Sevenfold Constitution of Nature and Man

Abbreviations:BCW H.P. Blavatsky Collected Writings, TPH, 1950-91Dia The Dialogues of G. de Purucker, A.L. Conger (ed.), TUP, 1948ET The Esoteric Tradition, G. de Purucker, TUP, 2nd ed., 1973

FEP Fundamentals of the Esoteric Philosophy, G. de Purucker, TUP, 2nd ed.,1979

FSO Fountain-Source of Occultism, G. de Purucker, TUP, 1974HPBM H.P. Blavatsky: The Mystery, G. de Purucker, PLP, 1974Key The Key to Theosophy, H.P. Blavatsky, TUP, 1972 (1889)Ocean The Ocean of Theosophy, W.Q. Judge, TUP, 1973 (1893)OG Occult Glossary, G. de Purucker, TUP, 2nd ed., 1996SD The Secret Doctrine, H.P. Blavatsky, TUP, 1977 (1888)

SDC Secret Doctrine Commentary, Stanzas I-IV, H.P. Blavatsky, TUP, 1994 (1890-91)

The seven substance-principles of the human constitution:the highertriad:

1. spirit (atman); 2. spiritual soul (buddhi); 3. mind (manas)

the lowerquaternary:

4. animal desires and passions (kama); 5. life or vital principle (prana); 6.astral body (linga-sharira); 7. physical body (sthula-sharira). (see Key 92-3)

1. AtmanThe essential self, pure consciousness. The essential and radical poweror faculty which gives us and every other entity its sentient consciousnessof pure selfhood.

2. Buddhi The faculty or spiritual organ which manifests as intuition, understanding,judgement, discrimination. It is the inseparable veil or garment of atman.

3. Manas The centre or organ of the ego-consciousness in man and in any otherquasi-selfconscious entity; the seat of the ‘I am I’.

4. Kama

The organ or seat of the vital psycho-electric impulses, desires,aspirations, considered in their energic aspect, and therefore the drivingforce in the human constitution. As every principle is sevenfold, there is adivine and spiritual kama as well as a grossly emotional kama, with allintermediate stages.

5. Prana ‘Life’, or more accurately the electromagnetic veil or ‘electrical field’manifesting in the individual as vitality.

6. Linga-sharira

The astral model-body, slightly more ethereal than the physical body; theastral framework around which the physical body is built, atom for atom,and from which it develops as growth proceeds.

7. Sthula-sharira

The physical body. Strictly speaking, it is not a real ‘principle’, butfunctions as the common ‘carrier’ of all the inner constitution during anylifetime on earth.

(see ET 949-50, HPBM 171-2)

Threefold division:

Upperduad

AtmanBuddhi Spirit

The essential or spiritual self, the divine-spiritual monad,unconditionally immortal throughout the galactic maha-manvantara. The source from which flow all the lowerportions of man’s constitution.

Inter-mediate duad

ManasKama Soul

Seat of the human ego, which is dual: the higher part orreincarnating ego aspires upwards and partakes of theimmortality of the upper duad, while the lower part or ordinaryhuman ego is attracted downwards and is mortal.

Lowertriad

PranaLinga-sharira Sthula-sharira

BodyThe physical human frame and its invisible vital-astral forcesand substances. As a triadic vehicle or veil it is mortalthroughout.

(see ET 958-9, HPBM 173)

‘[In the above diagram] man’s seven principles and elements are divided into threeseparate parts: a lowest triad, purely mortal and perishable; an intermediate duad,psychical, composite, and mostly mortal, kama-manas, the “man” proper, or “humannature”; and a higher duad, atma-buddhi, immortal, imperishable, the monad. At thedeath of the human being, this higher duad carries away with it all the spiritual essence,the aroma, of the lower or intermediate duad; and then the higher duad is the higherself, the reincarnating individuality, or egoic monad. Man’s ordinary consciousness in lifeat this stage of evolution is almost wholly in the lower or intermediate duad; when he

raises his consciousness to become one with the higher duad, he becomes a mahatma,a master.’ (FEP 199-200)

Cosmic principles:

Parabrahman-MulaprakritiThe Boundless

1.

Paramatman,brahman-pradhana,cosmicmonad

The supreme monadic self of any cosmic hierarchy. The root fromwhich flows forth in descending serial order all the other sixprinciples or elements of the universe. The first or unmanifest logos.

