The Initiation Procedure Within the Great Pyramid
of Giza, Egypt:
Original Theosophy Challenges the Mausoleums-Dogma of the Egyptologists
Part II
Abhinyano
Our Egyptian neophyte, in the sarcophagus of the King's
Chamber, had also established this supra-psychological, yogic union,
and this is so beautifully illustrated in Sixth Division of the Am-Tuat
book.*
The priests take him out of the sarcophagus, still in
the state of Samadhi after three days and three nights, and carry
his body through the passages of the pyramid into a room of a temple,
which stood in ancient time directly in front of the secret entrance
of the Descending Passage. This temple, as HPB writes, had a room
with a big window towards the East, and when the first rays of the
Sun touched the face of the still entranced new Initiate, he awoke:
In Egypt [his body] was placed in the Sarcophagus in the King's Chamber
of the Pyramid of Cheops, and carried during the night of the approaching
third day to the entrance of a gallery, where at a certain hour the
beams of the rising Sun struck full on the face of the entranced Candidate,
who awoke to be initiated by Osiris [Asar] and Thoth, the God of Wisdom.
. . . [I]n reality the Spirit-Sun within [his own Monad or Atma-Buddhi
and Higher Manas: Buddhi-Manas] enlighten[s] the newly-born man [and
new Initiate]. (SD II, p.589)
Such a Full-Initiate had several options. Since he had
won the right to enter the "Watery Abyss", the "Ocean
of Immortality", Nirvana or Space, he could either as a Khepe-Ra
(Dharmakaya, Spiritual Astronaut or Planetary Spirit) de facto step
over the "threshold of Nirvana" into Space in his self-created
vehicle or Robe, made from Phlogiston, Akasha or Nuclear Energy, and
"rove the interstellar spaces in full consciousness . . ." (Mahatma Letters, p.43) or:
[R]efuse to pass into the Nirvânic state or "don the Dharmakâya
robe [in Egypt as a Khepe-Ra] and cross to the other shore," as it would then become beyond [his] power to assist men even so little
as Karma permits. [As a Nirmanakaya, he would] prefer to remain invisibly
(in Spirit, so to speak) in the world, and contribute toward man's
salvation by influencing them to follow the Good Law, i.e. lead them
on the Path of Righteousness. (The Voice of the Silence, p.95)
This would mean that such an adept would—in his Nirmanakaya Robe—influence
certain men and women from the Astral plane, and this is done more
often than one may think.
The Initiate could also use again his present body,
his vehicle, and return to the Living as a member of the inner circle
of the Hierophants to teach other neophytes. He may be an adviser
to the Pharaoh in religious and even political matters, always having
the benefit of mankind at heart.
There exists a third option which the Buddha himself
used. He allowed his monad, his Dhyani-Buddhi part, or Atma-Buddhi,
to enter Nirvana, but he left his "middle part"—his
Manas per se and Buddhi-Manas or his "Bodhisattva"—in
Devachan, from which re-incarnation is still possible. In The Secret
Doctrine, we have the unique semi-esoteric teaching about "The
Mystery of the Buddha"—a sublime doctrine, which only Theosophy
possesses in the Western World. It is as follows:
The Dhyâni Buddha [as the Monad Atma-Buddhi], when the world
needs a human Buddha, "creates" through the power of Dhyâna
(meditation, omnipotent devotion) [by the discipline of Royal Yoga],
a mind-born son—a Bodhisattva—whose mission it is after
the physical death of his human, or Manushya-Buddha, to continue his
work on earth till the appearance of the subsequent Buddha. . . .
