Dream Interpretation in Esoteric Work

Dreams in Esoteric Work

A Neglected Discipline

I grow up in a Rosicrucian family and my mother gave me a few rules about dream interpretation she had learned from her teacher. When I began dreaming some serious dreams around 49 it irritated me that there wasn’t any good esoteric theories for dream interpretation. The psychoanalysts had some theories, especially around C.G.Jung, but there was no immediate relation between Jung and the esoteric traditions.

I started a research to find that information and I found out that Jung took his starting point in the chtlonic religions, the elemental kingdoms, what relates to the subconscious, where the esoteric traditions took their starting point in the super conscious, the higher ‘I’, but Steiner had also a description of the subconscious and the Chthonic world. I found what the archetypes like anima, animus, false ego’s, I and the teacher also existed in the esoteric tradition of man, and in dreams.

Some years later I found a file on the internet describing old Christian (and Hebrew) dream interpretation, with thousand of years experience, and found out it was the same method as I had found.

I read Fritz Pearl’s dream interpretation and it confirmed my findings, just as also Erich Fromm did. Erich Fromm also told that man could interpret his dreams under hypnosis, but he lost the understanding after awakening. The dreams are sent to the astral body, physically represented by the limbic system, the subconscious, and from there we sometimes become aware of the dreams when we wake up. It seems to be a rest of an old communication channel from the super-conscious to the subconscious from before we developed our left brain hemisphere and our ‘I’.

Erich Fromm tells that this dream language are the same we find used in old fairy tales and in the Bible as parables, that these texts have more than one level of information, that our subconscious understand the deeper level where our conscious brain only understand the upper layer, just as in dreams.

The subconscious uses the dreams to influence our conscious thinking indirectly, but when we interpret our dreams we can increase our progress immediately where the subconsciousness takes a long time to reach the goal, if ever.

Jung concentrates on the feeling’s in dream interpretation where the other concentrates on the symbols, like Chinese characters, Logograms, as concrete guidance from God or the higher ‘I’, depending on context.

By the word of the LORD the heavens were made, and all the hosts of them by the breath of His mouth … For He spoke, and it was done; He commanded, and it stood fast.
The LORD God planted a garden eastward in Eden, and there He put the man whom He had formed.

In the first part I have references to esoteric texts, in the second part a table relating the technical terms within different traditions including Jung, Steiner, Aristotle, and Kabbalah, and in the third part practical dream interpretation.

Esoteric views on Dream Interpretation

The Language

Erich Fromm writes in “The Forgotten Language”:

The Talmud says: “Dreams which are not interpreted are like letters which have not been opened.”

Rudolf Steiner has this general advice about the understanding of the spiritual world (GA156):

The only way we can experience anything from the spiritual world is to understand that we must take what it offers us as letters and words, which we must learn to read. That is it. And not to learn, to believe that we can spare ourselves learning to read the esoteric script, would be just as clever as someone taking a book and saying, “There are fools who say that something is expressed in this book. I thumb from page to page in it and see only pretty letters.” those who cannot read the letters absorb only what they see and are unconcerned about what is expressed.

He states that we should learn to understand the messages from the spiritual world, they are there to collect.

From the Content of the Esoteric Classes we have the following around the methodology:

One gradually notices that one’s dream life takes on a more regular character. The spiritual world flows into this at first. Meditation is the occult key for this. One should get a notebook and briefly write down characteristic dreams in the morning. Thereby, one gets practice in retaining what flows to one from higher worlds. That’s the first elementary method to later get to bringing spiritual experiences through, that is, that they break through into bright day consciousness… Only the symbolism is of value here and not the dream’s content. For the symbolic form is initially used by the spiritual world to introduce us to the forces of higher worlds. That’s why one must pay attention to the fine points of this symbolism.

I would add, get a notebook and write the dreams down each time you wake, there can easily be more than one message a night. Even the bible recommends taking notes, Dan. 7.1:

… Daniel had a dream, and visions passed through his mind as he was lying in bed. He wrote down the substance of his dream. See also Dream Interpretation: A Biblical Understanding.

You are everything in the dream

The persons who appear in dreams are all part of you, with few exceptions, if a person hinders you in the dream, it’s an aspect of yourself that are the cause (GA156), this is vital to understand, as it’s all too easy to project the dreams and problems onto others:

If, for example, one person fights or wounds another, you experience yourself as the inflictor of the wound and also as the soul that is wounded or attacked. You are everything in these images. You are utterly within them. If you had an image in front of you in which a beheading is depicted you experience yourself at the same time as the person who is beheaded and the person who does the beheading. That is how you experience yourself within this very fluctuating world of images. You yourself are every image and every movement in it.

Following Bobby Matherne is Fritz Perls dream interpretation (Gestalt Therapy) a good representative for this methology:

Fritz Perls taught people to interpret every component of a dream as a part of their own self. If you are driving a car and some one is skating in front of you slowing you down, you are both the driver of the car and the skater. If you then encounter a woman whose pickup truck is broken down, you are both the truck and the woman seeking help.

The Hebrew and the Christians have worked with dream interpretation for many thousand of years, so it is no surprise that they are much more concrete than the abstract psychoanalysts, and when I found their description I saw that they matched my experiences.

From Christian Dream Interpretation

Discerning Dreams About Yourself
At least 95% of your dreams will be about you – your inner self, your current situation, your relationships. Your dreams come from your heart and will express the things that are important to your heart.
The most common area your spirit will reveal will be your emotional, heart struggles and sanctification issues, expressed symbolically. Body and health issues are also important to your spirit, so they may be revealed, again in a symbolic way. Your relationships to other people are important to your heart, so these may be conveyed in signs and symbols. And the circumstances and events that surround your life, ministry or vocation are also important to your heart, so these may be portrayed symbolically in your dreams.

The source of the dreams

Steiner have the following, about dreams and the students relation to the higher self, From the Content of the Esoteric Classes, 10-26-’09:

Anyone who has a hidden opposition to his teacher will find that this feeling soon breaks through and adversely influences the effect of meditation. In an esoteric’s daily meditations he should keep it in mind that he’s mainly trying to get through to his higher self, and he should reflect on what this higher self is. He shouldn’t think that he’s supposed to bring something to this higher self — he should have an expectant attitude towards him and expect everything from him. Usually there are three ways in which it approaches a pupil on his path. The first way is a rather flitting one and it requires the attentiveness that an esoteric should have for all things. Namely, this is in a dream, and what happens there is what one calls a doubling of the ‘I’. For instance, one has a problem or wants to do something. Then someone appears to one in a dream who tells one what to do or who solves the problem, one who is better and cleverer than oneself. One should pay attention to such dreams.