2.

Alaya, adi-buddhi,maha-buddhi,akasha,anima mundi,cosmicaether

The seat or origin of the cosmic soul; the source of all intelligence,order, regularity, and ‘laws’ in the universe or hierarchy. The secondor quasi-manifest logos.

3. Mahat,cosmic mind

The source or centre of all monadic individualities in the hierarchy;individualized intelligence, mind, consciousness, as contrasted withthe universal (no. 2). The third or ‘creative’ logos. Manifest purusha-prakriti.

4. Cosmic kama

‘Desire’ in the sense of pure impersonal universal compassion andsympathy; the source of the cosmic driving or impelling energies ofthe universe. The womb of fohat, considered as the motive yetintelligently guided force or forces of the hierarchical universe.

5. Cosmic jivaor vitality

The cosmic psycho-electromagnetic field; the fountain and source ofthe cosmic vitality permeating all beings and things in the hierarchyand from which all these individuals derive their respective pranas.

6. Astral light, cosmic ether

The lowest actively functioning aspect of anima mundi (no. 2). It is tothe cosmic hierarchy what the model-body or linga-sharira is to thehuman body. It is the great reservoir which receives and stores allthe effluxes and emanations of the earth (or any other globe of thehierarchy) and radiates them back, producing epidemics anddiseases. The lower degrees of the kama-loka are situated in theastral light.

7. Sthula-sharira

The physical universe – the outward shell or body of the six moreethereal element-principles.

(see ET 952-4)

* * *

‘[W]e divide man into seven principles, but this does not mean that he has, as it were,seven skins, or entities, or souls. These principles are all aspects of one principle, andeven this principle is but a temporary and periodical ray of the One eternal and infiniteFlame or Fire.’ (SDC 33-4)

‘[T]he only difference between animate and inanimate objects on earth, between ananimal and a human frame, is that in some the various “fires” are latent, and in othersthey are active. The vital fires are in all things and not an atom is devoid of them. But noanimal has the three higher principles awakened in him; they are simply potential,latent, and thus non-existing.’ (SD 2:267)

‘Between man and the animal – whose Monads (or Jivas) are fundamentally identical– there is the impassible abyss of Mentality and Self-consciousness. What is humanmind in its higher aspect, whence comes it, if it is not a portion of the essence – and, insome rare cases of incarnation, the very essence – of a higher Being: one from a higherand divine plane?’ (SD 2:81)

‘[Occultism] shows in man two Egos (two aspects of the same divine principle), thehigher, or Individuality, and the lower, or Personality, in other words, the divine and theanimal man. It is these two that during our lifetime are in incessant struggle, the onetrying to gravitate heavenward, the other dragged down by its animal nature to the earthearthy.’ (BCW 12:415)

‘[We] have to admit a lower (animal), and a higher (or divine) mind in man, or what isknown in Occultism as the “personal” and the “impersonal” Egos. For, between thepsychic and the noetic, between the Personality and the Individuality, there exists thesame abyss as between a “Jack the Ripper,” and a holy Buddha.’ (BCW 12:353)

‘To understand [the difference between individuality and personality] well, you have tofirst study the dual sets of “principles”: the spiritual, or those which belong to theimperishable Ego; and the material, or those principles which make up the ever-changing bodies or the series of personalities of that Ego. ...

I.Atma, the “Higher Self,” is neither your Spirit nor mine, but like sunlight shines onall. It is the universally diffused “divine principle,” and is inseparable from its oneand absolute Meta-Spirit, as the sunbeam is inseparable from sunlight.

II.

Buddhi (the spiritual soul) is only its vehicle. Neither each separately, nor the twocollectively, are of any more use to the body of man, than sunlight and its beamsare for a mass of granite buried in the earth, unless the divine Duad is assimilatedby, and reflected in, some consciousness. Neither Atma nor Buddhi are everreached by Karma, because the former is the highest aspect of Karma, its workingagent of itself in one aspect, and the other is unconscious on this plane. Thisconsciousness or mind is,

III.

