In her Theosophical Glossary, Blavatsky wrote
the following about the trinity that is revered in India:
« Trimûrti is a Sanskrit word
that literally means “three faces”, or
“triple form” – and is the sacred Hindu Trinity.
In the modern Pantheon these
three persons are:
·
Brahmâ, the creator,
·
Vishnu, the
preserver, and
·
Shiva, the destroyer.
But this is an afterthought, as
in the Vedas neither
Brahmâ nor Shiva is known, and the Vedic trinity consists of Agni, Vâyu and
Sûrya; or as the Nirukta explains
it, the terrestrial fire, the atmospheric (or aërial) fire, and the heavenly
fire, since:
·
Agni is the god of
fire,
·
Vâyu of the air, and
·
Sûrya is the sun.
As the Padma Purâna has it: “In
the beginning, the great Vishnu, desirous of creating the whole world, became
threefold: creator, preserver, destroyer. In order to produce this world, the
Supreme Spirit emanated from the right side of his body, himself, as Brahmâ;
then, in order to preserve the universe, he produced from the left side of his
body Vishnu; and in order to destroy the world he produced from the middle of
his body the eternal Shiva.
Some worship Brahmâ, some Vishnu,
others Shiva; but Vishnu, one yet threefold, creates, preserves, and destroys,
therefore let the pious make no difference between the three.”
The fact is that all the three
“persons” of the Trimûrti are simply the three qualificative gunas or attributes of the
universe of differentiated Spirit-Matter, self-formative, self-preserving and
self-destroying, for purposes of regeneration and perfectibility.
This is the correct meaning; and
it is shown in:
Brahmâ being made the personified
embodiment of Rajoguna,
the attribute or quality of activity, of desire for procreation, that desire owing
to which the universe and everything in it is called into being.
Vishnu is the embodied Sattvaguna, that property
of preservation arising from quietude and restful enjoyment, which
characterizes the intermediate period between the full growth and the beginning
of decay.
While Shiva, being embodied Tamoguna – which is the
attribute of stagnancy and final decay – becomes of course the destroyer.
_ _ _
This is as highly philosophical
under its mask of anthropomorphism, as it is unphilosophical and absurd to hold
to and enforce on the world the dead letter of the original conception. »
(p.340-241)
The three Hindu gods
On
the three divinities that make up the Hindu Trimûrti, Blavatsky wrote:
Brahma (Sk.). The student must
distinguish between Brahma the neuter, and Brahmâ, the male creator of the
Indian Pantheon. The former, Brahma or Brahman, is the impersonal, supreme and
uncognizable Principle of the Universe from the essence of which all emanates,
and into which all returns, which is incorporeal, immaterial, unborn, eternal,
beginningless and endless. It is all-pervading, animating the highest god as
well as the smallest mineral atom. Brahmâ on the other hand, the male and the
alleged Creator, exists periodically in his manifestation only, and then again
goes into pralaya, i.e., disappears and is annihilated.
Vishnu (Sk.). The second person of
the Hindu Trimûrti (trinity), composed of Brahmâ, Vishnu and Siva. From the
root vish, “to pervade”. in the Rig-Veda,
Vishnu is no high god, but simply a manifestation of the solar energy,
described as “striding through the seven regions of the Universe in three
steps and enveloping all things with the dust (of his beams”.) Whatever may be
the six other occult significances of the statement, this is related to the
same class of types as the seven and ten Sephiroth, as the seven and three
orifices of the perfect Adam Kadmon, as the seven “principles” and the higher
triad in man, etc., etc. Later on this mystic type becomes a great god, the
preserver and the renovator, he “of a thousand names—Sahasranâma”.
Siva (Sk.). The third person of the Hindu Trinity
(the Trimûrti). He is a god of the first order, and in his character of
Destroyer higher than Vishnu, the Preserver, as he destroys only to regenerate
on a higher plane. He is born as Rudra, the Kumâra, and is the patron of all
the Yogis, being called, as such, Mahâdeva the great ascetic, His titles are
significant Trilochana, “the three-eyed”, Mahâdeva, “the great
god”, Sankara, etc., etc., etc.