The cleverer is what I later call the teacher. As most dreams are rather depressing, they tell where we go wrong and that we should do something to change it, it is very easy to get a somewhat strained relationship to the teacher, but the dreams are created in love to us, but the dream interface is so primitive that it can’t be done in a more gentle way.

Edgar Cayce is another well known source on dream interpretation:

Cayce reports that most dreams fall into the daily recapping and assessment category, with your higher self serving as the dream maker. In these dreams, you are given the opportunity to see how your thoughts and actions compare to your ideals – the person that you truly want to be. Study the basic theme of your dreams to discover if they reflect a theme or behavior in your life. If they are intense or recurring dreams, it may indicate an area of your life that demands your attention. Very often you will find clues to positive change right within the dreams themselves. Just remember that in most cases, your dreams are for your benefit…providing insights into ways in which you can change and grow. Understanding My Intense Dreams

And here on the three main actors in the soul of man, subconscious (astral), consciousness (I), and super consciousness (higher I):

According to Mr. Cayce, the most common influence impelling a dream is our subconscious and superconscious attempting to correlate life events and decisions to eternal, spiritual ideals. On one occasion Cayce modified the word correlation to “co-relation of subconscious and superconscious forces manifesting through the developing mind of the entity.” He frequently sought to remind us that we have three levels of consciousness, and they need to co-relate in order for us to have better integration of body, mind, and soul, each sharing in our life’s events, relationships, and decisions. Co-relating

In Job’s book (33:1-18), which is a description of “The Dark Night of the Soul” also called Metanoia, it says:

Why do you complain to him that he responds to no one’s words?
For God does speak—now one way, now another— though no one perceives it.
In a dream, in a vision of the night, when deep sleep falls on people as they slumber in their beds, he may speak in their ears and terrify them with warnings, to turn them from wrongdoing and keep them from pride, to preserve them from the pit, their lives from perishing by the sword.

It continues telling that those who don’t hear the message of the dreams becomes sick, as they don’t heed the warnings.

Jung and Steiner

If both Jung and Steiner were right, they had to have a common ground.  I don’t describe precisely what Animus and Anima are, as it’s explained better by others, but I show where they fit into the seven layer model of man, and how they fit into the model of Steiner, Aristotle and Plato. It may extend the understanding of both models.

The three Soul components:

• Orektikon, Eros, Sentient soul represents Anima for men and Animus for woman,
• Kinetikon, Logos, Intellectual soul, also called Heart and Mind soul, represents the Lower ‘I’/Persona/Ego, and
• Dianoetikon, Thumos, Consciousness soul, represents the Higher ‘I’.

The last soul component is the least developed, but we are currently working on it.

This table relates the Jung symbolism to various esoteric models, especially the model of Plato/Aristotle/Steiner:

	The Bodies of Man	Steiner Aristotle/Plato Hebrew	Age From – To Chakra	Feminine associations	Usage In Dreams
					Man	Woman
1	Physical body Malkuth	Physical Body	0 – (7) Root
2	Etheric body Yesod	Ether or Life body Threptikon	(7) – (14) Generative	Lilith	Anima	Animus
		Sentient body Aesthetikon	(14) – 21 Solar Plexus
3	Astral body Hod Kama New Age Ego
		Sentient soul Orektikon/Eros Nephesch	21 – 28 Heart	Maria Magdalene
					Lower I The Persona
4	‘I’ Netzach Nous Monad	Intellectual soul or Heart and Mind soul Kinetikon/Logos Ruach	28 – 35 Throat	Maria, Cleophas wife
		Consciousness soul or Spirit soul Dianoetikon/Thumos N’schamah	35 – 42 Brow	Virgin Sophia	Higher I The Divine Child
5	Manas Tiphareth Transformed astral body	Spirit self	42 – 49 Crown		The Teacher The Wise Man or Woman
6	Buddhi Chesed Transformed etheric body	Life spirit	49 – 56	The World Mother
7	Atma Geburah Transformed physical body	Spirit body	56 – 63

Karma and Dreams

My experience is that dreams 99,9% of the time has to do with the previous day. They are not good to tell you deep spiritual truth or intricate stories about the future, so it’s only in rare cases dreams contain other than help for your daily life.

When you go through the events of the  day, just before you sleep, you may recognize situations where you created karma, and by understanding what you did wrong, you may correct the error in the current life, instead of postponing it for future incarnations.

Dreams have a similar function, they try to instill your subconscious to evade the situation if or when it would happen again, but if you understand your dream, you can work consciously on it also, sparing yourself from many depressing experiences.

A few Examples:

If you dream that your car is broke or you can’t find the key’s, it means that you don’t do the right things.

If you jump on a trampoline it means you do a lot of work without getting anywhere.

If you are too late for the train, you didn’t take an oppurtunity which fate had set up for you.

If you start in kindergarten, you have behaved childish.

All of these dreams is a reference to the day before.

If we don’t react on the dreams, and handle the problems, the dreams may become nightmares.

I think dreams get more intense with age, as the possibility to understand and change the situation grows with maturity. You should see the dreams as messages from your Higher I telling you where you went wrong. These dreams are usually depressing as they tell you to correct things, but if you do well, you may get a dream in between where you fly on a private jet, move up to a higher class in school, even a chaste kiss for particularly good work in a complicated situation, and so on, showing progress.

Dream Symbols and interpretation

Anima/Animus

Anima/Animus represents the base unconscious Feelings and the Ether body, and are female actors in mens dreams and male actors in women’s dreams, for example your husband/wife, friends, colleagues, classmates, old girlfriends/boyfriends, or an unknown person.

As it concerns feelings, you seldom speak with your Anima/Animus, it’s mostly some kind of action, Love or some affection, or the opposite to that, showing the state between your feminine and masculine side.

Animus/Anima can in real seldom situations represent your physical body, maybe in connection with health problems. Remember, it’s the opposite of your own gender.

