In my personal opinion, the quote I will mention below was stated by one of the most knowledgeable and greatest mystics of the modern world. Her formal name is Helena Patrova Blavatsky, or sometimes known as HPB. Many who decide to study her life and Magnus Opum, The Secret Doctrine, have come to understand the great contribution she left to society at large. She was personal friends with Ghandi, known by Thomas Edison, many of the greatest writers and poets of modern times, and some believe read by Einstein. Her life’s work was dedicated to bringing the original ancient wisdom that lay beneath and connects all great scriptures and religions of the world – in their esoteric origin and intent. She was a fierce intellect stating some of the principles Einstein would lay out in the future as early as 1887 through her famous dialogues with her inner circle, decades before Einstein would compose General Relativity. But most of all, I am impressed by her love of truth, which she stated first and foremost as the dedication to the upliftment of all humanity and nature as the ONE LIFE in which we are all involved. To that aim she seemed to have genuinely dedicated her entire soul to.
Here is just one in a myriad of her knowledgeable quotes helping us to understand the ONE LIFE:
“Spirit is universal…It cannot know itself except as soul. Spirit is the “power to become;” Soul is “the becoming.” Spirit is the power to see and know; Soul is the seeing and knowing. Soul is the accumulation of perceptions and experiences by means of which Spiritual Identity is realized.”
Anyone who pays close attention to her statement will perhaps better understand why I drove the comment section in part one of this series in the direction that I did. When I stated that “I AM THAT I AM” is the power to “become,” perhaps some misunderstood my intent. The Unknown, eternal nature of the divine is the eternal ONE Essence which cannot be defined by human intellect, but as the ancient doctrine teaches us, it can be felt as an experience. While we are yet “individual souls,” our essence is as the Bhagavad Gita makes clear, “Thou art Parabrahm,” or, “Thou art THAT. In other words, there is a divine relationship between the individual and the Absolute, and as the Apostle Paul states, it is a mystery.
Shortly, we will get to Blavatsky’s comment and dissect it in detail using the Scriptures of the Bible as a perfect correlate for those looking to explore this type of metaphysics. But for now, we have to start with a proper introduction to a concept that is, in my opinion, foundational to grasp.
Karma…
What is it? The Eastern meaning translates best in English as “action.” And what is the basis of all action? This post will show that any action’s fundamental essence in the human soul is in fact an accumulation of prior thought, whether self-conscious or unconscious, purposeful and with knowledge, or blind and ignorant.
In the West we probably have an idea of Karma as cause and effect. This is also a good definition to start with, but I would like to broaden this concept a little more as something all pervasive and omnipresent. The Bible seems to state this in its esoteric meaning, but I will let you be the judge. Since this is predominantly a Bible site, let’s go there and review some of the scriptures that I hope will give you some pause to consider as they relate to, what I believe, is karma.
“Be not deceived: God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he reap” (Gal. 6:7).
Whether we define Karma as cause and effect or action, we can see that the Apostle Paul is expressing the same idea.This idea that “God cannot be mocked” by the human intellect has something to do with a universal law of reaping and sowing, which cannot be defied, because it is in operation everywhere at all times. The pretext of this scripture is also interesting. A few verses above, it states: “Let every man PROVE his own work…” and “For every man shall bear his own burden.”
Burden of what?
As we shall see, his or her thoughts and actions!
But here are some more scriptures to consider from the master Jesus that perhaps may broaden our view of the ONE LAW, as karma, being an integral concept throughout the Bible even though Western religious ideology has not typically seen it this way:
“Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfill (Matt 5:17).
It might be a strange concept for some to think Jesus is using the Old Testament law and the prophets in the context of Karma. Understandable. An exoteric view (the literal rendition of the carnal mind) of the Old Testament would suggest the law given to Moses was a set of specific rules to live by. And oh, but they are! But esoterically, and in a holistically and spiritual viewpoint, these rules govern the evolution of the soul, its growth and development, as it relates to the mind. Jesus is acknowledging a certain phase of evolution, that even he, as the ONE UNIVERSAL LIFE PRINCIPLE in manifestation, as the Word, needs fulfillment. There is no denial, nor could there ever be, for the very essence and spirit of Jesus Christ is the EMBODIMENT of that law. This is clearly stated at the end of the verse, acknowledging, I am come to FULFILL it. In the broader sense Jesus is stating that the Word made flesh is the fullness of the entire law, from beginning to end, in each stage of its evolutionary stages, through every character as symbolically represented as the soul’s developing nature. And none of these stages can be denied.
