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KAMALOKA -- Theosophy offers:
From: Dallas Ten Broeck
Date: Fri, 27 Apr 2001
Since there have been a number of inquiries concerning Devachan and Kamaloka here are some quotations on the subject which might be of use to students.
Best wishes, DTB
---
KAMALOKA KAMA - DESIRE AND PASSIONS
Kama (Sk.). Evil desire, lust, volition; the cleaving to existence [tanha]. Kama is generally identified with Mara the tempter." (See SD II 578-9) GLOS 170
"...the brute in us is made of the passions and the astral body. The development of the germs of Mind made man because it constituted the great differentiation. The God within begins with Manas or Mind, and it is the struggle between this God and the brute below which Theosophy speaks of and warns about. The lower principle is called "bad" because by comparison with the higher it is so, but still, it is the basis for action. We cannot rise unless self first asserts itself in the desire to do better. In this aspect it is called rajas or the active and "bad" quality, as distinguished from tamas, or the quality of darkness and indifference...rajas [gives] the impulse, and by the use of this principle of passion all the higher qualities are brought to at last so refine and elevate our desires that they may be continually placed upon truth and spirit...Theosophy does not teach that the passions are to be pandered to or satiated, for a more pernicious doctrine was never taught, but the injunction is to make use of the activity given by the 4th principle so as to rise and not to fall under the dominion of the dark quality that ends with annihilation, after having begun is selfishness and indifference..." OCEAN 49-50
KAMARUPA
Kamarupa (Sk.). Metaphysically...in esoteric philosophy, it is the subjective form created through the mental and physical desires and thoughts in connection with things of matter, by all sentient beings, a form which survives the death of their bodies. After death 3 of the 7 "principles"--or let us say planes of senses and consciousness on which the human instincts and ideation act in turn--viz., the body, its astral prototype and physical vitality,--being of no further use, remain on earth; the 3 higher principles, grouped into one, merge into the state of Devachan, in which state the Higher Ego [Higher Manas] will remain until the hour for a new incarnation arrives; and the eidolon of the ex-Personality is left alone in its new abode. Here the pale copy of the man that was, vegetates for a period of time, the duration of which is variable and according to the element of materiality which is left in it, and which is determined by the past life of the defunct. Bereft as it is of its higher mind, spirit and physical senses, if left alone to its own senseless devices, it will gradually fade out and disintegrate. But, if forcibly drawn back into the terrestrial sphere whether by the passionate desires and appeals of the surviving friends or by regular necromantic practices--one of the most pernicious of which is mediumship--the "spook" may prevail for a period greatly exceeding the span of the natural life of its body. One the Kamarupa has learnt the way back to living human bodies, it becomes a vampire, feeding on the vitality of those who are so anxious for its company..." GLOS 172 (see KEY p. 143-4, ML 108-9 112 118 198) A to Q 65 240)(see SD I 334 260 337fn VOICE 12fn)
"...the word Kama...means "desire,"...the 4th principle was the "body or mass of desires and passions." [GITA NOTES, p. 197: -- "Western psychology in classifications refers solely to mental states...[Eastern} and the ancient sages classifies the moral states, treating the mental states as mere effects produced by moral conditions...It lays bare unsuspected bases of error; it discloses the most subtle forms of self-delusion; it marks out the true course so painstakingly that the dullest mind cannot fail to grasp a clear perception of the path to true knowledge."] ...The west divides man into intellect, will and feeling, but it is not understood whether the passions and desires constitute a principle in themselves or are due entirely to the body..."desires of the flesh"..."fleshly appetites." OCEAN 45
"The passions and desires are not produced by the body...on the contrary, the body is caused by the former. it is desire and passion which caused us to be born, and will bring us to birth again and again in some body on this earth...[it] is the balance principle of the whole 7. It stands in the middle, and from it the ways go up or down. It is the basis of action, and the mover of the will..."Behind will stands desire." OCEAN 46