A.Andrew Gonzales,www.sublimatrix.com

Ego, Persona or Lower ‘I’

The Ego, the Lower ‘I’ represents Thinking, the dreamer in the dream. One of the goals is to unify the Lower ‘I’ with the corresponding Anima/Animus, that is Feeling and Thinking. Related to the Chymical Wedding.

Shadows or False Ego’s

There can also be other actors (Shadows), playing the role of False Ego‘s . Typically friends, classmates, colleagues, or less common, typically in groups, unknown players. These persons sometimes characterize traits which tells what the dream is about, but in all circumstances it’s easier for the “dreaming facility” to use an existing person than to create a new personality.

The Shadow’s I see as debris flowing around in the unconscious mind blocking the Chakras. They are the background for the plot of the dreams.

The False Ego’s are the persona’s we set up when relating to other people to hide us behind, protect our selves, or to impress other persons. Their role in the dreams are to show that they are there and to remove them you have to recognize them. There can of course be persons in the dream which is only extras just to give the background, but then they will be out of focus, they will be difficult to remember.

A friend of mine dreamed that she was playing on a tin drum in a concentration camp, followed by many anonymous people walking in ranks. It showed that her fear for other peoples views made her entertain a lot of false ego’es to please everybody, but it was a virtual hell for her soul.

Higher ‘I’, The Divine Child

The Higher ‘I’ represents the Willing, and is usually represented by a child, or teenager in the dream. Whatever happens to the child is a result of your life. The more the child prosper the better. The goal is to become the Divine Child.

The Wise Teacher

One more role is the Teacher, which I presumes represents the Spirit self, and in dreams usually is shown as your Father, Mother, a Teacher, or Chief from life, who you have some respect for. In dreams they often come down from upstairs or leave upstairs. Can be of both sexes, but I it’s mostly of the opposite gender.

Dream Symbols

Three other symbols which are paramount in dreams are your House, various Schools, and Transport Vehicles:

In dreams the House usually represents your physical and psychical state of development. Is it clean, is it in chaos, are you building on your second or third floor, is it finished? Working on the first floor tell’s about work on the higher consciousness, and windows or a television tell’s about spiritual vision.

The schools tell a little about how it is going, are you in a kindergarten, school, High School, or the University? Do you have a table? Have you forgotten your books? And so forth.

If you are reading Donald Duck or other zines you are wasting your time with inferior reading stuff.

Big golden or old looking books is about your collected wisdom, precisely what it means depend on context. It could be related to a chakra.

In dreams transport vehicles tells about how your journey is progressing. If you are riding a bicycle you are not doing especially well. Your car can go out of gasoline, or you can’t find the keys, you may have lost your ticket for the bus,  come late for the train. If everything is going as it should, which is more seldom, you may get a first class ticket for the airplane, or the train is waiting for you at the central station, saying that you have done right and you are on the track, even that a new period is started.

Numbers

It is extremely seldom to remember numbers in dreams, as it normally have no meaning. It’s like reading a book in a dream, without remembering the text, where the reading is vital not the text. If you remember a number it’s important to write it down quickly. What the number signifies depends on the context; it could be the number of days, time of day, number of hours, a specific date, and so forth.

Names

It’s also seldom to hear Noun’s in dreams, so when you hear one, try to find out what it stands for. Names in dreams can be quite humorous, but still contain vital information.

All the time my wife have been part of my dreams she had played the role of my anima, and other woman have also played the role, depending on the archetype needed in the message of the dream. 

Anonymous dream persons

Actual people from the real world are played by anonymous players, you have to use the context to decipher the real world implication.

The times where the dream have involved my wife or other real world people, it has been played by an anonymous character.

Periods

The table show seven-year periods connected to various chakras. Each period handles a given set of problems each person have to work with, and the chakras describe these. Cycles of Seven.

Here and Now

Most dreams are rather concrete, and they accentuate specific problems from the day before, and these problems are typically waves of underlying currents, life themes, waiting to be handled.

What makes dreams difficult to understand are that we live in the middle of our problems, that we can’t overview our own situation; but our dreams can, and if we learn to interpret our dreams it will help us to understand our own situation.

Dream Interpretation and Chakras

From time to time there are dreams telling about your progress or in which areas you have problems; here some symbols and colors related to the Chakras.

The Figure are the symbol of the Chakra, hold the cursor above the symbol, a short text maybe with a word in UPPERCASE, tells what which part to look for, as an example is Muladhara’s symbol a Square. Clicking on a symbol opens a Vortex of Light description of the Chakra. The Crown chakra has no dream symbol as I am aware of.

Chakra	Color	Animal	Figure	Comments
SahasraraCrown	Purple			Moon
Ajna Third Eye Pineal	Indigo			Clairvoyance, psychic abilities, imagination, dreaming, Venus.
Vishuddha Throat	Blue	White elephant		Pressure when you are not communicating your emotions properly, Mercury.
Ahanhata Heart	Green	Birds, animals with antlers		Lack of compassion, Sun.
Manipura Navel Solar Plexus	Yellow	Sacrificial animal		Personal Power, anger or a sense of victimization, Mars.
Svadhistana Sacral Hara	Orange	Water animals		Emotional problems or sexual guilt, Jupiter.
Muladhara Root	Red	Elephant, horse, and other big and heavy animals		Earth, survival, grounding, stillness, Saturn.

Literature

Dreams

Dream Interpretation: A Biblical Understanding

Af Herman Riffel:

Many believers read the scriptural accounts of dreams and never think it could happen to them. Today, though, many are realizing that God has never ceased using dreams and visions to guide, instruct, and warn. This book will give you a biblical understanding of dreams that you never had before!

Christian Dream Interpretation:

A short but very well written text on dream interpretation.

Discerning Dreams About Yourself
At least 95% of your dreams will be about you – your inner self, your current situation, your relationships. Your dreams come from your heart and will express the things that are important to your heart.
The most common area your spirit will reveal will be your emotional, heart struggles and sanctification issues, expressed symbolically. Body and health issues are also important to your spirit, so they may be revealed, again in a symbolic way. Your relationships to other people are important to your heart, so these may be conveyed in signs and symbols. And the circumstances and events that surround your life, ministry or vocation are also important to your heart, so these may be portrayed symbolically in your
dreams.

Myths-Dreams-Symbols

based on Eric Ackroyd1 & 2 and Edward C. Whitmont.

The Individuation Process: The Shadow, Anima/Animus, Mana personalities, the higher Self.