Jesus also reiterates his mission in another way: to fulfill the will of his father. And what is the Father’s will? Esoterically, it is universal and cosmic law which governs both the visible and invisible worlds, known to us in name as karma, to which the man can choose, if he or she so wishes, to become a co-worker with it. The Apostle Paul came to accept this sentiment when he stated that he had learned to be content in all situations, as a form of mental surrender to it.
The first generation of Isrealites (the beginning of qualities and faculties “called out” in the soul to be disciplined) reveals the struggle the mind affords man. They were always wanting to return to Egypt where they had “flesh” to eat. Remember in my first article eating pertains to what the mind gravitates to as mental ideas. The real problem of interpreting the Bible literally, is that it places all the stories into a historical narrative, wherein the religious institutions of the world say one must believe in that historical framework in order to become saved. But this historical narrative is contrived by cultural and political ideology which is man’s laws in partial ignorance, not God’s law, the universal law of nature.
One way to become a co-worker with this universal law is to first know that this law is omnipresent, eternally working, in every facet of our lives. For as Jesus also stated, nothing shall pass away until every jot and tittle of that law be fulfilled. God also states that my people perish for a lack of knowledge. And what is this lack of knowledge? It is failing to understand this cosmic law as an ever pervasive principle in the soul of man, ever guiding and evolving it, inwardly and outwardly. Man has the ability then to conform his thoughts in such a way that he becomes a co-worker with this ever pervasive, omnipresent law, or to be ignorant of it, and therefore be subject to the effect of going against it as the Isrealites did in the wilderness and forever incurred its just cause and effect. Every man reaps what he sows, either towards life, or towards spiritual death. That first generation continually denied it until they perished, and the next phase in the evolution of the soul under Joshua and Caleb began.
Everything comes down to a man’s thoughts in a certain stage of evolution, and that stage, where most of humanity is today, has much to do with the intellect and one’s own inner conscience, that still small voice that can speak to us if the intellect trains itself, and disciplines itself, to hear it. Man’s intellect can either gravitate towards the spirit, or be mired by the desire-nature. Man must surrender his desire mind, or personal self interests, to the ONENESS of all life. He or she must surrender ambition, pride, vanity, lusts and greed in all thought. For only in so doing can his mind become freed by the spirit. And as I will show, scripture teaches this principle as a self-conscious act of responsibility, through the act of thinking. As the Apostle Paul stated, all things that are lovely and true, “think” on these things. And in the Old Testament the law demanded that every first born son, whether human or animal, was to be dedicated to God. And sons and daughters symbolically represent our thoughts and emotions, which are to be dedicated to the spirit rather than the flesh or carnal mind, the desire mind.
Consider how Jesus stated how important thought really is when he tells us that if a man lusts after a woman in his heart, he has ALREADY committed adultery. Can anyone deny here the foundational aspect of thought, and its basis for all action? The revolutionary concept being conveyed here is that even before any action is committed, it is ROOTED in thought! Perhaps this is why that great mystic Blavatsky stated that all “Action” is a prior accumulation of thoughts. Do we see a correlation here between Blavatsky and Christ’s words? Absolutely!
Retributive justice then is always fair and equitable as karma, and we are rewarded for our thought, for it is us, as we are! Again, that Bible scripture cannot ring true enough: “As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he.” Can we deny then the basic power and nature of thought itself!? And what it means for the human condition!? We all reap what we sow, in thought. And this goes part and parcel with the intellectual man in our current stage of evolution of which we are all a part.
William Q Judge, one of the best friends of Blavatsky, also stated:
“When the period of rest after death is ended Manas (mind) is bound by innumerable electrical magnetic threads to earth by reason of the thoughts of the last life, and therefore by desire, for it was desire that caused so many thoughts and ignorance of the true nature of things. And understanding of this doctrine of man being really a thinker and made of thought will make clear all the rest in relation to incarnation and reincarnation. The body of the inner man is made of thought, and this being so it must follow that if the thoughts have more affinity for earth-life than for life elsewhere a return to life here is inevitable.”
Consider this in relation to Paul’s words, that as a man soweth, so shall he reap. The immortal thinker is a sower and a reaper. For those who can accept it, Mr. William Judge has just given the essence and subsequent meaning, in the esoteric sense, to the allegorical fall of Adam in the Garden.
He further states:
“The fifth principle is Manas…and is usually translated as Mind. Other names have been given to it, but it is the knower, the perceiver, the thinker…Manas, or the Thinker is the reincarnating being, the immortal who carries the results and values of all the different lives lived on earth or elsewhere. Its nature becomes dual as soon as it is attached to a body…In Manas the thoughts of all lives are stored…the total quantity of life thoughts makes up the stream or thread of a life’s meditation – “that upon which the heart was set” – and is stored in Manas, to be brought out again at any time in whatever life the brain and bodily environments are similar to those used in engendering that class of thoughts. It is Manas which sees the objects presented to it by the bodily organs and the actual organs within. When the open eye receives a picture on the retina, the whole scene is turned into vibrations in the optic nerves which disappear into the brain, where Manas is enabled to perceive them as idea.”
