if you have appropriately prepared your magic mirror for the appearance of this intelligence, Hagiel will appear in the mirror in accordance with her symbolic lay-out of the qualities of the

1.200-1.224 Talks, #Talks, #Sri Ramana Maharshi, #Hinduism
  D.: The spirit-body is the astral body then?
  M.: The intellect is the astral body now.
  D.: How can it be?
  M.: Why not? You seem to think that the intellect cannot be limited like a body. It is only an aggregate of certain factors. What else is the astral body?
  D.: But intellect is a sheath?

1.23 - Improvising a Temple, #Magick Without Tears, #Aleister Crowley, #Philosophy
  This means that your manoeuvres have somehow attracted the notice of the astral Plane: your new neighbours (May I call them?) are taking an interest in the latest Tenderfoot, some to welcome, to do all they can to help you to settle down, others indignant or apprehensive at this disturbance of routine. This is where your Banishings and Invocations come to the rescue. Of course, I am not here referring to the approach to Sanctuaries which of necessity are closely guarded, but merely to the recognition of a new-comer to that part of the world in general.
  Of course all these miracles are very naughty of you; they mean that your magical power has sprung a few small leaks; at least, the water is oozing between some planks not sealed as Hermetically as they should be. But oh and this is naughtier still it is a blessed, blessed comfort that they happen, that chance, coincidence and all the rest will simply not explain it all away, that your new vision of life is not a dream, but part and parcel of Experience for evermore, a real as any other manifestation of Reality through sense such as is common to all men.

1.25 - Fascinations, Invisibility, Levitation, Transmutations, Kinks in Time, #Magick Without Tears, #Aleister Crowley, #Philosophy
  The only experience I have of anything of this sort was when I was in Pacific waters, mostly at Honolulu or in Nippon. I was practising astral projection. A sister of the Order who lived in Hong Kong helped me. I was to visit her, and the token of perfect success was to be that I should knock a vase off the mantel-piece. We appointed certain days and hours with some awkwardness, as my time-distance from her was constantly growing shorter for me to pay my visit. We got some remarkable results; our records of the interview used to tally with surprising accuracy; but the vase remained intact!
  This is not one of my notorious digressions; and this is how transmutation comes into it. I found that by first taking the shape of a golden hawk, and resuming my own form after landing in her "temple" a room she had fitted ad hoc the whole operation became incomparably easier. I shall not indulge in hypotheses of why this should have been the case.

1.37 - Death - Fear - Magical Memory, #Magick Without Tears, #Aleister Crowley, #Philosophy
  There is one exception. I do remember the _first_, almost momentary, reaction. I am in my astral Form, in my best Sunday-go-to-meeting Ceremonial Vestments, and with my Wand I seem to hold this raised, attaching great importance to the act looking down upon the corpse, exactly as one does at the outset of an " astral Journey" in one's days of learning how to do it.
  I recall no impression at all made by this sight; neither regret nor relief nor even surprise.

1.51 - How to Recognise Masters, Angels, etc., and how they Work, #Magick Without Tears, #Aleister Crowley, #Philosophy
  I have been thinking over what I wrote in my last letter with regard to the verification of appearances in the astral Plane.[99]
  I did not mention a parallel question of even greater immediate practical importance: that of one's relations with astral or discarnate intelligences or with Those whom we call "The Masters" or "The Gods": the messages of gestures which reach us through the normal physical channels. The importance is that they actually determine one's line of conduct in critical situations.
  It seemed therefore a good idea to give you three examples from The Spirit of Solitude:[100] and here they are!

1.57 - Beings I have Seen with my Physical Eye, #Magick Without Tears, #Aleister Crowley, #Philosophy
  I give prominence to this phenomenon because what we saw, little and unsatisfactory as it was, appeared to our normal physical sight. I learned later that there is a kind of sight half-way between that and the astral. In a "regular" astral vision one sees better when the eyes are shut; with this intermediate instrument, to close them would be as completely annihilating as if the vision were an ordinary object of sight.
  It seems, too, as if I had picked up something of the sort as an aftereffect of the Evocation of Buer a Mercurial demon; for phenomena of one sort or another were simple showered on me from this moment, pari passu with my constantly improving technique in regular " astral visions." Sometimes I was quite blind, as compared with Frater V.N.; for when the circles was broken one nightsee the whole story in my Autohagiography he saw and identified dozens and scores of Abramelin demons as they marched widdershins around my library, while all I saw of them was a procession of "half-formed faces" moving shadowy through the dimly-lit room.
  --
  And I've never been able to see any more. This, however, it is a positive duty to tell you. One can acquire the power of seeing, with this kind of sight that is neither wholly normal nor wholly astral, all the natural inhabitants of the various places that one reaches in one's travels; one can make intimate contact with individual "elementals" as closely as one can with human beings or animals, although the relation is rarely continuous or permanent.
  The conditions of such intercourse are complex: (a) one must have the necessary degree of initiation, magical efficiency, and natural ability; (b) one must be at the time in the appropriate magical state, or mood; (c) both parties must desire to make the contact, or else one must be lawfully the superior, a master and slave relationship, (d) the magical conditions at the time must be suitable and propitious; e.g., one would not make love to a salamandrine during a sandstorm. Of course, like all operations, any such efforts must be justified by their consoance with one's True Will.

1.58 - Do Angels Ever Cut Themselves Shaving?, #Magick Without Tears, #Aleister Crowley, #Philosophy
  It seems to me much simpler to say that these Angels are "real" individuals, although living in a world of whose laws we have no conception; and that, in order to communicate with us, they make use of the symbolic forms appropriate; employ, in short, the language of the astral Plane.
  After all, it's only fair; for that is precisely what we do to them when we invoke them.

1.60 - Knack, #Magick Without Tears, #Aleister Crowley, #Philosophy
  The point you raise in particular as baffling them is the getting on to the astral plane. It is not much good explaining why the failure occurs, or at what point it occurs; the only thing that is any use is for the pupil to go on and on and on eternally. He must find out for himself where the snag is, and he must continue his experiment until he acquires the knack.
  All this should be perfectly obvious; the same sort of thing applies to every kind of game which you know. There is a particular knack for instance in putting. It is not that your calculations are wrong, it is not that your stance is wrong, it is not that your grip is wrong, it is that for some reason or other you fail to co-ordinate all these various factors in the problem; and sooner or later the moment comes when it appears to you quite natural to succeed in getting out of the body, or in opening the eyes on the astral plane, or in getting hold of the particular form of elemental energy which has until that moment escaped you.
  I have mentioned the question of astral journeys because that is one which in your experience, as indeed it has been in mine, is the one that most frequently occurs.
  I do not know why it is that people should get so easily discouraged as they do. I can only suggest that it is because they are touching so sensitive a spot in their spiritual and magical organisation that it upsets them; they feel as if they were completely hopeless in a much more serious way than if it was a matter of learning some trick in some such game as chess or billiards.
  --
  In Yoga practices one does not, at least as far as my experience goes, come against the delicacy that one does in all magical and astral practices. The reason for what is, I think, quite obvious. All the Yoga practices are ultimately of the protective type, whereas with magical and astral practices one is exposing oneself to the contact of exterior (or apparently exterior) forces. In neither case however is there any sort of reason at all for discouragement; and as I said above the cure in all cases is apparently the same.
  In one way or another the veil is rent, the pupil becomes the master, and the reason for that is really rather beyond my analysis so far as that has gone at present. I do not know whether it is some kind of awakening of some faculty of the magical self, though that seems to me the simplest and most probable explanation; but in any case there is no doubt about the nature of the experience, and there can be no difficulty about the recognition of it when it occurs.

1.61 - Power and Authority, #Magick Without Tears, #Aleister Crowley, #Philosophy
  Another thing is that the business of teaching itself is a very tricky one; even such simple matters as travelling on the astral plane are not to be attained by any amount of teaching unless the pupil has both the capacity and the energy as well as the theoretical and intellectual ability to carry out successfully the practices. (I have already said a good deal about this in my letter on Knack.)
  I have thought it most important that you should impress upon everybody these points. It is absolutely pitiful to watch the vain struggle of the incompetent; they are so earnest, so sincere, so worthy in every way of every possible reward and yet they seem unable to advance a single step.

1.63 - Fear, a Bad Astral Vision, #Magick Without Tears, #Aleister Crowley, #Philosophy
  object:1.63 - Fear, a Bad astral Vision
  class:chapter
  --
  Fear, a Bad astral Vision
  Cara Soror,
  --
  Alas! I fear me much this was no astral journey at all; it reads like weak imagination tinged by desire. All you got of interest was the answer to your question: and that you should have gripped, made more precise, analysed, interpreted. Dear me, no!
  Final shot: my instinct is all against the "lying in bed." These visions are intensely active: the hardest kind of work. Read Liber CDXVIII, 2nd Aethyr (and others) to understand the appalling physical strain, when you reach remote, well-guarded, and exalted confines of the Universe.
  --
  Of course, there are other Gods, notably Pan. (I must ask you to set my Hymn to Pan to music). But I doubt if any of these are what you want. Probably the most practical plan would be to make a musical conjuration of Sol: use this as your invocation when you go on the astral Plane: there find a suitable guide to the proper authority and so on!
  And that, dear Sister, for to-night will be exactly and precisely that!

1.66 - Vampires, #Magick Without Tears, #Aleister Crowley, #Philosophy
  In the same strain, he pointed out that for an angel to have practicable wings as in Mediaeval pictures, the breast-bone would have to stand out some five feet in front of the body. (The poor fellow, of course, was densely ignorant of the mechanics of the astral Plane. I am, for once, "on the side of the angels.")*[AC49]
  Am I digressing again? No, not really; I am just putting forward a case for keeping an open mind on the subject of Vampires, even of the Clan Dracula.

1.68 - The God-Letters, #Magick Without Tears, #Aleister Crowley, #Philosophy
  With all due caution, therefore, let us attack our puzzle from the other end; let us see what astral experiment tells us about the philology of it!
  Good! We'll call it D-Day and drop our paratroops. D is a sharp, sudden, forceful explosive sound, cut off smartly. Now then I can't tell whether you will connect this with ejaculation, with the idea of paternity. Whether or no, a vast number of people did so in the dawn of speech. Even to-day children seem instinctively to say "Dad" for "Father," though no allowance can be made for cases of mistaken identity. And the most ancient Father-Gods of the oldest and simplest civilizations are thus named. In Sumer He was AD, or ADAD, whence the later Egyptian Hadit, and the Semitic Adonai. (There are also words like AVD, the creative Magick). So also the Greeks in Syria knew Adonis, and the Latin Deus is itself the general word for God. Again, Valhalla houses Odin, Woden; and there are others. When the dental is complicated to a sibilant, as we shall see later, another idea is introduced; while the lightening of the sound to T has yet another effect.