Site directory.

A Step-By-Step Approach

This Step by Step Approach describes Dream Interpretation in a way usable with my terminology. It also has descriptions of how to combine the I Ching with Dream Interpretation:

I find that a very useful guideline for dream interpretation, especially at first, is to take everything in the dream to represent an aspect of the dreamer.

For example, if the dream involves the person travelling in a car with their uncle, then the car represents some aspect of the person’s life, and the uncle also represents a part of the person. This isn’t the only way to interpret dreams, but it’s a very good starting point, I think.

Here’s the step-by-step approach that I use.
I hope that by going through the example and then trying the exercise you’ll start to get a feel for what’s involved in trying to interpret a dream, whether it’s your own or someone else’s.

Dream Encyclopedia

Example: The House in Your Dream
…..
Each dream image holds enormous data, emotional response, and created patterns of behaviour. So in considering the house in your dream you need to remember you are in touch with a full surround databank of fantastic information about you, your past and your possibilities. You can interact with this information by exploring it in the right way. And to help with this let us look at and question some of the possibilities your dream house might hold.
…..

Contains many interesting and usable entries about the Archetypes used in dreams.

Dream Dictionary

Example with House:

Seeing a house in your dream, represents your own soul and self. Specific rooms in the house indicate a specific aspect of your psyche. In general, the attic represents your intellect, the basement represents the unconscious, etc. If the house is empty, then it indicates feelings of insecurity. If the house is shifting, then it suggests that you are going through some personal changes and changing your belief system. Dreaming that you are cleaning your house means your need to clear out your thoughts and getting rid of old ways. You are seeking self-improvement. Seeing an old, run-down house in your dream, represents your old beliefs, attitudes and how you used to think or feel. A situation in your current life may be bringing about those same old attitudes and feelings. Alternatively, the old house may symbolize your need to update you mode of thinking. Dreaming that your house is broken into, suggests that you are feeling violated. It may refer to a particular relationship or current situation in your life. Alternatively, it indicates that some unconscious material is attempting to make itself known. There are some aspects of yourself that you have denied. Dreaming of a haunted house means unfinished emotional business, related to your childhood family, dead relatives, or repressed memories and feelings. Dreaming that a house disappeared, indicates that you are not feeling grounded. You feel uprooted by a particular circumstance or relationship in your life.

This entry looks quite ok, I havent checked other entries.

Dreams and Dreaming:

From Dreams and Dreaming:

Dreams as not really nonsensical, but a lot of them are crypted somehow. Major psychologists have studied how dreams work and why they appear, and whether they occur according to patterns, and which patterns. Carl Jung, Medard Boss, Calvin Hall, Montague Ullman and others have decreed that dreams do carry meanings, but you need to understand how dreaming functions. Dreams functions on their own terms. Through the basics of dream interpretations to get a hold on many of them.

Some dreams reflect mind content that pertains to tasks and problems and other issues the mind gets deeply involved in. And parts of the jumbled “video clips” within may just present “left-overs” from days before. Dream interpretations need to be tentative, perhaps open-ended too. Consider the deep feelings and messages involved in the recurrent and most impressive dreams you have had.

Decode and interpret the flows of various icons, images, scenes, actors, happenings, concomitant feelings so as to arrive at tentative or putative postulates about what impressive dreams could mean. In such work there is help in mulling over single, outstanding ideas or episodes inside the stream or flow of a single dream. Take notes of them and learn to draw special illustrations that serve you in a log book. all of it could help, but it may be time-consuming work that had better be done for the whole life. In short, you have to learn to assess well.

Carl Gustav Jung on Dreams:

Here we come upon something of the utmost importance for the applicability of dream-analysis: the dream describes the inner situation of the dreamer, but the conscious mind denies its truth and reality, or admits it only grudgingly.

More on Carl Jung’s Archetypes.

Jungian dream interpretation: a handbook of theory and practice

Comprehensive guide to an understanding of dreams in light of the basic principles of analytical psychology. Particular attention to common motifs, the role of complexes, and the goal and purpose of dreams.

Catching the Thread:

Sufism, Dreamwork, and Jungian Psychology

By Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee, Irina Tweedie

Aristotle

In  Greek Sculpture and the Four Elements J.L.Benson references Steiner on Aristotle’s description of the soul of man:

Aristotle distinguishes in man the vegetative soul, by which he means approximately what we call ether body, then the aesthetikon or sensitive soul, which we call the sentient or astral body. Next he speaks of orektikon which corresponds to sentient soul, then comes kinetikon corresponding to the intellectual soul, and he uses the term dianoetikon for the consciousness soul.

J.L.Benson writes in Greek Color Theories and the Four Elements :

To my knowledge Steiner, working closely with concepts from Goethe’s scientific work, is the only modern thinker to give full weight to the macrocosmic aspect of the microcosmic foursome. Above the physical body (which Aristotle dealt with en passant : de An. 411a he uses the term etheric body for Aristotle’s threptikon or nutritive soul, astral or sentient body for the aesthetikon or sensitive soul and ego for nous.

Rudolf Steiner

On dreams:

One gradually notices that one’s dream life takes on a more regular character. The spiritual world flows into this at first. Meditation is the occult key for this. One should get a notebook and briefly write down characteristic dreams in the morning. Thereby, one gets practice in retaining what flows to one from higher worlds. That’s the first elementary method to later get to bringing spiritual experiences through, that is, that they break through into bright day consciousness. Dreams that are only reminiscences from daily life or that are based on heart disturbances, headaches or other bodily conditions are only of value if they’re clothed in a symbolical form, for instance if the thumping heart appears as a cooking oven, or the painful brain as a dome into which animals creep, etc. Only the symbolism is of value here and not the dream’s content. For the symbolic form is initially used by the spiritual world to introduce us to the forces of higher worlds. That’s why one must pay attention to the fine points of this symbolism. In your case — according to your capacities — it’ll also be good if you compare the dreams that you become aware of with the experiences of the next day. For your dreams may soon take on a portentous character. If this happens we’ll say some more about how this thing can be made productive for your spiritual life. Please give these indications a try and tell me how things are going in about eight days.

The Essential Nature of Man from Theosophy.

Chakras

Vortex of Light

This site offers an abbreviated introduction to the Chakra System, applications for meditation and healing using this system, and its relationship to other healing systems.

Chrystal Links

Visual appealing page on the Chakras.

