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Preface
5 Planes of Existence
Introduction
Five Planes of Manifestation
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TORTOISE
A symbol of the higher and the lower planes
centralised by the mental plane, and energised by the Divine Life.
"This tortoise is that life-sap (blood) of these worlds, which
flowed away from them when plunged into the waters : that life-sap
he (Pragâpati) now bestows on Agni. As far as the life-sap extends,
so far the body extends; that tortoise thus is these worlds.
"That lower shell of it is this terrestrial world; it is, as it
were, fixed; for fixed, as it were, is this earth-world. And that
upper shell of it is yonder sky; it has its ends, as it were, bent
down; for yonder sky has its ends, as it were, bent down. And what
is between the shells is the air. That tortoise thus is these
worlds; it is these worlds he thus lays down to form part of the
altar." - Sata. Bráh., VIL 5, 1, 1-2.
"Ra liveth, the Tortoise dieth " (On Sarcophagus of Seti I).-BUDGE,
Egypt. Heaven and Hell, Vol. II. p. 52.
The Divine Life (blood) of the planes of the manifest was indrawn
when at the close of the involutionary cycle, the planes disappeared
into the eternal Reality (waters) during an interval of pralaya,
prior to the next outpouring. That Divine Life of the Archetypal Man
(Pragâpati), at the opening of the new cycle, passed into the force
aspect of the Self (Agni) in this evolutionary cycle, and permeated
the whole renewed universe.
The lower quaternary (lower shell) is the lower nature of the soul,
and it is, as it were, fixed to be the foundation on which to build
the higher nature (sky). The higher nature, atma-buddhi (upper
shell), influences the lower through the mind (air). It bends down
to the lower whenever the lower aspires towards truth and goodness.
The planes of manifestation are the means in part by which the soul
is enabled to sacrifice the lower for the higher, and through
spiritual idealism rise triumphant at the cycle's end.
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