What is Alaya? Many times we ask questions of others, expecting them to shed some light for us on various principles and teachings of Theosophy, whereas in fact we could discover the answers just as satisfactorily – if not more so – for ourselves, through careful and meditative study.
“Alaya” is a Sanskrit term which appears in “The Secret Doctrine” and “The Voice of the Silence” predominantly.
The ninth sloka of the first stanza from the Secret Book of Dzyan given in Volume 1 (p. 27) of “The Secret Doctrine” states that during the “Night of the Universe,” the Maha-Pralaya or Universal Pralaya, “THE ALAYA OF THE UNIVERSE WAS IN PARAMARTHA.”
When H. P. Blavatsky refers to this verse later on (Vol. 1, p. 47), she includes some explanatory words in parentheses and writes it like this:
“BUT WHERE WAS THE DANGMA WHEN THE ALAYA OF THE UNIVERSE (Soul as the basis of all, Anima Mundi) WAS IN PARAMARTHA (Absolute Being and Consciousness which are Absolute Non-Being and Unconsciousness) . . .”
“Alaya means latent,” says HPB in “The Secret Doctrine Dialogues” p. 109, continuing, “At the end of Manvantara, when Pralaya sets in, certainly the Alaya will become Laya and fall into nothing. There will be the one Great Breath only.”
But what is this Alaya which, like everything else, is eventually reabsorbed into the Absolute or Absoluteness at the end of one Universal Life Cycle, to be outbreathed into manifestation once more at the dawn of the next?
We read in “The Secret Doctrine” that “The two terms “Alaya” and “Paramartha” have been the causes of dividing schools and splitting the truth into more different aspects than any other mystic terms.” (Vol. 1, p. 48)
We should understand that Alaya is a term and concept which originates with the Yogachara or Yogācāra School (typically written during HPB’s time as “Yogacharya”) of Buddhist philosophy. The “Yogachara School” literally means “Yoga Practice School” but this refers to a high and truly philosophical form of mental and spiritual yoga, not any kind of bodily or physical yoga practices.
The Yogachara school began in India and is part of Mahayana Buddhism.
In the article Nagarjuna, Madhyamaka & Prasangika we explained:
“Two apparently antithetical philosophical worldviews exist within Mahayana: Madhyamaka (often spelt “Madhyamika” during the time of H. P. Blavatsky) and Yogachara or Yogācāra (typically written as “Yogacharya” by HPB and her contemporaries). Both these fundamental perspectives have their original basis in different Mahayana scriptures in which the Buddha himself is presented as having taught both perspectives on different occasions. In some instances, the two schools of thought base themselves on the same set of scriptures but interpret and understand them differently. There is also a third and less frequently encountered philosophical viewpoint, known as Shentong or Tathagatagarbha, which has its basic ideological origins and inspiration in the Yogachara approach but which is not the same as it, although sometimes the two are blended together. . . . Madhyamaka (popularised by Nagarjuna in India in the 2nd to 3rd century C.E./A.D.) and Yogachara (popularised by Asanga and his half-brother Vasubandhu in India in the 4th century C.E.) agree on the vast majority of Buddhist concepts and doctrines. But where they disagree is on some of the most fundamental questions, such as “What is the nature of reality?” and “What is the ultimate nature of ourselves?” Both speak frequently of Shunyata – emptiness or voidness – and both typically deny the existence of anything that can properly be called “self” or “Self,” although some of the “Books of Maitreya” transcribed by Asanga do affirm that the Buddha Nature which is equally present within all beings is a type of pure, universal, impersonal Self or Atman. . . . To summarise it as briefly and simply as possible: Is there an ultimate or absolute underlying essence and definite primordial reality at the innermost core of human beings and of all manifestation? Yogachara says yes, even though it typically considers “self,” “soul,” or “spirit,” to be misnomers for this. Madhyamaka – especially the Prasangika form of Madhyamaka – ordinarily says no. . . . In other words, Madhyamaka believes that anything that can be affirmed about the ultimate nature of reality must of necessity be false and a mistaken approach that can only lead to problems. Even such phrases as “the ultimate nature of reality” or “the ultimate reality” are typically avoided, since they can lead to notions of an ultimate, absolute, eternal “Something,” whereas for them, although they acknowledge that everything is Shunyata or emptiness, they are careful to make it known that this emptiness is not conceived as any type of ultimate, infinite, absolute, eternal, self-existent Reality or Principle or Essence or Energy, but is literally an empty emptiness, devoid of any true reality or independent, permanent, unchanging existence of its own.”
