Page 84 (part 6)

Another form of the cross is given from the Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society (vol. xviii., p. 393, pl. 4): -- "At each of the four corners is placed a quarter arc of an oviform curve, and when the four are put together they form an oval; thus the figure combines the cross with the circle round in four parts, corresponding to the four corners of the cross. The four segments answer to the four feet of the Swastica cross and the Fylfot of Thor. The four-leaved lotus flower of Buddha, is likewise figured at the centre of this cross, the lotus being an Egyptian and Hindu type of the four quarters. The four quarter arcs, if joined together, would form an ellipse, and the ellipse is also figured on each arm of the cross. This ellipse therefore denotes the path of the earth . . . . Sir J. Y. Simpson copied the following specimen , which is here presented, as the cross of the two equinoxes and the two solstices placed within the figure of the earth's path. [[Vol. 2, Page]] 547 VARIATIONS OF THE SYMBOLISM. The same ovoid or boat-shaped figure appears at times in the Hindu drawings with seven steps at each end as a form or a mode of Meru." This is the astronomical aspect of the double glyph. There are six more aspects, however, and an attempt may be made to interpret a few of these. The subject is so vast that it would require in itself alone many volumes. But the most curious of these Egyptian symbols of Cross and Circle, spoken of in the above cited work, is one which receives its full explanation and final colour from Aryan symbols of the same nature. Says the author: -- "The four-armed Cross is simply the cross of the four quarters, but the cross sign is not always simple.* This is a type that was developed from an identifiable beginning, which was adapted to the expression of various ideas afterwards. The most sacred cross of Egypt that was carried in the hands of the gods, the Pharaohs, and the mummied dead, is the Ankh the sign of life, the living, an oath, the covenant . . . The top of this is the hieroglyphic Ru set upright on the Tau-Cross. The Ru is the door, gate, mouth, the place of outlet. This denotes the birth-place in the northern quarter of the heavens, from which the Sun is reborn. Hence the Ru of the Ankh sign is the feminine type of the birth-place, representing the north. It was in the N ORTHERN Q UARTER that the G ODDESS OF THE S EVEN S TARS, called the "Mother of the Revolutions," gave birth to time in the earliest cycle of the year. The first sign of this primordial circle and cycle made in heaven is the earliest shape of the Ankh-cross , a mere loop which contains both a circle and the cross in one image. This loop or noose is carried in front of the oldest genitrix , Typhon of the great Bear, as her Ark, the ideograph of a period, an ending, a time, shown to mean one revolution. "This then represents the circle made in the northern heaven by the Great Bear, which constituted the earliest year of time, from which we infer that the loop or Ru of the North represents that quarter, the birth-place of time when figured as the Ru of the Ankh symbol. Indeed this can be proved. The noose is an Ark or Rak type of reckoning. The Ru of the Ankh-cross was continued in the Cypriote and the Coptic Ro, P.** The Ro, was carried into the Greek cross , which is formed of the Ro and Chi or R-K. . . . The Rak, or Ank, was the sign of all beginning ( Arche ) on this account, and the Ank-tie is the cross of the North, the hind part of Heaven. . . ." Now this, again, is entirely astronomical and phallic. The Puranic version in India gives the whole another colour; and without, however, [[Footnote(s)]] ------------------------------------------------- *Certainly not; for very often there are symbols made to symbolize other symbols, and these are in turn used in ideographs. ** The R of the Slavonian and Russian alphabets (the Kyriletza) is also the Latin P. [[Vol. 2, Page]] 548 THE SECRET DOCTRINE. destroying the above interpretation it is made to reveal a portion of its mysteries with the help of the astronomical key, and thus offers a more metaphysical rendering. The "Ankh-tie" does not belong to Egypt alone. It exists under the name of pasa, a cord which Siva holds in the hand of his right back arm* (Siva having four arms). The Mahadeva is represented in the posture of an ascetic, as Maha-Yogi, with his third eye , which is "the Ru, ,set upright on the Tau-Cross" in another form. The pasa is held in the hand in such a way that it is the first finger and hand near the thumb which make the cross, or loop and crossing. Our Orientalists would have it to represent a cord to bind refractory offenders with, because, forsooth, Kali, Siva's consort, has the same as an attribute! The pasa has here a double significance, as also has Siva's trisula and every other divine attribute. This significance lies in Siva, as Rudra has certainly the same meaning as the Egyptian ansated cross in its cosmic and mystic meaning. In the hand of Siva it becomes linga and yonic. That which is meant is this: Siva, as said before, is unknown by that name in the Vedas; and it is in the white Yajur Veda that he appears for the first time as the great god -- M AHADEVA -- whose symbol is the lingham. In Rig Veda he is called Rudra, the "howler," the beneficent and the maleficent Deity at the same time, the Healer and the Destroyer. In the Vishnu Purana, he is the god who springs from the forehead of Brahma, who separates into male and female, and he is the parent of the Rudras or Maruts, half of whom are brilliant and gentle, others, black and ferocious. In the Vedas, he is the divine Ego aspiring to return to its pure, deific state, and at the same time that divine ego imprisoned in earthly form, whose fierce passions make of him the "roarer," the "terrible." This is well shown in the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad, wherein the Rudras, the progeny of Rudra, god of fire, are called the "ten vital breaths" ( prana, life) with manas, as eleventh, whereas as Siva, he is the Destroyer of that life.