"The astral man in kama loca is a mere shell devoid of soul [Higher Mind] and mind [Kama Manas], without conscience and also unable to act unless vivified by forces outside of itself. It has that which seems like an animal or automatic consciousness due wholly to the very recent association with the human Ego...every atom...has a memory of its own which is capable of lasting a length of time in proportion to the force given it. In the case of a very material and gross or selfish person the force lasts longer than in any other, and hence in that case the automatic consciousness will be more definite and bewildering to one who without knowledge dabbles with necromancy. Its purely astral portion contains and carries the record of all that ever passed before the person when living, for one of the qualities of the astral substance is to absorb all scenes and pictures and the impressions of all thoughts, to keep them, and to throw them forth by reflection when the conditions permit. This astral shell, cast off by every man at death, would be a menace to all men were it not in every case, except one...devoid of all the higher guiding principles which are the directors. But those guiding principles being disjoined from the shell, it wavers and floats about from place to place without any will of its own, but governed wholly by attractions in the astral and magnetic fields...Soulless and conscienceless, these in no sense are the spirits of our deceased ones. They are the clothing thrown off by the inner man, the brutal earthly portion discarded in the flight to devachan, and so have always been considered by the ancients as devils...because essentially astral earthy and passional...[they] retain an automatic memory and consciousness [after being for so long the vehicle of the real man on earth]..." OCEAN 103-104
[Low desires] the constant placing of the consciousness entirely below in the body or astral body... [High desires] the influence of and aspiration to the trinity above, of Mind, Buddhi and Spirit... [During life] the emplacement of the desires and passions is...throughout the entire lower man...it may be added to or diminished, made weak or increased in strength, debased or purified. [After death] it (Kama) informs the astral body, which then becomes a mere shell; for when a man dies his astral body and principle of passion and desire leave the physical in company and coalesce, It is then that the term Kamarupa may be applied, as Kamarupa is really made of astral body and Kama in conjunction, and this joining of the two makes a shape or form which though ordinarily invisible is material and may be brought into visibility. Although it is empty of mind and conscience, it has powers of its own that can be exercised whenever the conditions permit. These conditions are furnished by the medium of the spiritualists, and in every seance room the astral shells of deceased persons are always present to delude the sitters... For the astral spook--or Kamarupa--is but the mass of the desires and passions abandoned by the real person who has fled to "heaven and has no concern with the people left behind, least of all with seances and mediums. Hence, being devoid of the nobler soul, these desires and passions work only on the very lowest part of the medium's nature and stir up no good elements, but always the lower leanings of the being... The Kamarupa spook is the enemy of our civilization, which permits us to execute men for crimes committed and thus throws out into the ether the mass of passion and desire free from the weight of the body and liable at any moment to be attracted to any sensitive person. Being thus attracted, the deplorable images of crimes committed and also the picture of the execution and all the accompanying curses and wishes for revenge are implanted in living persons, who, not seeing the evil, are unable to throw it off. Thus crimes and new ideas of crimes are willfully propagated every day by those countries where capital punishment prevails." OCEAN 47-48
"The astral shells together with the still living astral body of the medium, helped by...forces of nature ... [called] "elementals" produce nearly all the phenomena of non-fraudulent spiritualism...[examples given]...in all this using and being used by the shells of suicides, executed murderers, and all such spooks as are naturally near to this plane of life...the astral shells of suicides and executed criminals are the most coherent, longest lived, and nearest to us of all the shades of Hades, and hence must, out of the necessity of the case, be the real "controls" of the seance room." OCEAN 48-49
KAMA LOKA
