{"id":331,"date":"2012-06-18T05:00:04","date_gmt":"2012-06-18T03:00:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/prajnaquest.fr\/blog\/?p=331"},"modified":"2012-06-18T05:00:04","modified_gmt":"2012-06-18T03:00:04","slug":"creation-stories-on-the-cosmogony-account-from-the-book-of-dzyan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/prajnaquest.fr\/blog\/creation-stories-on-the-cosmogony-account-from-the-book-of-dzyan\/","title":{"rendered":"Creation Stories: On the Cosmogony Account from the \u201cBook of Dzyan\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

The \u201cBook of Dzyan,\u201d from which a number of stanzas on cosmogenesis and anthropogenesis are given in The Secret Doctrine<\/em> by H. P. Blavatsky, purports to give the original genesis account possessed by humanity (see: \u201cThe Secret Doctrine-Original Genesis and the Wisdom Tradition<\/span><\/a><\/span>\u201d). The other genesis accounts found in the world are regarded as more or less modified copies of this original, going back to what was described as the \u201cBook of the Secret Wisdom of the World.\u201d We learn that the genesis account found in the latter and explained in \u201cBook of Dzyan\u201d is the original account of cosmogony, and that this is so because it is based on direct knowledge. It is not a story made up to explain what is commonly considered to be unknowable. It may be called a creation story, but not in the usual sense.<\/p>\n

The category of \u201ccreation stories\u201d is widely used for cosmogony accounts from traditional sources. It is a category in which the cosmogony account from the \u201cBook of Dzyan\u201d may usefully be placed. This cosmogony account, however, is not a story resulting from the speculations of finite or even primitive human minds. It is supposed to be a record of observation. How, one may wonder, can creation be observed when there is at that time no one to observe it? As we learn from a hitherto secret commentary, it was observed by spiritually advanced seers when entranced in states of sam\u0101dhi, through a spiritual sight that can see into the past (The Secret Doctrine<\/em>, vol. 1, p. 289):<\/p>\n

\u201cExtracts from a private commentary, hitherto secret<\/em>:<\/em><\/p>\n

(xvii) \u201cThe Initial Existence in the first twilight of the Mah<\/em>\u0101<\/em>-Manvantara<\/em> [<\/em>after the<\/em> Mah\u0101-Pralaya that follows every age of Brahm<\/em>\u0101<\/em>] is a<\/em> conscious spiritual quality. In the manifested<\/em> worlds [<\/em>solar systems<\/em>] <\/em>it is<\/em>, in its<\/em> objective subjectivity, like the film from a Divine Breath to the gaze of the entranced seer. It spreads as it issues from<\/em> Laya throughout infinity as a colorless spiritual fluid. It is on the<\/em> seventh plane, and in its<\/em> seventh state in our planetary world.<\/em>\u201d<\/p>\n

The cosmogony account from the \u201cBook of Dzyan\u201d is not a creation story in the usual sense also because it does not teach \u201ccreation\u201d as normally understood in the West. Like other cosmogony accounts found in the sacred texts of India, it teaches manifestation or emanation rather than creation. The world arises from something; it cannot be created out of nothing. So when we here speak of \u201ccreation,\u201d it must be understood in that sense. That sense was lost in the West when the original account of cosmogony was incorporated into systems that postulate a God who can create something out of nothing.<\/p>\n

According to The Secret Doctrine<\/em>, the original account of cosmogony was recorded in the language of symbols. Because a symbol can express things much more concisely than words can, this original account made only a very small book. This brief account of cosmogony written in symbol language is said to be the original source of the other genesis accounts found in the world (The Secret Doctrine<\/em>, vol. 1, p. xliii):<\/p>\n

\u201cThe \u2018very old Book\u2019 is the original work from which the many volumes of Kiu-ti<\/em> were compiled. Not only this latter and the Siphrah di-Tseniuthah<\/em> but even the Sepher Yetzirah<\/em>, the work attributed by the Hebrew Kabalists to their Patriarch Abraham (!), the book of Shu-King<\/em>, China\u2019s primitive Bible, the sacred volumes of the Egyptian Thoth-Hermes, the Pur\u0101\u1e47as<\/em> in India, and the Chaldean Book of Numbers<\/em> and the Pentateuch<\/em> itself, are all derived from that one small parent volume.\u201d<\/p>\n

The stanzas from the \u201cBook of Dzyan\u201d given in The Secret Doctrine<\/em> do not come directly from that one small parent volume, the \u201cBook of the Secret Wisdom of the World,\u201d but rather from the first of fourteen volumes of secret commentaries written on it (Blavatsky Collected Writings<\/em>, vol. 14, p. 422). Thus, these stanzas must to some extent adopt a particular set of terminology, which in turn has become associated with a particular system of thought. It may be that there are other secret or now lost commentaries, which adopt a different set of terminology associated with a different system of thought, but which are also valid ways of interpreting the original account. Perhaps the lost \u1e62a\u1e63\u1e6di-tantra<\/em> by Kapila, founder of the ancient S\u0101\u1e43khya system, is an example of such a text. We will try to be aware of such possibilities as we proceed in this series of investigations of creation stories.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The \u201cBook of Dzyan,\u201d from which a number of stanzas on cosmogenesis and anthropogenesis are given in The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, purports to give the original genesis account possessed by humanity (see: \u201cThe Secret Doctrine-Original Genesis and the Wisdom Tradition\u201d). The other genesis accounts found in the world are regarded as more […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_topic_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_reply_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[39],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-331","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-creation-stories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/prajnaquest.fr\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/331","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/prajnaquest.fr\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/prajnaquest.fr\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/prajnaquest.fr\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/prajnaquest.fr\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=331"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/prajnaquest.fr\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/331\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":333,"href":"http:\/\/prajnaquest.fr\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/331\/revisions\/333"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/prajnaquest.fr\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=331"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/prajnaquest.fr\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=331"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/prajnaquest.fr\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=331"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}