The Bodhisattva replaces in him the Kârana Sharira, the Ego
principle [Manas per se and Buddhi-Manas], and the rest correspondingly;
and it is in this way that Esoteric Philosophy explains the meaning
of the sentence that "by virtue of Dhyâna [or abstract
meditation] the Dhyâni-Buddha [the Buddha's Spirit or Monad]
creates a Bodhisattva," or the astrally clothed Ego [Manas and
Buddhi-Manas] within the Manushya-Buddha. Thus, while the Buddha merges
back into Nirvâna whence it proceeded, the Bodhisattva remains
behind to continue the Buddha's work upon earth. (SD III, pp.378-79)
This esoteric doctrine is so beautifully worked into stone on the
highest terrace (called the Arupadhatu) of the Borobudur Pyramid in
Java, recently restored. It has become a tourist attraction because
of its beauty and Buddhist-teachings. This monument shows the ageless
expression of human yearning for the Eternal and is actually a much
better document of Ancient Wisdom and Liberation-discipline than the
Great Pyramid of Giza, since the teachings are intact and are visible
on square galleries, containing innumerable bas-reliefs on both sides
of ballustrated corridors. In the case of the Great Pyramid there
are no bas-reliefs or paintings. The Initiates removed everything
belonging to the Mysteries when the Pyramid was sealed. But we have
the wall-paintings in the tombs of the Pharaohs in the Valley of the
Kings. These paintings contain the secrets of the initiation into
the Egyptian Mysteries as we know them today—The Book of Gates
and the Am-Tuat book.
Illustration XII of The Book of Gates depicts the entry
into the "Watery Abyss" or Nirvana as follows: The Khepe-Ra
[the Full-Initiate] steps out of his body and out of the realm of
the earth via his own stratum of the Unconscious or the autonomic
brain and nervous system. He does it in the state of Samadhi by his
powerful will and Yoga concentration. The Khepe-Ra himself as the
Initiate is represented by the symbol of the scarabaeus sacer, the
holiest emblem in Egypt (the beetle).† The Dharmakaya robe of
the Initiate is the flaming Matet Sektet-boat, which the Sky-god Nu
raises up with both arms. In the boat are, with the Khepe-Ra (beetle),
his helpers and the goddesses Isis and Nephthys. The Scarab (Initiate)
moves up and rolls in front of him the sun (his own Monad or Atmu-Horus
or Atma-Buddhi) which is received by the goddess Nut. The latter stands
upon the head of Asar (Osiris), here in his highest aspect (possibly
as Para-Brahman or Para-Atman). The body of Asar forms a circle, denoting
that this Khepe-Ra, the Full-Initiate, has completed the "Circle
of Necessity" and is now in the "Watery Abyss" (Nirvana,
Space) as a Divine Astronaut, Dharmakaya and Planetary Spirit.
Master Kuthumi has described in The Mahatma Letters
this most occult event of a fully liberated and enlightened Adept:
When our great Buddha—the patron of all adepts, the reformer
and the codifier of the occult system, reached first Nirvana on earth,
he became a Planetary Spirit; i.e.—his spirit [Monad or Atma-Buddhi]
could at one and the same time rove the interstellar spaces in full
consciousness, and continue at will on Earth in his original and individual
body. For the divine Self had so completely disfranchised itself from
matter that it could create at will an inner substitute for itself,
and leaving it in the human form for days, weeks, sometimes years,
affect in no wise by the change either the vital principle or the
physical mind of its body [Prana and Kama-Manas]. By the way, that
is the highest form of adeptship man can hope for on our planet. But
it is as rare as the Buddhas themselves, the last Khobilgan who reached
it being Sang-Ko-Pa [Tsong-Kha-pa] of Kokonor (XIV Century), the reformer
of esoteric as well as of vulgar Lamaism. . . . The planetary Spirit
of that kind (the Buddha like) can pass at will into other bodies—of
more or less etherialised matter, inhabiting other regions of the
Universe. There are many other grades and orders, but there is no
separate and eternally constituted order of Planetary Spirits. (The
Mahatma Letters, pp.43-44)
Such a Planetary Spirit or Khepe-Ra does not need an expensive, mechanical
spaceship, because he had created—during his initiation—a
vehicle, made of solar energy. This process is very veiled of course
as demonstrated in the 8th and 9th divisions of the Am-Tuat book,
where weaving instruments can be seen, which are allegorically and
figuratively denoting that a "fiery robe" or "vehicle
made from Akasha" (Fohat, Daiviprakriti or primordial, homogeneous
solar LIGHT or Phlogiston) is being "woven" for the Khepe-Ra
[or Nirvanin and Dharmakaya]. Even in the USA such hints of "weaving
instruments" can be found in the Initiation-Temple-Kivas, located
in the much misunderstood "pueblos" of Chaco Canyon in New
Mexico, where also a mysterious "robe" was being "woven"
by the neophytes of the Mysteries. Indeed, these Anasazi-pueblos have,
so far, never been understood properly by the materialistic and agnostic
physical scientists. In reality—from the esoteric standpoint—the
"pueblos" served as monasteries, ashrams, viharas, mystery-schools
and the Great-Kiva-temples with their two sarcophagi as initiation-chambers
similar to the King's Chamber of the Great Pyramid in Egypt. Thus
the initiation-ritual of the arcane Mysteries was known to the Toltecan
Anasazi!
