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BOOK OF R

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Kuiapati

E. krishnamacharya

V1SAKHAPATNAM

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REFACE

[** *”% i %

Once again there is a call from my spiritual colleagues,
Albert Sassi and Elizabeth Warnon to compose a concise
treatise on the Rituals of the Wisdom Religion. The scope
of the present work is to explain the nature and the
symbolism of the Ritualistic Key to the Wisdom. The
work deals with the sacramental value of initiations and
the changes brought upon the student thereby. One of the
main attempts of the author is to prove that the content
of the initiation rituals belonging to many religions and
orders remains the same throughout and that the common
content is expressed through many forms, symbols and
allegories throughout the centuries. The dawn of the science
of rituals is traced to the dawn of man on this earth and
this is because the dawn of man itself is the result of an
organised ritual of the unseen forces of nature ever at work.
Hence the necessity of such a branch of science is inevitable

A m

Gur

readers and there ends

: content of the book
stands responsible for z
humility the work is si
light of the human pei
ds the attempt.

perception

As soon as I rece
invited my spiritual stuc
book typed. Since the
book directly for typing.
1967 and finished on
to Mr, Albert Sassi and
compose this book. My t
Rao for the great pains

typed.

ie call to write this book 1
V. Raghava Rao to get the
vas insufficient 1 dictated the
ook was started on 15th April
)ril 1967. My thanks are due
h Warnon for inducing me to

My thanks are also due to Mr. Y.V. Raghav<
pains he took in getting my oral versioi

Waltair,

DEDICATED TO

■,*,<',• .V * "r;' • >C!v - V-A /. V * ’.' ’ ■ . V, ■•■'■T*'■'!**• « «1V- < V >'^ >"v

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1 Jv V VipT.- 'j.

The W. T. T

irust round a good friend,
heart and a nature
is soft and divine,
one with him wherever he is.

The World Teacher Trust

Rituals

Purpose

e of Symbolism in Rituals

• Operative and Speculative Rituals
. World Rituals - Classification

Vedic Rituals

Zodiacal Mysteries 24 ; 2. Planetary Rituals 25 ;
The Fire Ritual 38 ; 4. Consecration Rituals 42 ;
The Introductory and Concluding Rituals 47;
The Soma Ritual 51 ; 7. The Animal Sacrifice 56 :

(»r

ie Horse Ritual 59; 9. Man Sacrifice and all
Sacrifice 62 ; 10. The Significance of the Cremation
Rituals

Puranic Rituals

among the Puranic Rituals

Tradition of the eternal
and the Eagle 101;
Vanquishing the Serpent
Bricklaying and Building

Tantric and Agamic Rituals

between the Serpent
Tradition of Man
d) The Tradition
107.

Rituals and Mystery Compared

Concept of the Vedic Hymns

164

riontftnt an A Rnrm r.t t?.,*_ r. .

171

Science of Rituals-its purpose

There is a practical key to the theoretical
side of wisdom. Without this key the
theory remains a fine speculation. The
core of wisdom is not realised without the practical
approach. The life of man is an externalization
of the principles that are dormant in him. Man
lives mentally in the phenominal world with the
guidance of his supra-conscious planes which work
in him and guide him through his nature. This
nature includes man’s instincts, reflexes and emotions
which make up his behaviour. This plane
nature is not exposed to the individual conscious
ness of man’s mind in the majority of

thinks that

realization of what
reasoning of man

which guides him
self and the environment

stage in evolution,
with individuals as it
and races.

, But

by his own nature
respond to him
in terms
This is true as
with

understand that his
behaviour) cannot

Any amount

nature
;ily

his

Book of Ritu

branches—sciences, arts, politics, economics, soci
logy, religion etc. cannot allow him to achie
the above said step of getting at the mastery
his own nature. The whole activity of the univei
has its genuine secret within itself as an essenc
Man is also made up of the same essence. B
in between man and the universe there is one
own nature which receives impressions that a
his own and not genuine. However imperson
they may be, the impressions of man are bour
to be " the substituted secrets” of the genuine on
that exist as eternal truths in the splendour <
the creation. The subjective consciousness
substituted by the awakening of every Cosm<
through the process of creation. It is still sul
stituted by the plurality of the phenomena th:
build the universes in general and solar systen
in particular. So the substitutions in the lev
of the individual man on this earth are man
It is the duty of man (it is rather the inm
urge of man) to go higher up to the more and moi
original levels of creation by resubstituting. 7
this there is the impediment of his own natui
which works hitherto as his own protective shel

Here comes the necessity of crossing one’s ow
nature only to enter into a wider nature which serv<
as the background. Such a crossing of a sera
of natures serving as layers of veils requires ‘doinj
and not ‘knowing’ or ‘studying’. Man is doic
something always according to his own natui
and as instigated by his own nature. Such
doing is not useful for the present, purpose. Ther
is a way of doing certain things in a certai

The Science of Rituals-its purpose

manner which enables man to cross his own nature.
This presupposes a science of doing things and
that science is the “Science of Rituals”.