1.71 - Morality 2, #Magick Without Tears, #Aleister Crowley, #Philosophy
  You are not "stuck." You can use your astral Body well enough: too well, in one way. But I think you need a few more journeys with me: you ought to get on to the stage where the vision results from a definite invocation.
  Do please forget all these vague statements about the "clarification of one's dream-life" (meaning what?) and "shadow-thinking" (meaning what?) These speculations are idle, and idleness is poison. In your very next paragraph you give the whole show away! "Artistically it appeals to me but not spiritually." You have been spiritually poisoned.

1.83 - Epistola Ultima, #Magick Without Tears, #Aleister Crowley, #Philosophy
  The aspiring Magician only analyses himself for the purpose of finding new worlds to conquer. His first objective is the astral plane; its discovery, the classification of its tenants, and their control.
  All his early practises therefore are devoted to exploring the worlds which surround (if you choose, or if your prefer are contained in) the object of sense. If there is a tree in your garden, you want to find out whether that tree is occupied by a nymph or a nat, and if so, what are they like? How do they act? How can you make them useful to your purpose? It is in fact the ordinary every-day scientific method of exploration. The only difference is that in the course of one's experiments one becomes aware of parts of the nature of the object to be examined which are subtler and perhaps more powerful, nearer to reality, than those which ordinary scientific examination discloses. You will notice, however, that the qualities above-mentioned are identical. The chemical elements which go to form a tree are subtler, more powerful and nearer to reality than the tree as it is presented to the senses.
  --
  The first step is the separation of (what we call, for convenience) the astral body from the physical body. As our experiments proceed, we find that our astral body itself can be divided into grosser and subtler components. In this way we become aware of the existence of what we call, for convenience, the Holy Guardian Angel, and the more we realise the implications of the theory of the existence of such a being, the clearer it becomes that our supreme task is to put ourselves into intimate communication with him.
  For one thing, we shall find that in the object of sense which we examine there are elements which resist our examination. We must raise ourselves to a plane in which we obtain complete control of such.

1f.lovecraft - The Electric Executioner, #Lovecraft - Poems, #unset, #Zen
   others talk of astral projection of some sort. My zeal to catch
   Feldon certainly sent my thoughts ahead toward him, and with all his

1.whitman - As I Sat Alone By Blue Ontarios Shores, #Whitman - Poems, #unset, #Zen
   No more of soft astral, but dazzling and fierce,
   With war's flames, and the lambent lightnings playing,

2.07 - On Congress and Politics, #Evening Talks With Sri Aurobindo, #unset, #Zen
   Now, if a voice, or a spirit, comes to you and says that it is so and so, it does not, in the least, mean that it is that man. Any spirit from that plane can come and appear as that man. Europeans can't believe that a being on the subtle planes can have knowledge of things by means which are quite different from those we have to use. It can know many things. Not only that, it can catch hold of the astral body and the nervous form of the individual and appear before you. But that would not prove that it is that man. You can even take its photograph perhaps. But that is not the astral or the subtle body. It is the body just behind the physical that you see.
   But Europeans are mere children in these things. They take the laws of this plane and try to apply them to the subtle planes. Col. Wedgewood, when he came here, could not understand anything when someone told him that I was doing spiritual work. He asked: "What is spirituality?" But in spite of an explanation he could not understand what spirituality is. If Europeans had to pass through the experience of the stone-throwing incident which occurred in 41 Rue Franois Martin [the Guest House], they would at once take the incident as a proof of some spirit throwing it. In fact, it only proves that "stones fell" and that "they were thrown by some agency without the use of physical means". That is all you can say. It is a matter of experience; one has oneself to enter into these planes and find out the laws obtaining there. There are so many possibilities and you have yet to find out which is the fact in a particular case.

2.07 - The Cup, #Liber ABA, #Aleister Crowley, #Philosophy
  17:This cup (crescent, sphere, cone) represents the three principles of the Moon, the Sun, and Fire, the three principles which, according to the Hindus, have course in the body. footnote: These "principles" are seen by the pupil when first he succeeds in stilling his mind. That one which happens to be in course at the moment is the one seen by him. This is so marvellous an experience, even for one who has pushed astral visions to a very high point, that he may mistake them for the End. See chapter on Dhyana. The Hebrew letters corresponding to these principles are Gimel, Resh, and Shin, and the word formed by them means "a flower" and also "expelled," "cast forth."
  18:This is the Cup of Purification; as Zoroaster says:

2.14 - ON THE LAND OF EDUCATION, #Thus Spoke Zarathustra, #Friedrich Nietzsche, #Philosophy
  dreams and astral signs-and had faith in faith. You are
  half-open gates at which the gravediggers wait. And

2.21 - IN THE COMPANY OF DEVOTEES AT SYAMPUKUR, #The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna, #Sri Ramakrishna, #Hinduism
  M: "Because you don't believe in the Mahatmas, astral bodies, and so forth. Perhaps Bhaduri is a Theosophist. Further, you don't believe in the Incarnation of God. That is why he teased you, saying that when, you died this time you would certainly not be reborn as a human being. That would be far off. You wouldn't be born even as an animal or bird, or even as a tree or a plant. You would have to begin all over again, from stone and brick-bat. Then, after many, many births, you might assume a human body."
  DR. SARKAR: "Goodness gracious!"

2.22 - 1941-1943, #Evening Talks With Sri Aurobindo, #unset, #Zen
   Spiritual cure method described. Blue ray directed to the patient. Washes his own hands. astral body seen near the patient.
   19 APRIL 1943

3.01 - The Soul World, #Theosophy, #Alice Bailey, #Occultism
  [paragraph continues] In all three both basic forces are present. Let us take, to begin with, a formation of the first kind. It attracts other formations in its neighborhood by means of the sympathy ruling in it; but, besides this sympathy, there is at the same time present in it antipathy, through which it repels certain things in its surroundings. From the outside such a formation appears to be endowed with the forces of antipathy only. This, however, is not the case. There is sympathy and antipathy in it, but the latter predominates. It has the upper hand over the former. Such formations play a self-seeking rle in the soul space. They repel much that is around them, and lovingly attract but little to themselves. They therefore move through the soul space as unchangeable forms. The force of sympathy which is in them appears greedy. This greed appears at the same time insatiable, as if it could not be satisfied, because the predominating antipathy repels so much of what approaches that no satisfaction is possible. (Here we have to do with what is described in theosophical literature as the lowest part of the astral world.) Should one wish to
  p. 103

3.02 - The Formulae of the Elemental Weapons, #Liber ABA, #Aleister Crowley, #Philosophy
  matter of astral vision, for example, one striking case may be quoted.
  Without telling him what it was, the Master Therion once recited
  --
  The disciple then went on an astral journey, and everything seen
  by him was without exception harmonious with Venus. This was

3.11 - Of Our Lady Babalon, #Liber ABA, #Aleister Crowley, #Philosophy
  adherents. In this way the projection of the astral or Body of
  Light may be made absolutely tangible and practical. At the same

3.11 - Spells, #Advanced Dungeons and Dragons 2E, #unset, #Zen
    Sphere: astral, Travelers
    Range: Special
  --
    If the size and capacity of an extradimensional space is decreased, any contents of the space that exceed the current capacity are expelled (determined randomly). These contents are expelled from the space in the same way they originally entered it, if that path is still open. If the path is closed, as it would be if a bag of holding were tied shut or a portable hole were folded up, the "extra" contents are expelled into the astral plane.
    Any items in an enlarged space when the spell duration expires suffer the same fate.
  --
    Sphere: astral, Divination, Time
    Range: 0
  --
    If any other form of extradimensional space (such as a bag of holding ) is taken into the space created by seclusion, both spaces are ruptured and all contents are expelled onto the astral plane. Extradimensional manipulation can temporarily prevent this.
    The material components are a tiny crystal box of the finest workmanship (worth at least 1,500 gp) and a gem of at least 250 gp value. The gem is consumed in the casting; the box is not.

3.14 - Of the Consecrations, #Liber ABA, #Aleister Crowley, #Philosophy
  bewitched products into actual contactmaterial or astralwith
  their victims. The classical exorcists, on the contrary, for all their
  --
  assigning to the astral Light the power of transmitting vibrations of
  all kinds. He nowhere enters into detail as to how its effects are
  --
  form the results of our investigations of the astral Light. We have
  no account of its properties or of the laws which obtain in its sphere.
  --
  the astral Light, two or more objects can occupy the same space at [110]
  the same time without interfering with each other or losing their
  --
  us, in a different manner. In the astral Light we are bound by what
  is, superficially, an entirely different set of laws. We meet with
  --
  Such are a few of the principal characteristics of the astral Light.
  Its quantitative laws are much less dissimilar from those of material
  --
  the astral as rigorously as anywhere else. The distance of ones
  Magical target and the accuracy of ones Magical rifle are factors in
  --
  may modify the astral Light sufficiently to impress its intention to a
  certain extent on such people as happen to be sensitive. It is much
  --
  Pantacle would then causes a strain in the astral Light such that the
  vibrations would compel some alien consciousness to restore
  --
  may attack her astrally so that her aura becomes uneasy, responding
  no longer to her lover. Unless they diagnose the cause, a quarrel

3.15 - Of the Invocation, #Liber ABA, #Aleister Crowley, #Philosophy
  The first method concerns the so-called astral body. The Magician
  should practice the formation of this body as recommended in
  --
  transmuting the astral body into His shape. This last method is
  really essential to all proper invocation, and cannot be too

3.18 - Of Clairvoyance and the Body of Light, #Liber ABA, #Aleister Crowley, #Philosophy
  of its own classin particular, the phantoms of the astral plane.
  There is a sort of vague and indeterminate relation between the
  --
  deduce facts about material things from the astral aspect which they
  present to the eyes of the Body of Light.3 This astral plane is so
  varied and so changeable that several clairvoyants looking at the
  --
  to see through the astral eyes.
  These methods appear to The MASTER THERION to be unsatisfactory. Very often they do not work at all. It is difficult to teach a
  --
  about you as you rise until you see landscapes of the astral plane.
  Such have a quality all their own. They are not like material
  --
  turn your attention to reaching a definite place on the astral plane;
  invoke Mercury, for example, and examine carefully whether the
  --
  and out of your astral body as easily as you slip in and out of a
  dressing-gown. It will then no longer be so necessary for your
  --
  In projecting the astral, it is a valuable additional safeguard to
  perform the whole operation in a properly consecrated circle.
  --
   astral eyes the astral appearance of material things; and although
  this does not properly belong to pure clairvoyance, one may here
  --
  Having learned to create astral forms, the next step will be at first
  [149]
  very difficult. Phantasmal and fleeting as the astral is in general,
  those forms which are definitely attached to the material possess
  --
  trained and consecrated will in a well-developed astral body is such
  that it can even produce a permanent change in the material upon
  --
  restoring a healthy appearance to their astral forms. On the other
  hand, it is possible so to disintegrate the Body of Light even of a
  --
  example, you see two men of similarly unhealthy astral appearance.
  In one case the cause may be slight and temporary. Your help
  --
  an investigation of the deeper strata of the astral, such as compose
  the causal body.
  --
  To sum up, the first task is to separate the astral form from the [150]
  physical body, the second to develop the powers of the astral body,
  in particular those of sight, travel, and interpretation; third, to unify
  --
  which have commonly been classed under the astral. There is some
  reason for this, as the delimitations are somewhat vague. Just as the
  --
  plane has beings which encroach upon the boundaries of the astral,
  so do we find it in the higher planes.
  The mental images which appear during meditation are subjective, and pertain not at all to the astral plane. Only very rarely do
   astral images occur during meditation. It is a bad break in the
  --
  even includes a portion of it. It includes the astral, chiefly a fullblooded type of the astral. It reaches to and includes most, if not
  all, of the Spiritual planes.
  --
  the astral (a long way for some people), to the Spiritual. Some will
  be unable to do this. The fine body which is good enough to
  --
  Although it is said that the Spiritual lies beyond the astral, this
  is theoretical;1 the advanced Magician will not find it to be so in
  --
  first sentence is the ordinary astral journey).
  1. The previous experiment has little value, and leads to

