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EPL- INFORMATION FOR YOUR BUILDING SOUL

by Gerald Massey

Whilst the people of modern times appear to have been losing their Soul altogether, or not to have found out that they really possess one, the ancient Egyptians, Chaldeans, Hindus, Britons, and other races, reckoned that they had Seven souls, or that the one soul as permanent entity included the sum total of seven powers. The doctrine is very ancient, but it has been stated anew by the author of "Esoteric Buddhism," as if it were a recent revelation derived from India as the fountain-head of ancient knowledge.

Mr. Sinnett's claim is, that he has been specially appointed by the Mahatmas as their mouth-piece to the Western World, and empowered to put into print, for the first time, the oral Wisdom that has hitherto been kept all sacredly concealed. But I can assure Mr. Sinnett that the seven Souls of Man are by no means new to us, nor are they those "transcendental conceptions of the Hindu mind" in which he has been led devoutly to believe. To the serious student of such subjects, the system of esoteric interpretation now put forth, with its seven souls of man projected into shadow-land; its races of men that go round and round the Planetarium seven by seven, like the animals entering Noah's ark; its seven planets as stages of human existence, with our earth left out of the reckoning; its seven continental cataclysms, which occur periodically; does not contain a revelation of new truth from the Orient, nor a corroboration of the old. The seven souls of man were not metaphysical "concepts" at any time in the past. The doctrine belongs to primitive biology, or the physiology of the soul, which preceded the later psychology. Just as we speak of the seven senses the ancients spoke of the seven souls as principles, powers, or constituent elements of man. These were founded on facts of common perception, verifiable in nature; and we do not need those faculties of the occult adept "which mankind at large has not yet evolved" in order that they may be apprehended.

Mr. Sinnett is of opinion that it would be "impossible for even the most skilful professor of occult science to exhibit each of these seven principles separate and distinct from the others." That is, when they have been mystified by pseudo-esoteric misrepresentation, in a metaphysical phase; then they lose the distinctness of physics; and then we have to hark back once more to distinguish and identify these seven souls of man. The truth is, that when the teachings of primitive philosophy have passed into the domain of later speculations, you can make neither head, tail, nor vertebra of them--they constitute an indistinguishable mush of manufactured mystery! And the only way of exposing the pretensions of false teaching, and of destroying the superstitions, old or new, that prey upon and paralyse the human mind, is by explaining them from the root; to learn what they once meant in their primary phase is to know what they do not and cannot mean for us to-day. Nothing avails us finally, short of a first-hand acquaintanceship with the knowledge and modes of expression that were primordial.

It is quite possible, and even apparent, that the first form of the mystical SEVEN was seen to be figured in heaven by the seven large stars of the Great Bear, the constellation assigned by the Egyptians to the Mother of Time, and of the seven Elemental Powers. And once a type like this has been founded it becomes a mould for future use--one that cannot be got rid of or out of. The Egyptians divided the face of the sky by night into seven parts. The primary Heaven was sevenfold. The earliest forces recognised in Nature were reckoned as seven in number. These became Seven Elementals, devils, or later divinities. Seven properties were assigned to nature--as matter, cohesion, fluxion, coagulation, accumulation, station, and division--and seven elements or souls to man. A principle of sevening, so to say, was introduced, and the number seven supplied a sacred type that could be used for manifold future purposes. When Abraham took his oath at Beer-sheba, the Well of the Seven, we are told that he sevened, or did seven. Sevening was then a recognised mode of swearing; and Sevening is still a recognised mode of swearing with the Esoteric Buddhists, who, according to Mr. Sinnett, continue it ad libitum

, and carry it on through thick and thin.

The seven souls of the Pharaoh are often mentioned in the Egyptian texts. The moon-god, Taht-Esmun, or the later sun-god, expressed the Seven nature-powers that were prior to himself, and were summed up in him as his seven souls, of which he was the manifestor as the Eighth One. In the Hindu drawings we see the god Agni pourtrayed with seven arms to his body. These represent his seven powers, principles, breaths, or souls. The seven rays of the Chaldean god Heptaktis, or Iao, on the Gnostic stones indicate the same septenary of souls. The seven stars in the hand of the Christ in Revelation have the same significance. There is a star with eight rays, which is found to be the symbol of Buddha, of Assur in Assyria, of Mithras; and of the Christ in the catacombs of Rome. That was the symbol of the Gnostic pleroma of the seven souls, the perfect flower or star of which was the Christ of the Gnosis; not of any human history. It can be traced back to Egypt as the star of Sut-Horus, a star with eight points or loops, undoubtedly meant for Orion, which was at one time the star of Annunciation, that showed the place where the young child lay, or where the God was re-born upon the horizon of the Resurrection at Easter. A very ancient form of the eight-rayed star was a sign of the Nnu, the Associate Gods of Egypt, who were the Seven Ali (Ari) or Companions (Cf. the Babylonian Ili and Gnostic Elohim), as children of the Great Mother, the Gnostic Ogdoas. The same type, with the same meaning, is represented in the Book of Revelation, where the son of man (who is a male with female breasts, and therefore not a human being) holds in his hand the seven stars which symbolise the seven angels or spirits who are in the service of their Lord--like the Seven Great Spirits in the 17th chapter of the Egyptian "Book of the Dead."