The gunas
According
to Hinduism, the gunas are the three characteristics of which the Universe is
composed:
·
satva is contemplative
goodness, intelligence,
·
rayas is active
passion, energy, and
·
tamas is inert
ignorance.
These three characteristics form
a trinity that in Hinduism is called "Trigunas".
And as you can perceive the
Trimûrti and the Trigunas are the same, simply the explanation given through
the Trigunas is more philosophical, while the explanation given through the
Trimûrti is hidden behind Hindu mythology.
And that is why Blavatsky in her
Theosophical Glossary also wrote:
« Trigunas
(Sk.). The three divisions of the inherent qualities of
differentiated matter—i.e., of pure quiescence (satva), of activity and
desire (rajas), of stagnation and decay (tamas). They correspond
with Vishnu, Brahmâ, and Shiva (see “Trimûrti”). »
(p.338)
The three Vedic gods
On
the three divinities that make up the Vedic Trimûrti, Blavatsky wrote:
Sûryâ (Sk.). The Sun, worshipped in
the Vedas. The offspring of Aditi (Space), the mother of the gods. The
husband of Sanjnâ, or spiritual consciousness. The great god whom Visvakârman,
his father-in-law, the creator of the gods and men, and their “carpenter”,
crucifies on a lathe, and cutting off the eighth part of his rays, deprives his
head of its effulgency, creating round it a dark aureole. A mystery of the last
initiation, and an allegorical representation of it.
Agni (Sk.). The God of Fire in the Veda; the oldest
and the most revered of Gods in India. He is one of the three great deities:
Agni, Vâyu and Sûrya, and also all the three, as he is the triple aspect of
fire; in heaven as the Sun; in the atmosphere or air (Vâyu), as Lightning; on.
earth, as ordinary Fire. Agni belonged to the earlier Vedic Trimûrti
before Vishnu was given a place of honour and before Brahmâ and Siva were
invented.
Vâyu (Sk.). Air: the god and sovereign of the air;
one of the five states of matter, namely the gaseous; one of the five
elements, called, as wind, Vâta. The Vishnu Purâna makes Vâyu
King of the Gandharvas. He is the father of Hanumân, in the Râmâyana.
The trinity of the mystic gods in Kosmos closely related to each other, are “
Agni (fire) whose place is on earth; Vâyu (air, or one of the forms of Indra),
whose place is in the air ; and Sûrya (the sun) whose place is in the air (Nirukta.)
In esoteric interpretation, these three cosmic principles, correspond with the
three human principles, Kâma, Kâma-Manas and Manas, the sun of the intellect.
Observation
We see that here too
those three deities represent three principles of the Divine that under the law
of correspondence are also reflected in three principles of man, and this shows
you that within Indian mythologies there is an entire esoteric teaching, but
that it is hidden to the profanes by means of symbolism.
The Trimurti and
Parabrahma
Blavatsky
specified that the unmanifest God is not the Trimûrti:
« The Brahman, or
Parabrahm, the ABSOLUTE of the Vedantins, is neuter and unconscious, and has no
connection with the masculine Brahma of the Hindu Triad, or Trimûrti. Some
Orientalists rightly believe the name derived from the verb “brih,” to grow or
increase, and to be, in this sense, the universal expansive force of nature,
the vivifying and spiritual principle, or power, spread throughout the universe
and which in its collectivity is the one Absoluteness, the one Life and the
only Reality. »
(CW 3, p.424)
Correspondence with Kabbalah
And
in The Secret Doctrine, Blavatsky specified that:
« This first Jewish
triad (Sephira, Chochmah, and Binah) is the Hindu Trimurti.* However veiled, even in the Zohar, and more still in
the exoteric Pantheon of India, every particular connected with one is
reproduced in the other.
* In the Indian Pantheon the
double-sexed Logos is Brahma, the Creator, whose seven “mind born” sons are the
primeval Rishis — the “Builders.” »
(SD I, p.356)
No comments:
Post a Comment