Nick the Pilot
Well-Known Member
Hi everybody!
I recently read a thread here on this Forum which mentioned Nirvana and enlightenment. I thought it would be good to share the Theosophical perspective on the two topics, particularly that of Nirvana. I have several quotes on Nirvana from Theosophical literature, and I will be posting them in this thread from time to time.
One issue to consider is the difference between enlightenment and Nirvana. Many people confuse the two. Theosophists see the two as quite different. Enlightenment is the achieving of the final goal of human existence -- finally being released from the drudgery of mandatory reincarnations. (This is what some people say is the original meaning of "being saved," which is now used by Christians in a much different way.) An enlightened person is "saved" from the struggle and hardship of future forced reincarnations (which usually consist of the arduous task of burning off bad karma.) Enlightnement signifies that no more bad karma needs to be burned off, reincarnations are no longer required, and the person is now free to move on to doing more important tasks.
Once enlightenment is achieved, the person may choose to remain on earth in future incarnations (as a person that is called by some people a Bodhisattva), or the person may choose to move up to a higher level of consciousness that is called Nirvana. (One of the main differences between Mahayana Buddhism and Theravadan Buddhism is that the former stresses the value of considering becoming a Bodhisattva, while the latter does not hold the model of becoming a Bodhisattva in quite as high a regard.)
But what is Nirvana? Many Buddhists see it as perhaps a new way of thinking, a sudden clarity of purpose of being, or the having of some type of Aha! experience. Theosophists see it quite different. (At least some Theosophists do. Other Theosophists follow quite closely the Buddhist view of Nirvana.) Nirvana is seen as becoming able to be conscious on a plane of consciousness called the Nirvanic plane of consciousness. Here is a quote from a Theosophist on a description of Nirvana.
“The entry into [Nirvana] is utterly bewildering, and it brings as its first sensation an intense vividness of life, surprising even to him who is familiar with the buddhic plane. The surprise has been his before, though in a lesser measure, whenever he mounted for the first time from one plane to another. Even when we rise first in full and clear consciousness from the physical plane to the astral, we find the new life to be so much wider than any that we have hitherto known that we exclaim: ‘I thought I knew what life was, but I have never known before!’ When we pass into the mental plane, we find the same feeling redoubled; the astral was wonderful, but it was nothing to the mental world. When we pass into the higher mental plane, again we have the same experience. At every step the same surprise comes over again, and no thought beforehand can prepare one for it, because it is always far more stupendous than anything that we can imagine, and life on all those higher planes is an intensity of bliss for which no words exist.
“European Orientalists have translated Nirvana as annihilation, because the word means ‘blown out’, as the light of a candle is extinguished by a breath. Nothing could be a more complete antithesis to the truth, except in the sense that it is certainly the annihilation of all that down here we know as man, because there he is no longer man, but God in man, a God among other Gods, though less than they.
“Try to imagine the whole universe filled with and consisting of an immense torrent of living light, and in it a vividness of life and an intensity of bliss beyond all description, a hundred thousand times beyond the greatest bliss of heaven. At first we feel nothing but bliss; we see nothing but the intensity of light; but gradually we begin to realize that even in this dazzling brightness there are brighter spots — nuclei, as it were — which are built of the light because there is nothing but the light, and yet through them somehow the light gleams out more brightly, and obtains a new quality which enables it to be perceptible upon other and lower planes, which without this would be altogether beneath the possibility of sensing its effulgence. And by degrees we begin to realize that these subsidiary suns are the great Ones, that these are Planetary Spirits, Great Angels, Karmic Deities, Buddhas ... and Masters, and that through Them the light and the life are flowing down to the lower planes.
“Gradually, little by little, as we become more accustomed to the stupendous reality, we begin to see that, in a far lower sense, even we ourselves are a focus in that cosmic scheme, and that through us also, at our much lower level, the light and the life are flowing to those who are still further away-not from it, for we are all part of it and there is nothing else anywhere — but further from the realization of it, the comprehension of it, the experience of it.” (The Masters and the Path, pp. 197-199)
I recently read a thread here on this Forum which mentioned Nirvana and enlightenment. I thought it would be good to share the Theosophical perspective on the two topics, particularly that of Nirvana. I have several quotes on Nirvana from Theosophical literature, and I will be posting them in this thread from time to time.
