This
is part of an ongoing glossary of terms relating to the Book of Dzyan.
The term mūlaprakṛti is used in The
Secret Doctrine to refer to one of the two aspects under which the “omnipresent,
eternal, boundless, and immutable principle” is symbolized, the other aspect then
being referred to as parabrahman. These
two terms were adopted from the writings of T. Subba Row as the Advaita Vedānta
terms for the two aspects that H. P. Blavatsky had called “absolute abstract
space” or “pre-cosmic substance” and “absolute abstract motion” or “pre-cosmic
ideation,” respectively. However, this is not exactly what these two terms
refer to in Hinduism, and mūlaprakṛti is
not really an Advaita Vedānta term.
The term mūlaprakṛti is defined in The
Secret Doctrine as “the root of Nature” (vol. 1, pp. 62, 136), “the Root of
all” (vol. 1, pp. 147, 256, 340), “the ‘root-Principle’
of the world stuff and of all in the world” (vol. 1, p. 522), and “the root of
Prakriti” (vol. 2, p. 65). The entry in the Theosophical
Glossary shows that this is what Blavatsky thought was the literal meaning
of the term: “Mûlaprakriti (Sk.). . .
. undifferentiated substance . . . Literally, ‘the root of Nature’ (Prakriti) or Matter” (p. 218). This is
not the literal meaning of the term, nor can it be. The term is a Sanskrit
compound, consisting of mūla, “root,”
and prakṛti, “substance, matter,
nature.” In order to mean “the root of nature,” the compound would have to be prakṛti-mūla, not mūla-prakṛti.
The term mūlaprakṛti is a Sāṃkhya term, despite the fact that Subba Row used
it as an Advaita Vedānta term, and Blavatsky adopted it as such from him. It
occurs in the third verse of the authoritative Sāṃkhya-kārikā. The standard commentary by Vācaspati-miśra, the Sāṃkhya-tattva-kaumudī, glosses it there
as: mūlaṃ cāsau prakṛtiś ceti mūlaprakṛtiḥ, which Ganganatha Jha translates as:
“it is that ‘Matter’ which is the ‘Root’.” Grammatically it is, and can only
be, a karmadhāraya compound, not a tatpuruṣa compound. This is why it
cannot mean “the root of substance,” but can only mean “that substance which is
the root,” or simply, “root-substance.”
The term mūlaprakṛti is found only rarely in Advaita Vedānta texts; and when
it is, it is used as a synonym of māyā,
“illusion,” or avidyā, “wrong knowing.”
The term parabrahman that it is paired
with in The Secret Doctrine is not
much used in Advaita Vedānta texts, since they almost always simply use brahman for the absolute, the one
reality, with no need for any qualifying adjective like para, “supreme” or “highest.” Thus, mūlaprakṛti is paired with parabrahman
or brahman only like māyā is paired with brahman, as an illusory something that is not ultimately real
because it goes away when brahman is
realized through right knowing. It is without beginning, anādi, but not without end.
The idea that root-substance or mūlaprakṛti is eternal, and therefore
could be an aspect of the absolute, is a Theosophical idea and a Sāṃkhya idea,
but not an Advaita Vedānta idea. Subba Row strongly advocated that matter or
substance is eternal in his articles written in response to the Almora Swami,
thus giving an esoteric teaching as if it was the standard Advaita Vedānta
teaching. Later, however, in his lectures on the Bhagavad-gītā he reverted to the standard Advaita Vedānta teaching,
strongly distinguishing mūlaprakṛti
from parabrahman as being only the
veil of parabrahman. This was copied
in The Secret Doctrine several times
(vol. 1, pp. 10, 130, 274, 351, 426, 428, 429, 430, 432, 536) as being the true
esoteric teaching.
Subba Row had stated clearly in his
first lecture on the Bhagavad-gītā that
mūlaprakṛti is not parabrahman, and this was quoted
approvingly in The Secret Doctrine (vol.
1, p. 428): “Parabrahmam appears to it as Mulaprakriti. . . . This Mulaprakriti
is material to it (the Logos), as any material object is material to us. This
Mulaprakriti is no more Parabrahmam than the bundle of attributes of a pillar is
the pillar itself; Parabrahmam is an unconditioned and absolute reality, and
Mulaprakriti is a sort of veil thrown over it.” Following upon this in The Secret Doctrine (vol. 1, p. 629),
Blavatsky tells us to draw a deep line in our thought between the one reality
and mūlaprakṛti (vol. 1, p. 629): “.
. . the One Reality . . . a true spirit of esoteric philosophy . . . the
impersonal, attributeless, absolute divine essence which is no ‘Being,’ but the
root of all being. Draw a deep line in your thought between that
ever-incognizable essence, and the, as invisible, yet comprehensible Presence
(Mulaprakriti), . . .”
Yet, as one of the two aspects under
which the one reality is symbolized, The
Secret Doctrine makes it clear that no such distinction can be made: “. . .
the ONE Immutable—Parabrahm = Mulaprakriti, the eternal one-root” (1.340). “. .
. eternal (Nitya) unconditioned
reality or SAT (Satya), whether we
call it Parabrahmam or Mulaprakriti, for these are the two aspects of the ONE”
(1.69). “Absolute, Divine Spirit is one with absolute Divine Substance: Parabrahm
and Mulaprakriti are one in essence. Therefore, Cosmic Ideation and Cosmic
Substance in their primal character are one also” (1.337 fn.). “In its
absoluteness, the One Principle under its two aspects (of Parabrahmam and
Mulaprakriti) is sexless, unconditioned and eternal” (1.18). Blavatsky used
these two terms because, following Subba Row’s earlier writings, she thought
that this was the Advaita Vedānta teaching: “. . . viewed in the same light as
the Vedantin views his Parabrahm and Mulaprakriti, the one under two aspects.”
(1.46). This is not the Advaita Vedānta teaching, but it is the Theosophical
teaching.
The term mūlaprakṛti is not used in Theosophy like in Advaita Vedānta, where
it is synonymous with māyā, “illusion,”
the few times it occurs there. In Theosophy it is used much more like in Sāṃkhya,
where it is one of the two eternal cosmic principles, mūla-prakṛti, “root-substance,” and puruṣa, “spirit,” with one fundamental difference. Theosophy
teaches a single, non-dual reality, while Sāṃkhya as now known is a dualistic
system, although it may not have always been dualistic. Sāṃkhya is regarded as
the oldest philosophical system or worldview (darśana) in India, and its founder, Kapila is traditionally known
as the “first knower,” ādi-vidvān.
