Three further higher grades have to be conquered by the Arhan who would reach the apex of the ladder of Arhatship.
There are those who have reached it even in this fifth race of ours, but the faculties necessary for the attainment of these higher [[Footnote(s)]] ------------------------------------------------- [[Footnote continued from previous page]] (beginning of motion, hence of differentiation); (5) Germinal , fiery , (differentiated, but composed of the germs only of the Elements, in their earliest states, they having seven states, when completely developed on our earth); (6) Four-fold , vapoury (the future Earth); (7) Cold and depending (on the Sun for life and light).
* This cannot be so very unscientific , since Descartes thought also that "the planets rotate on their axes because they were once lucid stars, the centres of Vortices." [[Vol.
1, Page]] 207 THE TREE FROM WHICH THE ADEPTS GROW.
grades will be fully developed in the average ascetic only at the end of this Root-Race, and in the Sixth and Seventh.
Thus there will always be Initiates and the Profane till the end of this minor Manvantara, the present life-cycle.
The Arhats of the "fire-mist" of the 7th rung are but one remove from the Root-Base of their Hierarchy -- the highest on Earth, and our Terrestrial chain.
This "Root-Base" has a name which can only be translated by several compound words into English" -- "the ever-living-human-Banyan." This "Wondrous Being" descended from a "high region," they say, in the early part of the Third Age, before the separation of the sexes of the Third Race.
This Third Race is sometimes called collectively "the Sons of Passive Yoga ," i.e.
, it was produced unconsciously by the second Race, which, as it was intellectually inactive, is supposed to have been constantly plunged in a kind of blank or abstract contemplation, as required by the conditions of the Yoga state.
In the first or earlier portion of the existence of this third race, while it was yet in its state of purity, the "Sons of Wisdom," who, as will be seen, incarnated in this Third Race, produced by Kriyasakti a progeny called the "Sons of Ad" or "of the Fire-Mist," the "Sons of Will and Yoga," etc.
They were a conscious production, as a portion of the race was already animated with the divine spark of spiritual, superior intelligence.
It was not a Race, this progeny.
It was at first a wondrous Being, called the "Initiator," and after him a group of semi-divine and semi-human beings.
" Set apart " in Archaic genesis for certain purposes, they are those in whom are said to have incarnated the highest Dhyanis, "Munis and Rishis from previous Manvantaras" -- to form the nursery for future human adepts , on this earth and during the present cycle.
These "Sons of Will and Yoga" born, so to speak, in an immaculate way, remained, it is explained, entirely apart from the rest of mankind.
The " B EING" just referred to, which has to remain nameless, is the Tree from which, in subsequent ages, all the great historically known Sages and Hierophants, such as the Rishi Kapila, Hermes, Enoch, Orpheus, etc., etc., have branched off.
As objective man , he is the mysterious (to the profane -- the ever invisible) yet ever present Personage about whom legends are rife in the East, especially among the Occultists and the students of the Sacred Science.
It is he who changes form, yet remains ever the same.
And it is he again who holds spiritual sway over the [[Vol.
1, Page]] 208 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
initiated Adepts throughout the whole world.
He is, as said, the "Nameless One" who has so many names, and yet whose names and whose very nature are unknown.
He is the "Initiator," called the "GREAT SACRIFICE." For, sitting at the threshold of LIGHT, he looks into it from within the circle of Darkness, which he will not cross; nor will he quit his post till the last day of this life-cycle.
Why does the solitary Watcher remain at his self-chosen post?
Why does he sit by the fountain of primeval Wisdom, of which he drinks no longer, as he has naught to learn which he does not know -- aye, neither on this Earth, nor in its heaven?
Because the lonely, sore-footed pilgrims on their way back to their home are never sure to the last moment of not losing their way in this limitless desert of illusion and matter called Earth-Life.
Because he would fain show the way to that region of freedom and light, from which he is a voluntary exile himself, to every prisoner who has succeeded in liberating himself from the bonds of flesh and illusion.
Because, in short, he has sacrificed himself for the sake of mankind, though but a few Elect may profit by the GREAT SACRIFICE.
It is under the direct, silent guidance of this M AHA -- (great) -- G URU that all the other less divine Teachers and instructors of mankind became, from the first awakening of human consciousness, the guides of early Humanity.
It is through these "Sons of God" that infant humanity got its first notions of all the arts and sciences, as well as of spiritual knowledge; and it is they who have laid the first foundation-stone of those ancient civilizations that puzzle so sorely our modern generation of students and scholars.* [[Footnote(s)]] ------------------------------------------------- * Let those who doubt this statement explain the mystery of the extraordinary knowledge possessed by the ancients -- alleged to have developed from lower and animal-like savages, the cave-men of the Palaeolithic age -- on any other equally reasonable grounds.
Let them turn to such works as those of Vitruvius Pollio of the Augustan age, on architecture, for instance, in which all the rules of proportion are those taught anciently at initiations , if he would acquaint himself with the truly divine art, and understand the deep esoteric significance hidden in every rule and law of proportion.
No man descended from a Palaeolithic cave-dweller could ever evolve such a science unaided, even in millenniums of thought and intellectual evolution.
It is the pupils of those incarnated Rishis and Devas of the third Root Race, who handed their knowledge from one generation to another, to Egypt and Greece with its now lost canon of proportion; as it is the Disciples of the Initiates of the 4th, the Atlanteans, who handed it over to their Cyclopes , the "Sons of Cycles" or of the "Infinite," from whom the name passed to the still later generations of Gnostic priests.
