Our learned brother and correspondent judges apparently the Hindu religious systems by their Shastras and Puranas, probably the latter, and in their modern translation moreover, which is disfigured out of all recognition, by the Orientalists.
It is to their philosophical systems that one has to turn, to their esoteric teaching, if he would make a point of comparison.
No doubt the symbology of the Pentateuch and even of the New Testament, comes from the same source.
But surely the Pyramid of Cheops, whose measurements are all found repeated by Professor Piazzi Smythe in Solomon's alleged and mythical temple, is not of a later date than the Mosaic books?
Hence, if there is any such great identity as claimed, it must be due to servile copying on the part of the Jews, not on that of the Egyptians.
The Jewish glyphs -- and even their language, the Hebrew -- are not original.
They are borrowed from the Egyptians, from whom Moses got his Wisdom; from the Coptic, the probable kinsman, if not parent, of the old Phoenician and from the Hyksos, their (alleged) ancestors, as Josephus shows in his " Against Apion ," I.
, 25.
Aye; but who are the Hyksos shepherds?
And who the Egyptians?
History knows nothing of the question, and speculates and theorizes out of the depths of the respective consciousnesses of her historians.
( See Isis Unveiled , vol.
II., p.
430-438.) "Khamism, or old Coptic," says Bunsen, "is from Western Asia, and contains some germ of the Semitic, thus bearing witness to the primitive cognate unity of the Aryan and Semitic races"; and he places the great events in Egypt 9,000 years B.C .
The fact is that in archaic Esotericism and Aryan thought we find a grand philosophy, whereas in the Hebrew records we find only the most surprising ingenuity in inventing apotheoses for phallic worship and sexual theogony.
[[Vol.
1, Page]] 116 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
nothing to do with the classification of the septenary chain and belong to the purely aethereal, invisible worlds.
These will be noticed elsewhere.
Suffice for the present to show that they are purposely referred to as though they belonged to the chain.
"Another enumeration calls the Seven worlds -- earth, sky, heaven, middle region, place of birth, mansion of the blest, and abode of truth; placing the 'Sons of Brahma' in the sixth division, and stating the fifth, or Jana Loka, to be that where animals destroyed in the general conflagration are born again." (see Hindu Classical Dictionary.
) Some real esoteric teaching is given in the "Symbolism." He who is prepared for it will understand the hidden meaning.
------- STANZA V.
-- Continued.
3.
H E IS THEIR GUIDING SPIRIT AND LEADER.
W HEN HE COMMENCES WORK, HE SEPARATES THE SPARKS OF THE LOWER KINGDOM ( mineral atoms ) THAT FLOAT AND THRILL WITH JOY IN THEIR RADIANT DWELLINGS ( gaseous clouds ) , AND FORMS THEREWITH THE GERMS OF WHEELS.
H E PLACES THEM IN THE SIX DIRECTIONS OF SPACE AND ONE IN THE MIDDLE -- THE CENTRAL WHEEL ( a ).
( a ) "Wheels," as already explained, are the centres of force, around which primordial Cosmic matter expands, and, passing through all the six stages of consolidation, becomes spheroidal and ends by being transformed into globes or spheres.
It is one of the fundamental dogmas of Esoteric Cosmogony, that during the Kalpas (or aeons) of life, MOTION, which, during the periods of Rest "pulsates and thrills through every slumbering atom"* (Commentary on Dzyan), assumes an evergrowing [[Footnote(s)]] ------------------------------------------------- *It may be asked, as also the writer has not failed to ask, "Who is there to ascertain the difference in that motion, since all nature is reduced to its primal essence, and there can be no one -- not even one of the Dhyani-Chohans, who are all in Nirvana -- to see it?" The answer to this is: "Everything in Nature has to be judged by analogy.
Though the highest Deities (Archangels or Dhyani-Buddhas) are unable to penetrate the mysteries too far beyond our planetary system and the visible Kosmos, yet there were great seers and prophets in olden times who were enabled to perceive the mystery of Breath and Motion retrospectively, when the systems of worlds were at rest and plunged in their periodic sleep." [[Vol.