There are references to an old Sāṃkhya in which the absolute is brahman, and puruṣa and prakṛti are
merely its two aspects, just like in Theosophy. As such, it makes no difference
whether one refers to the absolute as spirit or as substance, since they are
only two ways of looking at the same one reality.
Thus we can have the rather
surprising statement in the Mahatma letter (#10, chronological #88): “In other words
we believe in MATTER alone, in matter as visible nature and matter in its
invisibility as the invisible omnipresent omnipotent Proteus with its unceasing
motion which is its life, and which nature draws from herself since she is the
great whole outside of which nothing can exist.” This does not at all rule out
spirit, since the letter is speaking of living substance. It is matter or
substance endowed with life or motion, motion which never ceases even during
pralaya when the cosmos is out of manifestation. It is this living substance
that was referred to in another Mahatma letter as mūlaprakṛti (#59, chronological #111):
“The
One reality is Mulaprakriti (undifferentiated Substance)—the ‘Rootless root,’
the . . . But we have to stop, lest there should remain but little to tell for
your own intuitions.”
Several
of the concepts central to the philosophy of H.P. Blavatsky’s (HPB’s)
work The
Secret Doctrine,
may be defined in terms of
“svabhâvât”. Some of these concepts will be listed in
this introduction. In the following paragraphs
we can have a look at some examples of the use of the term svabhâvât
(svabhāva),
in relevant scholarly, philosophical and religious works, to see if
we can find any resemblance to the concept of svabhāva as it is
presented in The
Secret Doctrine.
In the Proem to The Secret Doctrine (SD I, 1), in the “archaïc manuscript”, boundless abstract space is symbolised as an immaculate white disk on a dull background. In SD I, 35, abstract space is described as unconditional, and eternal (timeless or independent of time):
“What
is that which was, is, and will be, whether there is a Universe or
not; whether there be gods or none?” asks the esoteric Senzar
Catechism. And the answer made is — SPACE.
In
the very first śloka from the Book of Dzyan as presented in The
Secret Doctrine,
stanza 1 śloka 1 (SD I, 35), abstract space is called the eternal
parent:
1.
“THE ETERNAL PARENT (Space), WRAPPED IN HER EVER INVISIBLE
ROBES, HAD SLUMBERED ONCE AGAIN FOR SEVEN ETERNITIES (a).”
The
invisible robes in which the parent is “wrapped” are interpreted
in stanza 1 śloka 5 as mūlaprakṛti,
the one primordial substance. In stanza 1 śloka 5 (SD I, 40-41)
then, abstract space is called darkness:
1.5
DARKNESS ALONE FILLED THE BOUNDLESS ALL (a), FOR FATHER, MOTHER AND
SON WERE ONCE MORE ONE, […]
HPB
explains in SD I, 41:
When
the whole universe was plunged into sleep — had returned to its one
primordial element — there was neither centre of luminosity, nor eye
to perceive light, and darkness necessarily filled the boundless all.
In
stanza 2 śloka 5 (SD I, 60), we find the same identification, and
furthermore, darkness is called father-mother,
and
svabhâvât:
2.5
[…] DARKNESS ALONE WAS FATHER-MOTHER, SVABHAVAT, […]
This
applies only to the state of pralaya, the sleep of the universe, and
svabhâvât may appear in at least two respective stages. The
nivṛitti (also incorrectly spelled nirvṛtti) stage is also called
pradhāna,
when svabhâvât is in darkness, while the pravṛtti stage is called
prakṛti,
when svabhâvât has become the manifested matter which is at the
basis of the various planes of manifestation. Not in each case in
HPB’s writings the term pradhāna
is used for the unmanifested root of matter, but in volumes I and II
of the SD we find it used consistently in this manner. For example in
SD I, 257 we find:
the
former term (pradhāna) being certainly synonymous with Mulaprakriti
and Akasa, […]
Here
we see that ākāśa
is also identified with mūlaprakṛti,
the unmanifested “root of matter”.
1.
The Orthography of Svabhâvât
Concerning
svabhâvât, Friedrich Max Müller reported the following in 1876 in
his Chips
from a German Workshop
Vol. I. p 278:
The
Svâbhâvikas maintain that nothing exists but nature, or rather
substance, and that this substance exists by itself (“svabhâvât),
without a Creator or a Ruler. It exists, however, under two forms :
in the state of Pravritti,
as active, or in the state of Nirvritti,
as passive.
Daniel
Caldwell
has suggested
that
this passage might have been HPB’s source for the term svabhâvât,
and that the ending in -ât would indicate the ablative case of
svabhāva,
meaning “by itself”. If this is true, these two terms would be
two forms of the same base word, which is spelled in the current IAST
orthography
as svabhāva.
2.
Svabhāva: Nature or Substance
Based
on this identification of svabhâvât as svabhāva, we can look up
this term in common dictionaries and start reviewing what was written
in the time of HPB in sources she has consulted or might have
consulted, which is not always clear.
In this
last quotation from Müller, he distinguishes two senses of the word
svabhāva: “nature” and “substance”. Perhaps he is echoing
Brian Houghton Hodgson at this point. In the standard
Monier-Williams’ A
Sanskrit-English Dictionary
(MW),this
second sense is not mentioned in the main lemmata for svabhāva and
svabhāvāt:
m.
own condition or state of being, natural state or constitution,
innate or inherent disposition, nature, impulse, spontaneity
m.
(…vāt or …vena or …va-tas or ibc.), (from natural disposition,
by nature, naturally, by one’s self, spontaneously) ŚvetUp. Mn. MBh.
&c.
A
specific use of svabhāva or svabhāvāt as a philosophical term in
Mahāyāna Buddhist literature as mentioned
by HPB is not included in MW. In HPB’s time there were also the
dictionaries
by
Horace Hayman Wilson (whom she held in high regard as a researcher),
and
later
the great Sanskrit-German dictionary by Rudolf Roth and Otto von
Böhtlingk, which also do not mention svabhāva as “substance”.