Manas,* the derivation or product in a reflected form of Ahamkara, “the conceptionof I,” or EGO-SHIP. It is, therefore, when inseparably united to the first two, called theSPIRITUAL EGO, and Taijasi (the radiant). This is the real Individuality, or the divineman. It is this Ego which – having originally incarnated in the senseless humanform animated by, but unconscious (since it had no consciousness) of, thepresence in itself of the dual monad – made of that human-like form a real man. Itis that Ego, that “Causal Body,” which overshadows every personality Karma forcesit to incarnate into; and this Ego which is held responsible for all the sins committedthrough, and in, every new body or personality – the evanescent masks which hidethe true Individual through the long series of rebirths. ... [I]t knows and remembersits misdeeds as well as you remember what you have done yesterday. Is it becausethe memory of that bundle of physical compounds called “body” does not recollectwhat its predecessor (the personality that was) did, that you imagine that the real

Ego has forgotten them?’

*‘MAHAT or the “Universal Mind” is the source of Manas. The latter is Mahat, i.e.,mind, in man. Manas is also called Kshetrajna, “embodied Spirit,” because it is,according to our philosophy, the Manasa-putras, or “Sons of the Universal Mind,”who created, or rather produced, the thinking man, “manu,” by incarnating in thethird Race mankind in our Round. It is Manas, therefore, which is the realincarnating and permanent Spiritual Ego, the INDIVIDUALITY, and our various andnumberless personalities only its external masks.’ (Key 135-6)

‘Theosophists draw a clear and sharp distinction, not of essence but of quality,between personality and individuality. Personality comes from the Latin word persona,which means a mask, through which the actor, the spiritual individuality, speaks. Thepersonality is all the lower man: all the psychical and astral and physical impulses andthoughts and tendencies ... The higher triad is the individuality; the personality is thelower quaternary. ... The personality comprises within its range all the characteristicsand memories and impulses and karmic attributes of one physical life; whereas theindividuality is the aeonic ego, imperishable and deathless for the period of a solarmanvantara. It is the individuality through its ray or human astral-vital monad whichreincarnates time after time and thus clothes itself in one personality after anotherpersonality.’ (OG 126-7) ‘The individuality is the spiritual-intellectual and immortal part of us; deathless, atleast for the duration of the kosmic manvantara – the root, the very essence of us, thespiritual sun within, our inner god. The personality is the veil, the mask, composed ofvarious sheaths of consciousness through which the individuality acts.’ (OG 65)

* * *

‘[T]he old Sanskrit word describes [the astral model-body] exactly – linga sharira, thedesign body – because it is the design or model for the physical body. This is betterthan “ethereal body,” as the latter might be said to be subsequent to the physical,whereas in fact the astral body precedes the material one. ‘The astral body is made of matter of very fine texture as compared with the visiblebody, and has a great tensile strength, so that it changes but little during a lifetime, whilethe physical alters every moment. And not only has it this immense strength, but at thesame time possesses an elasticity permitting its extension to a considerable distance. Itis flexible, plastic, extensible, and strong. The matter of which it is composed iselectrical and magnetic in its essence, and is just what the whole world was composedof in the dim past when the processes of evolution had not yet arrived at the point ofproducing the material body for man. ... ‘The astral body is the guiding model for the physical one, and all the other kingdomshave the same astral model. Vegetables, minerals, and animals, have the etherealdouble, and this theory is the only one which will answer the question how it is that theseed produces its own kind and all sentient beings bring forth their like. ... ‘[T]he model for the growing child in the womb is the astral body already perfect inshape before the child is born. It is on this the molecules arrange themselves until thechild is complete, and the presence of the ethereal design-body will explain how theform grows into shape, how the eyes push themselves out from within to the surface ofthe face, and many other mysterious matters in embryology ... ‘The astral body has in it the real organs of the outer sense organs. In it are the sight,hearing, power to smell, and the sense of touch. It has a complete system of nerves and

arteries of its own for the conveyance of the astral fluid which is to that body as ourblood is to the physical. It is the real personal man. There are located the sub-consciousperception and the latent memory, which the hypnotizers of the day are dealing with andbeing baffled by.’ (Ocean 43-7)