3.21 - Of Black Magic, #Liber ABA, #Aleister Crowley, #Philosophy
  door of her room, and drew an astral T (traditore,2 and the symbol
  1. [According to The Magical Dilemma of Victor B. Neuburg by Jean Overton Fuller,
  --
  personalities, and Crowleys motive for this astral murder seems a straightforward
  case of sexual jealousy (read: she had shacked up with Neuburg). T.S.]
  --
  of Saturn) with an astral dagger. Within 48 hours she shot herself.1
  7. Works of creation and dissolution, and the higher invocations.
  --
  travel on the astral Plane, taking in turn each of the most synthetic sections, the
  Sephiroth and the Paths. These being thoroughly understood, and an Angel in
  --
  If the reader will turn to the account of his astral journeys in the
  Second Number of the First Volume of the Equinox,1 he will find

4.03 - THE ULTIMATE EARTH, #The Phenomenon of Man, #Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, #Christianity
  universe whose astral unit is the galaxy ?
  Without in any way wishing to discourage such hypotheses

4.04 - Conclusion, #The Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious, #Carl Jung, #Psychology
  solar, lunar, astral, or meteorological sense contri bute nothing
  of importance to the understanding of them; on the contrary,

4.0 - The Path of Knowledge, #Theosophy, #Alice Bailey, #Occultism
  It would indeed be more comfortable if one could reach the higher power of seeing while shunning the labor of thinking. Many would like this. But in order to reach it there is necessary an inner firmness, an assurance of soul to which thinking alone can lead. Otherwise there merely results a meaningless flickering of pictures here and there, a distracting display of soul or astral phenomena, which indeed gives pleasure to many, but which has nothing to do with a true penetration into the
   p. 199

5.4.02 - Occult Powers or Siddhis, #Letters On Yoga I, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  An activity on the astral plane in contact with the astral Forces attended by a leaving of the body is not a spiritual aim but belongs to the province of occultism. It is not a part of the aim of Yoga. Also fasting is not permissible in the Asram, as its practice is more often harmful than helpful to the spiritual endeavour.
  This aim suggested to you seems to be part of a seeking for occult powers; such a seeking is looked on with disfavour for the most part by spiritual teachers in India because it belongs to the inferior planes and usually pushes the seeker on a path which
  --
   may lead him very far from the Divine. Especially, a contact with the forces and beings of the astral (or, as we term it, the vital) plane is attended with great dangers. The beings of this plane are often hostile to the true aim of spiritual life and establish contact with the seeker and offer him powers and occult experiences only in order that they may lead him away from the spiritual path or else that they may establish their own control over him or take possession of him for their own purpose. Often, representing themselves as divine powers, they mislead, give erring suggestions and impulsions and pervert the inner life. Many are those who, attracted by these powers and beings of the vital plane, have ended in a definitive spiritual fall or in mental and physical perversion and disorder. One comes inevitably into contact with the vital plane and enters into it in the expansion of consciousness which results from an inner opening, but one ought never to put oneself into the hands of these beings and forces or allow oneself to be led by their suggestions and impulsions. This is one of the chief dangers of the spiritual life and to be on one's guard against it is a necessity for the seeker if he wishes to arrive at his goal. It is true that many supraphysical or supernormal powers come with the expansion of the consciousness in Yoga; to rise out of the body consciousness, to act by subtle means on the supraphysical planes etc. are natural activities for the Yogi.
  But these powers are not sought after, they come naturally, and they have not the astral character. Also, they have to be used on purely spiritual lines, that is by the Divine Will and the Divine
  Force, as an instrument, but never as an instrumentation of the forces and beings of the vital plane. To seek their aid for such powers is a great error.
  --
  As regards secrecy, a certain discretion or silence about the instructions of the Guru and one's own experiences is always advisable, but an absolute secrecy or making a mystery of these things is not. Once a Guru is chosen, nothing must be concealed from him. The suggestion of absolute secrecy is often a trick of the astral Powers to prevent the seeking for enlightenment and succour.
  Ordinarily, all the more inward and all the abnormal psychological experiences are called psychic. I use the word psychic for the soul as distinguished from the mind and vital. All movements and experiences of the soul would in that sense be called psychic, those which rise from or directly touch the psychic being; where mind and vital predominate, the experience would be called psychological (surface or occult). "Spiritual" has nothing to do with the Absolute, except that the experience of the Absolute is spiritual. All contacts with self, the higher consciousness, the

Appendix 4 - Priest Spells, #Advanced Dungeons and Dragons 2E, #unset, #Zen
        Sphere: astral
        Range: Touch
  --
      SPELL - astral Spell (Alteration)
        Sphere: astral
        Range: Touch
  --
        By means of this spell, a priest is able to project his astral body into the astral plane, leaving his physical body and material possessions behind on the Prime Material plane.
        As the astral plane touches upon the first levels of all the outer planes, the priest can travel astrally to the first level of any of these outer planes as he wills. The priest then leaves the astral plane, forming a body on the plane of existence he has chosen to enter.
        It is also possible to travel astrally anywhere in the Prime Material plane by means of the astral spell. However, a second body cannot be formed on the Prime Material plane.
        As a general rule, a person astrally projected can be seen only by creatures on the
         astral plane. The astral body is connected at all times to the material body by a silvery cord. If the cord is broken, the affected person is killed, astrally and materially, but generally only the psychic wind can cause the cord to break. When a second body is formed on a different plane, the silvery cord remains invisibly attached to the new body.
        If the second body or astral form is slain, the cord simply returns to the caster's body
        where the body rests on the Prime Material plane, reviving it from its state of suspended animation. Although astral projections are able to function on the astral plane, their actions affect only creatures existing on the astral plane; a physical body must be materialized on other planes.
        The spell lasts until the priest desires to end it, or until it is terminated by some outside means, such as dispel magic spell or destruction of the priest's body on the Prime
        Material plane--which kills the priest. The priest can project the astral forms of up to seven other creatures with himself by means of the astral spell, providing the creatures are linked in a circle with the priest. These fellow travelers are dependent upon the priest and can be stranded if something happens to the priest. Travel in the astral plane can be slow or fast, according to the priest's desire. The ultimate destination arrived at is subject to the desire of the priest.
      SPELL - Changestaff (Evocation, Enchantment)

APPENDIX I - Curriculum of A. A., #Liber ABA, #Aleister Crowley, #Philosophy
      Lilith, by George MacDonald. ::: A good introduction to the astral.
      La-Bas , by J. K. Huysmans. ::: An account of the extravagances caused by the Sin-complex.
  --
    Liber VI. (6) [B] Liber O vel Manus et Sagittae. ::: Instructions given for elementary study of the Qabalah, Assumption of God forms, vibration of Divine Names, the Rituals of Pentagram and Hexagram, and their uses in protection and invocation, a method of attaining astral visions so-called, and an instruction in the practice called Rising on the Planes. Equinox II, p. 11 and appendix VI in this book.
    Liber VII. (7) [A] Liber Liberi vel Lapis Lazuli ::: Adumbratio Kabbalae Aegyptiorum. sub Figura VII. Being the Voluntary Emancipation of a certain exempt Adept from his Adeptship. These are the Birth Words of a Master of the Temple. Its 7 chapters are referred to the 7 planets in the following order: Mars, Saturn, Jupiter, Sol, Mercury, Luna, Venus.

BOOK II. -- PART I. ANTHROPOGENESIS., #The Secret Doctrine, #H P Blavatsky, #Theosophy
  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
  --
  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.
  --
  means simply the astral light, so called by the Martinists, by Eliphas Levi, and now by all the modern
  Occultists. (Vide Sections about.)
  --
  (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

BOOK II. -- PART III. ADDENDA. SCIENCE AND THE SECRET DOCTRINE CONTRASTED, #The Secret Doctrine, #H P Blavatsky, #Theosophy
  the primeval animal root-types out of the astral. Darwinism only meets Evolution at its midway point -that is to say when astral evolution has given place to the play of the ordinary physical forces with
  which our present senses acquaint us. But even here the Darwinian Theory, even with the "expansions"
  --
  consolidating the astral body with surrounding materials -- this conception is too absurd even to be
  http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-3-01.htm (9 von 12) [06.05.2003 03:37:25]
  --
  no active work is done. All forms, as well as their astral types, remain as they were at the last moment
  of its activity. The "night" of a planet has hardly any twilight preceding it. It is caught like a huge
  --
  Earth (nor in the Universe either), without its astral prototype being first formed in Space. From
  Phidias down to the humblest workman in the ceramic art -- a sculptor has had to create first of all a
  --
  principles (body, its astral, or life double, etc.), drawn as they are by affinity and Karmic law always
  to the same individuality in a series of various bodies, etc., etc.*
  --
  Read for "into which Man degenerated," "the prototypes which man shed in the course of his astral
  developments," and an aspect of the true esoteric solution is before us. But a wider generalization is
  --
  resultants of the Third Round, astral fossil forms stored up in the auric envelope of the Earth and
  projected into physical objectivity subsequent to the deposition of the first Laurentian rocks.
  --
  the marsupials of the Triassic rocks of the Secondary Period, were evolved from purely astral
  progenitors contemporary with the Second Race. They are thus post-Human, and, consequently, it is
  --
  from their Root-type* -- Primeval astral
  [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
  --
  Third Round a GIGANTIC APE-LIKE FORM on the astral plane. And similarly at the close of the
  Third Race in this Round. Thus it accounts for the human features of the apes, especially of the later
  --
  Silurian systems, so called, are the relics of the Third Round. At first astral like the rest, they
  consolidated and materialized pari passu with the NEW vegetation.
  --
  the prototypes are projected out of the astral envelope of the earth, an indefinite amount of
  modification ensues.
  --
  his inner astral constitution, which can hardly be excavated from any geological strata! Such a
  tenacious, hopeful clinging to a self-degrading theory is the most wonderful feature of the day.
  --
  descends on Earth first, the psychic astral, the mould on which physical man is gradually built -- his
  Spirit, intellectual and moral faculties awakening later on as that physical stature grows and develops.
  --
  opacity and hardness; its softer portions having formed the present vegetation; the astral relics of
  previous vegetation and fauna having been utilized in the formation of the lower animals, and
  --
  adequate to meet the facts. The line of demarcation between etherospiritual, astral and physical
  evolution must be drawn. Perhaps, if Darwinians deigned to consider the possibility of the second
  --
  The "midway point of evolution" is that stage where the astral prototypes definitely begin to pass into
  the physical, and thus become subject to the differentiating agencies now operative around us.
  --
  sexes* are woven out of astral matter, and possess a structure utterly unlike that of the physical
  organisms, which eat, drink, digest, etc., etc., etc. The known physiological contrivances in organisms
  --
  the astral -- during the "midway halt" between the two planes of existence. Hardly had the "groundplan" of evolution been limned out in these ancestral types, than the influence of the accessory
  terrestrial laws, familiar to us, supervened, resulting in the whole crop of mammalian species. AEons
  --
  No. II. represents the domain of the purely astral prototypes previous to their descent into (gross)
  matter. astral matter, it must be noted, is fourth state matter, having, like our gross matter, its own
  "protyle." There are several "protyles" in Nature, corresponding to the various planes of matter. The
  --
  In all these instances a complete temporary mergence of the astral into the physical takes place. The
  evolution of physiological Man out of the astral races of early Lemurian age -- the Jurassic age of
  Geology -- is exactly paralleled by the "materialization" of "spirits" (?) in the seance-room. In the case
  --
  occult fact of the differentiation of species from the primal astral root-types. Whatever the whole
  posse comitatus of "natural selection," etc., etc., may effect, the fundamental unity of structural plan
  --
  BASIC astral PROTOTYPES PASS INTO THE PHYSICAL.
  ------B.
  --
  Seership, when he sends the astral double of AEneas to the battle field (II. 431-53), and has the gift of
  appearing to his Seers without being visible to other persons present -- (Iliad, xvii., 322-36) -- a gift,