If
we look at the Śvetāśvatara Upanishad (ŚvUp, ca. 400 BCE ±100),
the oldest extant work where the term svabhāva is mentioned, in ŚvUp
1.2 we find in the discussion on the first cause of things, svabhāva
as a possible first cause (tr. Robert Ernest Hume, 1921) :
kālaḥ svabhāvo niyatir yadṛcchā bhūtāni yoniḥ puruṣeti cintyam / saṃyoga eṣāṃ na tv ātmabhāvād ātmā hy anīśaḥ sukhaduḥkhahetoḥ //
Time (kāla), or inherent nature (sva-bhāva), or necessity (niyati) or chance (yadṛcchā),or the elements (bhūta), or a [female] womb (yoni), or a [male] person (puruṣa) are to be considered [as the cause]; […]
This
verse answers the question “kutaḥ sma jātā”, “whence
are we born?”, from the previous verse. Again we find svabhāva
as “inherent nature” and not as “substance”.
Moreover, from the translation it is not clear if svabhāva is
intended here as 1. inherent nature of individual entitites
(pluralistic) or 2. of entities in general or the universe as a
whole. (monistic) In the Book of Dzyan, svabhāva is in principle a
monistic concept, as we have seen in the introduction to this
article.
3.
HPB’s quote from the Anugītā
In
the SD, HPB refers to one extant work from the context of Hinduism
where svabhāva is used in the sense of “substance”. In SD I, 571
she quotes the Anugītā:
“[…]
Gods, Men, Gandharvas, Pisâchas, Asuras, Râkshasas, all have been
created by Svabhâva (Prakriti, or plastic nature), not by actions,
nor by a cause” — i.e., not by any physical cause.
In
the 1882 translation of the Anugītā
by K.T. Telang, a work HPB has consulted on other occasions, on p.
387 we find what is presumably the source of this quotation:
Gods,
men, Gandharvas, Pisâkas, Asuras, Râkshasas, all have been created
by nature5,
not by actions, nor by a cause.
where
note 5
refers to:
5.
The original is svabhâva, which Arguna Misra renders by Prakriti.
From
her substitution of “nature” by “Svabhâva (Prakriti, or
plastic nature)” we may derive that HPB interprets svabhâva here
as
the term svabhâvât appearing in the Book of Dzyan, which is
described as “plastic essence” (SD I, 61), the plastic root of
physical Nature (SD I, 98), which in its “active condition” is
called prakṛti.
Note
5 refers to the commentary to the Mahābhārata
by Arjuna Miśra (16th c.), who, according to the note, renders
svabhāva as prakṛti. We can read the original verse in book 14,
chapter 50 (Bombay ed. 51), verse 11 of the Mahābhārata,
the Anugītā
being part of its Aśvamedha parvan:
devā manuṣyā gandharvāḥ piśācāsurarākṣasāḥ sarve svabhāvataḥ sṛṣṭā na kriyābhyo na kāraṇāt || 14.50.11 ||
Indeed
in this verse, “by nature” seems to be an inadequate translation
for svabhāva. Although
Arjuna Miśra, and HPB, have thought that in this verse svabhāva
should be identified with prakṛti, it is still possible that the
author has intended “inherent nature” and not “substance”.
Just
as in the quotation from the
ŚvUp,
it is not exactly clear here if svabhāva
is intended as an individual (pluralistic) or a collective “cause”.
4.
The
Mahāvyutpatti
In
the Mahāvyutpatti
(Mv,
Toh.
4346),
the famous Tibetan-Sanskrit dictionary, a work from a Buddhist
context dating back to the first half of the 9th century, the
Sanskrit entry for prakṛti (no. 7497) is linked to Tibetan “rang
bzhin”, “rang bzhin ngo bo nyid”, and “rang bzhin
ngo bo nyid
dam
rang bzhin.” These three terms are expressions for
svabhāva as the “inherent nature” of Mahāyāna Buddhism. The
two terms rang bzhin and ngo bo nyid are derived from rang (own,
self) and ngo or ngo bo (face), and therefore their
primary meaning will be closer to svabhāva as “nature”
than to “substance”. The
next entry in the Mv, no. 7498, is indeed svabhāva, to which are
linked the same three expressions.
No.
Sanskrit
Tibetan
7497
prakṛti
rang
bzhin; rang bzhin ngo bo nyid; rang bzhin ngo bo nyid
dam
rang bzhin
7498
svabhāva
rang
bzhin; rang bzhin ngo bo nyid; rang bzhin ngo bo nyid
dam
rang bzhin
This
may suggest that at the time the Mv
was composed,
the terms svabhāva
and prakṛti were seen as completely synonymous, by the team of
creators of the dictionary, but also by extension by the lotsavas who
considered the Mv their golden standard. However, it does not say
anything about whether in the Mv svabhāva/prakṛti is considered a
pluralistic or monistic concept or perhaps even both.
5.
The Svabhāva Mantra
Eugène
Burnouf, on p. 393 of his Introduction
à l’Histoire du Bouddhisme Indien
(1876), notices that “the word Nature
does not render at all that which the Buddhists understand as
Svabhāva”
[tr.
IdB]:
They
see it at the same time as Nature which exists in itself, absolute
Nature, the cause of the world, and as the own Nature of every
existence, that which constitutes that it exists.
Here
we have the two standpoints, of Mahāyānist monism and Hīnayāna
pluralism, combined into one. In connection with the elusive or
illusive school of the Svābhāvikas
(spelled by Burnouf with the extra macron), Burnouf remarks on p.
395: “When they were asked: Where do existences come from? they
answered: Svabhāvāt,
‘from their own nature’ — And where do they go after this life? —
Into other forms produced by the irresistable influence of that same
nature. […]”.
On
pp. 572-3 Burnouf adds:
The
second of the two meanings of the word Svabhāva,
which I set out in my text, is perfectly
demonstrated in a passage
of the Pañcakramaṭippaṇī which I think is useful to cite. The
yogi must, according to
the text of that work, pronounce the following axiom: Svabhāva
śuddhaḥ sarvadharmāḥ svabhāva śuddho ‘ham iti.
‘All conditions or all existences are produced
from their own nature; I am myself produced from my own nature.’ I
believe that this meaning of svabhāva is the most ancient; if, as
Hodgson thought, the Buddhists understood by this term the abstract
nature, this metaphysical notion may have been added to the word
afterwards, of which the natural
interpretation is that which is indicated by the axiom I have just
cited. It may be useful to remark that taking the participle śuddha,
in the sense of ‘complete, accomplished;’ is colloquial in Buddhist
Sanskrit.
The
ṭippaṇī in question
is also known as the Piṇḍīkramaṭippaṇī,
which is Parahitarakṣita’s
short commentary on the first part of the tantric Nāgārjuna’s
Pañcakrama.