All this is a very delicate and very subtle knowledge,
and more citations are necessary in order to make it better understood:
The bodies of the Planetary spirits are formed of that which Priestley
and others called Phlogiston and for which we have another name [Fohat,
Daivi-prakriti; we would call it today Nuclear Energy]—this essence
in its highest seventh state forming that matter of which the organisms
of the highest and purest Dyans [Dhyan Chohans, Dhyani Buddhas, Khepe-Ras,
Nirvanins, Dharmakayas] are composed. . . . (Mahatma Letters, p.56)
These "bodies" or "robes" are very well known
to the learned theosophist and can be studied in Geoffrey Barborka's
Divine Plan under the title: "The Three Glorified Vestures."
HPB gives a short description of these "Buddhic bodies" in her famous work The Voice of the Silence:
The three Buddhic bodies or forms are styled:—
1) Nirmânakâya.
2) Sambhogakâya.
3) Dharmakâya.
The first is that ethereal form which one would assume
when leaving his physical he would appear in his astral body—having
in addition all the knowledge of an Adept. The Bodhisattva [here:
our neophyte] develops it in himself as he proceeds on the Path [of
initiation]. Having reached the goal [arriving at the threshold of
the "Watery Abyss" or Nirvana] and refused its fruition
[by not stepping over the threshold directly into Nirvana or Space],
he remains on Earth, as an Adept; and when he dies, instead of going
into Nirvâna, he remains in that glorious body [in his Nirmanakaya-Sambhogakayavesture]
HE HAS WOVEN FOR HIMSELF [emphasis mine] invisible to uninitiated
mankind, to watch over and protect it [or he may use again his old
physical form, if he so desires].
Sambhogakâya is the same, but with the additional
lustre of "three perfections," one of which is entire obliteration
of all earthly concerns.
The Dharmakâya body is that of a complete Buddha,
i.e., no body at all, but an ideal breath [of Fohatic or Akashic Fire
and Light]: Consciousness merged in the Universal Consciousness, or
Soul devoid of every attribute. Once a Dharmakâya [Khepe-Ra
or Planetary Spirit], an Adept or Buddha leaves behind every possible
relation with or thought for this earth. Thus, to be enabled to help
humanity, an Adept who has won the right to Nirvâna [Space],
"renounces the Dharmakâya body" in mystic parlance;
keeps, of the Sambhogakâya, only the great and complete knowledge,
and remains in his Nirmânakâya body. The esoteric school
teaches that Gautama Buddha with several of his Arhats [such as the
Arhats Morya and Kuthumi] is such a Nirmânakâya, higher
than whom, on account of the great renunciation and sacrifice to mankind
there is none known. (Voice, pp.96-97)
But let us return to the Egyptian Mysteries.
There is one ceremony which is of considerable interest
to the Egyptologists, namely the ritual of "the Opening of the
Mouth and Eyes," which was performed when the power of government
was transferred to the new Pharaoh after the death of the old one.
