Origin of Mind

It is a fundamental principle of occultism that life and consciousness are present in

all beings and things. H.P. Blavatsky writes: 'Everything in the Universe, throughout
all its kingdoms, is CONSCIOUS: i.e., endowed with a consciousness of its own kind and
on its own plane of perception. . . . There is no such thing as either "dead" or "blind"
matter, as there is no "Blind" or "Unconscious" Law.' (SD 1:274) However,
consciousness may be present in many different degrees of activity or latency.
The first three and a half root-races of humanity in the present, fourth round of the
earth's evolution are said to have been intellectually dormant. The fire of
selfconsciousness was kindled in nascent humanity by the incarnation of the
mnasaputras (or 'sons of mind'), advanced beings from past manvantaras, towards
the end of the third, Lemurian root-race.
To understand exactly what the mnasaputras are and do, it is useful to first consider
the various parts of the human constitution. A human being is essentially a stream of
consciousness and vitality pouring forth from the divine monadic essence. On each
plane, or subplane, there are knots or foci in this stream of consciousness, each
such knot being a monad, or consciousness-centre, acting though a suitable vehicle,
or soul, and possessing an ego, in which its evolutionary experiences are stored up.
The monads in man may be classified as follows:
divine or galactic monad (tman)
spiritual or solar monad (buddhi)
mnasic, higher human, or chain monad (buddhi-manas)
psychic, lower human, or globe monad (kma-manas)
beast monad (kma-prna)
astral monad (prna-linga-sharra)
physical monad (sthla-sharra)
Man is therefore a composite entity, and 'has within him a divinity, a Buddha or
Christos, a Mnasaputra, a human being, an astral entity; and he is housed in an
astral-vital-physical body' (FSO 446).
Human beings are essentially human monads, and at this stage of our evolution,
lower human monads. Since each monad in our constitution is sevenfold, we can
represent the human constitution in the form of a cross. The upright represents the
series of ascending monads, while the horizontal represents the seven principles or
qualities of each monad, and in our particular case, the globe monad.
Divine monad
|
Spiritual monad
|
Mnasic monad
|
Lower human monad
tman---buddhi---manas---kma---prna---linga-sharra---sthla-sharra
|
Beast monad
|
Astral monad
|
Physical monad
The seven principles of each monad may also be pictured as seven rungs leading
from one monad to the next. At present our consciousness tends to be centred in the
kma-mnasic part of the lower human monad. When we have raised our
consciousness to the buddhic and then tmic part of the lower human monad, this
monad will have become a mnasic monad and will then embody in the next, higher
kingdom.
Above the human kingdom there are three kingdoms of dhyni-chohans: the great
ones, the lower gods, and the gods. There is probably a close connection between
these three superhuman kingdoms and the mnasic, spiritual, and divine monads
respectively. G. de Purucker states that the mnasaputras are egos from the moon-
chain which attained mnasaputric dhyni-chohanship when the moon-chain went
into pralaya (Dia 3:30). Since all three dhyni-chohanic classes have developed their
mnasic faculties to the full, they may all be regarded, in one sense, as
mnasaputras.
Where amidst the many monads in man is our own mnasaputra? G. de Purucker
points out that there are in fact two mnasaputras within us: our own individual
mnasaputra whose powers are not yet fully evolved, and the mnasaputra which
awakened us in the third root-race (Dia 3:35, 53). Our own individual mnasaputra is
the higher manas or buddhi-manas of the lower human monad (Dia 3:155), while the
mnasaputra which inflamed us is the mnasic or higher human monad (Dia 2:280;
3:210-11). The two mnasaputra are usually children of the same parent star.
The close karmic bond between the two mnasaputras becomes clear if we consider
what we, the animals, and the mnasaputras were on the moon-chain, the former
embodiment of the earth-chain. The average and higher humans of the present
earth-chain were the beast monads in the humans on the moon. At the end of the
seventh round on the moon-chain these human monads entered the lower dhyni-
chohanic kingdom and therefore became mnasic monads. These are the
mnasaputras which awakened our minds. In other words, when our mnasaputras
were human monads on the moon, we were their beast monads. The beast monads
in the higher lunar animals are now our own beast monads, and, if we make the
grade, we shall act as their inflaming mnasaputras on the next embodiment of the
earth-chain, when they will have become lower human monads (earth pitris), and we,
higher human monads or mnasic monads (Dia 3:358-9; SOP 190).