1, Page]] 117 THE ANTIQUITY OF PHYSICAL SCIENCES.
tendency, from the first awakening of Kosmos to a new "Day," to circular movement.
The "Deity becomes a WHIRLWIND." They are also called Rotae -- the moving wheels of the celestial orbs participating in the world's creation -- when the meaning refers to the animating principle of the stars and planets; for in the Kabala, they are represented by the Ophanim, the Angels of the Spheres and stars, of which they are the informing Souls.
(See Kabala Denudata , " De Anima ," p.
113.) This law of vortical movement in primordial matter, is one of the oldest conceptions of Greek philosophy, whose first historical Sages were nearly all Initiates of the Mysteries.
The Greeks had it from the Egyptians, and the latter from the Chaldeans, who had been the pupils of Brahmins of the esoteric school.
Leucippus, and Democritus of Abdera -- the pupil of the Magi -- taught that this gyratory movement of the atoms and spheres existed from eternity.* Hicetas, Heraclides, Ecphantus, Pythagoras, and all his pupils, taught the rotation of the earth; and Aryabhata of India, Aristarchus, Seleucus, and Archimedes calculated its revolution as scientifically as the astronomers do now; while the theory of the Elemental Vortices was known to Anaxagoras, and maintained by him 500 years B.C., or nearly 2,000 before it was taken up by Galileo, Descartes, Swedenborg, and finally, with slight modifications, by Sir W.
Thomson.
(See his " Vortical Atoms.
") All such knowledge, if justice be only done to it, is an echo of the archaic doctrine, an attempt to explain which is now being made.
How men of the last few centuries have come to the same ideas and conclusions that were taught as axiomatic truths in the secrecy of the Adyta dozens of [[Footnote(s)]] ------------------------------------------------- *"The doctrine of the rotation of the earth about an axis is taught by the Pythagorean Hicetas, probably as early as 500 B.C .
The doctrine of the periodic restoration or recurrence of all things to their original state after vast cycles.
The passage describes the Kosmos awakening to a new 'Day' after periods of Rest and periodic sleep, implying cyclical restoration of cosmic activity after vast intervals of dormancy.
The Hermetic axiom that the structure of the cosmos is reflected at every scale — 'as above, so below; as within, so without' — making each level a legible map of the others.
The passage notes that measurements of the Pyramid of Cheops are 'all found repeated' in Solomon's Temple, implying a structural correspondence between sacred monuments across traditions.
Narratives or doctrines of cosmic origin — how heaven, earth, and the primordial deities first came into being. The Kojiki's deities born alone on the Plain of High Heaven, Voluspo's Ginnungagap, Genesis's tohu wa-bohu, the Timaeus's Demiurge fashioning the Receptacle, the Hesiodic Theogony, the Kalevala's egg-cosmogony, Egyptian Nun-and-Atum. Distinct from emanation_hierarchy (structural-ontological cascade), letters_of_creation (mechanism of creation), and apocatastasis/frashokereti (end-state restoration); cosmogony is temporally-narrative beginning.
Stanza V explicitly narrates the cosmic origin: a guiding spirit separates mineral sparks, forms wheels, and primordial matter passes through six stages of consolidation into globes.
Fragments of divine light or spirit trapped inside material bodies, awaiting liberation and return to their source.
The Stanza references 'sparks of the lower kingdom (mineral atoms)' that 'float and thrill with joy in their radiant dwellings,' using spark imagery for the fundamental particles from which worlds form.
A chain of divine beings or principles flowing downward from a single transcendent source (the One or the Father), each level less perfect than the one above.
The passage references the 'septenary chain' and enumerates the Seven worlds in hierarchical order (earth, sky, heaven, middle region, place of birth, mansion of the blest, abode of truth), with the Sons of Brahma placed in the sixth division.
A historical or mythical chain of transmission for secret wisdom from master to disciple across time and cultures — the credential of the teaching, not merely its content. Distinct from oral_tradition (the spoken-not-written modality of transmission, which a lineage may or may not use) and hidden_sayings (the concealment-for-readiness of a teaching's meaning, independent of who transmitted it or in what unbroken chain).