Both the Pañcakrama
and the ṭippaṇī were
published by Louis de la Vallée Poussin
in 1896,
in one volume in the series Études
et textes tantriques
of Ghent university. On p. 15, lines 5-7 we find this passage. (see
the Sanskrit Texts division of the Book
of Dzyan
web site, at http://prajnaquest.fr/blog/sanskrit-texts-3/sanskrit-buddhist-texts/)
Burnouf’s
“axiom” is widely known as a mantra, under various names.
It is called Svabhāva Mantra,
Śuddha Mantra, or Śūnyata Mantra although this name is also used
for another well known mantra. It is part of the sādhanas of quite a
number of different traditions. Since
the Pañcakrama
and
Piṇḍīkramaṭippaṇī
are
(sub-) commentaries to the Guhyasamājatantra, we might expect to
find this mantra in the Guhyasamāja root text, but, searching
visually several times, I have not been able to find it there. It is
however a part of a commonly used daily sādhana of Guhyasamāja. In
the Sādhanamālā, which is a later collection of 312 Buddhist
ceremonial practices, the mantra is found 30 times. An example of a
ceremony is the sādhana of Tārā, which is also studied by Stephan
Beyer in The
Cult of Tara.
The mantra is found there as part of the Four Mandala Offering to
Tara, where it is used to purify the location and attributes for the
ritual, before the ceremony. (p. 180)
The
mantra is also part of long and short versions of the Kālacakra
sādhana, and as such it is discussed by David Reigle in his article
on Sanskrit
Mantras in the Kālacakra Sādhana.
It was published in As
Long as Space Endures: Essays on the Kālacakra Tantra in Honor of
H.H. the Dalai Lama,
where the mantra is found on p. 302. As a source for this mantra,
Reigle refers to the Kālacakrabhagavatsādhanavidhiḥ (Toh. 1358).
His translation is the following:
oṃ;
Naturally pure are all things; naturally pure am I.
In
this translation, svabhāvaśuddhāḥ
is interpreted
as “pure of nature”, or “pure by nature” instead
of Burnouf’s “produced from its/their own nature”.
Lama
Thubten Yeshe, in An
Explanation of the Shunyata Mantra and a Meditation on Emptiness
(in:
Mandala,
January/March 2009) explains the meaning of this same mantra as
follows:
Also,
this mantra contains a profound explanation ofthe
pure, fundamental nature of both human beings andall
other existent phenomena. It means that everything is spontaneously
pure – not relatively, of course, but in the absolute sense. From
the absolute point of view, thefundamental
quality of human beings and the nature of allthings
is purity.
Svabhāva
is here interpreted by Lama Yeshe as the “fundamental nature”
of entities, or absolute reality, called paramārtha or pariniṣpanna
in the Book
of Dzyan.
Ultimate reality or absolute reality is “pure” in the sense
that it is the state of matter (mūlaprakṛti/prakṛti)
where it is still unmanifested, or as HPB might have called it,
non-manvantaric, or nivṛtti.
In
the three examples presented here svabhāva is viewed also as
absolute reality, paramārtha in Madhyamaka
terminology,
and not only as conditional reality, saṃvṛtti.
Of course in any form of Buddhism, “natural purity” would
be associated with “non-ego”, but in a different sense, the
term svabhāva is commonly found in Madhyamaka oriented Buddhist
writings. For example in the term niḥsvabhāva,
often used as a synonym for nairātmya, anātman or “non-ego”,
it indicates exactly the opposite, that is svabhāva only
as conditional reality, or in HPB’s corresponding terminology,
pravṛtti
as opposed to nivṛtti.
The Book of Dzyan on the other hand explicitly describes svabhāva as going through the two different stages: 1. nivṛitti, when “darkness alone was […] svabhâvât” (“in paramārtha”, absolute reality), and 2. pravṛtti, when svabhāva is prakṛti, the basic substance of the manifested universe, that is conditional reality.
6.
Hodgson’s Essays
On
p. 73 of Brian Houghton Hodgson’s Essays
on the Languages, Literature and Religion of Nepal and Tibet
(1874) we find a list of principles from the “Svabhavika
doctrine”, the first of which appears to be a translation of the
Svabhāva
Mantra:
All
things are governed or perfected by Swabháva; I too am governed by
Swabháva.
This
is again a very different translation, where śuddha
is taken as “governed/perfected by”.
David N. Gellner responds to this in his 1989 article Hodgson’s
Blind Alley? On the So-Called Schools of Nepalese Buddhism,
calling it a misunderstanding of the term svabhāvaśuddha, which he
translates as “free of essence”.
The
“Ashta Sáhasrika” is given by Hodgson as a reference, but
I have not found the mantra literally in the text of the
Aṣṭasāhasrikāprajñāpāramitā.
Some
similar passages are to be found in the text, of which the following
is an example (Edward Conze’s translation p. 250 and Sanskrit from
ed. Vaidya p. 211, my (IdB’s) comments in
square brackets):
Subhuti:
But
if, O Lord, as we all know, all dharmas [Skt. sarvadharmāḥ] are by
nature perfectly pure [Skt. prakṛtipariśuddhāḥ], […]
The
Lord: So
it is, Subhuti. For all dharmas [sarvadharmāḥ] are just by (their
essential original) nature perfectly pure [Skt. prakṛtyaiva
pariśuddhāḥ]. When a Bodhisattva who trains in perfect wisdom
[…] remains uncowed although all dharmas [Skt. sarvadharmeṣu] are
by their nature perfectly pure [Skt. prakṛtipariśuddheṣu], then
that is his perfection of wisdom [Skt. prajñāpāramitāyāṃ].
Here
we see that instead of svabhāvaśuddha (Reigle: pure by nature) the
compound
prakṛtipariśuddha
(Conze, 2nd ed. 1975: by nature perfectly pure) is used in the same
sense, reflecting the semantic agreement between svabhāva and
prakṛti.
Further,
the Tibetan version in the Derge Kanjur (Toh. 12) shows how the
compound was analysed by the lotsavas of the
Aṣṭasāhasrikāprajñāpāramitā:
it was taken as rang
bzhin gyis yongs su dag pa, which is “completely pure by
nature”, as opposed to “free of essence”.
7.
Prasannapadā
and Mūlamadhyamakakārikā
In Candrakīrti’s Prasannapadā (PsP), we find a lengthy discussion of the concept of svabhāva. In the 1931 partial edition of Stanisław Schayer, Ausgewählte Kapitel…, in an extensive note on pages 55-57, four different meanings of svabhāva are distinguished (paraphrased IdB):
Svabhāva as “nījam ātmīyam svarūpam”, an “essential” as opposed to “accidental” quality, like the hotness of fire. This is an idea compatible with Hīnayāna pluralism.