‘[The kama-rupa or “desire body”] is that part of man’s inner constitution in whichdwell or inhere the various desires, affections, hates, loves – in short, the variousmental and psychical energies. After death it becomes the vehicle in the astral worlds ofthe higher principles of the man that was. But these higher principles are neverthelessscarcely conscious of the fact, because the rupture of the golden cord of life at themoment of the physical death plunges the cognizing personal entity into a mercifulstupor of unconsciousness, in which stupor it remains a longer or shorter perioddepending upon its qualities of spirituality or materiality. ... ‘After death, ... there occurs what is called the second death, which is the separationof the immortal part of the second or intermediate duad from the lower portions of thisduad, which lower portions remain as the kama-rupa in the etheric or higher astralspheres which are intermediate between the devachanic and the earthly spheres. Intime this kama-rupa gradually fades out in its turn, its life-atoms at such dissolutionpassing on to their various and unceasing peregrinations. ‘It is this kama-rupa which legend and story in the various ancient world religions orphilosophies speak of as the shade and which it has been customary in the Occident tocall the spook or ghost. It is, in short, all the mortal elements of the human soul thatwas. The kama-rupa is an exact astral duplicate, in appearance and mannerism, of theman who died; it is his eidolon or “image.” ’ (OG 78-9)

‘The kama-rupa, which becomes the vehicle for the unconscious or quasi-consciousentity in the kama-loka, is actually forming constantly during the life of the individual ...[It] is one of the most fluidic, changeable and plastic parts of our constitution, for itundergoes modification with every passing mood, indeed with every passing thought. ... ‘However, after the death of the physical body there is no further change or growth ofthe kama-rupic form, it remaining more or less static, all modifications being of thenature of disintegration or slow decay. It is really that portion of the human constitutionwhich is the kama-manasic-astral seat or focus of the passional, emotional, lowermental and psychic attributes ... ‘During life the constantly changing kama-rupa has its seat in the linga-sharira, oruses it as its vehicle; and the linga-sharira, instantly responding to the various emotionaland passional movements in the kama-rupa, in its turn communicates these asimpulses to the physical body, which then responds in corresponding action. ‘Now it is the human ego which works through the kama-rupa during incarnation, justas the kama-rupa works through the linga-sharira, and this last again through the body.In fact, it is correct enough to say that the personal man, which is the reflection andusually distorted radiance of the reincarnating ego or human monad, is this kama-rupaitself; because being a collection of skandhas, the kama-rupa is the expression of themerely personal qualities of the human ego.’ (FSO 579, 664)

‘[The mayavi-rupa, “illusory body”, or “thought-body” is] a higher astral-mental form.[It] can assume all forms or any form, at the will of an Adept. ... [T]he Adept is enabledto project his consciousness in the mayavi-rupa to what would seem to the uninitiatedincredible distances, while the physical body is left, as it were, intranced.’ (OG 105)

‘[The higher triad is the] imperishable spiritual ego considered as a unity. It is the

reincarnating part of man’s constitution which clothes itself in each earth-life in a newpersonality or lower quaternary. The higher triad ... is the unity of atman, buddhi, andthe higher manas ... ‘Another manner of considering the human constitution in its spiritual aspects is thatviewed from the standpoint of consciousness, and in this latter manner the higher triadconsists of the divine monad, the spiritual monad, and the higher human monad. Thehigher triad is often spoken of in a collective sense ... as simply the reincarnatingmonad, or more commonly the reincarnating ego, because this latter is rooted in thehigher triad.’ (OG 59)

‘The human ego is seated in ... the intermediate duad, manas-kama. The part whichis attracted below and is mortal is the lower human ego. The part which aspiresupwards towards the buddhi and ultimately joins it is the higher human ego orreincarnating ego. The dregs of the human ego after the death of the human being andafter the second death in the kama-loka, remain in the astral spheres as thedisintegrating kama-rupa or spook.’ (OG 60)

‘The human soul, speaking generally, is the intermediate nature of man’s constitution... Another term for [it] is the ego – a usage more popular than accurate, because thehuman ego is the soul of the human soul so to speak, the human soul being its vehicle.... [T]he human soul is divided into the higher human soul, composed of the lowerbuddhi and the higher manas – and the self corresponding to it is the bhutatman,meaning the “self of that which has been” or the reincarnating ego – and the lowerhuman, the lower manas and kama, and the self corresponding to it is pranatman orastral personal ego, which is mortal.’ (OG 60-1)

‘[The causal body or karana-sharira] is the veil of energy and substance surroundingthe reincarnating ego. It is of a quasi-spiritual character. And it is from this karana-sharira, or causal body, that emanate or flow forth all the lower vehicles of the humanconstitution, such as the desire-body, and the various grades of the ethereal bodies.Actually the physical body is the lees or deposit of the energies and substances takingtheir origin in the karana-sharira.’ (Dia 2:37)