H. P. Blavatsky was often – but not always – critical of the standard Madhyamaka perspectives and referred to them as “the great deniers,” “teaching a system of sophistic nihilism,” and described their doctrines and conclusions as “exoteric travesties.” (See her entry for “Madhyamikas” on p. 196 of “The Theosophical Glossary” and her comment on p. 91 of “The Voice of The Silence” original 1889 edition.) But she also made numerous extremely positive statements, particularly about what she called the secret and purely esoteric system of Prasanga or Prasangika Madhyamaka. Please see the above link for those details.
It so happens that the Gelugpas – the “Yellow Hats” to whom the Dalai Lama and Panchen Lama belong and with whom HPB and the Masters have indicated their allegiance – hold exclusively in their most public teachings to the Prasangika-Madhyamika philosophical worldview and not at all to the Yogachara. This is not some new development but is the basis on which the Gelug school was founded in the very early 15th century by Tsong-Kha-Pa himself.
As for the Yogacharas, most exoteric and generally accepted historical sources trace them back to Aryasanga (often just referred to as Asanga, sometimes Arya Asanga) and his half-brother Vasubandhu, saying that they lived and founded this school or system of philosophy sometime around the 4th or at latesr 5th century C.E./A.D., i.e. around 1,000 years after the time of Buddha.
Some of Asanga’s writings were attributed to the Bodhisattva Maitreya – the next Buddha – as they were said to have been dictated by him during Asanga’s journeys into higher levels of consciousness.
Some of today’s scholars and researchers believe that Maitreya was actually his face to face teacher on the physical plane, with some of them identifying him with a mysterious individual known as Maitreyanatha (literally “Lord Maitreya”) about whom next to nothing is known except that he was said to come from the Kingdom of Shambhala. There are some contemporary writers who believe that this Maitreya was the real founder of the Yogachara School.
HPB once wrote that, “Chagpa-Thog-mad is the Tibetan name of Aryasanga, the founder of the Yogacharya or Naljorchodpa School. This Sage and Initiate is said to have been taught “Wisdom” by Maitreya Buddha Himself, the Buddha of the Sixth Race, at Tushita (a celestial region presided over by Him), and as having received from Him the five books of Champaitchos-nga [i.e. the Five Books of Maitreya, as they are commonly called in Mahayana Buddhism]. The Secret Doctrine teaches, however, that he came from Dejung, or Shambhalla, called the “source of happiness” (“wisdom-acquired”) and declared by some Orientalists to be a “fabulous” place. . . . [Tushita] is no fiction located in transcendental space. It is a bone-fide locality in the mountains, or, to be more correct, one encircled in a desert within mountains.” (“The “Doctrine of The Eye” & The “Doctrine of The Heart,” or The “Heart’s Seal” article)
She provides, however, interesting and important information about Aryasanga and the Yogachara or Yogacharya School which is not to be found elsewhere.
In “The Theosophical Glossary” she tells us that actually “there are two Yogacharya Schools, one esoteric, the other popular.” Aryasanga was “the Founder of the first Yogacharya School” and “This Arhat, a direct disciple of Gautama, the Buddha, is most unaccountably mixed up and confounded with a personage of the same name, who is said to have lived in Ayodhya (Oude) about the fifth or sixth century of our era.” By this latter personage is meant the historically known Asanga, though historians now know that he and Vasubandhu were actually from Gandhara, in what is present day Pakistan and Afghanistan but was then India.
She goes on to explain that the original Aryasanga (described in “The Secret Doctrine” Vol. 1, p. 49, as “a pre-Christian Adept and founder of a Buddhist esoteric school”) was the founder of “the lofty system of the early Yogacharya school of pure Buddhism, which is neither northern nor southern, but absolutely esoteric” and that “none of the genuine Yogacharya books (the Narjol chodpa) have ever been made public or marketable.” (“Glossary” entries for “Yogacharya” on p. 381 and “Aryasangha” on p. 32)
The entry in “The Theosophical Glossary” for “Maitreya” (p. 202) reads virtually identically to that for “Aryasangha” since we read that “The fact is that Maitreya was a follower of Buddha, a well-known Arhat . . . and that he was the founder of an esoteric philosophical school.” One distinction between the two entries is that while HPB says Aryasangha was “a direct disciple of Gautama” she writes that Maitreya was “not his direct disciple.” We can therefore merely speculate about the real connection between the two but speculation rarely leads to lasting value or definite knowledge.