Svabhāva as svalakṣaṇa, the own individual mark which is carried by the individual substrate of a dharma. The Hīnayānists are called Svabhāvavādins in the sense that they accept a manyfold of these individual substances (pluralism).
Svabhāva as equivalent of prakṛti, of upādāna [[material cause]] and of āśraya [[basis of perception]], of the unchanging, eternal substrate of all changes. In the Hīnayāna schools, the Vaibhāṣikas accept this view, while the Sautrāntikas agree with the Mādhyamikas at this point, calling a transcendental lakṣya [[characteristic]] completely illusory. [[But being Hīnayāna schools, both of these are considered pluralist.]]
Svabhāvaḥ as “svato bhāvaḥ”, the absolute being, “nirapekṣaḥ svabhāvaḥ”. The universe as “one and whole” is absolute. This idea is not compatible with Hīnayānist pluralism.
In
the third and fourth points we may recognise concepts similar, both
in a different way, to the svabhāva
presented in the Book of Dzyan. In the text of the
PsP, chapter XV § 2 (Schayer § 5 p. 63, cp. Vaidya ed. p. 116) the
third point is analysed as follows (tr. from German IdB):
Diese
Eigenwesen [[tatsvarūpam]] ist die dharmatā
der dharmas.
— Und was ist die dharmatā
der dharmas?
— Der svabhāva
der dharmas.
— Und was ist dieser svabhāva?
— Die prakṛti.
— Und was ist diese prakṛti?
— Die śūnyatā.
— Und was ist diese śūnyatā?
— Das naiḥsvābhāvya.
— Und was is dieses naiḥsvābhāvya?
— Die tathatā,
d.h. die Unwandelbarkeit der wahren Beschaffenheit
(tathābhāvāvikāritva),
das ewige Beharren [in seinem An-sich-Sein] (sadā
sthāyitā),
das absolute Nicht-entstehen (sarvadānutpāda).
This
own essence [[tatsvarūpam]]
is
the “entitiness” of entities. And what is the “entitiness”
of entities? It is the svabhāva of entities. And what is this
svabhāva? It is its basic material. And what is this basic material?
It
is emptiness. And what is this emptiness? It is the fundamental
absence of svabhāva. And what is this fundamental absence of
svabhāva? It is thusness, that is the unique property of the true
being-thus, the eternal
fixedness [in its being per se], the absolute non-origination.
To
Candrakriti this line of reasoning proves that svabhāva cannot exist
as a basic substance in which (or on the basis of which) change is
taking place. The reasoning is based on Nāgārjuna’s
Mūlamadhyamakakārikā
(MMK) XV.8, to which this PsP passage is a commentary (tr. Mark
Siderits and Shōryū Katsura, 2013):
yady astitvaṃ prakṛtyā syān na bhaved asya nāstitā | prakṛter anyathābhāvo na hi jātūpapadyate ||
If
something existed by essential nature (prakṛti), then there would
not be the nonexistence of such a thing. For it never holds that
there is the alteration of essential nature.
8.
Conclusions
The
examples discussed here, from the Anugītā,
the Mahāvyutpatti,
the Svabhāva
Mantra
and the Prasannapadā/Mūlamadhyamakakārikā,
do not sufficiently
show
that the term svabhāva has been used, in original Hindu or Buddhist
texts, not only in the sense of an “inherent nature”, but
also in the sense of “substance”. In the Book of Dzyan it
is described primarily as “substance”.
In Buddhism, pluralism is generally associated with Hīnayāna and monism with Mahāyāna. We have seen that in Buddhist texts another distinction of two senses of the word svabhāva may be recognised: in the svabhāva mantra we have found the term svabhāva as “fundamentally pure”, while the part svabhāva in the “doctrine of niḥsvabhāva” is used as exactly the opposite. We can define these two senses of the svabhāva as nivṛtti and pravṛtti respectively. In the Book of Dzyan, svabhāva is described primarily as “monistic”, but going through the nivṛtti and pravṛtti phases of manifestation. This may imply that svabhāva is in these two phases “monistic” and “pluralistic” respectively. •
On the Summary to the First Fundamental Proposition
By Ingmar de Boer on March 20, 2013 at 12:22 am
In the summary in SD I, 16, a clearer idea of is given of the subject of the first fundamental proposition. This proposition is stating an “Omnipresent, Eternal, Boundless, and Immutable PRINCIPLE”. The summary is meant as a clarification of the text in SD I, 14-16 under (a).
The following summary will afford a clearer idea to the reader.
(1.) The ABSOLUTE; the Parabrahm of the Vedantins or the one Reality, SAT, which is, as Hegel says, both Absolute Being and Non-Being.
The Absolute, Parabrahman.
(2.) The first manifestation, the impersonal, and, in philosophy, unmanifested Logos, the precursor of the “manifested.” This is the “First Cause,” the “Unconscious” of European Pantheists.
The unmanifested Logos, which is apparently different from the Absolute here. We have called this the First Logos. (see The Three Logoi)
(3.) Spirit-matter, LIFE; the “Spirit of the Universe,” the Purusha and Prakriti, or the second Logos.
Literally the Second Logos.
(4.) Cosmic Ideation, MAHAT or Intelligence, the Universal World-Soul; the Cosmic Noumenon of Matter, the basis of the intelligent operations in and of Nature, also called MAHA-BUDDHI.
In our earlier analysis we have identified the Universal World-Soul with the Third Logos.
Confusingly, we found Mahat to correspond to the Second Logos.
The Cosmic Noumenon of Matter is mentioned as “noumenon of matter” in SD I, 84
The expanding and contracting of the Web — i.e., the world stuff or atoms — expresses here the pulsatory movement; for it is the regular contraction and expansion of the infinite and shoreless Ocean of that which we may call the noumenon of matter emanated by Swabhavat, which causes the universal vibration of atoms.