Kheper.net

Contains information on a deeper Esoteric level

Paracelsus in “The Life of Paracelsus” by Franz Hartmann

“If we desire to enter into communication with the spirit of a deceased person, we may make a picture representing that person, and write his name and the questions we wish to ask him upon it, and put that picture under our head after retiring to rest; and during our sleep the deceased appears to us in our dreams and answers our questions. But the experiment must be made in a spirit of unfaltering faith, full of confidence that it will succeed, else it will fail, because it is not the picture that brings the spirit, but our faith that brings us into communication with it; and the picture is only made for the purpose of assisting the imagination, and to make it more powerful (Philosoph., v.).

Previous version of the text

The earlier version:  What are the feminine and masculine sides we all talk about? My goal was to find the relation between Jung’s vocabulary and esoteric terminology, together with hints on dream interpretation, there are written much wrong on the subject.

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Serpents of the Kundalini Fire

To continue the tale of the serpents lets look at the Kundalini Fire from India. The Kundalini system looks like the Caduceus Staff with the two Serpents around the spine: The serpents has two different colors like the two outer pillars in the Kabbalah Tree of Life, and they have the same interpretations as the Feminine and Masculine energies. Seven Lotus Flowers or Chakras, which are spiritual organs, are placed on the spine.

Macrocosmic Man

Left side of Man  is the masculine side and the right side is the feminine side, as we see the Tree of Life from the front, the macrocosmic man.

Chakras in the Tree of Life
! Face looking out of paper !

The correspondence between the Chakras (see later) and the Sephirots:

1. Sahasrara or the Crown Chakra, corresponds to Keter
2. Ajna, the Third Eye , or the Brow Chakra corresponds to Chokmah, and the back head chakra with Binah.
3. Vishuddha or the Throat Chakra corresponds to Chesed and Ta Chui, The Neck Chakra, with Gevurah.
4. Ahanhata or the Heart Chakra corresponds to Tiferet
5. Manipura or the Navel Chakra, where Hod corresponds to the Liver and Netzach corresponds to the Stomach
6. Svadhistana or the Sacral Chakra corresponds to Yesod
7. Muladhara, the base of spine, the Root Chakra, corresponds to Malkhut

From the heart and up the feminine and masculine energies are nearly in Equilibrium with the heart near the center.

5. Chesed, 6. Gevurah, 7. Chokmah, 8. Binah, 9. Daat, 10. Kether

Microcosmic Man

Rudolf Steiner describes the two sides of man as being a kind of fight between Luciferic and Ahrimanic powers, where Lucifer is the masculine power (Yang) and Ahriman is the feminine power (Yin). Both described in the literature as Serpents or Dragons. Lucifer represents The Right Pillar, and Ahriman The Left Pillar. They are on Earth seen as Evil powers, but they are necessary factors in our development, as we both need the Feminine and Masculine influence, but we need to find the balance between them. From The Balance in the World and Man, Lucifer and Ahriman:

The left part of you — your left man, as it were — is the fortification set up by Lucifer, and your right man is the fortification set up by Ahriman. And the whole art of life consists in finding the true balance between them.

See also an extended Collection of Steiner texts about Lucifer and Ahriman(pdf) . The energy flows from the left side to the right side, from the Luciferic or Masculine side to the Ahrimanic or Feminine side.

Microcosmic Man

Crossed arms or legs shortcuts the natural streams and should be avoided, except where specified in meditative practices.

From The Kingdom of God from www.adishakti.org/

“Now this Kundalini is the power which is placed in the sacrum bone, nowhere else… And imagine this bone is called sacrum; “sacrum” means “sacred. So they knew there was something in it… This is the primule, is the germinating power within us. Now this fact has been accepted for thousands of years in India and elsewhere. For in the Bible also … they talk of the Tree of Life. That is the same as this… So this is the thing that is being described in our ancient books, in all the scriptures, even in the Qur’an they are described as Ruh, R,U,H, Ruh. “Ruh” means the “cold breeze”, the “cool breeze”. The cool breeze of the Holy Ghost is described in the Bible also.

Japanese Mitsudomoe

The Mitsudomoe represents the trinity of the Shinto religion: Sky, Man, and Earth, which is the same as the three Pillars of Kabbalah: first, second and third, or Steiners Lucifer, Christ, and Ahriman, or the Hindi Rajas, Sattva, and Tamas.

Japanese Mitsudomoe

Korean Sam-Taegeuk

In Sam-taegeuk we have the same three, with red as heaven, blue as Earth, the physical world, and yellow as man.

Korean Sam-Taegeuk

In relation to Kabbalah, blue is the left pillar, yellow the center pillar, and red is the right pillar.

Bön tradition of Tibet

Bön is the oldest spiritual tradition of Tibet, and they use the same symbol as the Korean Sam-Taegeuk.

The Three Gunas

In the Aurvedic tradition the three Gunas are the three principles of the world. The “trinity”, Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva, represent the gunas, or qualities of tamas, sattva and rajas. From Brahman, Atman, Karma and Gunas

They are sattva (goodness, virtue, essence), rajas (power, passion, activity) and tamas (dullness, inertia). All earthly events, like the laws of nature, are guided by one of the three gunas or a combination thereof. There should be a balance between them for harmonious workings of the world. Disequilibria will lead to chaos, war, suffering, corruption and destruction.

The three gunas dominate People by various degrees and a way to regulate these in the body and mind is through ayurvedic cooking:

Sattvic foods :

Are fresh, juicy, light, unctuous, nourishing, sweet and tasty.
Give the necessary energy to the body without taxing it.
The foundation of higher states of consciousness.
Examples : juicy fruits, fresh vegetables that are easily digestible, fresh milk and butter, whole soaked or also sprouted beans, grains and nuts, many herbs and spices in the right combinations with other foods,…

Rajasic foods :

Are bitter, sour, salty, pungent, hot and dry.
Increase the speed and excitement of the human organism.
The foundation of motion, activity and pain.
Examples : sattvic foods that have been fried in oil or cooked too much or eaten in excess, specific foods and spices that are strongly exciting, …

Tamasic Foods :

Are dry, old, decaying, distasteful and/or unpalatable.
Consume a large amount of energy while being digested.
The foundation of ignorance, doubt, pessimism, …
Examples : foods that have been strongly processed, canned or frozen and/or are old, stale or incompatible with each other – meat, fish, eggs and liquor are especially tamasic.