BOOK II. -- PART II. THE ARCHAIC SYMBOLISM OF THE WORLD-RELIGIONS, #The Secret Doctrine, #H P Blavatsky, #Theosophy
  The princeps aeris hujus, the "prince of the air" of St. Paul, is not the devil, but the effects of the astral
  light, as Eliphas Levi correctly explains. The Devil is not "the God of this period," as he says, for it is
  --
  man of the Initiate, after he is reborn, namely once that he begins to live in his astral body (See "The
  Elixir of Life"*); for, his spiritual nature overcoming the physical, he would soon snap it off and part
  --
  Marquis de St. Martin -- the Martinists -- astral light, by the mediaeval Kabalists and Alchemists the
  Sidereal Virgin and the Mysterium Magnum, and by the Eastern Occultists AEther, the reflection of
  --
  "Lucifer, the astral Light . . . . is an intermediate force existing in all creation, it serves
  to create and to destroy, and the Fall of Adam was an erotic intoxication which has
  --
  the application of Adam -- a myth -- to the illustration of the astral effects. Akasa -- the astral light* -can be defined in a few words; it is the universal Soul, the Matrix of the Universe, the "Mysterium
  Magnum" from which all that exists is born by separation or differentiation. It is the cause of
  --
  Hence, while it is the universal Cause in its unmanifested unity and infinity, the astral light becomes,
  with regard to Mankind, simply the effects of the causes produced by men in their sinful lives. It is not
  --
  Thus to the profane, the astral Light may be God and Devil at once -http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd2-2-06.htm (6 von 12) [06.05.2003 03:36:44]
  The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, pt 2, ch 19
  --
  work you must know how to separate Spirit and Life in Nature, and, moreover, to separate the astral
  soul in yourself and to make it tangible, and then the substance of the soul will appear visibly and
  --
  him to die only in the physical body and still live and lead a conscious life in his astral body. The
  variations on this theme are endless, but the secret meaning is ever the same. The Pauline expression
  --
  magnetism, astral radiation, motion, and Intelligence, or what some call self-consciousness.
  We have said it elsewhere. Long before the cross or its sign were adopted as symbols of Christianity,
  --
  esoteric meaning of it shows him proceeding cyclically and creating astral prototypes on the
  descending spiritual arc and then on the ascending physical arc. The latter is the sub-division of a twofold creation, subdivided again into seven descending and seven ascending degrees of spirit falling,
  --
  by the spectroscope. This number is the factor, sine qua non, in the production of occult astral
  phenomena.

BOOK I. -- PART I. COSMIC EVOLUTION, #The Secret Doctrine, #H P Blavatsky, #Theosophy
  The astral Light ... 75
  Primeval Radiations from Unity ... 79
  --
  the great Cosmic or even Solar pralayas, but only their Akasic or astral "photographs." But during the
  minor pralayas, once over-taken by the "Night," the planets remain intact, though dead, as a huge
  --
  the mud represents material life, the stalk passing up through the water typifies existence in the astral
  world, and the flower floating on the water and opening to the sky is emblematical of spiritual being.
  --
  [[Vol. 1, Page]] 59 astral LIGHT IS NOT THE ANIMA MUNDI.
  would be broken entirely in our conception, had we not something concrete before our eyes to contain
  --
  and between itself and the Reality has the astral Light, the great Deceiver of man's limited senses,
  unless Knowledge through Paramarthasatya comes to the rescue.
  --
  present in an ideal form in the astral Light from "Dawn" to "Night" during the Manvantaric period,
  like everything else, as a matter of fact, in this objective Universe; from man down to mite, from giant
  --
  good and the bad Serpent (the astral Light of
  [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
  --
  *The astral Light, or the AEther, of the ancient pagans (for the name of astral Light is quite modern)
  is Spirit . . . . Matter. Beginning with the pure spiritual plane, it becomes grosser as it descends until it
  --
  Substance, which becomes astral Matter. It is also called the "Fiery Serpent," as above described. If
  the student bears in mind that there is but One Universal Element, which is infinite, unborn, and
  --
  the nefarious evil fluid; Aour is the synthesis of the two, astral Light proper. Can the Philologists tell
  why Od -- a term used by Reichenbach to denominate the vital fluid -- is also a Tibetan word meaning
  --
  Soul of things. Electricity, the ONE Life at the upper rung of Being, and astral Fluid, the Athanor of
  the Alchemists, at its lowest; GOD and DEVIL, GOOD and EVIL. . . .
  --
  recombining in a certain way (or dissociating) the "Elements" by means of astral fire that the greatest
  phenomena are produced.
  --
  from the Chaldean Ana, heaven, or astral Light, Anima Mundi; whence Anaitia, Devi-durga, the wife
  of Siva, is also called Annapurna,
  --
  thought is self-engraved upon the astral fluid, which is the receptacle and, so to say, the
  mirror of all the manifestations of being.
  --
  they are the Recorders or Annalists who impress on the (to us) invisible tablets of the astral Light,
  "the great picture-gallery of eternity" -- a faithful record of every act, and even thought, of man, of all
  --
  heart of the defunct, which becomes an open book before (whether) Yama, Minos, Osiris, or Karma -are all so many copies of, and variants from the Lipika, and their astral Records. Nevertheless, the
  Lipi-ka are not deities connected with Death, but with Life Eternal.
  --
  already traced in the astral Light not fatalistically, but only because the future, like the PAST, is ever
  alive in the PRESENT -- they may also be said to exercise an influence on the Science of Horoscopy.
  --
  Consciousness and Being, the sixth and the seventh (counting downwards) being the astral and the
  terrestrial, or the two lower planes.
  --
  objective -- aspect on the astral plane. (See "The Occult World," pp. 89, 90.)
  ** The views of our present-day scientific thinkers as to the relations between mind and matter may be
  --
  with Occultism -- Akasa, Jivatma, divine astral Light, or the "Soul of the World." But this first stage
  of Evolution was in due course of time followed by the next. No world, as no heavenly body, could be
  --
   The astral body or Linga Sarira.
   Sthula-Upadhi, or basis of the principle.
  --
  standpoint, to translate some visions in and from the astral Light, to render some teachings partly
  gathered from a Master's thoughts, but unfortunately misunderstood. This work also speaks of the
  --
  clouds of the astral matter that stands between him and the next plane. . . . ."
  It becomes patent why we could not perceive, even with the help of the best earthly telescopes, that
  --
  strings of which dwelleth the Spirit, Soul and astral body of the Kosmos, whose shell only has now
  fallen into the hands of Modern Science. . . . . . Be prudent, we say, prudent and wise, and above all
  --
  Now the evolution of the external form or body round the astral is produced by the terrestrial forces,
  just as in the case of the lower kingdoms; but the evolution of the internal or real MAN is purely
  --
  only his prototype or dimensionless image from the astral regions.
  [[Vol. 1, Page]] 176 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
  --
  At the beginning of the human stage of the Fourth Round on this Globe, they "ooze out" their astral
  doubles from the "ape-like" forms which they had evolved in Round III. And it is this subtle, finer
  --
  their cycle of transmigration in the three preceding Kalpas (Rounds). Then, they (the astral doubles)
  became the men of the first Human Race of the Round. But they were not complete, and were
  --
  which covered those divine astral doubles changed and consolidated with every sub-race; the form
  and physical structure of the fauna changing at the same time, as they had to be adapted to the everchanging conditions of life on this globe during the geological periods of its formative cycle. And thus
  --
  their monads will be liberated and pass into the astral human forms (or the highest elementals) of the
  Sixth* and the Seventh Races, and then into lowest human forms in the fifth Round -- no units of
  --
  James calls 'devilish') the lower portion the Anima Mundi or astral Light. (See the close of this Sloka).
  With the Nazarenes and the Gnostics this Spirit was
  --
  frantic and blind matter, guided by the insinuations of the spirit (not the Divine breath but the astral
  spirit, which by its double essence is already tainted with matter); and the offer of the MOTHER being
  --
  the seven capital sins, the progeny of an astral soul separated from its divine source (spirit) and matter,
  the blind demon of concupiscence. Seeing this, Fetahil extends his hand towards the abyss of matter,
  --
  "Archons" and "Powers." But the astral Light, while only the lower aspect of the Absolute, is yet dual.
  It is the Anima Mundi, and ought never to be viewed otherwise, except for Kabalistic purposes. The
  --
  the Seer and the "Psychic." The higher aspect, without which only creatures of matter from that astral
  Light can be produced, is this Living Fire, and it is the Seventh Principle. It is said in "Isis Unveiled,"
  in a complete description of it: -"The astral Light or Anima Mundi is dual and bisexual. The (ideal) male part of it is purely divine and
  spiritual, it is the Wisdom, it is Spirit or Purusha; while the female portion (the Spiritus of the
  --
  life-principle of every living creature, and furnishes the astral soul, the fluidic perisprit, to men,
  animals, fowls of the air, and everything living. Animals have only the latent germ of the highest
  --
  Ghost of the early Christians) -- Akasa;** while Sophia Achamoth personified the lower astral Light
  or Ether. Ilda-Baoth,*** or Jehovah, is simply one of the Elohim, the seven
  --
  ** The astral light stands in the same relation to Akasa and Anima Mundi, as Satan stands to the Deity.
  They are one and the same thing seen from two aspects: the spiritual and the psychic -- the supere thereal or connecting link between matter and pure spirit, and the physical. See for the difference
  --
  with the scale of the chemical atoms of Science -- from the hypothetical Helium down to Uranium -they would of course be found to differ. For these have, as correspondents on the astral plane, only the
  four lowest orders -- the higher three principles in the atom, or rather molecule or chemical element,
  --
  Divine, the psycho-mental from the Spiritual -- tainted from its lower plane by the astral -- the whole
  animate and (seemingly) inanimate Nature evolving on parallel lines, and drawing its attri butes from
  --
  The shadow, the astral form, is annihilated, "devoured by the Uraeus" (cxlix., 51), the Manes will be
  annihilated; the two twins (the 4th and 5th principles) will be scattered; but the Soul-bird, "the divine
  --
  6. Too uselessly apocalyptic. Why not say that the astral reflects the good as well as the bad man;
  man, who is ever tending to the upper triangle, or else disappears with the Quaternary.
  --
  ** Esotericism teaches the same. But Manas is not Nephesch; nor is the latter the astral, but the 4th
  principle, if also the 2nd prana, for Nephesch is the "breath of life" in man, as in beast or insect, of
  --
  7. The fatal image (the astral) endows Nephesch with its aptitudes; but Ruach is able to substitute for
  this (vitiated) Nephesch the image
  --
  7. The astral through Kama (desire) is ever drawing Manas down into the sphere of material passions
  and desires. But if the better man
  --
  the Creators and "Builders," that astral Light which the paradoxical Eliphas Levi calls in one breath
  "the body of the Holy Ghost," and in the next "Baphomet," the "Androgyne Goat of Mendes"*; AIR,
  --
  (?!) and the power of central attraction . . . the astral Light, this electromagnetic ether, this vital and
  luminous caloric, is represented on ancient monuments by the girdle of Isis which twines round two
  --
  Eliphas Levi commits a great blunder in always identifying the astral Light with what we call Akasa.
  What it really is will be given in Part II. of Vol. II.
  --
  erroneous; for if all that exists was evolved through (or via) it, it is not the astral light. The latter is not
  the container of all things but only the reflector, at best, of this all. Eliphas Levi writes: -"The great Magic agent is the fourth emanation of the life principle (we say -- it is the first in the inner,
  --
  flatly contradict the assertion. No Hindu has ever mistaken Prakriti -- the astral Light being only
  above the lowest plane of Prakriti, the material Kosmos -- for the "immortal Spirit." Prakriti is ever
  --
  even by physical Science. Nor is it astral Light. It is, as said, the noumenon of the seven-fold
  differentiated Prakriti** -- the ever immaculate "Mother" of the fatherless Son, who becomes "Father"
  --
  These are the reasons why the Occultists refuse to give the name of astral Light to Akasa, or to call it
  Ether. "In my Father's house are many mansions," may be contrasted with the occult saying, "In our
  --
  and very erroneously termed, astral Light, which Eliphas Levi calls "the imagination of Nature,"||
  probably to avoid giving it its correct name, as others do.
  --
  extra-natural visions take place. . . . . astral Light, acting under the impulsion of powerful wills,
  destroys, coagulates, separates, breaks, gathers in all things. . . . God created it on that day when he
  --
  energy and action." Eliphas Levi ought to have added that the astral light, or primordial substance, if
  matter at all, is that which, called Light, LUX, esoterically explained, is the body of those Spirits
  --
  Earth (i.e., MATTER in its essential form). Our globe is, so far, in its Kamarupic state -- the astral
  body of desires of Ahamkara, dark Egotism, the progeny of Mahat, on the lower plane. . . .
  --
  essence into its grossest appearance. Therefore our human forms have existed in the Eternity as astral
  or ethereal prototypes; according to which models, the Spiritual Beings (or Gods) whose duty it was to
  --
  beneath the astral powers (Superhuman astral Spirits.) They change perpetually, not always
  identically, but revolving in circles.**** They permeate by the body two parts of the Soul, that it may
  --
  For truly the astral light of the derided Kabalists has strange and weird secrets for him who can see in
  http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd1-1-13.htm (23 von 26) [06.05.2003 03:31:33]
  --
  * The astral light of the Kabalists is very incorrectly translated by some "AEther;" the latter is
  confused with the hypothetical Ether of Science, and both are referred to by some theosophists as