One can see this ritual even on the wall of the tomb of Tut Ankh Amon
and in the tomb of Pe-ta-Amen-Apt in the Valley of the Kings. But
this ritual was exoteric and was done in public. The real and esoteric
ritual of "the Opening of the Mouth and Eyes" was performed
when the old Initiator had decided to give the new and young Initiate
the "Last and Supreme Word." Again it is HPB who mentions
the ritual in her careful and suggestive way:
Clothed with his Anandamayakosha, the body of bliss [Buddhi and Buddhi-Manas]—the
Srotâpanna [the new Initiate] remained there where we have no
right to follow him [within the realm of his Unconscious in the Samadhi-state],
and upon returning—received the Word, with or without the "heart's
blood" of the Hierophant.
Only in truth the Hierophant was never killed—neither
in India nor elsewhere, the murder being simply feigned—unless
the Initiator had chosen the [new] Initiate for his successor and
had decided to pass to him the last and supreme Word, after which
he had to die—only one man in a nation having the right to know
that word. Many are those grand Initiates, who have thus passed out
of the world's sight, disappearing. . . .
But he died, he was not killed. For killing, if really
done, would belong to black, not to divine [White] Magic. It is the
transmission of light, rather than a transfer of life, of life spiritual
and divine, and it is the shedding of Wisdom, not of blood. (SD III,
pp.272-73)
And further in the footnote:
"At the last moment of the solemn ‘new birth,' the Initiator
passed ‘the word' to the [new] initiated, and immediately after
the latter had a weapon [the ur-hekau-instrument, made of a sinuous
piece of wood, one end of which is in the form of a ram's head, surmounted
by a uraeus-snake] placed in his right hand, and was ordered to strike.
. . ." Weapon and killing must be understood in their allegorical
sense. (SD III, p.273fn)
With all these subtle informations the entire ritual,
which took place within the room of the Pyramid-temple (originally
in front of the secret entrance to the Descending Passage), can be
now given in detail.
After the successful and thus new Initiate was carried
during the night of the approaching third day from the King's Chamber
into the temple in front of the Pyramid, and the beams of the rising
Sun struck the face of the still entranced man, reclining on a bed,
he awoke and stood up. The old Hierophant and main-initiator asked
his priests to step back and form a circle around him and the new
Initiate, his successor and ‘spiritual son'. The priests had
to be witnesses of this important theurgic ritual, but had to be far
enough away that they would not be able to hear the sound of the Word.
The old Hierophant took now the new Initiate to his chest and at the
moment the cheek of the old Hierophant touched the cheek of his chosen
successor, he whispered the ‘Sound of the Word' into his ear.
The SUPREME WORD and the POWER OF THE SUN was thus transmitted. Then
the old Hierophant stepped back, took the ur-hekau-instrument, the
mysterious hatchet, gave it to his successor and ordered him to strike
him with it on the head. The new Hierophant did exactly that by tapping
gently the old one on his temple. Symbolically it would mean that
the old Hierophant had to die immediately. The latter said good bye
to his priests, reclined on a bed, withdrew according to the modus
operandi of Tulku, his Manas (Buddhi-Manas-principle), but also his
Prana (vis vitalis), together with the linga shariram, the ‘etheric
double' or the protoplasmic duplicate of the solid physical body—an
occult theurgic operation and siddhi—at which point the old Hierophant
promptly died.
The Monad of the Hierophant, his Dhyani-Buddha-part
or Atma-Buddhi, went as a Khepe-Ra, Dharmakaya and Planetary Spirit
into the ‘Watery Abyss', Nirvana, Space, but his ‘middle
Principles' (Manas and Buddhi-Manas) returned to Sekhet Hetepet (Sekhet
Aanru, Devachan), from which it could associate itself with the new
Hierophant, in case it was necessary. The latter then ‘became
endowed with a double life.' In Isis Unveiled, we read that:
The High Hierophant alone knew how to perform this solemn operation
by infusing his own vital life and astral soul [Manas per se and Buddhi-Manas]
into the adept [by Dhyana meditation and the Tulku-siddhi], chosen
by him for his successor, who thus became endowed with a DOUBLE LIFE
[emphasis mine]. (Isis Unveiled II, pp.564-65)
For what purpose?