Saints and seers can survive easily on sattvic foods alone. Householders that live in the world and have to keep pace with its’ changes also need rajasic energy. They ought to keep a balance between the sattvic and rajasic foods and try to avoid tamasic foods as much as possible.

Tamas is Yin or the left pillar of the Kabbalah Tree of Life, and Rajas is Yang or the right pillar, and Sattva is the equilibrium, Tao the imaginary line between Yin and Yang, the center pillar.

Hatha Yoga

The definition of Hatha Yoga, from Erin Goldman:

Yoga, as you may know, means union. Hatha is actually two words in one. Ha meaning sun and tha meaning moon. So one might say that Hatha Yoga is the union of opposites (of sun and moon). We all have “sun energy” within us. This is a masculine, active, fire energy. We also have within us “moon energy”. This is a feminine, passive, cooling energy. The practice of Hatha Yoga joins together these two opposite energies, creating a balanced individual. The combination of the words Ha and Tha in sanskrit means forceful. Thus, the practice creates a more balanced and more powerful you.

And as Ha are the masculine Sun it relates to Rajas, Yang or Lucifer and Tha the feminine Moon relates to Tamas, Yin or Ahriman, and Hatha is the equilibrium and relates to Sattva, Tao, or Christ.

Yamas and Niyamas

In Hatha yoga there are a set of moral and ethic directives, Yamas and Niyamas, that work on the area of Ha and Tha:

The Yamas

Since Yama comes from the root word ‘yam’ ‘to hold’ or ‘to rule’, yama yoga represents the behaviours that ‘control’ certain negative tendencies (the ‘animal/instinctive nature’) that occur in all human beings. These are the five ideals of:

• Ahimsa (non-violence)
• Satya (truth)
• Asteya (non-stealing, or non-cheating)
• Brahmacharya (continence, involving self-restraint and moderation in all you do)
• Aparigraha (non-coveting, including no envy, jealousy or unhealthy competitiveness).

The Niyamas

The niyamas are the general actions that are necessary if we truly want to achieve a condition of health and deep balance within ourselves. The niyamas ask us to aim for:

• Purity (Sauca)
• Contentment (Santosha)
• Ardour (Ishawar-Pranidhana)
• Discipline (Tapas)
• And study of the Self (Svadhyaya)

Yamas is rules to discipline Tha or Yin where Niyamas are rules to discipline Ha or Yang.

Ketu and Rahu

Satyam

Brhadaranyaka Upanishad 5.4.1-5.5.1:

“Clearly, that is itself, and that was just this, namely, the Satyam (the real or true) itself. ‘Brahman is the real (Satyam)’– a man who knows this immense and first-born divine being in this manner conquers these worlds. ‘Brahman is the real (Satyam)’– a man who knows this immense and first-born divine being in this manner, would he ever be conquered himself? For Brahman is simply Satyam (the real or true).

…..The gods venerated only Satyam (the real or true) , which is made up of three syllables — sa, ti, yam. Sa is one syllable, ti is another, yam is the third. The first and last syllables constitute the real, while the middle syllable is the unreal. So the unreal is trapped on both sides by the real and becomes completely united with the real. The unreal does not injure a man who knows this.”

And a slightly different explanation given in Chandogya Upanishad 8.5.4:

“Now the name of Brahman is Satyam (Real or true). This word has three syllables: sa, ti, and yam. Of these, sat is the immortal, and ti is the mortal, while the syllable yam is what joins those two together. Because the two are joined together (yam) by it, it is called yam. Anyone who knows this goes to the heavenly world every single day.”

The last can be shown in western esoteric tradition as:

Incan Tradition

In the Incan tradition they have yachay, munay, and llankey which is the same as the three Pillars of Kabbalah: right, center and left pillar, or Steiners Lucifer, Christ, and Ahriman, or the Hindi Rajas, Sattva, and Tamas:

In the Andes they recognize three ways of knowing, each associated with a different part of our physical body. I have found this distinction to be very useful in organizing my thoughts about what the Andean culture has to offer and how it differs from our own. One way of knowing is through the yachay, which is located in the head. The yachay is the center of the intellect. A second way of knowing is through the munay, which is located in the heart. The munay is the center of love. And a third way of knowing is through the llankay, which is located slightly below the navel. The llankay is the center of the physical body. The Andeans take the whole of who we are as a being and differentiate it into three aspects, sometimes, for they also differentiate it in other ways as well, into two aspects (the right side and left side of the body), or some other number, depending upon the context. […]  Anyway, one class of distinctions the Andeans make in our existence is between the intellect (yachay), the heart (munay), and the ability to manipulate the physical world (the llankay), we can be differentiated in other ways as well. Kenosis.

The Pentagram and the Ether Streams

Steiner describes, in “From the Contents of Esoteric Classes“, the pentagram with:

We’re always surrounded by five ether streams in the world around us on earth. They’re called earth, water, fire, air and thought ethers. These etheric streams are also active in man: earth either from the head to the right foot, from there water ether to the left hand, from there fire ether to the right hand, from there air ether to the left foot, and then thought ether back to the head. This is the occultist’s sacred pentagram, the symbol of man. Its point is directed upwards, which indicates that the spirit streams to man from the heights. The pentagram is present in many flowers and other things in nature. The sign of black magic is a pentagram with one point at the bottom, through which magicians attract bad forces from the earth and send them out of the two top horns into the environment by means of their bad will in order to use soul and nature forces for their own egotistical, evil purposes.

The cross sections of the five etheric streams and their connections with color, taste, and body regions are as follows:

Prithivi Tattwa, earth ether, square with only the corners distinct, yellow, sweet, bones and muscles;
 Apas Tattwa, water ether, crescent moon at fifth day, white, tart, digestion;
 Teja/Agni Tattwa, fire ether, equilateral triangle, red, hot, blood;
 Vaju Tattwa, air ether, circle, green, sour, nerves;
Akasha Tattwa, thought ether, two intersecting spirals — one is distinct, dark blue, bitter, lymph vessel system.

The five ether streams are called Tattwas.