Whatever the case may be about Aryasanga and Maitreya, HPB continues in the two “Theosophical Glossary” entries by talking about the later Aryasanga – that “personage of the same name, who is said to have lived in Ayodhya (Oude) about the fifth or sixth century of our era” – and says that he “taught Tantrika worship in addition to the Yogacharya system. Those who sought to make it popular, claimed that he was the same Aryasangha, that had been a follower of Shakyamuni [i.e. Buddha], and that he was 1,000 years old. . . . one finds in the Yogacharya Bhumi Shastra of the pseudo-Aryasangha a great deal from the older system, into the tenets of which he may have been initiated. It is, however, so mixed up with Sivaism and Tantrika magic and superstitions, that the work defeats its own end, notwithstanding its remarkable dialectical subtilty.”
We therefore find it said that “the fundamental tenets of the Yogacharya system” became “so disfigured by the Ayodhyan imitator” and that “the doctrines of the latter . . . compiled and glossed . . . in the sixth century of our era, and his mystic tantras and mantras, his formularies, litanies, spells and mudras, would certainly, if attempted without a Guru, serve rather purposes of sorcery and black magic than real Yoga.”
Since there is at no present no historical evidence available to support or confirm the above details and assertions – about the only Asanga known to history not being the original Asanga, and the only Yogacharya or Yogācāra school known to history not being the original and real one, as also about Buddha ever having anyone named Asanga or Aryasanga as a disciple or Arhat – they are dismissed by scholars and historians as untrue, and seeing as these academics are not usually esotericists, let alone Initiates, they can hardly be blamed for this.
It should be noted, however, that one should not conclude from the above that all the works of the “historical” Asanga are of the type described by HPB. Numerous of his writings are now translated into English and one of those “Books of Maitreya” – the Uttara Tantra or Ratnagotravibhaga – has nothing to do with anything tantric (despite its title) but is profoundly and purely Theosophical from beginning to end. It forms the basis of our article Buddha Nature. It has also been found that the Theosophical Mahatmas quoted from it in a note They wrote to A. P. Sinnett. Thus the situation is not as clear as one might like and it is almost impossible to know or guess what in those books comes from the original Aryasanga and what from his apparent “imitator” who, as HPB comments, may well have been initiated into the system of the real Yogacharyas.
Scholars, historians, and academics like to think, of course, that no-one could possibly know more than they do or have access to information and records which are closed and inaccessible for the general public.
Thus while such people will view HPB’s words as mistaken or fantastical, students of Theosophy will recognise that what she said on such matters as these was usually based on KNOWLEDGE; both her own and that of the Masters. For although it is never specifically stated outright, there are many hints and much evidence scattered throughout the Theosophical literature – and especially in “The Theosophical Glossary” – to indicate that the Masters, Adepts, and Initiates of the Trans-Himalayan Brotherhood belong to the secret and esoteric Yogachara School of pure Buddhism, i.e. the original Yogachara School and System of the original Aryasanga.
In “Transactions of the Blavatsky Lodge” p. 55, a student, referring to the exoteric and publicly known Yogacharya teaching, asks HPB by means of suggestion whether it is the case that Theosophy teaches “the same doctrines as the Yogacharya School?” to which the answer is given, “Not quite. But let us go on.”
Even more indicative than this, even more specific than the followers of the Masters’ philosophy being described as “Occult students of the Aryasanga School” on p. 69 of the first volume of “The Secret Doctrine,” is the direct admission in her article “Old Philosophers and Modern Critics” that the phraseology of the Stanzas from the Secret Book of Dzyan – which form the basis of both volumes of “The Secret Doctrine” – is that of “the Esoteric Yogacharyas.” And of course, in the “Theosophical Glossary” entry for “Vajrapani” on p. 359-360, she states that the real nature of Vajrapani “is known only to, and explained by, the highest Initiates of the Yogacharya School.” Nowhere in her writings does HPB imply that the Trans-Himalayan Adepts are ignorant of things which other Initiates know about . . . therefore “the highest Initiates of the Yogacharya School” and the highest Initiates of the Trans-Himalayan Esoteric School, which has also been called the Arhat Esoteric School, must be one and the same.