Kamaloka (Sk.). The semi-material plane, to us subjective and invisible, where the disembodied "personalities," the astral forms, called kamarupa remain, until they fade out from it by the complete exhaustion of the effects of the mental impulses that created these eidolons of human and animal passions and desires...It is the Hades of the ancient Greeks and Amenti of the Egyptians, the land of Silent Shadows; a division of the first group of the Trailokya. (see Kamadhatu T. Glossary. 171) GLOS 171-2 (See ML 108-9 112 198 187- a few hours to a few years - LUCIFER III 174 - muddy torrents of K L - Trailokya (Sk.). The 3 regions or worlds...of post mortem states....Kamaloka or Kamadhatu, the region of Mara, is...the world of astral light, and the "world of shells." [it] has 7 divisions, the lowest of which begins on earth or invisibly in its atmosphere...the highest being the abode of those who have died owing to accident, or suicide in a fit of temporary insanity, or were otherwise victims of external forces. It is a place where all those who have died before the end of the term allotted to them, and whose higher principles do not, therefore, go at once into Devachanic state--sleep a dreamless sleep of oblivion, at the termination of which they are either reborn immediately, or pass gradually into the Devachanic state. Rupadhatu [2nd state of Trailokya] is the celestial world of form, or what we call Devachan...the Esoteric Philosophy teaches that though for the Egos for the time being, everything or every one preserves its form (as in a dream), yet as Rupadhatu is a purely mental region, and a state, the Egos themselves have no form outside of their own consciousness. Esotericism divides this "region" into 7 Dhyanas, "regions," or states of contemplation, which are not localities, but mental representations of these. Arupadhatu [3rd state]...is again divided into 7 Dhyanas, still more abstract and formless, for this "World" is without any form or desire whatever. It is the highest region...the abode of those who are almost ready for Nirvana..." T. GLOS. 236-7
Kama loka--or the place of desire--is the astral region penetrating and surrounding the earth. As a place it is and on and about the earth. Its extent is to a measurable distance from the earth, but the ordinary laws obtaining here do not obtain there, and entities therein are not under the same conditions as to space and time as we are. As a state it is metaphysical...[relating] to the astral plane...in it the ruling force is desire devoid of and divorced from intelligence. It is an astral sphere intermediate between earthly and heavenly life...the origin of purgatory....the soul may be detained in kamaloca by the enormous force of some unsatisfied desire, and cannot get rid of the astral and kamic clothing until that desire is satisfied by someone on earth or by the soul itself. But if the person was pure minded and of high aspirations, the separation of the principles on that plane is soon completed, permitting the higher triad to go into devachan. Being the purely astral sphere, it partakes of the nature of astral matter which is essentially earthly and devilish, and in it all the forces work undirected by soul or conscience. It is the slag-pit...of the great furnace of life, where nature provides for the sloughing off of elements which have no place in devachan...it must have many degrees...lokas or places in a metaphysical sense....in kama loca all the hidden desires and passions are let loose in consequence of the absence of the body, and for that reason the state is more diversified than the life plane." OCEAN 100-1
"...in kama-loca this mass of desire and thoughts exists very definitely until the conclusion of its disintegration, and then the remainder consists of the essence of those skandhas, connected...with the being that evolved and had them...they are said to remain until the being comes out of devachan, and then at once by the law of attraction they are drawn to the being, who from them as a germ or basis builds up a new set of skandhas for the new life." OCEAN 103
"A rough classification of these shells that visit mediums
would be as follows:
1. Those of the recently deceased, whose place of burial is not far
away [ Protestant Christian Churches are often located in or near a
burial field or persons buried in the Church itself ] This class will
be quite coherent in accordance with the life and thought of the former
owner. An unmaterial, good, and spiritualized person leaves a shell
that will soon disintegrate. A gross, mean, selfish, material person's
shell will be heavy, consistent, and long lived...
2. Those of persons who died far away from the place where the medium
is. Lapse of time permits such to escape from the vicinity of their old
bodies, and at the same time brings on a greater degree of
disintegration which corresponds on the astral plane to putrefaction of
the physical. These are vague, shadowy, incoherent; respond but briefly
to the psychic stimulus, and are whirled off by any magnetic current.
