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Preface
5 Planes of Existence
Introduction
Five Planes of Manifestation
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HEEL
A symbol of the lower nature of the human
soul.
"And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy
seed and her seed: it shall bruise thy head, and thou (serpent)
shalt bruise his heel." - GENESIS. iii. 15.
And ethical distinction shall be drawn between the sense nature with
its appetites and delights, and the higher emotion-nature; and
through this distinction shall the struggle within the soul proceed.
From this conflict between higher and lower, the result shall be
that the lower mental (head) directivity of desire, or lower will,
shall be crushed out by the Divine nature (Christ within) grown up
in the soul, and this will lead to the dissipation of the lower part
of the soul (heel).
"To this serpent, this spirit of evil in the world, God is speaking.
What does God say? There shall be a long, terrible fight between man
and the power of evil. The power of evil shall haunt and persecute
man, cripple him and vex him, hinder him and make him suffer. It
shall bruise his heel. But man shall ultimately be stronger than the
power of evil, and shall overcome it and go forth victorious, though
bruised and hurt, and needing recovery and rest. He shall bruise its
head. . . . Is it not true that everywhere the good is hampered and
beset and wounded by the evil which it is ultimately to slay; true
also that the good will ultimately slay the evil by which it was
wounded and beset ? These two facts, in their combination, make a
philosophy of life which, when one has accepted it, colours each
thought he thinks, each act he does. The two facts subtly blend
their influence in every experience.' - PHILLIP BROOKS, Serm., The
Giant, etc.
“As heels are the lowest part of the body, Christ's heel bruised by
Satan is his humbled manhood, and his people who are subject to him.
To have heels bare, denotes shame, contempt, captivity or distress
(JER. Xiii. 22). To lift up the heels or kick is to render evil for
good to a superior, as a beast when it strikes its master; so Judas
acted in betraying our Lord." - GURNEY, Bible Dict., p. 256.
"A day arrives when man becomes aware of a dual nature within him, a
divine and an earthly, one in which he shares with the gods, and one
which is his in common with the brutes. But he pays a heavy price
for his self-knowledge. Henceforth he is at war with himself, the
God and the serpent within him fighting for mastery. On the whole,
victory rests with the former, and in the end will do so completely,
but it will not be a scathless triumph; the God will crush the
serpent's head, but the latter will wound the heel that tramples it.
. . . The whole upward progress of humanity towards the stature of
the superman has been a continuous bruising of the serpent's head:
but in the process we have had to suffer; the heel that tramples
down the evil has to feel the serpent's fangs." - R. J. CAMPBELL,
Serm., Trampling the Serpent.
"Achilles is not quite invulnerable; the sacred waters did not wash
the heel by which Thetis held him. Siegfried, in the Nibelungen, is
not quite immortal, for a leaf fell on his back whilst he was
bathing in the dragon's blood, and that spot which it covered is
mortal." - EMERSON, Compensation.
"Thetis endeavoured to make Achilles immortal by dipping him in the
river Styx, and succeeded with the exception of the ankles (or heel)
by which she held him." - Smith's Class. Dict.
“Achilles" is a symbol of the personality brought forth by nature
(Thetis). The "river Styx" signifies the life of the soul on earth,
through which the personality is developed and purified. But though
the personality is purified ultimately, it misses immortality by
reason of its lower nature (heel) which is mortal. When the lower
nature vanishes, the personality vanishes with it. Nevertheless,
within the personality there evolves the lower Self, which, when the
lower nature is cast off, rises immortal to the higher planes and
becomes one with the Higher Self. It is this which is signified by
Achilles " being said to be immortal all but his lowest part (heel).
'By 'heel' is signified the lowest natural principle, as the
corporeal, which the serpent' should bruise." - SWEDEN - BORG, Arc.
Cel. to Genesis. iii. 15.
'Krishna finally died of an wound which he sustained accidentally
and in an unforeseen manner on his heel,- the only vulnerable part
of his body (cf. Achilles, Balder, Adonis, and Osiris)." - A. DREWS,
The Christ Myth, p. 107.
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