The 'inflaming' mnasaputra is sometimes referred to as our spiritual soul or highest
human soul, and our own human soul may be regarded as its ray or projection (Dia
1:198; SOP 468). Our human souls are 'the children of the Mnasaputras, whose
destiny it is to call them to selfconsciousness' (Dia 1:202). The mnasaputras are
both ourselves and not ourselves. Although they are part of our constitution, they are
not we, the lower human egos, but our higher natures which brought our egos forth;
they are in fact a separate monad (Dia 3:360). It was their karmic duty to sacrifice
themselves by overenlightening the lower human part of us and helping to raise it to
their own high level. The mnasaputras continue to overenlighten us, but are also
evolving in their own high sphere, presumably the janar-loka (BCW 12:Diagram V).
In most cases they are scarcely conscious at the present time that they are the
directing geniuses of some human being (Dia 3:39).
The 'inflaming' mnasaputra may be called our higher ego (Dia 2:296), though the
higher human ego may also be regarded as an essential part of ourselves (i.e. of the
lower human monad) which is not yet awakened (Dia 3:34). Strictly speaking, we
should draw a distinction between the reembodying ego (or chain ego) and the
reincarnating ego (or globe ego) (FSO 564-5; Dia 3:336-7). We could then call the
'inflaming' mnasaputra the reembodying ego and our own inner mnasaputra the
reincarnating ego. However this distinction is not always made, and the two terms
are often used interchangeably. On one occasion, G. de Purucker says that the
sleeping human soul was awakened by the mnasaputras, enabling it to evolve the
egoic reincarnating faculty and become a reincarnating ego, and that the destiny of
the reincarnating ego is to become a mnasaputra itself (Dia 2:468-9). HPB simply
says that 'our Egos, the Principle which reincarnates, are called in The Secret
Doctrine, the Mnasaputra' (BCW 12:607fn).
Likewise, the higher human monad, or spiritual-intellectual monad, and the lower
human monad, or human-animal monad, are sometimes referred to collectively as
the human monad. On one occasion, for instance, it is said that an animal monad
develops into a human monad, then into a mnasaputra or solar monad, and later
into a divine monad (Dia 1:324). This would imply that the human monad is the
chain-monad and the mnasaputra the solar monad, but elsewhere both these
points are denied (Dia 2:461; 2:296). The varying meanings given to these terms are
no doubt intended to prevent us from allowing our ideas to crystallize!
Just as there are two mnasaputras in us, so there are two inner gods: the divine
monad (the god of the upright), and the as yet unevolved tmic part of the human
monad (the god of the horizontal). G. de Purucker explains that when the neophyte
undergoing initiation cries: 'O god of me, why hast thou forsaken me!' this refers to
the fact that the human ego must face the trials of initiation alone. But the second cry
on the cross: 'O my divinity, how dost thou glorify me!' is uttered when the human
ego has discovered the divinity at the heart of its own human monadic essence. Our
task is therefore to discover the divinity of the horizontal as well as of the vertical
(Dia 3:261-7).
At the very beginning of the fourth round, the human kingdom on this globe was
represented by a relatively small number of shishtas. G. de Purucker writes: 'They
began to feel the impulse of the inflowing of egos from the Third Round, coming from
Globe C on to this Globe D. With each new impulse, the Shishtas in the bodies
began to prepare more freely to provide the bodies for the coming stream of
reembodying egos or mnasaputras. Hence, when the proper time came, the
Shishtas had become millions instead of being, let us say, a few thousands. Then,
among these Shishtas, the incoming Mnasaputras began to pick each one the body
most closely allied to it by karmic destiny, and began to overshadow it little by little,
but progressively more as the ages advanced; much as the incoming mind or
Reincarnating Ego reincarnates little by little in the growing child.' (Dia 3:188)
This means that the mnasaputras actually 'descended' before the third root-race.