The noumenon of matter is the web
In this passage we can safely assume that “universal vibration of atoms” corresponds to “pulsatory movement”, which is apparently the “expanding and contracting of the Web”. What causes this vibration is not entirely clear from the text. Syntactically “which” could refer either to
1. the regular contraction and expansion
2. the infinite and shoreless Ocean
3. that which we may call the noumenon of matter
4. Swabhavat
Logically, it could not be 1, as the cause of vibration could not be itself. From “for it is the regular…” we can again safely conclude that by the “infinite and shoreless Ocean” is meant the Web. It could therefore not be 2, because the Web apparently does not vibrate by itself. Is the noumenon emanated or the matter? The Ocean apparently consists of the “noumenon of matter”. Therefore the Ocean is still unmanifested, and it is the noumenon that is emanated by Swabhavat, not matter. As the noumenon is itself the substance of the Ocean, Swabhavat will be the cause of its vibration. The alternative would be that the noumenon is the cause of vibration, which means that the Web vibrates because of its substance.
If we return to śloka 10 in stanza III:
AND THIS WEB IS THE UNIVERSE SPUN OUT OF THE TWO SUBSTANCES MADE IN ONE, WHICH IS SWABHAVAT
Here Swabhavat is identified with the substance of the web. Because the substance is twofold in itself, the vibration is an inherent quality of the web, as we can see from śloka 11 in stanza II:
IT (the Web) EXPANDS WHEN THE BREATH OF FIRE (the Father) IS UPON IT; IT CONTRACTS WHEN THE BREATH OF THE MOTHER (the root of Matter) TOUCHES IT.
This means both solutions 3 and 4 could be acceptable, and consequently the “Cosmic Noumenon of Matter” is the Father-Mother substance of the Web, alternatively Swabhavat. As for now it is unclear to me if this might be related to the Second, or the Third Logos.
The “basis of intelligent operations in and of Nature” might be interpreted either way, but seems closer to our idea of the Third Logos than to the Second.
As for mahabuddhi, we can sum up some other relevant passages here.
1. One location is SD I, 451:
Mahat (or Maha-Buddhi) is, with the Vaishnavas, however, divine mind in active operation, or, as Anaxagoras has it, “an ordering and disposing mind, which was the cause of all things,” — [[Nous o diakosmonte kai panton aitios]].
We identified Anaxagoras’ concept of nous as the Third logos, and also the “divine mind in active operation” is exactly what we have defined as the Third Logos. In this quote, mahat (mahabuddhi) is defined differently, not as the Second Logos but as the Third, apparently following “the Vaishnavas”.
The quote “Nous [estin] ho diakosmon te kai panton aitios” is taken from Plato’s Phaedo, 97c, “νοῦς ἐστιν ὁ διακοσμῶν τε καὶ πάντων αἴτιος“, “it is the mind that arranges and causes all things”, in the translation of Harold North Fowler.
2. A second is SD I, 572:
Esoterically the teaching differs: The divine, purely Adi-Buddhic monad manifests as the universal Buddhi (the Maha-buddhi or Mahat in Hindu philosophies) the spiritual, omniscient and omnipotent root of divine intelligence, the highest anima mundi or the Logos.
Here we have mahat (mahabuddhi) as the Second Logos, which is the Logos proper, and HPB’s Anima Mundi.
Mahat is used in different meanings, though it seems to be in a consistent way. Apparently in the summary of the first fundamental proposition, mahat is used conform SD I, 451.
Returning to the structure of the summary, it seems to be
(1) Parabrahman, the Absolute
(2) First Logos
(3) Second Logos
(4) Third Logos
If we try to put this in a diagram, instead of something like
the structure would become something like
Today I consulted the 1893 “Third Revised Edition” of The Secret Doctrine, which – fascinatingly – has a slightly altered summary text, on p. 44 (different page numbering):
(1.) Absoluteness: the Parabrahman of the Vedântins or the One Reality, Sat, […] (2.) The First Logos: the impersonal […] (3.) The Second Logos: Spirit-Matter […] (4.) The Third Logos: Cosmic Ideation […]
This would mean that the Adyar edition also has this version of the summary, as it is based on the 1893 revised edition. This version of the summary does “afford a clearer idea to the reader”, as opposed to the 1888 summary…
Studying the first fundamental proposition in The Secret Doctrine, we see that the “Omnipresent, Eternal, Boundless, and Immutable PRINCIPLE” postulated in SD I, 14 is the Rootless Root of “all that was, is, or ever shall be”, Parabrahman, the Absolute.
Two aspects of the Absolute are then described, which are absolute abstract Space and absolute abstract Motion, the latter symbolized in the Book of Dzyan as The Great Breath.
The Great Breath is seen by HPB as precosmic Ideation, while the other aspect of the Absolute is seen as precosmic root-substance (Mūlaprakṛti). Both these are underlying manifested Consciousness and manifested Matter respectively, or Spirit and Matter, Subjectivity and Objectivity in the manifested universe.
These two aspects are obviously referred to in the last sentence of the passage, after the summary, “The ONE REALITY; its dual aspects in the conditioned Universe.”
Mūlaprakṛti: the Veil over Parabrahman
In this context HPB refers to ‘Mr. Subba Row’s four able lectures on the Bhagavad Gita, “Theosophist,” February, 1887.’
In the first of these lectures, on page 304 of The Theosophist Vol. VIII, we find some explanation about the relationship between Parabrahman and Mūlaprakṛti:
From its objective standpoint, Parabrahman appears to it as Mulaprakriti.
The “it” in this sentence is the ego “having an objective consciousness of its own”.
Parabrahman is an unconditioned and absolute reality, and Mulaprakriti is a sort of veil thrown over it. Parabrahman cannot be seen as it is.
What is said here, is that Parabrahman is the Absolute, and Mūlaprakṛti is an aspect of it, only in the sense that we cannot see more of it than that. Mūlaprakṛti is not a component, “aspect” or principle in itself, either separate from or united with Parabrahman. This is different from HPB’s interpretation in her description of the first fundamental principle, as two aspects, pre-Cosmic Ideation and pre-Cosmic Substance.
On page 305 of The Theosophist Vol. VIII, “the highest Trinity that we are capable of understanding” is mentioned, being Mūlaprakṛti, Īśvara (the Logos) and the “conscious energy of he Logos” (i.e. HPB’s fohat). This is the trinity we have defined as the First, Second and Third Logos. (see The Three Logoi)
In SD I, 14 we find:
Thus, then, the first fundamental axiom of the Secret Doctrine is this metaphysical ONE ABSOLUTE — BE-NESS — symbolised by finite intelligence as the theological Trinity.
On page 305, Subba Row describes the “conscious energy of he Logos” as the “Holy Ghost of the Christians”. This confirms that Subba Row thought of this trinity as the “theological Trinity”.