In the exoteric and publicly known Yogachara philosophy – which in the eyes of the world is the only form of the Yogachara philosophy – the term “Ashta-vijnana” (also found in one of the Master K.H.’s letters, “The Mahatma Letters” p. 200) is used to refer to the total of eight states of consciousness in the human being – “ashta” meaning “eight” and “vijnana” meaning “consciousness” in Sanskrit – the eighth and highest of which is Alaya-vijnana, the source, origin, and substratum of all the others, and which is also considered to be “the receptacle or totality of Consciousness both absolute and relative.”
Alaya-vijnana (pronounced “Vinyana”) is variously translated as “Storehouse Consciousness,” “Causal Consciousness,” “Base Consciousness,” and called “Mula-vijnana” meaning “Root Consciousness.” Western as well as Eastern researchers into the Yogachara system all seem to differ somewhat in their understanding of it but in essence it is as described in our article The Essence of Buddhism:
“Under the law of karma – self-created destiny through cause and effect, action and reaction – our mindstream or mental continuum (chitta santana) is propelled from rebirth to rebirth in this world.
“This is a stream of energy and consciousness constantly in flux and transformation and not the same from moment to moment. It is not in reality a “being” or an “entity” or an “Ego,” hence is not referred to as “soul” or “self.”
“It is individual, or at least individualised, in the sense that one person’s mindstream is not that of another, but “soul” and “self” are considered unfitting and misleading words for what it actually is.
“In Yogachara or Yogācāra philosophy, the mindstream/mental continuum (chitta or chitta santana) is also called alayavijnana (also written alaya-vijnana): “storehouse consciousness” or the “substratum of consciousness,” also known as mulavijnana: “root consciousness” or “base consciousness.” It is a type of extremely subtle “container” in which all our karmic seeds (from thought, feeling, word, and act) and impressions of whatever type, over lifetimes, are recorded and preserved, and from which they eventually manifest in our life experience.
“On the cosmic or universal level, there is an equivalent alayavijnana applying to the whole cosmos and spoken of by Yogachara-influenced Chinese Chan Buddhists as “Universal Mind” or the “Mind of the Universe.”“
Students of the Advaita Vedanta philosophy of Hinduism may see some parallels between this and their doctrine of the Causal Body, called Karana Sharira in Sanskrit. HPB spoke of the Causal Body as the Spiritual Body of man and asserted that “It is the inseparable and co-existent vehicle of the Monad during the periods of manifestation, and is best described, as indicated by its name, as that in which inhere all the Karmic causes which have been generated by that “monad.”” (“Theosophical Articles and Notes” p. 204-205)
To go into greater detail, in the exoteric Yogachara teachings of the historically known Asanga and Vasubandhu, the Ashtavijnana or “Eightfold Consciousness” of the human being is presented as, in descending order:
8. Alayavijnana – Storehouse consciousness, also known as Mulavijnana, root consciousness.
7. Klishtamanovijnana – Abstract mind consciousness – “Klishta” can mean “intricate” and “abstruse” but can also mean “afflicted” (and is linked etymologically with the word “klesha”) – The Klishtamano-vijnana is also known simply as Manas (literally “mind”), the perceiver of the highest reality, i.e. of Alaya.
6. Manovijnana – Mind consciousness, in the sense of the lower mind and lower thoughts – Mind as the sixth sense, as it is frequently called in Buddhism, i.e. that which garners, evaluates, and is affected by the experiences and sensations of the five physical senses.
5. Kayavijnana – Body consciousness – the sense of touch.
4. Jihvavijnana – Tongue consciousness – the sense of taste.
3. Ghranavijnana – Nose consciousness – the sense of smell.
2. Shrotravijnana – Ear consciousness – the sense of hearing.
1. Chakshurvijnana – Eye consciousness – the sense of sight.
All forms of Buddhism accept the lower six facets of consciousness enumerated above but the Klishtamanovijnana (more or less synonymous, in a rough or loose sense, with the Higher Mind or Higher Manas of Theosophy) and Alayavijnana (in some respects equivalent here to the Atman or universal Higher Self of Theosophical teachings) are unique to Yogachara thought.