They are galvanized for a moment by the astral currents of the medium
and of those persons present who were related to the deceased.
3. Purely shadowy remains which can hardly be given a place...the mere
mold or impress left in the astral substance by the once coherent shell
long since disintegrated...[almost] fictitious...such shadowy
photographs ...are enlarged, decorated, and given an imaginary life by
the thoughts, desires, hopes and imaginings of medium and sitters at
the seance.
4. ( see description of "Elementaries" under that heading in this paper
) "...suicides and those who are suddenly shot out of life by accident
or murder, legal or illegal, pass a term almost equal to the length
life would have been but for the sudden termination. These are not
really dead. To bring on a normal death, a factor not recognized by
medical science must be present. That is, the principles of the
being...have their own term of cohesion, at the natural end of which
they separate from each other under their own laws...before that
natural end the principles are unable to separate...the normal
destruction of the cohesive force cannot be brought about by mechanical
processes except in respect to the physical body. Hence a suicide, or
person killed in an accident or murdered by man or by order of human
law, has not come to the natural termination of the cohesion among the
other constituents, and is hurled into the kamaloca state only partly
dead. There the remaining principles have to wait until the actual
natural life term is reached, whether it be one month or sixty years."
OCEAN p. 105-108
[End of kama loka]
After a certain time in kama loca the being falls into a state of unconsciousness which precedes the change into the next state. It is like the birth into life, preluded by a term of darkness and heavy sleep. It then wakes to the joys of devachan." OCEAN p. 108
SKANDHAS - THE VEHICLES OF KARMA
[kama]...the 4th principle in the classification of man's constitution...they are not merely inherent in the individual nor are they due to the body per se. While man is living in the world the desires and passions--kama--have no separate life apart from the astral and inner man, being...diffused throughout his being. But...they coalesce with the astral body after death and thus form an entity with its own term of life, though without soul...During mortal life the desires and passions are guided by the mind and soul [Higher Manas]; after death they work without guidance from the former master; while we live we are responsible for them and their effects, and when we have left this life we are still responsible, although they go on working and making effects on others while they last as the sort of entity...without our direct guidance. In this is seen the continuance of responsibility. They are a portion of the skandhas...which are the aggregates that make up man. The body includes on set of the skandhas, the astral man another, the kama principle is another set, and still others pertain to other parts. In kama are the really active and important ones which control rebirths and lead to all the varieties of life and circumstances upon each rebirth, They are being made from day to day under the great law that every thought combines instantly with one of the elemental forces of nature, becoming to that extent an entity which will endure in accordance with the strength of the thought as it leaves the brain, and all of these are inseparably connected with the being [man] who evolved them...all we can do is to have thoughts of good quality...the Masters are not exempt from this law, but they "people their current in space" with thoughts powerful for good alone." OCEAN 101-102
ELEMENTARIES - SOULLESS ENTITIES
Elementary/ies Disembodied souls of the depraved; these souls having at some time prior to death separated from themselves their divine spirits, and so lost their chance for immortality...these souls remain in their Kama-rupic envelopes, and are irresistibly drawn to the earth amid elements congenial to their gross natures. Their stay in the Kamaloka varies as to its duration; but ends invariably in disintegration, dissolving like a column of mist, atom by atom, in the surrounding elements." GLOS 112
"In certain cases [seances, mediumship, etc...] to be noted there is an intelligence at work that is wholly and intensely bad, to which every medium is subject, and which will explain why so many of them have succumbed to evil, as they have confessed...Definite, coherent entities, human souls bereft of the spiritual tie, now tending down to the worst state of all, avitchi, where annihilation of the personality is the end.