I want us to focus on one important statement of Judge above: “…the total quantity of life-thoughts makes up the stream or thread of a life’s meditation – that upon which the heart was set”.
And so we can see that whatsoever a man soweth is related first and foremost to his thoughts and ideas, and that which HE BECOMES IN MANIFESTATION.
It is interesting that the Sanskrit word for mind stems from manas. And this correlates to “mana” from “heaven,” which the Israelites that left Egypt were supposed to eat symbolically (in post one eating relates to perception of ideas), but rejected God’s food (or spiritual ideas, which the lower self and selfish personality is often apt to do!). And this is why esoterically they, the people (the potential faculties of becoming the disciplined mind), have to wander around in the desert so long until Joshua and Caleb rise up under the law. They represent two aspects of the mind. Joshua, being from the tribe of Ephriam, is one that sets his analytical mind correctly, and Caleb, being from the tribe of Judah, is the aspect of the higher mind. The union of the two, which can only be accomplished by Joshua’s proper thoughts, is thus the leader that leads the people (the faculties and qualities) to the Promised Land. This is why Joshua didn’t live by sight, or external reality, but by the inner man, and set his thought correctly towards the higher life and spirit in that Promised Land, which refused to believe or see the external report. It is Moses, the intellectual and moral nature developing in man (through the law), that is the foundation for both the coming of Joshua and Caleb. Every detail in scripture is important, and little thought is ever given to why Joshua is associated with the tribe of Ephriam (NOT JUDAH!). And Ephriam camped on the left side of the tabernacle. Jesus is from Judah, and this is why both Joshua and Caleb are needed, the two aspects of the mind. We must think, and discern!
William Judge also once said on his translation of the Bhagavad Gita:
“Man, made of thought, occupant only of many bodies from time to time, is eternally thinking. His chains are through thought, his release due to nothing else.”
So we see that according to Mr. Judge, our release is contingent upon our thought. Thought is what traps us, but it is also what releases us, in the sense that it requires a certain stage in evolution to begin the true free will of the spiritual mind to manifest itself in US, and THROUGH us.
Blavatsky gives us more information to ponder on the working of this process:
“Manas, the Mind Principle, is the connecting link between our pure nature, eternal, spiritual nature and our mortal, physical, material, personal nature…it is continually presented with the choice between spirituality and sensuality and has to choose one or the other, since the spiritual nature and the sensual nature can never and will never mix or meet. Manas cannot go in both directions at once. It can only either go up or down…up towards spirituality or down towards sensuality…Whichever one it chooses will shape and determine its destiny and its future evolutionary progress.”
Perhaps we can now see why Jesus states that man cannot serve two masters. He meant either the desire mind or the spiritual mind. For Blavatsky states, “The Self of Matter and the SELF of Spirit can never meet. One of the twain must disappear; there is no place for both.”
And what is perhaps the most important concept she gives to these points further elucidated:
She states: “The Mind, which we have agreed to call the Human Soul…is a compound in its highest form, of spiritual aspirations, volitions and divine love [Abel]; and in its lower aspect, of animal desires and terrestrial passions imprated to it by its associations with its vehicle, the seat of all these [Cain]. It thus stands as a link and a medium between the animal nature of man which its higher reason seeks to subdue, and his divine spiritual nature to which it gravitates, whenever it has the upper hand in its struggle with the inner animal…”
And…
“Whenever [the mind] disconnects itself, for the time being, with [from] kama, becomes the guide of the highest mental faculties, and is the organ of the free will in physical man.”
I leave you with one more thought from the Book of Hebrews that is perhaps the best statement of karma and reincarnation in the Bible, in my humble opinion:
“All these people were still living by faith when they died. They did not receive the things promised; they only saw them and welcomed them from a distance, admitting that they were foreigners and strangers on earth” (Hebrews 11:13).
Some of God’s most faithful servants didn’t receive the promise. They welcomed them though from a distance. Meaning, the Hebrews’s author understands that the omnipresent eternal law is evolving the soul, and we can become a coworker with its divine attributes. These people which knew they were strangers in a land correlates to the aspects, attributes, and faculties of the evolving soul in its stages of growth and development and discipline under the spirit.
To not see that this scripture is probably one of the most profound statements backing up reincarnation of the soul and the law of karma is a travesty!
Man was never meant to transcend the LAW. He was meant to become a co-operator with it! For he is that law itself, unfolding in many ways and on many planes of its manifested presence. This is also clearly stated in Jeremiah, where the eternal law is written on the heart, not in transcending it as the religious mindset today sometimes so insidiously advocated, but becoming at ONE WITH IT.