BOOK I. -- PART III. SCIENCE AND THE SECRET DOCTRINE CONTRASTED, #The Secret Doctrine, #H P Blavatsky, #Theosophy
  Primaries in the astral realms -- this work will, of course, besides the men of Science, have every
  materialist against it. But this opposition can, at most, be only temporary. People have laughed at
  --
  besides being the "agent" for transmitting light. It is the astral fluid or "Light" of the Kabalists, and
  the "Seven rays" of Sun-Vishnu.
  --
  The human body itself is charged with the ether [Say astral light. -- H.P.B.]; its minute
  particles are held together by it; the plant is in the same condition; the most solid earth,
  --
  belonging to the same plane. The less power of resistance for astral influences a person possesses, the
  more will he be subject to such influences. The vital force is not enclosed in man, but radiates (within)
  --
  animal whose astral "vital body" has not been irreparably separated from the physical body by the
  severance of the magnetic or odic chord. As one saved thrice from death by that power, the writer
  --
  obtained from the fifth and sixth planes of the etheric (or astral) Force, will never be permitted to
  serve for purposes of commerce and traffic. That Keely's organism is directly connected with the
  --
  which must remain unnamed, were the heavenly bodies in direct astral and psychic communication
  with the Earth, its Guides, and Watchers -- morally and physically; the visible orbs furnishing our
  --
  outside of us, or by our more intimate astral, or inner man, who is but too often the evil genius of the
  embodied entity called man. Both these lead on the outward man, but one of them must prevail; and
  --
  It is a law of occult dynamics that "a given amount of energy expended on the spiritual or astral plane
  is productive of far greater results than the same amount expended on the physical objective plane of
  --
  primordial vital principles in the Sun), i.e., the astral body of the deceased or the "Elementary" fades
  out and disappears in the "Son of the earth," limited time. The soul quits the fields of Aanroo and goes
  --
  of the astral, before the physical body: the former being a model for the latter; and (c) that man, in
  this Round, preceded every mammalian -- the anthropoids included -- in the animal kingdom.*
  --
  progenitors, spiritually or astrally. The Assyriologists, ignorant of the esoteric teachings, could hardly
  be expected to pay any greater attention to the mysterious and ever-recurring number seven on the

BOOK I. -- PART II. THE EVOLUTION OF SYMBOLISM IN ITS APPROXIMATE ORDER, #The Secret Doctrine, #H P Blavatsky, #Theosophy
  Providence, but the Universal Soul, that which E. Levi calls astral Light in its material aspect. And
  this "Soul" is, in its dual aspect of spirit and matter, the true anthropomorphic God of the Theists; as
  --
  Jupiter-Titan, etc., etc. They know that the soul of the astral LIGHT is divine, and
  [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
  --
  and what not, only not the seven planets, which are Surya's brothers, not his Sons. These astral gods,
  whose chief with the Gnostics was Ildabaoth* (from Ilda "child," and Baoth "the egg"), the son of
  --
  Anima Mundi, the astral Light of the Theurgists and Kabalists, being its last and lowest division."
  The [[stoicheia]] (Elements) of Plato and Aristotle, were thus the incorporeal principles attached to

Book of Imaginary Beings (text), #unset, #Arthur C Clarke, #Fiction
  physical body, of an ethereal body, of an astral body, and of
  an ego; at the start of the Saturnian period he was a physical

Conversations with Sri Aurobindo, #unset, #Arthur C Clarke, #Fiction
  The other question is to judge the relations of the leaders of the T.S. with the masters, that is, to determine the nature of the psychical experiences of these people. Everything in their works, and particularly the little true spirituality one meets with, makes me think that they have never gone beyond the vital plane which corresponds to what they call the astral plane. I set aside the case of deception. First, there is to be considered wilful self-deceit, the fact that on this plane we see what we mentally want to see. This is a complex and marvellous realm, where the true and the false are inextricably entangled. Everything appears under a logical and seductive form, organised but finally illusory.
  HPB was an amazing woman, with strong intuitions but wherein everything was mixed up, incapable of discussing critically psychical facts. She did not want it, besides. What mattered to her was to launch a movement. And this impulse, this desire to organise, to exercise an influence, is the characteristic of the vital plane. There are influences of all sorts there, whose one desire is to take possession of those who are rising high in order to use them for their own ends. Not only the weak are their prey, but the strong can be so equally, for it is specially the strong they aim at. After HPB, there was A.B. In the beginning she simply followed the lines of HPB, then it was CWL who influenced her. She recognised him, however, at a certain moment of her life (the glamour he has put on me), but as she had nothing of her own, she returned. And what is special about the vital plane is that anyone who has a certain realisation there, can make another person get the same realisation. One must not apply the criteria of ordinary life to this plane; this is the mistake that many spiritists, metapsychists, etc. make. I know it by experience. I have old disciples who have deviated, without my being able to bring them back, so great is the force of deception. Others write to me letters full of visions they have had; they have seen me and I am supposed to have given them instructions. Now, it was not I, and those instructions I would disown. It so happened that several of them had the same vision at the same time, not taking into account small variations of detail.