BLACK MAGICIANS
They are known as black magicians. Having centered the consciousness in the principle kama, preserved intellect, divorced themselves from spirit, they are the only damned beings we know. In life they had human bodies and reached their awful state by persistent lives of evil for its own sake; some of such are already doomed to become what I have described are among us on earth to-day. These are not ordinary shells, for they have centered their force in kama, thrown out every spark of good thought or aspiration, and have a complete mastery of the astral sphere...[they are classified as shells] because they are such in the sense that they are doomed to disintegration consciously as the others are to the same end mechanically only. They may and do last for centuries, gratifying their lusts through any sensitive they can lay hold of where bad thought gives then an opening. They preside at nearly all seances, assuming high names and taking the direction so as to keep the control and continue the delusion of the medium, thus enabling themselves to have a convenient channel for their own evil purposes. Indeed, with the shells of suicides, of those poor wretches who die at the hand of the law, of drunkards and gluttons, these black magicians living in the astral world hold the field of physical mediumship and are liable to invade the sphere of any medium no matter how good. The door once open, it is open to all. This class of shell has lost higher manas, but in the struggle not only after death but as well in life the lower portion of manas which should have been raised up to godlike excellence was torn away from its lord and now gives this entity intelligence which is devoid of spirit but has power to suffer as it will when its final day shall come." OCEAN p. 105-107
ELEMENTALS - NATURE SPRITES AND FORCES
Elemental/s Spirits of the Elements. The creatures evolved in the 4 Kingdoms or Elements--earth, air, fire, and water. They are called by the Kabalists, Gnomes (of the earth), Sylphs (of the air), Salamanders (of the fire), and Undines (of the water). Except a few of the higher kind and their rulers they are rather forces of nature than ethereal men and women...as the servile agents of the Occultists, may produce various effects; but if employed by the "Elmentaries" --in which case they enslave the mediums--they will deceive the credulous. All the lower beings generated on the 5th, 6th and 7th planes of our terrestrial atmosphere, are called Elementals..." GLOS 111-112
"Existing in the sphere of kama loka, as...also in all parts of the globe and the solar system, are the elementals or nature forces. They are innumerable, and their divisions are almost infinite...they are...the nerves of nature. Each class has its own work just as has every natural element or thing...the elementals act under law, but being higher in the scale than gross fire or water their action seems guided by mind. Some of them have a special relation to mental operations and to mental operations and to the action of the astral organs, whether these be joined to a body or not. When a medium forms the channel, and also from other natural coordinations, these elementals make an artificial connection with the shell of a deceased person, aided by the nervous fluid of the medium and others near, and then the shell is galvanized into an artificial life. Through the medium connection is made with the physical and psychical forces of all present. The old impressions of the astral body given up their images to the mind of the medium, the old passions are set on fire. Various messages and reports are then obtained from it, but not one of them is original, not one is from the spirit. By their strangeness...this is mistaken for the work of the spirit, but it is all from the living when it is not the mere picking out from the astral light of the images of what has been in the past." OCEAN p. 104-5
CHANNELING - MEDIUMSHIP - SEANCES - PSYCHIC PHENOMENA
"...psychical phenomena...related to spiritualism...has been well known in India where it is properly designated "bhuta worship," meaning the attempt to communicate with the devil or Astral remnants of deceased persons...by it the gross and devilish, or earthly, parts of men are excited, appealed to, and communicated with." OCEAN 146
"Do mediums communicate with the spirits of the dead ? Do our departed friends perceive the state of life they have left, and do they sometimes return to speak to and with us? ....Our departed do not see us here. They are relieved from the terrible pang such a sight would inflict. Once in a while a pure-minded, unpaid medium may ascend in trance to the state in which a deceased soul is, and may remember some bits of what was there heard; but this is rare. Now and then in the course of decades some high human spirit may for a moment return and by unmistakable means communicate with mortals. At the moment of death the soul may speak to some friend on earth before the door is finally shut. But the mass of communications alleged as made day after day through mediums are from the astral unintelligent remains of men, or in many cases entirely the production of, invention, compilation, discovery and collocation by the loosely attached Astral body of the living medium." OCEAN 147