It was an old tradition in Egypt—long before the
time of the ‘warrior-king'—that the leading Hierophant,
a Full-Initiate, always had been the de facto ruler of the land. He
made the laws, planned and ordered the construction of the pyramids,
was the head of the all powerful solar theocracy and maintained the
Mystery-schools. The pharaoh was his creature, his right hand, and
he allowed that the masses adored him. Thus he was the power behind
the throne! After he had chosen his successor, he worked post mortem
as the mentor of the new Initiate and leading Hierophant in such a
way that he—in important matters of state—acted as a counselor.
When the work was done, the ‘astral body' (the Manas and Buddhi-Manas
principle) would step back and return to Sekhet-Aanru. This is the
so-called ‘double life' also known as the Tulku-siddhi (Ego-transference),
an occult Theurgy, which the learned Theosophist knows in regard to
the relationship of our Masters Morya and Kuthumi with HPB. In this
manner, large portions of both Isis Unveiled and The Secret Doctrine
were written!
Getting finally to the end of this paper two more citations
shall be given:
The pure monad, the "god" [Ra] incarnating and becoming
Chrestos [the suffering neophyte Afu-Ra and ‘Man of sorrows'],
or man, on his trial of life, a series of those trials [in the Mystery-schools
and in the Great Pyramid] led him to the crucifixion of flesh, and
finally into the Christos Condition [as a Khepe-Ra, Dharmakaya and
Planetary Spirit]. (HPB Collected Writings VIII, p.201fn)
Monsieur S. Lancri, a French Theosophist, read a paper
during a meeting of the Theosophical Society in London, 1977 with
the title "The Occultism of Ancient Egypt". He said:
There is no doubt that the allegory of the journey of [the god] Ra,
the Sun [as they are being illustrated and described in the ‘Book
of Gates' and the Am-Tuat book], was connected with the teachings
[and disciplines] given during Initiation in the Egyptian sanctuaries
[and Mystery schools].
There was a close relationship between India and Egypt.
This is proven by the historical invasion of Egypt by a large mass
of people from Southern India and Sri Lanka under the leadership of
Manu Vina, known to the Egyptologists as Menes. These East-Indians
were called ‘Schesoo-Hor', the ‘servants of Horus', and
their conquest is engraved in the walls of the Temple of Edfu, south
of Luxor (HPB described this historical fact in Isis Unveiled I, p.627
and The Secret Doctrine II, p.450).
But before the colonization of Egypt by these Eastern
Indians, there were the dynasties of Divine Kings, followed by dynasties
of Heroes in Egypt. They may have been of Atlantean origin, and since
the Atlanteans were the inventors of the concept of the pyramid, their
descendants built the Great Pyramid of Giza:
[S]ince the Dendera Zodiak shows the passage of three Sidereal Years,‡ the Great Pyramid must have been built 78,000 years ago. . . . (SD
II, p.451)
Thus it was not Cheops (or Khufu) who allegedly built
it as the Egyptologists claim, because Egypt had already reached the
apex of its civilization and culture many thousands of years before
him, a culture modern Egyptologists do not know anything about and
as a result, they do not understand the initiation-procedure of the
Mysteries, which were universal and international. In India they are
called Raja Yoga, and this heroic discipline of enlightenment and
liberation from the bonds of matter and the flesh is still alive there,
especially in the ashrams of the Himalayas.
We as Theosophists and Buddhists possess some hints
in regard to the ‘initiation' or rather the ‘last trial'
of Arhat Kuthumi by which he became a Bodhisattva, and they are given
here. Arhat Morya writes in The Mahatma Letters, the following:
Two days later when his [Kuthumi's] "retreat" was decided
upon in parting he asked me: "Will you watch over my work, will
you see it falls not into ruins?" I promised. What is there I
would not have promised him at this hour! At a certain spot not to
be mentioned to outsiders, there is a chasm spanned by a frail bridge
of woven grasses and with a raging torrent beneath. The bravest member
of your Alpine clubs would scarcely dare to venture the passage, for
it hangs like a spider's web and seems to be rotten and impassable.