Liber 111 - The Book of Wisdom - LIBER ALEPH VEL CXI, #unset, #Arthur C Clarke, #Fiction
   15. ON astral TRAVEL
   16. ON THELEMIC CULT
  --
   DE VIA PER EMPYRAEUM. (On astral Travel)
   Concerning thy Travellings in thy Body of Light, or astral journeys and
   Visions so-called, do thou lay this Wisdom to thy Heart, o my Son, that
  --
   Mathematicians and the Physicians should not be one with the astral
   Light, or Plastic Medium or Aub, Aud, Aur (these three being a Trinity)
  --
   giveth Men Enlightenment, and Scin, Light astral, and Scire also, by a
   far Travelling. But especially is this Root hidden in Sus, hat is of
  --
   the astral World without Magical Protection, or invoke them, as do the
   Spiritists. For by Death is Man released only from the Gross Body, at
   the first, and is complete otherwise upon the astral Plane, as he was
   in his Life. But this Wholeness suffereth Stress, and its Girders are
  --
   is this Fine Body which bindeth it to the astral, as did the Gross to
   the Material World so then it accomplisheth willingly the Sacrament of

Liber 46 - The Key of the Mysteries, #unset, #Arthur C Clarke, #Fiction
   Newton, Mesmer and others to quantify the astral body. 18^th and 19^th
   century efforts to measure ectoplasm, oddic force, etc. and to
  --
   A. It is formed of astral or terrestrial light, and transmits {105} the
   double magnetization of it to the human body. The soul, by acting on
  --
     In the stars which it magnetizes, it becomes astral light.
     In organized beings, light, or magnetic fluid.
  --
   Our plastic medium is a magnet which attracts or repels the astral
   light under the pressure of the will. It is a luminous body which
  --
   It is the mirror of the imagination. This body is nourished by astral
   light just as the organic body is nourished by the products of the
   earth. During slumber, it absorbs the astral light by immersion, and
   during waking, by a kind of somewhat slow respiration. When the
  --
   hallucination is waking still partially subjected to the astral
   intoxication of slumber.
  --
     The vibrations of the voice modify the movement of the astral light,
     and are a powerful vehicle of magnetism.
  --
   Powdered charcoal absorbs and retains the astral light. This explains
   the magic mirror of Dupotet.
  --
   The astral light, or rather the vital light, of the plastic medium,
   absorbed by the charcoal, becomes wholly negative; for this reason
  --
   The astral light into which sleep plunges us is like an ocean in which
   innumerable images are afloat, flotsam of wrecked existences, mirages
  --
   the astral light.
   It is, as we said previously, the admixture of the phenomena of sleep
  --
   Our plastic medium breathes in and out the astral light or vital soul
   of the earth, as our body breathes in and out the terrestrial
  --
   make the astral light unwholesome, and not assimilable.
   The air of some places may be too bracing for some people, and suit
  --
   we have said, the universal vital fluid, the astral light, being the
   mediating principle between the ideas and the forms, is obedient to the
  --
   with the School of Pasqualis Martinez, call astral light, which Mr. de
   Mirville calls the devil, and which the ancient alchemists called
  --
   laws of magnetism or astral light.
   We prefer the word "light" to the word "magnetism," because it is more
  --
   like squirrels; we crawl like serpents; we are intoxicated with astral
   light; we plunge into the common reservoir, as happens in a more
  --
   universal agent, teaches that one must act upon the astral body in
   order to react upon the material visible body; it teaches also that the
   essence of the astral light is a double movement of attraction and
   repulsion; just as human bodies attract and repel one another, they can
  --
   its early stages by exercising a powerful action of will on the astral
   body as it breaks loose, and by recalling it to life through some
  --
   Baphomet. It is the qabalistic sign of the OD, or astral light, with
   its two poles, and its balanced centre. One knows that in the language
  --
   The universal light, when it magnetizes the worlds, is called astral
   light; when it forms the metals, one calls it azoth, or philosophical
  --
   which we call astral light, to deny its possibility would be to take
   little account of the most ordinary phenomena of Nature.
  --
   under the influence of astral and magnetic intoxication, and we have
   been struck by the anarchical tendencies with which it is filled under
  --
   globules which the astral light has coloured, and the blood flows.
   Photography proves to us sufficiently that images are real
  --
   greatly astonish the observers of fluidic phenomena. They are astral
   photographs traced by the imagination of the mediums with or without
  --
   These signs have served from the beginning to express astral vertigo,
   and remain in a state of mirage in the reflections of the divulged
  --
   astral writings are often ridiculous or obscene. The pretended spirits,
   when questioned on the greater mysteries of Nature, often reply by that
  --
   projection of astral larvae, occasioned by the heat of the atmosphere,
   and the fanatical exhaustion of the pilgrims.
  --
   project their deformities on the astral light, and live upon the same
   terrors which give them birth. That black giant which reaches its wings
  --
   the astral light which has become their electro-magnetic atmosphere:
   and thus the companionship of the wicked is less fatal to the good than
  --
   The astral ascendant has been divined by other magi, who gave it the
   name of "tourbillon" (vortex).
  --
   voluntarily or involuntarily make use of a current of astral light
   which has gone astray. Those, {251} for example, who live in isolation,
  --
   at a distance by blows inflicted on his astral larva.
   We shall here ask of MM. de Mirville and Gougenet Desmousseaux if they
  --
   upon the portion of astral life which is specialized in us, and which
   serves us for the assimilation and configuration of the elements
  --
   physical ugliness; for the astral medium, that interior architect of
   our bodily edifice, modifies it ceaselessly according to our real or

Liber 71 - The Voice of the Silence - The Two Paths - The Seven Portals, #unset, #Arthur C Clarke, #Fiction
   acceptance of the astral as SAT.
   17. This Earth, Disciple, is the Hall of Sorrow, wherein are set along
  --
   the astral World. It would certainly include all states up to dhyna.
   The Student will remember that his "rewards" immediately transmute

Liber, #Liber Null, #Peter J Carroll, #Occultism
  @Liber VI. (6) [B] Liber O vel Manus et Sagittae. ::: Instructions given for elementary study of the Qabalah, Assumption of God forms, vibration of Divine Names, the Rituals of Pentagram and Hexagram, and their uses in protection and invocation, a method of attaining astral visions so-called, and an instruction in the practice called Rising on the Planes. Equinox II, p. 11 and appendix VI in this book.
  @Liber VII. (7) [A] - Liber Liberi vel Lapis Lazuli ::: Adumbratio Kabbalae Aegyptiorum. sub Figura VII. Being the Voluntary Emancipation of a certain exempt Adept from his Adeptship. These are the Birth Words of a Master of the Temple. Its 7 chapters are referred to the 7 planets in the following order: Mars, Saturn, Jupiter, Sol, Mercury, Luna, Venus.

P.11 - MAGICAL WEAPONS, #Liber Null, #Peter J Carroll, #Occultism
  THE FIVE CLASSES of magical weapon are divided according to their function rather than by the gross appearance they may manifest on the physical plane. All weapons are designed to have an effect on the physical, but the weapons themselves exist primarily on the aetheric or astral level. The physical form of a magical weapon is no more than a convenient handle or anchor for its aetheric form.
  The Sword and Pentacle are weapons of analysis and synthesis respectively. Upon the pentacle aetheric forms, images, and powers are assembled when the magical will and perception vitalize the imagination. The magician may create hundreds of pentacles in the course of his sorceries, yet there is a virtue in having a general purpose weapon of this class, for its power increases with use, and it can be employed as an altar for the consecration of lesser pentacles. For many operations of an evocatory type, the pentacle is placed on the cup and the conjuration performed with the wand.
  --
  The magician should be capable of performing any ritual on the astral, that is to say, by the power of imagination alone. By strongly visualizing any of his weapons to the point where he actually hallucinates their presence, he draws both the aetheric form of the weapon and the associated powers within himself into action. Such empty-hand techniques are the mark of an adept.

r1914 04 08, #Record of Yoga, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
   astral .. astral(referring to a tendency to consider favourably the bases of European & Theosophical mysticism)
   5) Exulting (effective aishwarya)

r1914 05 22, #Record of Yoga, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
   Swapnasamadhi thrown back in lipi into a false coherence & in dream into the old confusion; the rupa does not yet advance at all sensibly but keeps its gains in continuity. It is, however, confined to the dim chhayamaya proper to that low physical nervosity now dominant & typified in some systems in Patala & the astral worlds. The luminous visions occur rarely, & those which come are usually of a gross pranic & trivial kind.
   The translation of experience into terms of vijnanabuddhi continues with a dull steadiness, without intense ananda, but without nirananda. Occasionally the Prana & nervous mind indicate a slight impatience or sense of depression. Apparently these have to be eliminated before the tamasic pressure will be entirely removed.

Sayings of Sri Ramakrishna (text), #Sayings of Sri Ramakrishna, #Sri Ramakrishna, #Hinduism
  planes and spheres like astral plane, Devayanic plane, solar sphere, lunar sphere etc., and that man's
  subtle body can go to all these places. They say many other such things. Sir, what is your opinion on
  --
  in such trivial things as solar sphere, lunar sphere, astral sphere etc., is not genuine search after God.
  One has to do Sadhanas (spiritual practices) in order to get devotion to His lotus feet; one has to weep

Talks 125-150, #Talks, #Sri Ramana Maharshi, #Hinduism
  D.: The answer does not satisfy me. We wander in the astral plane in our sleep but we do not remember it.
  M.: The astral plane is concerned with dreams, not with deep sleep.
  D.: What do you consider to be the cause of world suffering? And how can we help to change it, (a) as individuals? or (b) collectively?
  --
  D.: What is the astral body?
  M.: Do you not have a body in your dream? Is it not different from the recumbent body on the bed?
  D.: Do we survive after death? Does the astral body outlive physical death?
  M.: Just as in dreams you wake up after several novel experiences, so also after physical death another body is found and so on.
  D.: They say that the astral body lives for forty years after death.
  M.: In the present body you say the dream body is astral. Did you say so in the dream body? What is astral now would appear real then, the present body itself is astral according to that viewpoint. What
  Talks with Sri Ramana Maharshi is the difference between one astral body and another? There is no difference between the two.
  Mr. P. Brunton: There are degrees of reality.