‘The spiritual soul is the vehicle of the individual monad, the jivatman or spiritual ego;in the case of man’s principles it is essentially of the nature of atma-buddhi. Thisspiritual ego is the center or seed or root of the reincarnating ego. It is that portion of ourspiritual constitution which is deathless as an individualized entity – deathless until theend of the maha-manvantara of the cosmic solar system. ‘The spiritual soul and the divine soul, or atman, combined, are the inner god – theinner buddha, the inner christ.’ (OG 167)

‘[The aura is an] extremely subtle and therefore invisible essence or fluid thatemanates from and surrounds not only human beings and beasts, but as a matter offact plants and minerals also. It is one of the aspects of the auric egg, and therefore thehuman aura partakes of all the qualities that the human constitution contains. It is atonce magneto-mental and electrovital, suffused with the energies of mind and spirit –the quality in each case coming from an organ or center of the human constitutionwhence it flows. ... Sensitives have frequently described it in more or less vague termsas a light flowing from the eyes or the heart or the tips of the fingers or from other partsof the body. Sometimes this fluid, instead of being colorless light, manifests itself byflashing and scintillating changes of color – the color or colors in each case depending

not only upon the varying moods of the human individual, but also possessing abackground equivalent to the character or nature of the individual.’ (OG 14-5)

‘[The auric egg] is the source of the human aura as well as of everything else that thehuman septenary constitution contains. It is usually of an oviform or egg-shapedappearance ... It ranges from the divine to the astral-physical, and is the seat of all themonadic, spiritual, intellectual, mental, passional, and vital energies and faculties of thehuman septiform constitution. In its essence it is eternal ...’ (OG 15) ‘The auric egg originates in the monad which is its heart or core, and from which,when manifestation begins, it emanates forth in streams of vital effluvia. On the differentplanes which the auric egg traverses as a pillar of light, from the atmic to the physical,each such auric or pranic effluvium is a principle or element, commonly reckoned inman as seven in number.’ (FSO 427)

* * *

‘You must be very careful indeed not to look upon the seven principles of man, asgiven in our exoteric books, as meaning that they exist in seven layers or stages, eachseparate from all the others. ... Every principle has every other principle inherent withinit ... The seven principles ... are merely seven aspects of the Cosmic Life ...’ (Dia 2:405-6) ‘[A]ll the seven principles of man, and a fortiori, on a large scale, all the sevenprinciples of the universe, are simply seven different manifestations or aspects orphases of a fundamental life-substance – of an entity, in short. Every human being, asalso the universe, has inherent in him or in it a divine manifestation or aspect, a spiritualone, an intellectual one, a passional one, a vital one, and an astral-physical one. Nowyou cannot separate these into water-tight compartments because they all goinseparably together. They all interblend, intermingle, interpenetrate, interwork, and areinterconnected. You cannot say that a man is just mind and feeling, and that the bodyhe lives in is something entirely different, and that the inner god from which he springsis something absolutely different from him. He is essentially one stream ofconsciousness manifesting in seven different ways called principles.’ (Dia 2:417)

‘We speak of buddhi, manas, kama, etc., as merely generalizing terms, orabstractions. The actual situation is, however, that the buddhic principle is simply theaggregate of buddhic entities with their buddhic vital auras; and it is so also as regardsthe other principles. ... You won’t find such a thing as buddhi per se as an entity in theuniverse. What we call buddhi is the aggregate of buddhic entities who are in that stageof their evolutionary growth ... ‘It is the armies of entities in the universe of closely similar or identic grade whichmake the cosmic principles.’ (Dia 2:375)

‘The seven principles of man are a likeness or rather copy of the seven cosmicprinciples. They are actually the offspring or reflection of the seven cosmic principles,limited in their action in us by the workings of the law of karma, but running in theirorigin back into That which is beyond ... ‘These principles of man are reckoned as seven in the philosophy by which thehuman spiritual and psychical economy has been publicly explained to us in the presentage. In other ages these principles or parts of man were differently reckoned – theChristian reckoned them as body, soul, and spirit, generalizing the seven under thesethree heads.