Asanga and Vasubandhu drew heavily on a scripture called the Avatamsaka Sutra, in which Buddha himself, along with various Bodhisattvas and high beings, is presented as speaking about the Ashtavijnana, including Alayavijnana. The Lankavatara Sutra is also a Yogachara-esque compendium of Buddha’s teachings and it states that Alayavijnana is identical with the term Tathagatagarbha, i.e. “Buddha Nature,” which in turn is said (in the Mahaparinirvana Sutra, for example) to be synonymous with Atman, the Higher Self, a concept fiercely rejected and deemed heretical by the vast majority of Buddhists. Shunyata (Emptiness or Voidness) as the real nature of everything manifested and unmanifested is still spoken of in such texts and in the historically known Yogachara system but from a perspective which is very Theosophical when clearly understood.
But the truly esoteric Yogachara teachings regarding Alaya (and also regarding every other subject), whilst having some significant similarities, are obviously different and more extensive than this in a number of respects, although only a very small portion of them has been made public in the Theosophical teachings. On pages 48 to 49 of the first volume of “The Secret Doctrine” we read:
“Alaya is literally the “Soul of the World” or Anima Mundi, the “Over-Soul” of Emerson, and according to esoteric teaching it changes periodically its nature. Alaya, though eternal and changeless in its inner essence on the planes which are unreachable by either men or Cosmic Gods (Dhyani Buddhas), alters during the active life-period with respect to the lower planes, ours included. During that time not only the Dhyani-Buddhas are one with Alaya in Soul and Essence, but even the man strong in the Yoga (mystic meditation) “is able to merge his soul with it” (Aryasanga, the Bumapa school). This is not Nirvana, but a condition next to it.”
“The Yogacharyas (of the Mahayana school) say that Alaya is the personification of the Voidness, and yet Alaya (Nyingpo and Tsang in Tibetan) is the basis of every visible and invisible thing, and that, though it is eternal and immutable in its essence, it reflects itself in every object of the Universe “like the moon in clear tranquil water” . . .”
“But what is the belief of the inner esoteric Schools? the reader may ask. What are the doctrines taught on this subject by the Esoteric “Buddhists”? With them “Alaya” has a double and even a triple meaning. In the Yogacharya system of the contemplative Mahayana school, Alaya is both the Universal Soul (Anima Mundi) and the Self of a progressed adept. “He who is strong in the Yoga can introduce at will his Alaya by means of meditation into the true Nature of Existence.” The “Alaya has an absolute eternal existence,” says Aryasanga – the rival of Nagarjuna.”
In her entry for “Alaya” on p. 14 of “The Theosophical Glossary,” HPB defines it as “The Universal Soul” and adds that it is “Identical with Akasha in its mystic sense, and with Mulaprakriti, in its essence, as it is the basis or root of all things.”
Her deeply esoteric article “Psychic and Noetic Action” speaks of the Reincarnating Ego, the Higher Manas, in the human being, and says that “the Higher Mind-Entity – the permanent and the immortal – is of the divine homogeneous essence of “Alaya-Akasha,” or Mahat.” Mahat, literally meaning “The Great,” is a Hindu term for the Universal Mind or Cosmic Mind and it is taught in Theosophy that every human mind is a ray of that Divine Universal Mind and of the same intrinsic essence as It.
Alaya is sometimes correlated by H. P. Blavatsky with Atman, sometimes with Buddhi, and sometimes, as we just saw, with Mahat and the Higher Manas; in other words, with all three of the highest Principles within the human being. These are not contradictions. Instead, it shows us that Alaya is a term incapable of being rigidly confined to one specific, fixed “compartment.” Throughout “The Theosophical Glossary,” it is frequently correlated with the Buddhi within us and the Mahabuddhi in the Universe. Buddhi, which literally means “Wisdom,” is associated with the spiritual Heart quality, with deep intuitive perception and insight, and with compassion.
As the Universal Soul, Alaya is the Universal Consciousness, “the basis or root of all things,” “the basis of every visible and invisible thing,” “eternal and immutable in its essence” and yet reflecting itself “in every object of the Universe.” But the Universal Soul is not the same as the ONE Supreme Absolute Reality. The Absolute is that Paramartha in which “the Alaya of the Universe” lies latent during the unimaginably lengthy period of Universal Pralaya, as we saw mentioned in the Stanzas of Dzyan at the start of this article.
Alaya is the Universal Logos. It radiates forth from the Absoluteness of Paramartha (regardless of whether we refer to It as Paramartha, Adi-Buddhi, Adi-Buddha, Brahman, Parabrahm, En-Sof, or anything else) at the dawn of each Maha-Manvantara or Maha-Kalpa and proceeds to become the Living Universe itself. The Universal Soul, the Universal Logos, is the Universal Life.