The Divine Names Text (Dionysis), #The Divine Names, #unset, #Zen
  But what slipped from our view in the midst of our discourse, the Good is Cause of the celestial movements in their commencements and terminations, of their not increasing, not diminishing, and completely changeless, course 20, and of the noiseless movements, if one may so speak, of the vast celestial transit, and of the astral orders, and the beauties and |36 lights, and stabilities, and the progressive swift motion of certain stars, and of the periodical return of the two luminaries, which the Oracles call "great," from the same to the same quarter, after which our days and nights being marked, and months and years being measured, mark and number and arrange and comprehend the circular movements of time and things temporal. But, what would any one say of the very ray of the sun? For the light is from the Good, and an image of the Goodness, wherefore also the Good is celebrated under the name of Light; as in a portrait the original is manifested. For, as the goodness of the Deity, beyond all, permeates from the highest and most honoured substances even to the lowest, and yet is above all, neither the foremost outstripping its superiority, nor the things below eluding its grasp, but it both enlightens all that are capable, and forms and enlivens, and grasps, and perfects, and is measure of things existing, and age, and number, and order, and grasp, and cause, and end; so, too, the brilliant likeness of the Divine Goodness, this our great sun, wholly bright and ever luminous, as a most distant echo of the Good, both enlightens whatever is capable of participating in it, and possesses the light in the highest degree of purity, unfolding to the visible universe, above and beneath, the splendours of its own rays, and if anything does not participate in them, this is not owing to the inertness or deficiency of its distribution of light, but is owing to the inaptitude for light-reception of the things which do not unfold |37 themselves for the participation of light. No doubt the ray passing over many things in such condition, enlightens the things after them, and there is no visible thing which it does not reach, with the surpassing greatness of its own splendour. Further also, it contributes to the generation of sensible bodies, and moves them to life, and nourishes, and increases, and perfects, and purifies and renews; and the light is both measure and number of hours, days, and all our time. For it is the light itself, even though it was then without form, which the divine Moses declared to have fixed that first Triad 21 of our days. And, just as Goodness turns all things to Itself, and is chief collector of things scattered, as One-springing and One-making Deity, and all things aspire to It, as Source and Bond and End, and it is the Good, as the Oracles say, from Which all things subsisted, and are being brought into being by an all-perfect Cause; and in Which all things consisted, as guarded and governed in an all-controlling route; and to Which all things are turned, as to their own proper end; and to Which all aspire ----the intellectual and rational indeed, through knowledge, and the sensible through the senses, and those bereft of sensible perception by the innate movement of the aspiration after life, and those without life, and merely being, by their aptitude for mere substantial participation; after the same method of its illustrious original, the light also collects and turns to itself all things existing----things with sight |38 ----things with motion----things enlightened----things heated----things wholly held together by its brilliant splendours----whence also, Helios, because it makes all things altogether (a)ollh~), and collects things scattered. And all creatures, endowed with sensible perceptions, aspire to it, as aspiring either to see, or to be moved and enlightened, and heated, and to be wholly held together by the light. By no means do I affirm, after the statement of antiquity, that as being God and Creator of the universe, the sun, by itself, governs the luminous world, but that the invisible things of God are clearly seen from the foundation of the world, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Deity.
    SECTION V.
  --
  But the gifts of the unfailing Power pass on, both to men and living creatures, and plants, and the entire nature of the universe; and It empowers things united for their mutual friendship and communion, and things divided for their being each within their own sphere and limit, without confusion, and without mingling; and preserves the order and good relations of the whole, for their own proper good, and guards the undying lives of the individual angels inviolate; and the heavenly and the life-giving and astral bodies 40 and orders without change: and makes the period of time possible to be; and disperses the revolutions of time by their progressions, and collects them together by their returns; and makes the powers of fire unquenchable, and the rills of water unfailing; and sets bounds to the aerial current, and establishes the earth upon nothing; and guards its life-giving throes from perishing; and preserves the mutual harmony and mingling of the elements without confusion, and without division; and holds together the bond of soul and body; and arouses the nourishing and growing powers of plants; and sustains the essential powers of the whole; and secures the continuance of the universe without dissolution, and bequeaths the deification Itself, by furnishing a power for this to those who are being deified. And in a word, there is absolutely no single thing which is deprived of |97 the overruling surety and embrace of the Divine Power. For that which absolutely has no power, neither is, nor is anything, nor is there any sort of position of it whatever.
    SECTION VI.

The Dwellings of the Philosophers, #unset, #Arthur C Clarke, #Fiction
  old dragon, is bom the astral stone, white, heavy, shining as pure silver, and which appears to
  be signed, bearing the imprint of its nobility, its stamp U) esoterically translated as the griffin,
  --
  is our astral stone by tearing it from its arsenical ganque, take two parts of virgin earth, our
  scaly dragon, and one part of the igneous agent, which is that valiant knight armed with the
  --
  absolute harmony of the higher with the lower elements, our matter, lacking astral virtues, can
  be of no use. Before it is put to work, the body on which we operate, is more earthly than
  --
  which coagulation caused to appear on its surface. Furthermore the astral signature of the
  mercury, as it was common to call the mark in question, asserts itself with even more clarity
  --
  the astral matter. "Return", says the fixed, "and I shall return". In seven successive repetitions
  the clouds conceal from view now the star, now the flower, according to the phases of the
  --
  not to despise the astral signature, revealer of the prepared mercury. "Direct your course by
  the aspect of the North Star, which our Magnet will cause to appear to thee. The Wise man
  --
  sky and the earth, feeding on astral influences or celestial dynamism which it transmitted to
  the passive substance, by attracting them in the manner of a true magnet. De Cyrano Bergerac
  --
  metallic divinities and of their astral planetary correspondences a set, deliberate confusion? If
  we are able to be questioned on this point we would answer in the affirmative without

The Essentials of Education, #unset, #Arthur C Clarke, #Fiction
  Stuttgart, Morning, April 10, 1924 ::: Ancient humankind could read nature and human nature intuitively; modern science can spell but not read. Learning to read children. Digestion before and after the change of teeth. Relationship between breath and heartbeat from seven to fourteen and how music harmonizes them. The etheric body and sculpting. The astral body and music. The I-being and speech. Eurythmy, music, and speech.
  LECTURE 4

WORDNET



--- Overview of adj astral

The adj astral has 1 sense (first 1 from tagged texts)
                    
1. (1) stellar, astral ::: (being or relating to or resembling or emanating from stars; "an astral body"; "stellar light")





--- Similarity of adj astral

1 sense of astral                          

Sense 1
stellar, astral


--- Antonyms of adj astral
                                    



--- Pertainyms of adj astral

1 sense of astral                          

Sense 1
stellar, astral
   Pertains to noun star (Sense 1)
   =>star
   => celestial body, heavenly body


--- Derived Forms of adj astral
                                    




IN WEBGEN [10000/451]