Although HBP does not give any indication which trinity she is referring to, from these correspondences between her description and Subba Row’s, we can assume that she refers to the Trinity that we have defined as the First, Second and Third Logos, which she sees as “symbolising” the “metaphysical ONE ABSOLUTE — BE-NESS”, which is the “Omnipresent, Eternal, Boundless, and Immutable PRINCIPLE” postulated in SD I, 14.
This same problem appears in SD I, 15:
Considering this metaphysical triad as the Root from which proceeds all manifestation, […]
“This” seems to refer to:
Spirit (or Consciousness) and Matter are, however, to be regarded, not as independent realities, but as the two facets or aspects of the Absolute (Parabrahm), […]
Again the only possible interpretation here seems the Absolute itself, together with its two aspects. A more fitting interpretation would be though, that the Root is the Parabrahman which she sees as a “metaphysical triad” in itself, or the triad “symbolising” Parabrahman.
As we have seen, HPB associates Mahat, the Universal Mind or Intelligence, with the Second Logos. As Cosmic Ideation, we would associate it with the Nous and the world of Ideas of the Plotinic model, corresponding to the Second Logos. The Nous as the creative principle of the universe on the other hand, may be associated with the third aspect, not the second. In the Besant-Leadbeater interpretation the Nous is the creative Mind, corresponding to the Third Logos, Divine Activity. Therefore in this model the Demiurge is associated with the Third Logos, again because the third is the “creative aspect”. Notably, in both models the Dhyan Chohans are connected with the third aspect.
These different views, as we have seen, can be traced to the Plotinic interpretation of the three logoi by HPB, versus the interpretation of Damascius, and subsequently Mead in his Orpheus, and Besant and Leadbeater. Another source for Mead however, was The Secret Doctrine, as it was, naturally, for Besant and Leadbeater. Did Mead, Besant and Leadbeater make a conscious choice to deviate from HPB’s interpretation? We do not have an argumentation from any of them for doing so. Maybe they did not think they were so far removed from HPB’s interpretation? In SD I, 256 we find:
For MAHAT is the first product of Pradhana, or Akasa, and Mahat — Universal intelligence “whose characteristic property is Buddhi” — is no other than the Logos, for he is called “Eswara” Brahma, Bhava, etc. (See Linga Purana, sec. lxx. 12 et seq.; and Vayu Purana, but especially the former Purana — prior, section viii., 67-74). He is, in short, the “Creator” or the divine mind in creative operation, “the cause of all things.”
Pradhāna is associated with he First Logos, cp. Mūlaprakṛti. The first product of pradhāna is the Second Logos. Universal intelligence is the Logos, Īśvara, Brahmā, again the Second Logos, not the Third. In the next phrase the problem becomes apparent: he is the “Creator”, “the divine mind in creative operation”, which could easily be interpreted as the third aspect. It is, confusingly, about the Second Logos, the Divine Mind or Wisdom, and not about fohat, its force, i.e. the Third Logos.
We can see that the cause of misunderstanding here is, that the description of the Second and Third Logoi is not unambiguous. This quote from SD I, 256 is only one example, but this ambiguity occurs repeatedly through the whole text of the SD, making it difficult to reconstruct the model of the triad as it was intended.
5. Synthesis
When we combine the correspondences between the two interpretations, we might come to the following three “definitions”.
1. The First Logos is the ever unmanifest Logos, Divine Will.
2. The Second Logos is the manifested Logos, Divine Wisdom.
3. The Third Logos is described by HPB as the “light of the Logos”, Divine Activity.
I will summarize here, the model presented in The Secret Doctrine, suppleted with the terminology from The Ancient Wisdom and other correspondences found, leaving out the differences which are based on problems of interpretation, as we have been able to show, I hope convincingly, in these posts on the Three Logoi.
1. First Logos, the One, the Ever Unmanifest, represented by Mūlaprakṛti, the Plotinic and Orphic Hen, Hyparxis, Universal Good, the Christian Father-aspect, Divine Will.
2. Second Logos, the manifested Logos, the Logos proper, the Verbum, the Plotinic Nous, the Demiurge, HPB’s Anima Mundi, Universal Soul, Creative Intelligence, Mahat, Universal Mind, Universal Intelligence, Divine Mind, Divine Wisdom, the Son-aspect, the Christ, Brahmā, Īśvara, Avalokiteśvara (manifested).
3. Third Logos, the Light of the Logos, Fohat, Daiviprakṛti, the Plotinic Psuchē, the Nous of Anaxagoras, Divine Activity, the Holy Ghost.
What comes closest to a definition of the logoi in The Secret Doctrine, is a quote from the 1885 lecture of T. Subba Row, published under the title Notes on the Bhagavad Gita. In SD I, 429 we find:
Metaphysicians explain the root and germ of the latter, according to Mr. Subba Row, as the first manifestation of Parabrahmam, “the highest trinity that we are capable of understanding,” which is Mulaprakriti (the veil), the Logos, and the conscious energy “of the latter,” or its power and light*; or — “matter, force and the Ego, or the one root of self, of which every other kind of self is but a manifestation or a reflection.”
So we have as the triad, according to Subba Row (Notes…, TUP 2nd ed., p. 22):
1. Mulaprakriti,
2. Eswara or Logos,
3. conscious energy of the Logos, which is its power and light.
Subba Row describes Mūlaprakṛti as a “veil over parabrahman”. He identifies the third aspect with the concept of Daiviprakṛti as used in the Bhagavad Gīta, and notes that it “is called fohat in several Buddhist books”.
HPB and Subba Row’s interpretation seems to correspond to Plotinus, who is considered the main representative of the Neo-Platonic system. In this model the Nous is the second hypostasis:
1. To Hen (The One)
2. Ho Nous (Intellect, Spirit, Universal Mind)
3. Hē Psuchē (The World Soul)
Mead in his work on Plotinus (p. 26 and 28) also describes the Nous as the second principle. Proclus, in his Metaphysical Elements, follows Plotinus in this respect: Proposition XX: The essence of soul [Hē Psuchē] is beyond all bodies [To Sōma], the intellectual nature [Ho Nous] is beyond all souls, and The One [To Hen] is beyond, all intellectual hypostases.
In the Christian tradition, for example in Augustinus’ De Trinitate, we find the same triad:
1. Father, cp. To Hen
2. Son, the Christ, the Word, the Logos, cp. Ho Nous
3. Holy Ghost, cp. the Anima Mundi, World Soul, Hē Psuchē
Contrary to Plotinus however, who identified the Nous with the Demiurge, in the Christian tradition the Father-aspect is identified with the Creator God, as formulated in the first line of the Nicene Creed of 325 (tr. Philip Schaff):
We believe in one God, the Father Almighty, Maker of all things visible and invisible.