And in “The Creative Cosmic Tone“

It is characteristic of it [the etheric body] that it is indeed, the architect, the creator of the physical body. Just as ice forms out of water, so does the physical body fashion itself out of the etheric body, which, like the ocean, is flooded through by many currents flowing in all directions. Among them are five main currents. When you stand with feet apart and arms outstretched, you can accurately follow the direction of these five currents. They form a pentagram. Everybody has these five currents hidden in him. The healthy etheric body appears so that these currents are, as it were, his bony framework. You must not suppose however, that everything pertaining to the etheric body is only within, because when a person moves, for instance, the currents actually go through the air. This pentagram is as mobile as a man’s physical bony framework. Thus, when the occultist speaks of the pentagram as the figure of man, it is not a matter of something that has been thought out, but rather he is speaking of it as the anatomist does of the skeleton.

Yin and Yang Meridians

Here we see the meridians of the chinese acupunkture system, with Yin as right side and Yang as left side.

The Rosicrucian Cross

The Rosicrucian Cross is the symbol for the Spiritual Stream started by Christian Rosenkreuz known under the name Rosicrucianism. The Rosicrucian Cross combines the seven Red Roses, Lotus Flowers or Chakra’s with the Cross we have seen in the Caduceus Staff or the Tree of Life of the Kabbalah. When the Roses Bloom on the cross the Chakra’s has been opened. The twelve rays are the influence of the Zodiac as the roses symbolize the planets.

In this context, the roses are Yang and the cross Yin, but together they are life, Tao or in Hindi Rajas, Tamas and Sattva.

In Steiners terminology Lucifer, Ahriman and Christ:

He who tears the roses from the black cross and has nothing left but the black cross, would fall into the clutches of Ahriman. The black cross in itself represents life when it strives to embrace inanimate matter. Also, if one were to separate the cross from the roses, keeping only the latter, one would nor find the proper thing. For the roses, separate from the cross, tend to elevate us to a life of selfish striving toward the spiritual, but not to a life in which we reveal the spirit in a material world. Not the cross alone, not the roses alone, but the roses on the cross, the cross carrying the roses: That is our proper symbol. RS

From a meditation by Steiner:

Imagine you see before you a black cross. Let this black cross be for you a symbol for the baser elements that have been cast out of man’s impulses and passions; and at the point where the beams of the cross meet, picture to yourself seven resplendent bright red roses arranged in a circle. Let these roses symbolize for you a blood that is the expression of passions and impulses that have undergone purification.

Kundalini Rising

There are three forces connected with the spine, also called Sushumna or Aaron’s rod. These are Kundalini, the serpent-fire, Ida the female force, and Pingala the male force. The Moon moves in the Ida and the Sun in the Pingala. Ida is cooling. Pingala is heating. The two serpents, around the Spine, has two different colors like the two outer pillars in the Kabbalah Tree of Life, and they have the same interpretations as the Feminine and Masculine energies. They connect Earth with the spiritual world and the spiritual world with Earth. For these to flow the Lotus Flowers, or Chakras, has to be open or running. When European esoteric talk about Initiation eastern religions talk about Kundalini Rising. The development path is described in The Eightfold Path.

Chakras

The Chakras is known all over the world and are the spiritual organs controlling our body. The Inkas in south America know five of them, and they match the Indian descriptions.

The five ñawi (eyes) are roughly equivalent to the chakras. Kulli ñawi corresponds to the third eye, Sonqo ñawi to the heart, kunka ñawi to the throat, cosco ñawi to the navel, and siki ñawi to the root chakra.

The Chinese know them and use them in their medicine. They are the base for Astrology, and most alternative medical schools. When we are born, our Astral organs contains a picture of our Karma, which through our youth are build into the Etheric organs, and the pictures are erased from the Astral body as they are imprinted in the Etheric body. Astrology tells about Karmas influence on you, through those Etheric organs. Through your life you build your new karma in your Astral body, constantly modeling the Astral organs. When the Kundalini fires, your Astral body’s Chakras are imprinted into the Ether body, and you have now made your own Etheric organs, from the Karma you have build in this life, and is now free from the tyranny of your birth chart. The Chakras relation to our spiritual bodies are shown in a table in Dream Interpretation in Esoteric Work

Yetzer ha Tob and Yetzer ha Ra

From “An Introduction to the Study of the Kabalah” by William Wynn Westcott:

In another form of symbolism the Kabalist tells us a man has two companions, or guides; one on the right, Yetzer ha Tob, to good acts, he is from the higher Sephiroth; and one on the left, Yetzer ha Ra, encouraging the appetites and passions, temptations to evil, is an agent of Samael and of The Beast.

Man is in a very unfortunate position according to the Zohar 95 b, for it is there said that the Evil Angel joins him at birth, but the Good Angel only at the age of 13 years.

Merkabah

Merkabah, also spelled Merkava, is the divine light vehicle allegedly used by ascended masters to connect with and reach those in tune with the higher realms, symbolized with the Kabbalah. “Mer” means Light, “Ka” means Spirit, and “Ba” means Body. Mer-Ka-Ba means the spirit/body with rotating fields of light, which transports energy in our spiritual bodies, our chakras are the seven lowest of these sephira.

The four Chayot angels, Man, Ox, Lion and Eagle, represent the basic archetypes that God used to create the current nature of the world, the lower 4 sephira. They also relate to the inner planets, Earth, Moon, Venus, and Mercury.

In Alchemy

In Synergetic Qabala the relation between the Gunas and Alchemical metals are described