Wikipedia - Ad Astral Aviation -- Australian charter airline
Wikipedia - Adastral Park
Wikipedia - Astral Body
Wikipedia - Astral body -- Concept of a subtle body, intermediate between the soul and body
Wikipedia - Astral Chain -- 2019 action-adventure hack and slash video game
Wikipedia - Astral City: A Spiritual Journey -- 2010 Brazilian film directed by Wagner de Assis
Wikipedia - Astral Disaster
Wikipedia - Astral Media -- Canadian media company
Wikipedia - Astral Plane
Wikipedia - Astral plane -- Concept of a world of celestial spheres
Wikipedia - Astral projection -- Controversial interpretation of out-of-body experiences
Wikipedia - Astral Project -- American modern jazz quartet
Wikipedia - Astralwerks
Wikipedia - Celastrales -- Order of flowering plants, mostly fom tropics and subtropics
Wikipedia - Gascoyne Land District -- Cadastral in Western Australia
Wikipedia - Hundred of Bagot (Northern Territory) -- Cadastral in the Northern Territory, Australia
Wikipedia - Karlin -- Cadastral area of Prague, Czech Republic
Wikipedia - Kyje -- Cadastral district of Prague in Czech Republic
Wikipedia - Lands administrative divisions of Australia -- Cadastral divisions of Australia for land identification purposes
Wikipedia - List of Celastrales of South Africa -- Flowering plants in the order Celastrales recorded from South Africa
Wikipedia - Out-of-body experience -- A phenomenon in which the soul (astral body) is said to exit the physical body
Wikipedia - P. A. L. Chapman-Rietschi -- Scholar and research writer in the field of history of astronomy, ancient astral sciences, archaeoastronomy, and astrobiology
Wikipedia - Peyton Survey -- 1584 cadastral survey overseen by Christopher Peyton
Wikipedia - Super Xuxa contra Baixo Astral -- 1988 film directed by Anna Penido, David Sonneschein
Wikipedia - Urogonodes astralaina -- Species of hook-tip moth
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/11324945-the-human-aura-astral-colors-and-thought-forms
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1290529.The_Astral_Projection_Workbook
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1333678.The_Astral_Alibi
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/152048.Astral_Projection_for_Beginners
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1892846.The_Astral_Body
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/18994541-astral-dynamics
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/19382598-the-treatise-on-astral-projection
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2073827.Astral_Astria
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/21520753-astral-tide
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/22062685-astrally-yours
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/23949003-astral-hell
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/243117.The_Astral_Plane
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25588027-astral
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25633388-astral-projection
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2759386-astralreiseninnerhalb-und-au-erhalb-des-k-rpers-geschichte-theorie
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/28385668-akashic-records-psychic-astral-travel-meditation
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/29524747-the-astral-codex
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/304977.Astral_Dynamics
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/31112352-the-ultimate-guide-to-astral-projection-and-out-of-body-experiences
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/31313957-viagem-astral
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/31365535-voyage-astral
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/35629741-astral-weeks
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/39732380-the-astral-traveler-s-handbook-other-tales
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/426154.Mastering_Astral_Projection
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/472839.Astral_Projection_Ritual_Magic_And_Alchemy
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/5827253-the-astral-explorer
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7536011-r-cits-d-un-voyageur-de-l-astral
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/864788.Astral_Doorways
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/9718022-the-astral-disruptor
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/9850441-the-astral
https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/12404648.M_a_Astral
https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/5404759.Eduardo_Daniel_Mastral
https://religion.wikia.org/wiki/Intermediate_zone#Astral_Intoxication
Kheper - astral -- 98
Kheper - astral_physical -- 52
Kheper - gross_astral -- 50
Kheper - lower_astral -- 40
Kheper - astral_body -- 43
Kheper - astral -- 109
Kheper - astral index -- 28
Kheper - Robert_Monroe -- 52
Kheper - astral_body -- 39
Kheper - astralhol -- 80
http://malankazlev.com/kheper/topics/subtlebody/astralhol.htm.htm -- 0
http://malankazlev.com/kheper/topics/subtlebody/BAB-astral.htm -- 0
Kheper - HBP-Astral_Light -- 23
https://thoughtsandvisions-searle88.blogspot.com/2012/09/astral-projection.html
https://thoughtsandvisions-searle88.blogspot.com/2012/10/astral-plane-from-kheper.html
https://thoughtsandvisions-searle88.blogspot.com/2012/10/astral-plane.html
https://thoughtsandvisions-searle88.blogspot.com/2015/06/how-to-perform-astral-projection.html
https://thoughtsandvisions-searle88.blogspot.com/2015/11/astral-projection-natural-phenomenon.html
https://thoughtsandvisions-searle88.blogspot.com/2015/11/benefits-of-conscious-projection-astral.html
https://thoughtsandvisions-searle88.blogspot.com/2016/08/astral-physics-and-timespace.html
dedroidify.blogspot - astral-projection-tutorial
https://esotericotherworlds.blogspot.com/2013/02/out-of-body-experiences-oobe-astral.html
https://esotericotherworlds.blogspot.com/2013/10/the-astral-body.html
https://esotericotherworlds.blogspot.com/2013/10/the-astral-light.html
Dharmapedia - Astral_plane
Dharmapedia - Astral_projection
Occultopedia - astral_body
Occultopedia - astral
Occultopedia - astral_plane
Occultopedia - astral_projection
Occultopedia - astral_travel
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Anime/AstraLostInSpace
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Characters/AstralCabal
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Characters/TheAstralConnection
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/FanficRecs/AstralChain
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Film/NineSevenSixEvil2TheAstralFactor
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Literature/AstralDawn
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/AnAstralProjectionNotAGhost
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/AstralCheckerboardDecor
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/AstralFinale
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/AstralProjection
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Manga/AstraLostInSpace
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Music/AstralWeeks
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Roleplay/AstralCabal
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/VideoGame/AstralChain
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/VisualNovel/AstralTransparencyColesGate
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Webcomic/AstralAves
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Tropers/AstralMagnet
976-Evil 2: The Astral Factor(1991) - In this straight-to-video sequel to the 1988 horror film, Patrick O'Bryan returns as Spike, again battling the supernatural in a college town. The majority of the plot deals with pretty Robin (Debbie James), a coed who learns that her dean, Prof. Grubeck (Rene Assa), is a rotting ghost who uses astr...
https://myanimelist.net/manga/105912/Toaru_Kagaku_no_Railgun_Gaiden__Astral_Buddy
https://myanimelist.net/manga/4286/Astral_Project__Tsuki_no_Hikari
https://astralchain.fandom.com
https://aliens.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Drifter
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Attacker
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Confrontation
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Demons
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_demons
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Emanations
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Executioner
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Frontier_Map
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Frontier_Map/l1
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Frontier_Map/l2
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Frontier_Map/l3
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Gemstones
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Gemstones/Asee-Teph
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Gemstones/Coba_Plateau
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Gemstones/Coldberg
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Gemstones/Dead_Sea
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Gemstones/Dragon_Ring
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Gemstones/Eljune
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Gemstones/Gipat
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Gemstones/Igsh_Military_District
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Gemstones/Nezebgrad
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Gemstones/Severny_Steppe
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Gemstones/Wild_Isles
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Gemstones/Yazes_Shard
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Gemstones/ZIT
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Graveyard
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Hangar
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Hangar/IoR_Astral_Hangar
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Hangar/League_Astral_Hangar
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Loot
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Loot/Items_Comparison
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Navigation
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Retreat
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Sectors
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Shield
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Shield_I
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Ships
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_space
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Background:_The_Astral
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Chapter_5:_The_Invasion_of_the_Astral_Demons
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Chapter_7:_The_Great_Astral_Campaign
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Epic_Astral_Shield_I
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Epic_Massive_Astral_Shield_I
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Epic_Shimmering_Astral_Shield_I
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Epic_Shimmering_Astral_Shield_III
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Glittering_Astral_Shield_I
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Glittering_Astral_Shield_II
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Glittering_Astral_Shield_III
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Massive_Astral_Shield_I
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Massive_Astral_Shield_II
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Massive_Astral_Shield_III
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Pulsating_Astral_Shield_I
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Pulsating_Astral_Shield_II
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Quest:Astral_Batteries
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Quest:Astral_Components
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Quest:Astral_Resistance
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Quest:Astral_Secret
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Quest:Astral_Support
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Quest:The_Astral_Mines
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Quest:The_Curse_of_the_Astral
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Rare_Massive_Astral_Shield_I
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Rare_Massive_Astral_Shield_II
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Rare_Massive_Astral_Shield_III
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Rare_Shimmering_Astral_Shield_I
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Rare_Shimmering_Astral_Shield_III
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Ravenous_Astral_Annihilator
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Ravenous_Astral_Pummeler
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Ravenous_Astral_Rampager
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Ravenous_Astral_Thrasher
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Resiliant_Astral_Shield_III
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Resilient_Astral_Shield_I
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Resilient_Astral_Shield_II
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Resilient_Astral_Shield_III
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Savage_Astral_Assassin
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Savage_Astral_Conjurer
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Savage_Astral_Destroyer
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Savage_Astral_Devourer
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Savage_Astral_Dominator
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Savage_Astral_Flayer
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Savage_Astral_Marauder
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Savage_Astral_Mauler
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Savage_Astral_Mindbreaker
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Savage_Astral_Raider
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Savage_Astral_Ripper
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Savage_Astral_Sentinel
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Savage_Astral_Sniper
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Savage_Astral_Spellweaver
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Shimmering_Astral_Shield_I
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Shimmering_Astral_Shield_II
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Shimmering_Astral_Shield_III
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Shining_Astral_Shield_I
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Shining_Astral_Shield_III
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/The_Astral
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/The_Legacy_of_the_Junes:_Astral_Demons
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Young_Astral_Assassin
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Young_Astral_Devastator
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Young_Astral_Marauder
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Young_Astral_Ripper
https://allods.fandom.com/wiki/Young_Astral_Spellweaver
https://allthetropes.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Projection
https://ancardia.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_attunement
https://animanga.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Project
https://animanga.fandom.com/wiki/Bermuda_Triangle:_Colorful_Pastrale
https://annex.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_dreadnought
https://astralchain.fandom.com/wiki/
https://astralchain.fandom.com/wiki/Aberrations
https://astralchain.fandom.com/wiki/Aether
https://astralchain.fandom.com/wiki/Agamemnon
https://astralchain.fandom.com/wiki/Akira_Howard
https://astralchain.fandom.com/wiki/Akira-Legion_Fusion
https://astralchain.fandom.com/wiki/Alicia_Lopez
https://astralchain.fandom.com/wiki/Archives
https://astralchain.fandom.com/wiki/Ares
https://astralchain.fandom.com/wiki/Ark_Historical_Records
https://astralchain.fandom.com/wiki/Arm_Legion
https://astralchain.fandom.com/wiki/Arrow_Legion
https://astralchain.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Chain
https://astralchain.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Chain_Wiki
https://astralchain.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Chain_Wiki:Rules
https://astralchain.fandom.com/wiki/Astral_Chain_Wiki:Style_Guide
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Kimi to Boku no Saigo no Senjou, Aruiwa Sekai ga Hajimaru Seisen -- -- SILVER LINK. -- 12 eps -- Light novel -- Action Military Romance Fantasy -- Kimi to Boku no Saigo no Senjou, Aruiwa Sekai ga Hajimaru Seisen Kimi to Boku no Saigo no Senjou, Aruiwa Sekai ga Hajimaru Seisen -- A force known as Astral power permeates throughout the world, wielded by astral mages. Fearing its destructive power, the "Empire" persecutes those who show their abilities. The tormented mages then founded the Nebulis Sovereignty to flee from their oppressors. Since then, the two nations have been in bitter conflict, the war still going strong for more than a century. -- -- After committing the great crime of freeing an imprisoned witch, the talented knight Iska is sentenced to prison. A year later, the Empire leadership suddenly decides to set him free, with the condition that he hunts down a fearsome mage known as the "Ice Calamity Witch." Hoping to end the war, Iska agrees. Coincidentally, the Ice Calamity Witch herself, Aliceliese "Alice" Lou Nebulis XI, also wishes for peace and is willing to do everything she can to bring down the Empire. -- -- As Iska and Alice both yearn for a crusade that will turn the world into one without struggle, woe, or pain, the strings of fate tie them ever closer together, creating a bond that goes beyond something fabricated by mere coincidence. -- -- -- Licensor: -- Funimation -- 162,998 6.54
Words Worth -- -- Arms -- 5 eps -- Visual novel -- Adventure Hentai Demons Magic Fantasy -- Words Worth Words Worth -- The legend has survived for generation. The Words Worth tablet, which will unlock the secrets of the Universe for the one who can decipher it, has been shattered. The warring tribes of Light and Shadow blame each other, and their accusations lead to all out war! -- -- Astral, the undisciplined heir to the throne of the Shadow Forces, lusts for his bride-to-be, Sharon. But Sharon, an accomplished warrior herself, feels her body drawn toward Caesar, the Shadow Tribe`s bravest swordsman. -- -- Sharon battles alongside Caesar during an assault by the Light Forces, and her ferocious beauty captivates Sir Fabris, the leader of the Tribe of Light. Fabris` army loses the battle, but he vows that he will one day get Sharon into his bed, the hard way, if necessary. -- -- Meanwhile, Astral takes his sexual frustrations out on Maria, a Light Tribe sorceress who has been taken captive. As Astral penetrates Maria, Sir Fabris prepares to launch a penetration of his own: a full-scale attack on the Tribe of Shadow! -- -- (Source: AnimeNfo) -- -- Licensor: -- NuTech Digital -- OVA - Aug 25, 1999 -- 7,567 6.75
Yu☆Gi☆Oh! Zexal -- -- Gallop -- 73 eps -- Manga -- Action Game Fantasy Shounen -- Yu☆Gi☆Oh! Zexal Yu☆Gi☆Oh! Zexal -- In the bustling and futuristic city of Heartland, a young boy named Yuuma Tsukumo has a dream that everyone his age wants to achieve—earning the title of the greatest duelist! Sadly, due to his lackluster dueling skills, this dream is far from achievable. But when the school bully, Ryouga "Shark" Kamishiro, splits the key given to him by his father into two pieces, he inadvertently sets Yuuma on a collision course with his dream. -- -- Retaining one half of the key, Yuuma begins a duel with Shark, but soon realizes that his inexperienced skills are no match for him. In a sudden turn of events, Yuuma's key repairs itself, and the "Door of Destiny'' appears before him. Using the key to open it, Yuuma is greeted by an alien by the name of Astral—a being only he can see. -- -- The bewildered Yuuma soon learns that his memories have been divided into 100 "Number Cards," all of which he must retrieve. However, he is also not the only one looking for them. Bombarded by these revelations, Yuuma, alongside Astral, must defend the world from the upcoming threats that loom over Heartland City—regardless of any divine intervention that may occur. -- -- -- Licensor: -- 4Kids Entertainment, Konami -- TV - Apr 11, 2011 -- 57,016 6.34
Yu☆Gi☆Oh! Zexal Second -- -- Gallop -- 73 eps -- Manga -- Action Game Fantasy Shounen -- Yu☆Gi☆Oh! Zexal Second Yu☆Gi☆Oh! Zexal Second -- After defeating a mysterious enemy, Yuuma Tsukumo, along with the help of Kaito Tenjou and Ryouga "Shark" Kamishiro, has thwarted the Barians' plans. However, Yuuma is still on a quest to retrieve the Number Cards to restore Astral's memories. The Seven Barian Emperors catch wind of Yuuma and Astral's endeavors and begin to collect the cards themselves to achieve their ultimate goal: destroying Astral's world in exchange for saving their own. -- -- Though only five of the emperors are present, they unanimously decide on annihilating Astral and Yuuma once and for all. Elsewhere, with their newfound powers of ZEXAL, Astral and Yuuma work to eliminate the enemy force that threatens Earth and the rest of the universe. -- -- Yu☆Gi☆Oh! Zexal Second unveils the mysteries and unpleasant surprises that lie in the wake of Yuuma's adversities. As Astral struggles to accept his past and the consequences it may have brought, will the gods continue to shower their fortune upon Yuuma on yet another perilous adventure? -- -- TV - Oct 7, 2012 -- 29,166 6.84
Yu☆Gi☆Oh! Zexal Second: Midokoro Tenkomori Special -- -- - -- 1 ep -- Manga -- Action Fantasy Game Shounen -- Yu☆Gi☆Oh! Zexal Second: Midokoro Tenkomori Special Yu☆Gi☆Oh! Zexal Second: Midokoro Tenkomori Special -- Recap of first 8 episodes of the second season, narrated by Yuma and Astral. -- Special - Dec 8, 2012 -- 3,996 6.16
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