The passage explicitly traces a chain of transmission: Brahmins taught the Chaldeans, who taught the Egyptians, who taught the Greeks, establishing a cross-cultural lineage of secret wisdom.
Salvation through direct experiential knowledge of the divine nature, not through faith, ritual, or moral works alone.
The passage implies that esoteric truth is accessible only to those 'prepared' for it, suggesting a form of direct experiential knowledge rather than mere intellectual study.
Esoteric teachings reserved for those ready to receive them; outer meaning conceals an inner liberating truth.
The passage states 'Some real esoteric teaching is given in the Symbolism. He who is prepared for it will understand the hidden meaning,' directly articulating the doctrine of concealed inner truth.
The doctrine of the universe as boundless and without center or circumference, populated by innumerable worlds — Bruno's rejection of the closed Aristotelian sphere; the divine and the cosmos as ontologically infinite.
The reference to 'the systems of worlds' at rest in periodic sleep and the vast temporal scale of Kalpas implies a cosmos of innumerable worlds beyond any single planetary system.
A non-physical dimension of reality, interpenetrating the physical world, populated by forces, beings, and forms ordinarily imperceptible to physical senses and instruments, that can affect embodied life without being seen — Dion Fortune's 'mind-side of nature,' the astral plane of Western esotericism broadly construed. Distinct from astral_light (a specific transmitting medium or fluid operating within this realm, not the realm itself), pleroma (the divine fullness at the summit of a cosmic hierarchy, not a parallel plane coextensive with ordinary life), and animism (particular indwelling spirits bound to specific natural objects, not the general unseen dimension itself).
The passage references 'purely aethereal, invisible worlds' that are purposely referred to as though they belonged to the septenary chain, acknowledging a non-physical dimension of reality.
The doctrine that the cosmos unfolds as a structured descent of spirit into matter — a directional process traced stage by stage from an unconditioned principle down through successive planes to full materialization — complemented by its own eventual return ('evolution'). Distinct from emanation_hierarchy (the static structure of the resulting levels of the cascade) and cosmogony (a single originating event rather than an ongoing staged process) in naming the directional cosmic PROCESS of descent itself, paired with its own complementary ascent.
The passage describes primordial matter passing 'through all the six stages of consolidation, becomes spheroidal and ends by being transformed into globes or spheres,' a directional staged descent from undifferentiated to materialized form.
The Hermetic doctrine of a measured swing or pendulum motion between poles — action and reaction, flow and outflow, rise and fall — operating in mental, physical, and cosmic-historical registers alike. Distinct from apocatastasis (cosmic-scale eschatological restoration after vast cycles) in naming a constant, ever-present oscillation rather than a singular restorative event.
The passage describes the periodic cycles of the Kosmos — alternating 'Day' and 'Rest,' Kalpas of life and sleep — as a fundamental oscillation governing cosmic existence.
Organized, persisting groups — fraternities, orders, lodges — that maintain esoteric knowledge or practices as an institution distinct from public religion or mainstream society, holding 'the keys' collectively rather than through any one master-disciple pair. Distinct from esoteric_lineage (a genealogical chain of individual transmission, not an institution) and hidden_sayings (the concealment of a teaching's meaning, independent of whether any organized body holds it).
The passage references 'Initiates of the Mysteries' and 'the secrecy of the Adyta,' implying organized groups that maintain esoteric knowledge apart from public religion.
The Hermetic doctrine that nothing rests — matter, energy, mind, and spirit are a single continuum differing only in rate of vibration, from the grossest matter to the least material spirit. Distinct from cosmic_sympathy (affinity resonating BETWEEN separate things) in being a claim about what constitutes any one thing in the first place, and from magical_equilibrium (Lévi's operational balancing technique, which presupposes some vibration doctrine rather than stating this general principle).
The passage states that during periods of Rest motion 'pulsates and thrills through every slumbering atom,' and discusses the evergrowing tendency toward circular movement as a fundamental cosmic law.