‘Some of the Indian thinkers divided man into a basic fourfold entity, others into afivefold. The Jewish philosophy, as found in the Qabbalah which is the esoteric traditionof the Jews, teaches that man is divided into four parts: neshamah, ruah, nefesh, andguf.’ (OG 137)

‘[A]ll methods of division are somewhat arbitrary, in that one could with equal truthspeak of three-principled creatures or beings, or even four- or five-principled, etc.’ (FSO279)

‘The real esoteric seven-fold classification ... is not the seven-fold classification wehave adopted.’ (SD 2:635-6)

‘In the last analysis man’s constitution is twelvefold, consisting of the seven manifestand the five unmanifest units of far superior character ...’ (FSO 564)

‘Many theosophists experience quite unnecessary difficulty in understanding why thehuman constitution should be at one time divided in one way and at another timedivided in another way. The difficulty lies in considering these divisions as beingabsolute instead of relative, in other words, as representing watertight compartmentsinstead of merely indefinite and convenient divisions.’ (OG 59)

* * *

‘There are two basic ways of viewing man: one, as being compounded of the sevencosmic elements, ... and the other, as being a composite of interacting monads orcenters of consciousness working in and through ... the seven cosmic elements whichgive to man his seven principles. ... ‘[W]hat are [the] seven (or ten) principles? ... A background of divinity clothing itself inspirit, these bringing into birth the light of mind; and the light of mind, coworking with theother principles and elements thus far evolved, brought forth cosmic desire; and so ondown until we reach the sthula-sharira. ... ‘Every mathematical point of space is a monad, a point of consciousness, because allInfinity is infinite consciousness. Therefore every point of Infinity must be aconsciousness-center, a sevenfold monad, which has its atman, buddhi, manas, right ondown, because the universe is built of these seven stuffs reducible to one causal stuff –spirit, consciousness, atman. [W]e must not have our minds confused with the idea thatthe seven principles are one thing, and the monads are something else which workthrough the principles as disjunct from them. ... ‘Every one of the seven principles or elements of a monad can represent one of thecosmic planes, and is itself sevenfold. For instance, there is an atman of the kama, abuddhi of the kama, and so forth throughout the range of element-principles or stuffs.What differentiates one man from another, or a man from a beast? The differences donot lie in their respective seven principles, because these enter and form the compoundconstitution of all entities, but arise from the relative degree of evolution of the individualmonads. The human monad is far more evolved than is that of an animal or of a plant,or than are the highly unified monads which, due to their relative stage of development,distinguish granite from marble or sandstone. ‘The seven principles which compose man – atman, buddhi, manas, kama, prana,linga-sharira, sthula-sharira – are identic with those which compose our solar cosmos,man’s seven principles interblending and interacting in more or less the same fashionas the cosmic principles do. For instance, just as the astral light of our earth is its fluidic

astral double, so in man the linga-sharira is the astral double of the human body; andjust as the various cosmic pranas are the compound vitality of our globe, so is thecompounded prana of the human constitution the element of vitality in man.’ (FSO 443-5)

‘[T]he seven principles of man, as hitherto given out in our teachings, are a veryelementary and primer way of explaining man’s constitution. It is like saying that man’sphysical body consists of the chemical elements: so much carbon, oxygen, nitrogen,phosphorus, calcium, etc. These are cosmic elements. Our seven human principles arealso cosmic principles. But when we speak of the seven principles of man in a moretechnical way, ... we mean them to be knots or centers of consciousness; as, forinstance, the divine monad or ego, the spiritual monad or ego, the human monad orego, the animal monad or ego, the astral monad or ego, and the physical monad or egowhich is the body. It is these centers of consciousness, or monads or egos, which intheir aggregate really are man. Therefore, an infinitely better way of looking upon manas a sevenfold being is to consider his stream or river of consciousness as consisting ofseven centers or knots, whirlpools, of consciousness, ranging from the divine to thephysical. These seven centers or knots of consciousness exist and work in and throughthe seven cosmic elements, which latter, expressing themselves in man, we call atman,buddhi, manas, kama, and the material last three.’ (Dia 3:246)