"Materialization of a form out of the air...is a fact...one way to produce this...is by the accretion of electrical and magnetic particles into one mass upon which matter is aggregated and an image reflected out of the astral sphere...the second method is by the use of the astral body of the living medium...[it] exudes from the side of the medium, gradually collects upon itself particles extracted from the air and the bodies of the sitters present until at last it becomes visible...in almost every instance dimness of light is requisite because a high light would disturb the astral substance in a violent manner and render the projection difficult. Some so-called materializations are hollow mockeries, as they are but flat plates of electrical and magnetic substance on which pictures from the astral light are reflected. These seem to be the faces of the dead, but they are simply pictured illusions." OCEAN 149
ASTRAL LIGHT - ASTRAL BODY - MEDIUMSHIP - SEANCES
"...the intermediary between mind and body--the astral body--is thrown off at death and left in the astral light to fade away; and...the real man goes to Devachan. The existence, nature, power and function of the astral light and its place as a register in Nature. That it contains, retains, and reflects pictures of each and every thing that happened to anyone, and also every thought; that it permeates the globe and the atmosphere around it; that the transmission of vibration through it is practically instantaneous, since the rate is much quicker than that of electricity as now known. The existence in the astral light of beings not using bodies like ours, but not human in their nature, having powers, faculties, and a sort of consciousness of their own; these include the elemental forces or nature sprites divided into many degrees, and which have to do with every operation of Nature and every motion of the mind of man. That these elementals act at seances automatically in their various departments, one class presenting pictures, another producing sounds, and others depolarizing objects for the purposes of apportation. Acting with them in the astral sphere are the soulless men who live in it. To these are ascribed the phenomenon, among others, of the "independent voice," always sounding like a voice in a barrel just because it is made in a vacuum which is absolutely necessary for an entity so far removed from spirit... The astral body of the medium...extended from the physical body, may also extrude at times any portion of itself such as hand, arm, or leg and thereby move objects, indite letters, produce touches on the body, and so on...and the astral body of any person may be made to feel sensation...transmitted to the brain, causes the person to think he is touched on the outside or has heard a sound. Mediumship is dangerous because the astral part of the man is now only normal in action when joined to the body...to become a medium means that you have to become disorganized physiologically and in the nervous system, because through the latter is the connection between the two worlds. The moment the door is opened all the unknown forces rush in, and, as the grosser part of nature is nearest to us it is that part which affects us most; the lower nature is also first affected and inflamed because the forces used are from that part of us. We are then at the mercy of the vile thoughts or all men, and subject to the influence of the shells in Kama Loka... To attempt to acquire the use of the psychic powers for mere curiosity or for selfish ends is also dangerous for the same reasons as in the case of mediumship. As the...present day is selfish to the last degree and built on the personal element, the rules for these powers in the right way have not been given out, but the Masters of Wisdom have said that philosophy and ethics must first be learned and practiced before any development of the other department [psychism] is indulged in... Equally improper is the manner of the scientific schools which...indulge in experiments in hypnotism in which the subjects are injured for life... For this reason, those who know all about the psychical world, its denizens and laws, are proceeding with a reform in morals and philosophy before any great attention will be accorded to the strange and seductive phenomena possible for the inner powers of man." OCEAN 150 - 152
[In chapter 16 of The Ocean of Theosophy, Mr. Judge gives explanations for the various types of psychic phenomena, e.g.: clairvoyance, Clairaudience, thought-transference, prophecy, dream and vision, levitation, apparitional appearances. In chapter 17 he gives facts that relate to Psychic Phenomena and Spiritualism.]
[In The Key to Theosophy Mme. Blavatsky gives the same general facts relating to Kama-loca and to Devachan, and traces the progress of the principles of man after the death of the body. Skandhas are considered by her as the "carriers" of man's karma. KEY pp. 143 - 226]
Subject: DEVACHAN --- THEOSOPHY OFFERS
DETAILS
From: Dallas Ten Broeck
Date: Fri, 27 Apr 2001 17:55
Dear Friends: Some questions concerning Devachan (and Kamaloka) have recently been asked. Here are some quotations from Original theosophical sources that may prove to be helpful in reviewing the subject.
