Page 88 (part 5)

The Vayu Purana shows, and Harivansa corroborates, that the Maruts -- the oldest as the most incomprehensible of all the secondary or lower gods in the Rig Veda -- "are born in every manvantara (Round) seven times seven (or 49); that in each Manvantara, four times seven (or twenty-eight) they obtain emancipation, but their places are filled up by persons reborn in that character. " What are the Maruts in their esoteric meaning, and who those persons "reborn in that character"? In the Rig and other Vedas, the Maruts are represented as the storm gods and the friends and allies of Indra; they are the "Sons of heaven and of earth." This led to an allegory that makes them the children of Siva, the great patron of the Yogis, "the M AHA- Y OGI, the great ascetic, in whom is centred the highest perfection of austere penance and abstract meditation, by which the most unlimited powers are obtained, marvels and miracles are worked, the highest spiritual knowledge is acquired, and union with the great spirit of the universe is eventually gained. " In the Rig Veda the name Siva is unknown, but the god is called Rudra, which is a word used for Agni, the fire god, the Maruts being called therein his sons. In the Ramayana and the Puranas, their mother, Diti -- the sister, or complement of, and a form of Aditi -- anxious to obtain a son who would destroy Indra, is told by Kasyapa the Sage, that "if, with thoughts wholly pious and person entirely pure, she carrys the babe in her womb for a hundred years" she will get such a son. But Indra foils her in the design. With his thunderbolt he divides the embryo in her womb into seven portions, and then divides every such portion into seven pieces again, which become the swift-moving deities, the Maruts.* These deities are only another aspect, or a development of the Kumaras, who are Rudras in their patronymic, like many others.** Diti, being Aditi, unless the contrary is proven to us, Aditi, we say, or Akasa in her highest form, is the Egyptian seven-fold heaven. Every true Occultist will understand what this means. Diti, we repeat, is the sixth [[Footnote(s)]] ------------------------------------------------- * In the Ramayana it is Bala-Rama, Krishna's elder brother, who does it. ** With regard to the origin of Rudra, it is stated in several Puranas that his (spiritual) progeny, created in him by Brahma, was not confined to either the seven Kumaras or the eleven Rudras, etc., but "comprehends infinite numbers of beings in person and equipments like their (virgin) father. Alarmed at their fierceness, numbers, and immortality , Brahma desires his son Rudra to form creatures of a different and mortal nature." Rudra refusing to create, desists, etc., hence Rudra is the first rebel. ( Linga, Vayu, Matsya, and other Puranas.) [[Vol. 2, Page]] 614 THE SECRET DOCTRINE. principle of metaphysical nature, the Buddhi of Akasa. Diti, the mother of the Maruts, is one of her terrestrial forms, made to represent, at one and the same time, the divine Soul in the ascetic, and the divine aspirations of mystic Humanity toward deliverance from the webs of Maya, and final bliss in consequence. Indra, now degraded, because of the Kali Yuga, when such aspirations are no more general but have become abnormal through a general spread of Ahamkara (the feeling of Egotism, Self, or I -AM-NESS) and ignorance -- was, in the beginning, one of the greatest gods of the Hindu Pantheon, as the Rig Veda shows. Sura-dhipa, "the chief of the gods," has fallen down from Jishnu, "the leader of the celestial host," -- the Hindu St. Michael -- to an opponent of asceticism, the enemy of every holy aspiration. He is shown married to Aindri (Indrani), the personification of Aindri-yaka, the evolution of the element of senses, whom he married "because of her voluptuous attractions " ; after which he began sending celestial female demons to excite the passions of holy men, Yogis, and "to beguile them from the potent penances which he dreaded." Therefore, Indra, now characterized as "the god of the firmament, the personified atmosphere" -- is in reality the cosmic principle Mahat, and the fifth human -- Manas in its dual aspect: as connected with Buddhi; and as allowing himself to be dragged down by his Kama -principle (the body of passions and desires). This is demonstrated by Brahma telling the conquered god that his frequent defeats were due to Karma, and were a punishment for his licentiousness, and the seduction of various nymphs. It is in this latter character that he seeks, to save himself from destruction, to destroy the coming "babe" destined to conquer him: -- the babe, of course, allegorizing the divine and steady will of the Yogi -- determined to resist all such temptations, and thus destroy the passions within his earthly personality. Indra succeeds again, because flesh conquers spirit -- (Diti is shown frustrated in the Dvapara Yug, during that period when the Fourth Race was flourishing). He divides the "Embryo" (of new divine adeptship, begotten once more by the Ascetics of the Aryan Fifth Race), into seven portions -- a reference not alone to the seven sub-races of the new Root-Race, in each of which there will be a "Manu,"* but also to the seven degrees of adeptship -- and then each [[Footnote(s)]] ------------------------------------------------- * Notwithstanding the terrible, and evidently purposed , confusion of Manus, Rishis, and their progeny in the Puranas, one thing is made clear: there have been and there will be seven Rishis in every Root-Race (called also Manvantara in the sacred books) as there are fourteen Manus in every Round, the "presiding gods, the Rishis and Sons of the Manus" being identical. (See Book III . ch. 1 of Vishnu Purana. ) "Six" Manvantaras are given, the Seventh being our own in the Vishnu Purana. The Vayu Purana furnishes the nomenclature of the Sons of the fourteen Manus in every Manvantara, and the Sons of the seven Sages or Rishis. The latter are the progeny [[Continued on next page]] [[Vol. 2, Page]] 615 THE DOOM OF CONTINUAL REBIRTH. portion into seven pieces -- alluding to the Manu-Rishis of each Root-Race, and even sub-race.