* * *

‘Monad A spiritual entity which to us humans is indivisible; it is a divine-spiritual life-atom, but indivisible because its essential characteristic, as we humans conceive it, ishomogeneity, while that of the physical atom, above which our consciousness soars, isdivisible, a composite heterogeneous particle. ‘Monads are eternal, unitary, individual life-centers, consciousness-centers, deathlessduring any solar manvantara, therefore ageless, unborn, undying. Consequently, eachone such – and their number is infinite – is the center of the All, for the divine or the Allis That which has its center everywhere, and its circumference nowhere. ‘Monads are spiritual-substantial entities, self-motivated, self-impelled, self-conscious, in infinitely varying degrees, the ultimate elements of the universe. Thesemonads engender other monads as one seed will produce multitudes of other seeds; soup from each monad springs a host of living entities in the course of illimitable time,each such monad being the fountainhead or parent, in which all others are involved,and from which they spring. ‘Every monad is a seed, wherein the sum total of powers appertaining to its divineorigin are latent, that is to say unmanifested; and evolution consists in the growth anddevelopment of all these seeds or children monads, whereby the universal lifeexpresses itself in innumerable beings. ‘As the monad descends into matter, or rather as its ray – one of other innumerablerays proceeding from it – is propelled into matter, it [produces] from itself ... on each oneof the seven planes through which it passes, its various vehicles, all overshadowed bythe self, the same self in you and in me, in plants and in animals, in fact in all that is andbelongs to that hierarchy. This is the one self, the supreme self or paramatman of thehierarchy. It illumines and follows each individual monad and all the latter’s hosts of rays– or children monads. Each such monad is a spiritual seed from the previousmanvantara, which manifests as a monad in this manvantara; and this monad throughits rays throws out from itself ... all its vehicles. These vehicles are, first, the spiritualego, the reflection or copy in miniature of the monad itself, but individualized through the

manvantaric evolution, “bearing” or “carrying” as a vehicle the monadic ray. The lattercannot directly contact the lower planes, because it is of the monadic essence itself, thelatter a still higher ray of the infinite Boundless composed of infinite multiplicity in unity.’(OG 111-2)

‘[C]onsider the monad as unitary. It is a spiritual unit. Yet even the spiritual monad isactually a composite entity. It is the cosmic seed out of which the tree of cosmic lifegrows, its roots upwards; its branches, branchlets, twigs, leaves, fruits, below.Eventually out of such a seed come all the issues of cosmic life, and if there were butone infinitely homogeneous essence in the monad, there could not be this dispersinginto the manifold, incredibly numerous, innumerable planes, beings, hierarchies of themanifested universe. The very fact that heterogeneity issues from what we callhomogeneity shows that heterogeneity with all its innumerable branches was locked upin the homogeneous monadic essence, streaming through that homogeneous monadicessence as the life stream of a tree issues forth from the apparently, and to us actually,homogeneous seed. ... ‘Thus then, the monad to us is homogeneous. All issues forth from it, all again will bereabsorbed or withdrawn back into it when pralaya opens. But all these differentindividualities must have been lying latent there in order that they might issue forththerefrom. Therefore it shows us that the monad is not merely a channel, a laya-center,through which streams ... whatever there is of manifested life, but that the monad itselfis an entity.’ (Dia 1:42-3)

‘The monad itself really is a composite entity despite its name which means “unit.” Itis compact of, first a central Flame – a consciousness-center, which is so to say a pointor atom of the Cosmic Life, deathless and ever-enduring. Next, this inner center issurrounded by garments, by veils, which are vehicles, though which it expresses itselfon the lower planes.’ (Dia 1:195)

‘[The monad is] the ultimate Self, the god within, the atman. ... This is the perpetualindividual, the spiritual individuality, the indivisible part of us. The heart of the monad, itssuperior fountain of life and intelligence, is a divine monad, the inner god. But the wordmonad is used in a general way for a variety of consciousness centers in man. There isthe spiritual monad, offspring of the divine monad; there is the human monad, offspringof the spiritual monad; there is the vital-astral monad, offspring of the human monad. Allthese together form the human constitution. ... ‘Now the soul, which is an aggregate entity just as a monad itself really is, is simplythe clothing or the psychomental veil of a monad which is passing through thatparticular phase of its everlasting peregrinations through periodic time and hierarchicalspace. This monad’s expression on any plane is a soul. This soul, in turn, works throughits own vehicle, whether an ethereal or a physical one. Mystically, the physical bodyitself may be called an aggregated monad of the physical plane, because it is formed ofmathematical points, little lives or monads of which the soul is the Monad of monads ofthis particular bodily hierarchy; while the monad above the soul is again its supermonador Monas monadum.’ (FSO 271)

‘Monadic essence has been commonly used to signify the essential or divinesubstance of a monad, of which the monad is an individualized expression in time andspace. Hence, monadic essence is virtually equivalent to the term god, there being asmany gods as there are monads. We have thus the series: gods (or monadic essence),monads, egos, souls (or vehicles) ...