However, it was only in the latter part of the third root-race (beginning in the fifth
subrace) that the psychophysical constitution of the bulk of humanity was
sophisticated enough to begin to manifest our latent mental faculties and the
awakening of our minds could truly begin. This process is continuing even today, at
different rates according to our karmic background. However, what happened in the
third root-race was a recapitulation of what took place in the third round (beginning,
presumably, in the fifth root-race). But even in the first and second rounds, there
were selfconscious 'humans', in whom the mnasaputras had incarnated. These
must have been those who had reached the very highest human stage by the close
of the seventh round on the moon.
The mnasaputras which called our latent mental powers into selfconscious activity
are dhyni-chohans of the lowest class (SOP 176). However, the whole process was
started off by even higher mnasaputras, dhyni-chohans who were already
mnasaputras on the moon-chain (SOP 190, 468). 'They were the Mahtmans on
the moon become gods when the moon men became dhynized' (SOP 267). It was
these beings which incarnated among the men of the third root-race as the divine
teachers and guides. They taught the arts and sciences, founded the first mystery
schools, and struck the keynotes of spiritual wisdom. When their work was
accomplished, they returned to their own sublime spheres. These mnasaputras
must have been dhyni-chohans of the higher two classes (Dia 3:360). We know, at
any rate, that the bulk of the lowest dhyni-chohanic life-wave is just opening its first
root-race on globe C (SOP 196; Dia 2:358).
How do the mnasaputras accomplish their work? G. de Purucker says that the
mnasaputra does not literally 'come down' into the flesh. '"Incarnation" and
"descent" when so used are figures of speech. What actually happens is that the
Mnasaputra surrounds, incloses, with its own aura, with its vital atmosphere, the
soul which it is its karmic duty to "awaken".' (Dia 2:470) The mnasaputra infused a
portion of its own spiritual-intellectual fire, its own psycho-vital life into the as yet
sleeping, undeveloped human soul, just as the fire penetrates into the molecules of
gold and makes it glow molten (Dia 2:471). The process may also be likened to the
kindling of an unlighted candle by the flame of a burning candle.
De Purucker says that the mnasaputras 'quickened and enlightened in us the
Manas-manas of our manas-septenary, because they themselves are typically
mnasic in their essential characteristic or svabhva. Their own essential or mnasic
vibrations, so to say, could cause that essence of Manas in ourselves to vibrate in
sympathy, much as the sounding of a musical note will cause sympathetic response
in something like it, a similar note in other things.' (OG 99) In other words, the life-
atoms composing the soul and aura of the mnasaputras evoked sympathetic
(mnasic) vibrations in our own human soul.
Something similar takes place in the relationship between parents and children,
teacher and pupil, master and chela. The child learns not only by instruction,
example, and imitation, but also by the interchange of life-atoms, especially on the
unseen levels of our constitution.
The human brain is a deposit of thought-fluid and therefore of the mnasic essence
in the individual; it is 'the focus of the Mnasaputric influence working through the
human Manas'. 'During the lifetime of the body, the life-atoms in the brain are
continuously bathed with ksha; and it is through the ksha in the human
constitution that the Mnasaputra works' (Dia 3:371). It is because of this connection
with the Mnasaputric fluid that the life-atoms of the brain are the most ethereal in
the human body.
Every kingdom helps to advance the evolution of the kingdom below it. This, too,
takes place by an exchange of life-atoms (SOP 176; FSO 620). Without this inspiring
influence of the higher kingdoms, the pace of evolution would be desperately slow.
But in reality, nature is interlinked in all its parts: 'From Gods to men, from Worlds to
atoms, from a star to a rush-light, from the Sun to the vital heat of the meanest
organic being the world of Form and Existence is an immense chain, whose links
are all connected' (SD 1:604).
Abbreviations:
BCW H.P. Blavatsky Collected Writings
Dia Dialogues of G. de Purucker
FSO Fountain-Source of Occultism
OG Occult Glossary (2nd ed.)
SD The Secret Doctrine
SOP Studies in Occult Philosophy
by David Pratt. November 1997. Last revised: May 2003.
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