Many people – and even many Theosophists, especially if they follow the distorted teachings of people such as C. W. Leadbeater, Annie Besant, and Alice Bailey – do not understand what this oft-used term “Logos” is actually referring to, even if they think they do. We would recommend reading carefully The Logos, The Logoi, and The Seven Highest Beings, particularly if you think this may apply to you.
HPB said that in the Esoteric Philosophy, Alaya has a triple meaning. First, it is the Anima Mundi, which although literally meaning “World Soul” has always been used in philosophy to indicate the “Soul of the Universe”; second, it is a name which can be applied to the Higher and Spiritual Ego of every individual, not only that of “a progressed adept”; and its third meaning is supplied by the Master K.H. when he says that the vision and perception of the great majority of “seers” is “vision imperfect and deceptive because untrained and non-guided by Alaya Vynyana (hidden knowledge).” (“The Mahatma Letters” p. 198-199) So Alaya-vijnana can also be a synonym for the hidden knowledge of the Secret Doctrine itself, the Gupta Vidya, the ancient and ageless Wisdom.
The “Venerable Chohan-Lama . . . than whom no one in Tibet is more deeply versed in the science of esoteric and exoteric Buddhism” once wrote part of an article for HPB, which was published under the title of “Tibetan Teachings.” Judging from the description given of him, as well as the tone and phraseology of his writing, it would seem that this individual was possibly the same as the Maha Chohan, the venerable Master of the Masters and the Chief of the Trans-Himalayan Brotherhood, whose famous and important letter can be read by clicking here.
He says in that article:
“In the book known as the Avatamsaka Sutra [Note: We referred to this a few paragraphs ago, as one of the primary texts for Yogachara thought; it is also referred to in connection with the teachings about the after-death states in “The Mahatma Letters” p. 108.], in the section on ‘the Supreme Atman – Self – as manifested in the character of the Arhats and Pratyeka Buddhas,’ it is stated that ‘Because from the beginning, all sentient creatures have confused the truth, and embraced the false; therefore has there come into existence a hidden knowledge called Alaya Vijnana.’ ‘Who is in the possession of the true hidden knowledge?’ ‘The great teachers of the Snowy Mountain,’ is the response in The Book of Law.”
Later he continues, “Very true, our Masters teach us ‘that immortality is conditional,’ and that the chances of an adept who has become a proficient in the Alaya Vijnana, the acme of wisdom, are tenfold greater than those of one who, being ignorant of the potentialities centred within his Self, allows them to remain dormant and undisturbed until it is too late to awake them in this life.”
Some very beautiful and inspirational things are said regarding Alaya in the book “The Voice of the Silence” translated by H. P. Blavatsky from the esoteric Buddhist text “The Book of the Golden Precepts” which she says is generally found in centres where Yogacharya schools are established, in Tibet and surrounding regions.
Her book – which has been praised and endorsed by leading figures in the world of Buddhism, including the current Dalai Lama, the ninth Panchen Lama, and the famed Buddhist expert D. T. Suzuki (see “The Voice of The Silence” – An Authentic Buddhist Text) – consists of three “fragments” from the original text and it is in the second and third of these, titled “The Two Paths” and “The Seven Portals” respectively, that the following references to Alaya occur . . .
* “Alas, alas, that all men should possess Alaya, be one with the great Soul, and that possessing it, Alaya should so little avail them!
“Behold how like the moon, reflected in the tranquil waves, Alaya is reflected by the small and by the great, is mirrored in the tiniest atoms, yet fails to reach the heart of all. Alas, that so few men should profit by the gift, the priceless boon of learning truth, the right perception of existing things, the Knowledge of the non-existent!”
* “Of teachers there are many; the MASTER-SOUL is one, Alaya, the Universal Soul. Live in that MASTER as ITS ray in thee. Live in thy fellows as they live in IT.”
* “Thou hast to saturate thyself with pure Alaya, become as one with Nature’s Soul-Thought. At one with it thou art invincible; in separation, thou becomest the playground of Samvriti, origin of all the world’s delusions.
“All is impermanent in man except the pure bright essence of Alaya. Man is its crystal ray; a beam of light immaculate within, a form of clay material upon the lower surface. That beam is thy life-guide and thy true Self, the Watcher and the silent Thinker, the victim of thy lower Self. Thy Soul cannot be hurt but through thy erring body; control and master both, and thou art safe when crossing to the nearing “Gate of Balance.””