"It is owing to the divine perfection [[Footnote continued on next page]] [[Vol.
1, Page]] 209 THE SACRED ISLAND.
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.
The passage narrates the origin of the Third Race ('produced unconsciously by the second Race'), the conscious production of the 'Sons of Will and Yoga' by the 'Sons of Wisdom,' and the descent of the 'Wondrous Being' from a 'high region.'
The supreme God's radical concealment beyond ordinary knowledge or perception; the Hidden Father.
The central figure is explicitly the 'Nameless One' who is 'ever invisible,' 'mysterious to the profane,' and whose 'names and whose very nature are unknown,' embodying radical divine concealment.
The uncreated luminous quality of the divine, sometimes experienced directly in mystical states; illumination as revelation.
Light is used as a symbol of the divine realm ('region of freedom and light,' 'threshold of LIGHT,' 'fountain of primeval Wisdom') contrasted with the 'circle of Darkness' of the material world.
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 describes a clear hierarchical cascade from the 'Root-Base' through the 'Sons of Will and Yoga,' the 'Sons of God,' down to the Third Race and humanity, with the 'ladder of Arhatship' as a graded ascent within that hierarchy.
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 traces an unbroken chain of transmission from the 'Nameless One' through the 'Sons of God' to historically named sages (Kapila, Hermes, Enoch, Orpheus) and onward to Egypt, Greece, and Gnostic priests.
Esoteric teachings reserved for those ready to receive them; outer meaning conceals an inner liberating truth.
The passage distinguishes between 'Initiates and the Profane' and refers to knowledge that is 'mysterious (to the profane)' and 'the Sacred Science,' implying esoteric teachings reserved for the initiated.
The doctrine that the divine or a spiritual principle takes on a specific, bounded material or bodily form — descending from an unconditioned state into individual, corporeal existence — as a discrete act rather than a diffuse pervading presence. The Christian Word made flesh, the Hindu avatara, the Egyptian pharaoh as living Horus, the Vajrayana tulku. Distinct from divine_immanence (the general claim that the divine pervades all of creation diffusely, not a specific embodiment-event) and separation_from_source (the felt exile FROM origin, the opposite motion) in describing a specific, individuated descent INTO a particular body or form.
The passage describes the 'Sons of Wisdom' incarnating in the Third Race and the 'Wondrous Being' descending from a high region into a specific form on Earth, as discrete acts of spiritual descent into corporeal existence.
The ritual admission of an individual into esoteric knowledge or a sacred order through a formal rite of passage — testing, ordeal, or ceremony — marking a definite before/after threshold in the initiate's status and access. Distinct from hidden_sayings (the doctrine being concealed, not the rite of admission to it) and esoteric_lineage (the historical chain of transmission across generations, not a single individual's admission).
The passage references 'Initiates and the Profane' and the 'ladder of Arhatship' with graded stages to be conquered, implying a formal threshold of admission into esoteric knowledge.
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 describes a non-physical realm ('region of freedom and light,' 'high region') populated by the 'ever invisible' Nameless One and semi-divine beings who influence the physical world without being seen by the profane.
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 a structured descent: the 'Wondrous Being' descended from a 'high region,' the 'Sons of Wisdom' incarnated in the Third Race, and the 'Sons of Will and Yoga' were produced as a conscious emanation into the material world.
A spiritual elite who possess the divine spark and are predestined for salvation, contrasted with psychic (faithful) and hylic (material) persons.
The passage distinguishes a few 'Elect' who may profit by the 'GREAT SACRIFICE' and the 'Sons of Will and Yoga' as a select group apart from the rest of mankind, contrasted with the profane majority.
The soul's journey back to its divine origin, reversing the fall into matter through stages of purification or illumination.
The passage describes 'lonely, sore-footed pilgrims on their way back to their home' and the Nameless One showing 'the way to that region of freedom and light' to those who have 'liberated himself from the bonds of flesh and illusion.'
The felt condition of exile from one's divine origin — Rumi's reed flute torn from its bed, Plotinus's 'we have forgotten,' the Gnostic forgetfulness; the affective wound that complements return_to_source and gives the return its motive.
The Nameless One is described as 'a voluntary exile' from the 'region of freedom and light,' and Earth-Life is called 'this limitless desert of illusion and matter' from which souls seek return.
A staged journey of the soul upward through heavenly realms or levels of being toward the divine source.
The passage describes the 'ladder of Arhatship' with graded stages to be 'conquered,' culminating at the 'apex' and the 'Root-Base of their Hierarchy,' a staged upward journey through levels of being.
A vertical structure connecting cosmic levels — a tree, pillar, mountain, or ladder linking heaven, earth, and underworld around which the cosmos is organised. Yggdrasil binding the Nine Worlds in Norse cosmology, the Kalevala's Sampo as world-pillar, the Mayan ceiba, the Vedic Aśvattha, the shamanic central tree of Eliade's analyses. Cosmic-structural in character: distinct from sefirot_tree (a kabbalistic emanation diagram) and emanation_hierarchy (an ontological cascade); world_tree_axis is the cosmos's spine rather than the divine's outflow.
The 'ever-living-human-Banyan' is explicitly titled 'THE TREE FROM WHICH THE ADEPTS GROW' and functions as the cosmic spine from which all sages and hierophants 'branched off,' connecting the Root-Base to the historical world.