One issue to consider is the difference between enlightenment and Nirvana. Many people confuse the two. Theosophists see the two as quite different. Enlightenment is the achieving of the final goal of human existence -- finally being released from the drudgery of mandatory reincarnations. (This is what some people say is the original meaning of "being saved," which is now used by Christians in a much different way.) An enlightened person is "saved" from the struggle and hardship of future forced reincarnations (which usually consist of the arduous task of burning off bad karma.) Enlightnement signifies that no more bad karma needs to be burned off, reincarnations are no longer required, and the person is now free to move on to doing more important tasks.
Once enlightenment is achieved, the person may choose to remain on earth in future incarnations (as a person that is called by some people a Bodhisattva), or the person may choose to move up to a higher level of consciousness that is called Nirvana. (One of the main differences between Mahayana Buddhism and Theravadan Buddhism is that the former stresses the value of considering becoming a Bodhisattva, while the latter does not hold the model of becoming a Bodhisattva in quite as high a regard.)
But what is Nirvana? Many Buddhists see it as perhaps a new way of thinking, a sudden clarity of purpose of being, or the having of some type of Aha! experience. Theosophists see it quite different. (At least some Theosophists do. Other Theosophists follow quite closely the Buddhist view of Nirvana.) Nirvana is seen as becoming able to be conscious on a plane of consciousness called the Nirvanic plane of consciousness. Here is a quote from a Theosophist on a description of Nirvana.
“The entry into [Nirvana] is utterly bewildering, and it brings as its first sensation an intense vividness of life, surprising even to him who is familiar with the buddhic plane. The surprise has been his before, though in a lesser measure, whenever he mounted for the first time from one plane to another. Even when we rise first in full and clear consciousness from the physical plane to the astral, we find the new life to be so much wider than any that we have hitherto known that we exclaim: ‘I thought I knew what life was, but I have never known before!’ When we pass into the mental plane, we find the same feeling redoubled; the astral was wonderful, but it was nothing to the mental world. When we pass into the higher mental plane, again we have the same experience. At every step the same surprise comes over again, and no thought beforehand can prepare one for it, because it is always far more stupendous than anything that we can imagine, and life on all those higher planes is an intensity of bliss for which no words exist.
“European Orientalists have translated Nirvana as annihilation, because the word means ‘blown out’, as the light of a candle is extinguished by a breath. Nothing could be a more complete antithesis to the truth, except in the sense that it is certainly the annihilation of all that down here we know as man, because there he is no longer man, but God in man, a God among other Gods, though less than they.
“Try to imagine the whole universe filled with and consisting of an immense torrent of living light, and in it a vividness of life and an intensity of bliss beyond all description, a hundred thousand times beyond the greatest bliss of heaven. At first we feel nothing but bliss; we see nothing but the intensity of light; but gradually we begin to realize that even in this dazzling brightness there are brighter spots — nuclei, as it were — which are built of the light because there is nothing but the light, and yet through them somehow the light gleams out more brightly, and obtains a new quality which enables it to be perceptible upon other and lower planes, which without this would be altogether beneath the possibility of sensing its effulgence. And by degrees we begin to realize that these subsidiary suns are the great Ones, that these are Planetary Spirits, Great Angels, Karmic Deities, Buddhas ... and Masters, and that through Them the light and the life are flowing down to the lower planes.
“Gradually, little by little, as we become more accustomed to the stupendous reality, we begin to see that, in a far lower sense, even we ourselves are a focus in that cosmic scheme, and that through us also, at our much lower level, the light and the life are flowing to those who are still further away-not from it, for we are all part of it and there is nothing else anywhere — but further from the realization of it, the comprehension of it, the experience of it.” (The Masters and the Path, pp. 197-199)