Best wishes, DTB
DEVACHAN
Reason for Devachanic Experience
What is Conscious in Devachan ? "As to the personal Soul--by which we mean the spark of consciousness that preserves in the Spiritual Ego the idea of the personal "I" of the last incarnation--this lasts, as a separate distinct recollection, only throughout the Devachanic period; after which time it is added to the innumerable incarnations of the Ego...(108) Immortality is but one's unbroken consciousness; and the personal consciousness can hardly last longer than the personality itself...and such consciousness...survives only throughout Devachan, after which it is reabsorbed, first, in the individual, and then in the universal consciousness." KEY TO THEOSOPHY, p. 107-8
["Manas...the Ego"] ..."It has not forgotten them [deeds in past lives] ...it knows and remembers its misdeeds as well as you remember what you have done yesterday." KEY 136
Death Vision - A Review
"At the solemn moment of death every man, even when death is sudden, sees the whole of his past life marshaled before him, in its minutest details. For one short instant the personal becomes one with the individual and the all-knowing Ego. But that instant is enough to show him the whole chain of causes which have been at work during his life. He sees and now understands himself as he is, unadorned by flattery or self-deception. He reads his life, remaining as a spectator looking down into the arena he is quitting; he feels and knows the justice of all the suffering that has overtaken him." KEY 162
"Life in Devachan is the function of the aspirations of earth life; not the indefinite prolongation of that "single instant," but its infinite developments, the various incidents and events based upon and outflowing from that one "single moment" or moments." KEY, 162
"The last series of powerful and deeply imprinted thoughts are those which give color and trend to the whole life in devachan. The last moment will color each subsequent moment. On those the soul and mind fix themselves and weave of them a whole set of events and experiences. expanding them to their highest limit, carrying out all that was not possible in life." OCEAN, p. 113
"Occult Science teaches that the frame of mind in which a man dies, is of the utmost importance owing to the abnormal and psychic state in which he then is. The last thought of a dying person does much to influence his immediate future. The arrow is ready to fly from the bow; the bow-string is abreast of the ear, and the aim will decide the immediate fate of the arrow. Happy is he for whom "Om" is the bow, the Self is the arrow and Brahman--its aim!" At such a sacred moment, strong spiritual aspirations, whether natural or induced by the earnest exhortations of either one who has a true conviction, or better still, of one possessed of the divine Gnosis, will protect the Soul of him who is leaving life...at death we shall be judged by our own Higher Self, and, under the conduct of the agents of the Karmic Law (the Demiurgos collectively), will have to reincarnate again into the prison of the Body, until the past evil Karma has been exhausted. For until the last farthing of the Karmic debt is exhausted, we can never be untied from the wheel of "Sansara." -- Footnote by H.P.B. -- Lucifer, Vol. 8, p. 127-8
"That flash of memory which is traditionally supposed to show a drowning man every long-forgotten scene of his mortal life--as the landscape is revealed to the traveler by intermittent flashes of lightning--is simply the sudden glimpse which the struggling soul gets into the silent galleries where his history is depicted in imperishable colors." Isis I 179
"When the frame is cold and eyes closed, all the forces of the body and mind rush through the brain, and by a series of pictures the whole life just ended is imprinted indelibly on the inner man not only in a general outline but down to the smallest detail of even the most intimate and fleeting impression." OCEAN, p. 97
Do Not Disturb the Dying
"No man dies insane or unconscious--as some physiologists assert. Even a madman, or one in a fit of delirium tremens will have his instant of perfect lucidity at the moment of death, though unable to say so to those present...speak in whispers...lest you disturb the quiet ripple of thought, and hinder the busy work of the Past casting on its reflections upon the veil of the future." Mahatma Letters, p. 170