Alchemy is not concerned exclusively with consciousness, but also seeks the subtle transformation of the body, so that the physical level is also brought into perfect equilibrium.  Thus, the alchemical metals may be considered analogous to the chakras of the yogis.  We can draw another parallel among the three major principles of alchemy and those of Yoga, which are known as the Gunas. Mercury……….Sattva Sulphur………Rajas Salt……….Tamas The quality of Mercury is vital and reflective; it equates with the spiritual principles of goodness and intelligence; Sattva guna is illuminative.  The quality of Sulphur is fiery and passionate like the principles of Rajas, which incites desire, attachment and action.  The quality of Salt is arrestive and binding, and reflects the gross inertia of matter, which is much like Tamas.  These gunas and the three alchemical substances symbolize spirit, soul and body.  Another “alchemical” way the gunas were applied concerns food: sattvic foods incline one toward meditation and the spiritual life (fruits, vegetables, nuts, and grains); rajasic foods are stimulating (i.e. spicy food); tamasic food incites the baser instincts (animal flesh). The concept of four basic elements, harmonized in a fifth, is also common to both alchemy and yoga doctrines.  The Indian elements are known as Tattvas.  They are:  Akasha (quintessence); Tejas or Agni (fire); Apas (water); Vayu (air); Prithivi (earth).  Furthermore, the preparation for the practice of both alchemy and yoga requires a moral or ethical preparation.  Both stress that evil tendencies should be overcome while positive virtues are developed.  This includes both behavior and the purification of various body centers.  The objective is not wealth, but health or wholeness. Alchemy also speaks of a “secret fire”, which is often compared to a serpent or dragon.  Here again, we find the correspondence to Kundalini, the serpent-power.  Alchemy is performed by the aid of Mercury, the illuminative principle, and the powers of the sun and moon.  Both alchemists and Tantrics practice with the essential aid, sometimes sexual, of a mystical sister, the alchemist’s soror mystica or yogi’s yogini, complement of King/Queen, Shiva-Shakti, God/Goddess joined together in the miracle marriage.  The yogic system works in three channels in the subtle body.  One equates with the sun, another with the moon.  They are called ida and pingala.  The third, or harmonizing channel, is known as sushumna, and is associated with illumination.  The twin serpents twine together and open the third way, as shown in the Cadeusus.

Paracelsus in “The life of Philippus Theophrastus Bombast of Hohenheim…” by Franz Hartmann

The Bible tells us that Man is made out of nothing ; that is to say, his spirit, the real man, is from God, who is not a thing, but the eternal reality ; but he is made into three somethings or substances,’ and these three constitute the whole of Man: they are himself, and he is they, and from them he receives all that is good or evil for him. Every state in which man can possibly enter is determined by number, measure, and weight.’ The “Three Substances” are the three forms or modes of action in which the universal primordial Will is manifesting itself throughout Nature, for all things are a Trinity in a Unity. The ” Salt” represents the principle of corporification, the astringent or contractive and solidifying quality, or, in other words, the body ; the ‘Sulphur’ represents the expansive power — the centrifugal force, in contradistinction to the centripetal motion of the first quality — it is that which “burns,” i.e., the soul or light in all things ; and the “Mercury” is the Life, i.e. that principle or form of will which manifests itself as life, or consciousness and sensation. Each of these forms of will is an individual power ;  nevertheless they are substantial, for “matter” and “force” are one, and originate from the same cause. The three substances, held together in harmonious proportions, constitute health; their disharmony constitutes disease, and their disruption death.

Steiner in Salt, Mercury, Sulphur

In olden times men did not use the abstract word think to express something that arose in the mind as a picture. When a real knower spoke about ‘thinking’ he spoke of the salt-process just described. Nor did he speak in an abstract way of the ‘will’ but of the astral forces laying hold of the airy element in man, of the sulphur-process from which the will is born. Willing was a process of concrete reality and it was said that the adjustment between the two — for they are opposite processes — was brought about by the mercury-process, by that which is fluid and yet has form, which swings to and fro from the etheric nature to the astral nature, from the fluidic to the aeriform.

Dambala and Aida Wedo – Tahiti

Body, Soul, and Spirit

In the western countries the church only work with Body and Soul, having done away with the spirit in 689. Steiner says :

 Even the concept of the threefold nature of the human organism or the human being in its entirety has in a certain respect been abolished for occidental civilization by the eighth Ecumenical Council of Constantinople in the year 869. I have often mentioned this. The dogma was then established that the Christian does not have to believe in the threefold human being but only in a twofold human being.
The belief in body, soul and spirit was tabooed, and medieval theologians and philosophers who still knew a great deal about the true facts had a hard time to circumvent this truth, for the so-called trichotomy, the “membering” of the human being into body, soul, and spirit had been declared a heresy. They were compelled to teach the duality, namely, that man consists of body and soul, and not of body, soul and spirit.

and here:

Outside the circle of spiritual science, as you know, the total nature of man is thought of as consisting of but two parts, the bodily-physical and the psychic. In the realm of recognized science it is not customary nowadays to mention the spirit. Indeed, following certain premises, the result of reverting to the threefold organization of man (body, soul and spirit), as did the catholicizing Viennese philosopher, Günther, in the nineteenth century, raised scientific misgivings and also the blacklisting, in Rome, of Günther’s interesting books. This was done because as early as 869, at the eighth Ecumenical Council at Constantinople, the Catholic Church, in contradiction to both the Old and the New Testaments, had abolished the spirit. It had guided the development of dogmatism in such a way that the organization of man was permitted to comprise body and soul only. Curiously enough, this catholic development has persisted into our present science. If we seek to ascertain from history why scientists admit only body and soul we find but one reason. In the course of time the spirit has been forgotten; the habits of thought prevalent in certain circles have lost the ability to accept the spirit along with the soul of man.

This has melted soul and spirit together to one unit giving the dualistic view with body and soul as opposites, placing the bad Ego in the body and the goodly in the soul, where the Ego should be in the equilibrium in the soul between the materialistic body and the goodly spirit, we should walk the golden middle-way between the physical and the spiritual..

Literature

I have used “The Kabbalistic Sefirot and the Chakras“, and “The Chakras” by Kheper.net, and “Chakras” by Bellabenes Astralseiten (German), in preparation of this text. The Mans inner Cosmic System looks at the organs role in the body. Steiner says that the meaning of Mercury and Venus was changed in old times, so when Steiner connect Venus with the Kidneys and Mercury with the lungs, old traditions will typically do the opposite, as in Universal Healing TAO.

Notes on Lucifer & Ahriman, The spiritual Bodies and Initiation, and The Eightfold Path. A visually inspiring page on Chakras at Chrystal Links. In “Knowledge of the Higher Worlds And Its Attainment” Rudolf Steiner goes more in depth with the Lotus Flowers or Chakras. In “The Occult Significance of the Bhagavad Gita” Steiner looks at Sattva, Rajas, and Tamas. Kundalini Shakta by Arthur Avalon (Sir John Woodroffe). In Alchemy: Salt, Mercury, Sulphur and Alchemy: The Evolution of the Mysteries by Rudolf Steiner.

Principles of Christian Dream Interpretation

This paper is quite interesting. The Jews and Christians has thousand of years experience with dream interpretation and they accepted the spiritual world as the source of the dreams which our psychoanalysts don’t, and that limit their success in dream interpretation.

Ha and tha