Yet it is not; and he who dares the trial and succeeds—as he
will if it is right that he should be permitted—comes into a
gorge of surpassing beauty of scenery—to one of our places and
to some of our people, of which and whom there is no note or minute
among European geographers. At a stone's throw from the old Lamasery
stands the old tower, within whose bosom have gestated generations
of Bodhisatwas. It is there, where now rests your lifeless friend
[Kuthumi]—my brother, the light of my soul, to whom I made a
faithful promise to watch during his absence over his work. (ML, p.219)
In The Theosophical Forum, HPB says in a letter to Mrs.
Hollis-Billings:
K.H. or Koot-Hoomi is now gone to sleep for three months to prepare
during this Sumadhi [of Raja Yoga] or continuous trance state for
his initiation, the last but one, when he will become one of the highest
adepts [and Bodhisattva]. Poor K.H. his body is now lying cold and
stiff in a separate square building of stone with no windows or doors
in it, the entrance to which is effected through an underground passage
from a door in Toong-ting (reliquary, a room situated in every Thaten
(temple) or Lamasery); and his Spirit is quite free. An adept might
lie so for years, when his body was carefully prepared for it beforehand
by mesmeric passes etc. It is a beautiful spot where he is now in
the square tower. The Himalayas on the right and a lovely lake near
the lamisery. His Cho-han [the Maha Chohan?] (spiritual instructor,
master, and the Chief of a Tibetan Monastery) takes care of his body.
M [Morya] also goes occasionally to visit him. . . . Now Morya lives
generally with Koot-Hoomi who has his house in the direction of the
Kara Korum Mountains. . . . (The Theosophical Forum VIII, May 1936,
pp.344-45)¶
Finally, the Kiva-tower combinations within the so-called ‘cliff-dwellings'
of the Anasazi in Mesa Verde, Colorado, which were actually ashrams
or monasteries, had the same purpose. The towers also could be entered
from below only. The writer has seen and studied them. Here the Americans
could have their greatest spiritual treasures, but even their scientists
do not understand these ashrams and the ‘pueblos' of Chaco Canyon,
N.M. One does not have to look far for the reason for this sad state
of affairs. The reliance by so many Protestant faiths on the "fire
and brimstone" of the Old Testament and the peopling of much
of North America by these faiths has resulted in a country whose fear-based
belief system had nowhere to go but to descend into materialism. This
Judeo-slant to Christianity inevitably leads to a self-righteous intolerance
because of its reliance on the "Heresy of Separateness" and its adherents work towards the destruction of the Solar-religions
and disciplines because of their blind and ignorant fears. Any form
of Higher Ethical, Moral, and Spiritual education is quashed and this
has resulted in a low Spiritual Culture in America. We have here a
very materialistic, technical civilization, which tends to lead man
to evil through separateness with its fatal consequences (like geological
catastrophes and wars). See the warnings of our Masters and with them
of HPB!
* The neophyte is drawing with his right hand, which
is raised above his head, to himself the beetle (scarab) of Khepe-Ra,
which is of the type of regeneration, new divine birth, or resurrection.
This is the transformation into an initiate.
† The Scarab is a dung-eater (coprophagos), which represents
the man who works himself out of his material body (represented by
the dung the beetle larva must feed on and transform) by heroic efforts
during initiation, changing his inner nature (first egg, then larva,
finally new beetle) and flies free from his material prison into the
Sun as a "resurrected and liberated" spiritual astronaut
— Khepe-Ra, Dharmakaya, Planetary Spirit.
‡ A "Sidereal year . . . is equal to 25,868 of our solar
years." SD II, p.345.
¶ For the above paragraph this writer is indebted to the well-known
theosophical scholar Robert Hühtwohl, Santa Fe, NM, who offered
it as a footnote in his article "The Practical Vision of Sri
Kalachakra." See The High Country Theosophist, Boulder Colorado,
Vol. 12, April 1977.
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