‘Taking up next in order the term ego, we can briefly describe this highly importantpart of a man, on whatever plane of his constitution it may be native, as the stored-upfund of conscious evolutionary experience acquired during the continuously repetitiveimbodiments of a monad in the worlds of manifestation. As an illustration, thereincarnating ego is the gatherer and the storehouse of all the spiritual and intellectualexperiences gained by the human monad in its many incarnations ... ‘The term soul we can define as the sentient, sensitive vehicle or garment, itself ofliving substance, with which the ego surrounds itself during any imbodiment. Anotherterm for soul is body – not necessarily a body of flesh, but any vehicle in and throughwhich, and on whatever plane of the human constitution, an ego may be expressingitself. ... ‘Thus we have the divine-spiritual stuff or essence, itself a god, which whenexpressing itself as an individual on the next inferior plane we call a monad; suchmonad expresses itself on the plane on which it may be manifesting through itsappropriate manasic garment or egoic focus which is its ego; and each such ego in itsturn surrounds itself with its own pranic auras or characteristic veil of living substanceand sensitive stuff, its soul. ‘Man being a microcosm of the macrocosm, we can by analogy understand theconstitution of a universe by transferring to a cosmic scale these points of teachingconcerning the constitution or auric egg of man. We then infer that a universe has itsmonadic essence, its cosmic monad, its cosmic ego as an individual, and likewise itscosmic soul or anima mundi. ‘The following two diagrams are symbolic representations of certain structural andinterpenetrating parts of nature, and should not be read as exact or photographicpictures, but only as suggestive of related entities or qualities.’ (FSO 432-3)

‘ “Monad” is a generalizing term. There are divine monads and spiritual monads,intellectual monads and astral monads, even physical monads. Then following anotherline of degrees, there is the monad of our home-universe. There is the monad of a solarsystem which is its sun. There is the monad of every planet. There is the monad ofevery atom.’ (Dia 2:413)

‘[E]very monad is what may be called a “creative” entity continually issuing forth fromitself streams of children-monads, and ... each one of such children-monads follows itsown evolutionary course until the great consummatum est of the solar universe. Thus itis that the divine monad has hosts of children-monads, each one of which is a spiritualmonad or ego. ... [T]he spiritual monad or ego has as its children-monads numbers ofreimbodying monads or egos which ... are contained in its constitution as the entitieswhich reimbody themselves in the different planetary chains. ... ‘[E]ach such child-monad commences its career in any solar kalpa or manvantara asa super-spiritual elemental, and after passing through the innumerable myriads ofimbodiments or manifestations in the various realms and planes and worlds of that

universal solar system, emerges at the end of the kalpa as a self-conscious divinity.’(Dia 3:302-3)

‘The reach of the divine monad, which is essentially the atmic monad with its buddhicvehicle, is the galaxy; the range of the spiritual monad, the buddhi-manas, is the solarsystem; while the field of action of the reimbodying ego is the planetary chain; andfinally, the range of the astral monad or lower quaternary ... is a single globe of a chain,our globe D for instance.’ (FSO 564)

‘[J]ust as the divine monad endures as long as the galaxy endures, so does thespiritual monad endure as long as the solar system endures ... [It then enters]paranirvana ...where it remains until the solar system, after the long solar pralaya, in itsturn reappears for a new solar manvantaric period of activity ... ‘[The] higher ego ... lasts as long in self-conscious functional activity ... as does theplanetary chain itself, and [then] ascends upwards into its nirvana, and remains in thisrelatively sublime condition of abstract consciousness until the chain reappears anew, ...whereupon [it] enters into self-conscious functional activity of a higher order ...’ (ET 850-1)

‘Every monadic essence, every monad, no matter where or in what period of time, isa learning entity, always advancing from the less to the more perfect. In any one cosmicmanvantara it begins its evolutionary journey as an unself-conscious god-spark, passingthrough all the phases and experiences which that particular manvantara contains, andfinishes as a fully perfected god.’ (FSO 293)

compiled by David Pratt. September 2005.

The monad: one and many

Origin of mind

Hierarchies: worlds visible and invisible

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