Wednesday 21 May 2014

Levels of Selfhood



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Most religions and many philosophies interpret Man [1] as a single consciousness or soul or spirit in a physical body. But, although an improvement over gross Materialism[2], this interpretation is actually extremely naive, for it ignores all the manifold aspects and dimensions that human consciousness includes.
A more sophisticated understanding is that the so-called individual is made up of a multiplicity of "souls" or levels of being. The human entity (and for that matter, every evolutionary entity) is thus a synthesis of a number of elements of being, corresponding to different dimensions or planes of existence. In the present essay, these various levels of body, soul, and spirit can be defined as follows:












Table 1. The various levels of self and corresponding planes of existence






Level of being or self ('microcosm")World or Plane ("macrocosm")Associated experience
Unmanifest AbsoluteUnmanifest AbsoluteShunya, Sachchidananada, etc
Transcendent Higher Self Manifest AbsoluteEternal Consciousness
Immanent Higher SelfInmost BeingInner Divine Consciousness
Spirit(Noeric Ideational) Plane
(Spiritual/ Angelic)
Inspiration,
gnosis, wisdom
SoulImaginal Plane
(Higher Psychic)
Intuition, Love,
Spiritual purpose
Double Astral Plane
(Lower Psychic)
Dreaming, Imagination, "Astral travelling"
Physical PsycheEtheric Plane
(Subtle Physical)
Physical Consciousness
Physical BodyPhysical Plane Body Consciousness


















One can use Egyptian, Indian, Greek, and Kabbalistic terms to supplement the imprecise and ambiguous English equivalents like "spirit" and "soul". If you look at other esoteric [3] teachings, you will notice all use pretty much the same schema, although differing in details and terminology.  A few examples of these inter-doctrinal equivalences are given as follows:






Table 2. The various levels of self in different esoteric systems












Level of being or self ('microcosm")Egyptian equivalentTaoist equivalentNeoplatonic equivalentSufi equivalentBlavatsky
Theosophical equivalent
Theosophical equivalent
(Adyar School & others influenced by)
Aurobindo equivalent 
(Integral psychology)
Absolute Self?TaoThe One?not representednot representedParamatma?
Transcendent Higher Self  ??HenadDivine NameAtmaMonadJivatma
Immanent Higher Self"Memphite Theology" (Old_Kingdom) Ka; 
New Kingdom
Khu (in part)
Shen - immortal spirit Augeoidesayn thabithaImmortal EgoSoul;
Higher Triad
(Atma-Buddhi- Manas)
Psychic Being
(Chaitya Purusha)
SpiritKhu (in part)Hun (Spirit)Noetic Soulaql (intellect)Buddhi ManasHigher Mental (Causal)Mental (in part)
SoulBa (soul)
Ab (heart)
Hun (Spirit)Soulqalb
(heart)
Kama ManasHigher Emotional/ AstralVital (in part)
Double Sahu;
Ka (Double) 
P'o (yin nature)Irrational Soulnafs
(soul)
Kama rupaLower Emotional/ AstralVital (in part)
Physical PsycheKa (in part)Ch'iVegetative soulnafs
(soul)
SthulaEtheric bodySubtle Physical
Physical BodyKhatbodyPhysicalPhysicalSukshmaPhyscal bodyGross Physical



Physical, Spiritual and Causal

Taking the five "lower" principles in Table 1 - the Body, Psyche, Double, Soul and Spirit - these each correspond to a particular "vertical" Plane or stratum of existence, from pure "matter" to pure "spirit" (the higher three principles do not lie on the Spirit-Matter axis at all).   In addition to this "vertical" axis, there is a "horizontal" one, which constitute a sequence of "frequency octaves" equivalent to the energy levels in an electron orbital shell around an atom's nucleus
Just as there are an infinite number of possible quantum energy levels in an electron's orbit, so there are an indefinate number of "vibratory" or "frequency" levels of consciousness on each plane. In Indian Vedantic and Tibetan Buddhist metaphysics, these frequency levels are grouped into Gross, Subtle, and Causal [4]; whilst Western Esotericism [5] refers to Physical, Psychic and Spiritual.
 Table.3 illustrates the relation between the "horizontal" and the "vertical" gradations of manifestation, and gives the terms used here.












Table.3. The Frequency octaves in the Physical Body, Physical Psyche (or "subtle bodies"), Double, Soul, Spirit, and higher grades of existence.












Pure Spirit
 
 
 
 
 
:
:
Higher Planes
 
 
 
 
 
:
:
Spirit
 
 
 
 
 
Spiritual Being...
Soul
 
 
 
 
BaSpiritual Ba...
Double
 
 
 
 
Ka/Astral doubleSpiritual Ka...
physical psyche
 
Etheric bodyEmotional bodyMental bodyPsychic BodiesSpiritual Bodies...
physical bodyexternal physicalOrganic (wholistic) Physical Emotional Physical Mental Physical Psychic PhysicalSpiritual Physical...
:
physical mechanicalPhysical subconsciousEmotional subconscious
(= Jungian shadow)
Mental subconscious
(= Jungian shadow)
Psychic subconscious
(= Collective Unconscious)
Spiritual subconscious
(= the Jungian "Self")
...
:
physical mechanicalinconscientinconscientinconscientinconscientinconscient...
:
pure matter<----------------------------------------------------------------->
pure spirit
 
 
gross (outer)
subtle (inner)
very subtle
 
 
Body
Emotion
Mind
Spirit











Unfortunately, many esoteric teachings tend to confuse the "vertical" series of planes, the "horizontal" frequency series, the "inner-outer" sequence from Higher Self to ego, and the Absolute Self, collapsing everything into a single set of planes of consciousness. That is why it so hard to match up the different systems; they use similiar language and concepts to describe totally different things.





Notes

[1]. The term "Man" as used here is, it hardly needs to be pointed out, gender neutral. Because of patriarchial overtones, feminists have suggested that the term be replaced by a gender-neutral one like "Person". However, the word "Person" comes from the Greek persona, meaning a mask used in theatre, whilst "Man" is derived from the Indo-European root mn, from which we also derive "mind"; hence Man literally means "a thinking being". Since the only way the human species can be distinguished from the rest of the animal kingdom is in our superior intellectual devlopment, I feel that this is a more appropriate term to use here.
[2]. "Materialism" here refers not to a particular lifestyle based around material goods, but a sceptical way of looking at things, that denies all realities beyond those that are currently known to physical science. This is a reductionist perspective that actually constitutes a specific meme
[3]. "Esoteric" means the inner or hidden meaning of things, the occult, the metaphysical; as opposed to "exoteric", the outer meaning, conventional knowledge or reality
[4] The division "gross, subtle, and causal" is derived from Indian Vedantic philosophy, specifically the Mandukya Upanishad), which speaks of four states of consciousness, the waking, dream, dreamless sleep, and transcendent state. These were later identified with the five koshas [see note 5 below]. Tibetan Buddhism refers to a similiar three-fold distinction as "gross", "subtle", and "very subtle" [Table 3].
[5] By "Western Esotericism" is meant the occult and spiritual teachings that have developed in the West in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries; such as Theosophy, Hermetic Qabalah, Rosicrucianism, and Thelema. The division of being into "body, soul, and spirit" is central to the teachings of the Christian theosophist and clairvoyant Rudolph Steiner.







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