* “Know that the stream of superhuman knowledge and the Deva-Wisdom thou hast won, must, from thyself, the channel of Alaya, be poured forth into another bed.”
* “Compassion is no attribute. It is the LAW of LAWS – eternal Harmony, Alaya’s SELF; a shoreless universal essence, the light of everlasting Right, and fitness of all things, the law of love eternal.
“The more thou dost become at one with it, thy being melted in its BEING, the more thy Soul unites with that which IS, the more thou wilt become COMPASSION ABSOLUTE.
“Such is the Arya Path, Path of the Buddhas of perfection.”
In HPB’s article “The Mind in Nature” we find Alaya being described as “”the divine Soul of thought and compassion” of the trans-Himalayan mystics.” In her footnotes to “The Alchemists,” we read that “This “Fire” is that of Alaya, the “World-Soul,” the essence of which is LOVE, i.e., homogeneous Sympathy, which is Harmony, or the “Music of the Spheres.” And in the article “The Last Song of the Swan,” she quotes the above statement from “The Voice of The Silence” about divine Compassion being “the LAW of LAWS – eternal Harmony, Alaya’s SELF” and describes it as “the very essence and esse of the dormant Individuality” or divine Ego within all of us. “This compassion [is] crystallized in our very being,” she adds.
Thus, Compassion is at the Heart of the Universe and we ought never to forget it.
As the original and genuine Aryasanga was “an Arhat, a direct disciple of Gautama the Buddha,” it stands to reason that the teachings of the “absolutely esoteric” Yogacharya School of “pure Buddhism” which he founded – of which we can safely assume that only a small portion is presented in the Theosophical teachings – are representative of the secret teachings of Buddha himself.
“There is an esoteric doctrine, a soul-ennobling philosophy, behind the outward body of ecclesiastical Buddhism,” says HPB in the article “The Theosophical Society: Its Mission and Its Future,” “. . . This secret system was taught to the Arhats alone, generally in the Saptaparna (Mahavansa’s Sattapani) cave . . . near the Mount Baibhar (in Pali Webhara), in Rajagriha, the ancient capital of Maghada [in North-East India], by the Lord Buddha himself, between the hours of Dhyana (or mystic contemplation). It is from this cave . . . that the Arhats initiated into the Secret Wisdom carried away their learning and knowledge beyond the Himalayan range [i.e. into the Trans-Himalayan regions and Tibet], wherein the Secret Doctrine is taught to this day.”
As for herself, she remarks in that same article that she “is undeniably a Buddhist – i.e., a follower of the esoteric school of the great “Light of Asia,”” but that neither Theosophy nor the Theosophical Movement are to be confused with the religion of Buddhism. If the Movement “has a Buddhist colouring [it is] simply because that religion, or rather philosophy, approaches more nearly to the TRUTH (the secret wisdom) than does any other exoteric form of belief. Hence the close connexion between the two.”
“While the Southern Buddhists [i.e. those of the Theravada School] have no idea of the existence of an Esoteric Doctrine – enshrined like a pearl within the shell of every religion – the Chinese and the Tibetans have preserved numerous records of the fact,” she states, adding, “But it is only in the Trans-Himalayan fastnesses – loosely called Tibet – in the most inaccessible spots of desert and mountain, that the Esoteric “Good Law” – the “Heart’s Seal” – lives to the present day in all its pristine purity.” (“The “Doctrine of The Eye” & The “Doctrine of The Heart,” or The “Heart’s Seal” article)
Many Buddhists may and do deny this, yet HPB maintains that the members of this Trans-Himalayan Esoteric Brotherhood are “the “direct followers” of Gautama the Buddha” and quotes a prophecy which refers to them as “those who are to be denied by His Church for the next cycle” but only for the next cycle, since eventually the truth will be known to all. (“Reincarnations of Buddha” article)
It seems that some Theosophists make the rather naive mistake of thinking that “Trans-Himalayan” is literally the actual name of the Masters’ esoteric School and Brotherhood. It is merely a geographical designation, for it is in the Trans-Himalayan region that the Esoteric Yogacharya School has its base and centre. The Trans-Himalayan Brotherhood is of course inseparable from the Brotherhood of Shambhala.
May we saturate ourselves with pure Alaya, the bright and immaculate ray of the Universal Light within us, and allow it to reach to our very heart of hearts.
~ BlavatskyTheosophy.com ~
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