Basis for Devachanic
"Life in Devachan is the function of the aspirations of earth life; not the indefinite prolongation of that "single instant," but its infinite developments, the various incidents and events based upon and outflowing from that one "single moment" or moments." KEY 162
Length of Devachanic Stay
"...the term between two rebirths is said to extend from ten to 15 centuries, during which time the physical consciousness is totally and absolutely inactive, having no organs to act through..." KEY 132
Contrast in Devachan -- Wisdom
"...the Higher Triad, Manas, Buddhi, and Atma,--the real man, immediately go into [the state] of Devachan...they are the immortal part of us; they, in fact, and no other are we. This should be firmly grasped by the mind, for upon its clear understanding depends the comprehension of the entire doctrine." OCEAN, p. 65
AWARENESS OF TIME AND SPACE IN DEVACHAN DIFFERENT
"...Devachan is a state where the Ego enjoys and does not suffer, suffering being reserved for the earth life. It is not a question of memory strictly speaking, but is a state where the causes generated on this earth which can exhaust in no other state, do so exhaust themselves, leaving the causes relating to this plane of earth life to be afterwards exhausted here, and as it is, like this life, a state of illusion, the Ego naturally enlarges all its conceptions of what it thought best and highest when it was alive, for such are the causes that relate to that state." Practical Occultism," p. 258-9
LEAVING DEVACHAN - A NEW PERSONALITY and KARMA
"Good Karma is that kind which the Ego desires and requires; bad, that which the Ego neither desires nor requires. And in this the Ego, being guided and controlled by law, by justice, by the necessities of upward evolution, and not by fancy or selfishness or revenge or ambition, is sure to choose the earthly habitation that is most likely, out of all possible of selection, to give the karma for the real advantage in the end...we see that the "advantages" which one would seek were he looking for the strengthening of character, the unloosing of soul force and energy, would be called by the selfish and personal world "disadvantages." Struggle is needed for the gaining of strength; buffeting adverse eras is for the gaining of depth; meager opportunities may be used for acquiring fortitude; poverty should breed generosity. The middle ground in all this, and not the extreme is what we speak of... the Ego has drawn about itself in a former life some tendencies which cannot be eliminated in any other way...sometimes...a pure, powerful Ego incarnates in just such awful surroundings, remaining good and pure all the time, and staying there for the purpose of uplifting and helping others." WQJ ART. Vol. I, pp. 138-9 [ULT]
Dallas Ten Broeck quotes from the following sources:
WQJ ART: William Quan Judge Articles, Vol. I and II, Published by the United Lodge of Theosophists (ULT)
KEY: H.P. Blavatsky, Key to Theosophy, published by various theosophical publishing company's usually with the same pagination.
SD: H.P. Blavatsky, The Secret Doctrine, vol I and II, published in various editions. The current edition from the Theosophical Publishing House which is part of the H.P. Blavatsky Collected Writings, has the same pagination as the original. This is also true of a few other versions. Dallas uses the original pagination.
ISIS: H.P. Blavatsky, Isis Unveiled, Vol. I and II, published also in various editions. This is also available as part of the H.P. Blavatsky Collected Writings with the original pagination. Dallas uses the original pagination.
OCEAN: W.Q. Judge, The Ocean of Theosophy. Published by the Theosophical University Press (TUP) and perhaps also in other editions.
GLOSS: I don’t know which theosophical glossary Dallas means. Check the glossaries at my links page to be sure.
Practical Occultism: Dallas probably means the book out by TUP with that name which includes various articles on that subject, mostly by H.P. Blavatsky.
VOICE: The Voice of the Silence, by H.P. Blavatsky. Small but precious booklet, available online. (see my contents page for selected quotes from it.)
Gita Notes: Dallas probably means W.Q. Judge's Notes on the Bhagavad Gita, a book out at TUP.
I have not checked these sources.
Katinka Hesselink, compiler archives.