Now let us finally return to HPB’s statement I made at the outset of this entire post. HPB’s quote above gets us close to the nature of who we are, and what we are to become, within the human condition. Let’s break it down.
“Spirit cannot know itself except as Soul,” she states.
The logic seems sound if we ponder it deeply. How could any substance universally diffused be self-consciously aware, which requires an individualized perception? And this is our mind manifested through a personality. The fall of the universal mind into matter allowed man to “KNOW” good and evil, or the duality of nature. This was the opportunity for the spirit to get it know itself, once self consciousness had been achieved. Before it was truly innocent because it knew not how to self-reflect on its current condition, but rather followed the law in its lowest workings. In order to become conscious of itself, it would need some further evolutionary development.
Now let’s look more at Blavatsky’s quote and dig even deeper!
“Spirit is the “power to become;” Soul is “the becoming.”
According to her words, spirit then, is the “power” to “become.” If one has a power, but never uses it, it lays dormant or latent, and manifests as nothing. All this talk in the New Age movement of today endlessly speaks of our power, and what we truly are as “divine” entities. And while this is true, it means nothing. Absolutely NOTHING, except what could be. In other words, it remains as an abstraction unless realized. To realize anything, the soul in the human kingdom must use the mental, emotional, and physical form to move in the direction of “becoming” something more, or expanded, than what it was prior. This can only be accomplished through “experience,” and the knowledge that can be gained through this experience. If one perceives the entire book of Job from beginning to end, one might realize that in the beginning of the Book, he only KNEW God by the hearing of the ear. But at the end of this journey, through his encounter with the adversary, he came to know God personally.
Blavatsky further quotes:
“Soul is the accumulation of perceptions and experiences by means of which Spiritual Identity is realized.”
Spiritual identity? What is she really getting at? Spirit, as a universally diffused principle, cannot be said to have any identity unless an aspect of its potential has become “realized” into a form, and that is our soul, and more specifically, the mind. It is ultimately an illusion, Maya. Yes! But not because it isn’t a real experience, but only because the experience is temporary, and continually changing.
The same concept is taught in that great esoteric book of Malachi, where Yaweh states, bring all the “tithes” into the storehouse. Tithes here simply symbolize an effort, mentally, emotionally, and physically, to dedicate all to God, which becomes “stored” as a permanent spiritual volition and cements itself to the immortal aspect of the higher ego. This “storehouse” is known more esoterically as the “causal body” or soul, which is the composite I spoke of earlier of spiritual volition cemented to unconditioned immortality. Such soul essence is what incarnates partially in each incarnation. Partially, as it informs and becomes the lower personality, which has the right and potential to add more to the “storehouse.”
Many Christians interpret the blessings that God will pour out back to them in Malachi as wealth, or physical prosperity, but it has little to do with personal life, and rather more to do with the permanent acquired attributes of the individuality, which remains as such only because those are spiritual volitions which have married itself to universality.
Now let’s expand upon those confusing above words and go into some esoteric thought that will run contrary to much New Age thought, but what I think is absolutely vital! How does the spiritual soul “realize” itself? And what is the true purpose of the aspects of the lower souls?
Blavatsky gives the esoteric key here in these statements:
“…the higher Mind in Man, or his Ego (Manas) is, when linked indivisibly with Buddhi, a spirit…”
In other words, the middle soul, or human mind, is the cementing link between the marriage of the lower personality and the Holy Spirit.
She further explains:
“”Buddhi becomes conscious by the accretions it gets from Manas after every new incarnation…”
Before explaining further, I will now link another scripture, which people can either accept or deny in its esoteric significance.
Who knoweth the spirit of man that goeth upward, and the spirit of the beast that goeth downward to the earth? (Ecc: 3:21).
And this also brings us back to the middle part of Blavatsky’s brilliant quote which we haven’t dissected yet:
“Spirit is the power to see and know..”
I will end here even though I feel like there is so much more to say on the subject. But the post is becoming quite long already 🙂 Perhaps I will conclude with this sentiment: the intellect of man in this world of manifestation is not the pinnacle of man, but rather an evolutionary stage that has to be set right. There will come a time in humanity’s future, that some already KNOW, where even the intellect is simply a tool of the spirit. Who knows how many have already accomplished this point in the great stages of humanity’s evolution? I certainly don’t. And who can say where we each out in those stages of evolution except of the spirit within us all? We each have to decide how much we have surrendered the intellect to the will of the father. But hopefully this post provides some thoughts that we can all self reflect on, and how much we are being coworkers with that great law, which is both God and man in manifestation 🙂
Blessings 🙂