3. The three logoi in The Ancient Wisdom
The introduction to Besant’s The Ancient Wisdom we find a clue as to the origin of the Besant-Leadbeater interpretation. On page 28, reference is made to Orpheus, a study by G.R.S. Mead of 1896 on the theogony of the Orphic religion. In Orpheus the creation of the universe begins with The One. The One Existence is called thrice unknown darkness in the Orphic system. From the darkness comes the primordial triad, with its three hypostases:
1. Universal Good (super-essential),
2. World Soul (self-motive essence),
3. Intellect (Mind).
These three hypostases “appear”, in AW p. 34-35, as the Christian Trinity where the First Logos is the Father, the “fount of all life”, the Second Logos the Son, and the Third Logos the Holy Ghost, the “creative Mind”. The creative Mind, the “noetic” aspect, is presented here as the third aspect.
From Orpheus (p. 93) we learn that the essential characteristics of the Orphic triads are defined by Plato as
In Plato’s dialogue Philebus, these characteristics are summed up by Socrates in a different order: 1. infinite (apeiron), 2. finite (peras) and 3. mixed (meikton). In SD I, 426, HPB states that Porphyry shows that the Monad and the Duad of Pythagoras are identical with Plato’s infinite and finite in “Philebus” — or what Plato calls the ἄπειρον and πέρας, confirming this order. The noetic, μεικτόν, is again in third position.
Mead in his turn in Orpheus refers to Neo-Platonist authors Proclus and Damascius. Damascius’ Difficulties and Solutions of First Principles seems to be Mead’s main source concerning the Orphic metaphysical system. Moreover, HPB has also read this work, and refers to it as “πρώτων ἀρχῶν“. In the First Principles, for example in the French translation of Edouard Chaignet of 1898, we find in § 55 that the third principle, which is the Nous, “is called mixed by Plato” and by “Philolaus and the pythagoreans”. The Three Universal Principles, the proenōma, are called
1. Father, Patēr
2. Power, Dunamis
3. Reason, Nous
We can see that Damascius’ interpretation of the Primordial Triad goes back to Plato’s Philebus. Even earlier, Anaxagoras (and later Aristotle) used the term Nous to denote purely the creative principle in the universe. As such, it could of course also be associated with the third principle.
H.P. Blavatsky (HPB), in The Secret Doctrine uses the term Logos throughout the text (with capital “L”, and without prior ordinal), usually indicating the so called Second Logos. In The Secret Doctrine each of the three logoi is attributed consistently to one of the three aspects, the hypostases, of what may be called the first cosmological triad of our system. Studying the three logoi in The Secret Doctrine can easily lead to confusion, not only because the subject matter itself is prone to confusion, but also because HPB’s style of writing can at times be very confusing.
In the oevres of Annie Besant and Charles Leadbeater on the other hand, the three logoi are more clearly defined, but unfortunately they do not in every respect correspond to the logoi in The Secret Doctrine. In many later theosophical works, and also in many other modern works in the area of spirituality, the three logoi are often introduced without any attempt to definition, while implicitly referring to the relevant works of Besant and Leadbeater.
We could ask ourselves what is the origin of the Besant-Leadbeater interpretation, and how does it correspond to HPB’s version of the logoi? Can we explain the differences? Could we perhaps formulate new air-tight definitions for the three logoi?
1. Some Examples of Differences
There are some clear differences in interpretation, which we could discuss here, illustrated with examples from both Besant’s The Ancient Wisdom (AW) and HPB’s The Secret Doctrine (SD), before trying to go deeper into the foundations of the models.
Example 1: Mahat
In SD II, 468 we have:
[…] it is the Logos Demiurge (the second logos), or the first emanation from the mind (Mahat), […]
Instead, in AW, p.112, we find:
[…] the Great Mind in the Kosmos. (Mahat, the Third LOGOS, or Divine Creative Intelligence, the Brahmâ of the Hindus, the Mandjusri of the Northern Buddhists, the Holy Spirit of the Christians.)
HPB in the SD associates Mahat with the Second Logos, Divine Wisdom, the Brahmā of the Hindus, the Son-aspect of the Christians, instead of the Third.
Example 2: Mahat, the Demiurge and Avalokiteśvara
In SD I, 572 we have:
[…] universal Buddhi (the Maha-buddhi or Mahat in Hindu philosophies) the spiritual, omniscient and omnipotent root of divine intelligence, the highest anima mundi or the Logos.
The “Logos” here is the manifested or Second Logos. HPB in the SD identifies the Universal Mind (Mahat) with the Second Logos.
Further in SD I, 110 we have:
Simultaneously with the evolution of the Universal Mind, the concealed Wisdom of Adi-Buddha — the One Supreme and eternal — manifests itself as Avalokiteshwara (or manifested Iswara), which is the Osiris of the Egyptians, the Ahura-Mazda of the Zoroastrians, the Heavenly Man of the Hermetic philosopher, the Logos of the Platonists, and the Atman of the Vedantins.* By the action of the manifested Wisdom, or Mahat, represented by these innumerable centres of spiritual Energy in the Kosmos, the reflection of the Universal Mind, which is Cosmic Ideation and the intellectual Force accompanying such ideation, becomes objectively the Fohat of the Buddhist esoteric philosopher.
The Logos of the (Neo-) Platonists is the Plotinic Second Logos. It is the Demiurge and Avalokiteśvara, and corresponds to Mahat. In SD I, 72n we have, to be sure that HPB does not mean the Third Logos:
But there are two Avalokiteshwaras in Esotericism; the first and the second Logos.
Instead, in AW p. 42 we find:
Then the Third LOGOS, the Universal Mind, […]
Note that in the quotation from SD I, 110, the Anima Mundi (Second Logos), is not equivalent to the Anima Mundi, the World Soul, of the Neo-Platonists, which is the third aspect. This is, of course, to make things easier for us…
Example 3: Brahmā
In SD I, 381n we have:
In Indian Puranas it is Vishnu, the first, and Brahma, the second logos, or the ideal and practical creators, […]
HPB in the SD identifies Brahmā with the Second Logos.
Instead, in AW p. 14-15 we find:
The LOGOS in His triple manifestation is : [..]the Third, Manjusri – “the representative of creative wisdom, corresponding to Brahmâ.”
We could now take a closer look at the “definitions” of the three logoi in both these works, in the next post.