A ritual works as a sacrament to change and
broaden the nature of man. This science of
sacramental workings is imparted to man by the
higher nature and it is always there existing as
a branch of the impersonal wisdom of the universe.
From time to time man rises to this impersonal
level to gather a part of the ritualistic wisdom. It is
later followed and practised by a set' of people
and is gradually clothed in the various religious
allegories. Thus we find that all the major religions
of man including the most ancient (Pre-Vedic,
Vedic and early Buddhistic religions) religious
schools contain their own set of rituals and the
ritualistic sciences. A careful study of the common
essence of the rituals needs no apology because
it goes a long way in aiding man to cross his
own nature.

Whenever man works anything against his own
environment, there is the origin of evil, sin, sorrow
and suffering. By a curative process the bitter
experience one gathers makes him rectify and
enter into a more correct working. Thus gradually
man is trained to tune himself with the
workings of nature around him. In other words
his nature is gradually replaced by the nature
of his nation, race, planet and the solar system.
The more a man attunes himself to a broader
nature, the more his work is universalised or
ritualised. For this the science of rituals teaches
us to understand the activity of the creation and

Book of Ritu

try to imitate its work. When a part or the wh<
of creation is understood as a mystery in a limit
scale, it serves as a ritual and it will have a defin:
sacramental value upon him. By this we can undersl
nd the reason why the various rituals of worl
religions are in the form of dramatised versions wi
the creative forces as characters. The sun, tkemo<
and the planets show a wonderful order and precise
in their movement and behaviour. The properties
space (geometrical, numerical and physical) follow
definite order. The whole creation is a well-knit pi;
of a series of chain actions. The whole successic
contains a drama, a mystery play, which is imitate
successfully by the experienced ritualist. The chan
cters in the rituals include the planetary consciou
ness, the dawn, the dusk, the noon and the midnigl
and such like. This is because they are the builde:
of the universe and they form the primary symbo
for man to speculate in the light of his sacn
mental changes.

Symbolism rules the objective experience of
man. The whole life activity is expressed as an
allegory of the hidden cause. This cause (which is
the creative urge of the innermost consciousness) is
concealed in the created state of things around
man. Hence to a ritualist every objective pheno¬
menon of creation whether primary or secondary
will serve as a symbol concealing truth in its very
nature. The subjective truth is concealed in every
thing by its representative value and is revealed
through the activity of the living being that works
as an allegory. Thus every incident happening on
the physical plane is an allegory of truth. Historical
incidents and the cycles of evolution also seive
as the allegories of the hidden truth which is concealed
in the subjectivity of man. Every living being is
ail observer forming his own centre with its own
horizon as the circumference and the rest of the
objective world in between. This is thereason why
the symbol of the Circle with its centre located ‘0’
has become the oldest symbol of worshipping by all
ritualistic religions. In a mystic piece of architec¬
ture described in the splendour of the ever-unfol-
ding-bird (Suparna) with his centre everywhere and
circumference nowhere, we find a question and an
answer in Rig Veda. The question is “I question:
where is the centre of this creation? The answer

Book of Rituals

is : “ Here is the centre of creation ”, ‘ here *
meaning' the consciousness of a created entity.
Every created being has its own centre and its
horizon as the circumference. Here the centre and
circumference are but the two points of a compass
that are relative to one another. The fixed point
is the centre and the movable point is the circum¬
ference. It is to be remembered that these two
points are ever interchangeable. These two are
concealed under the two arms of the square (the
objective splendour of the creation which forms
the mind and matter). Hence the square concealed
in the two points of the compass, forms the star¬
ting symbol of every ritualist who enters into life
as an “Entered Apprentice”. The whole space is
an unbound subjectiviiy to itself but it is a globe
relative to an observer. The apparent dawn of
the objective universe is in fact the dawn of the
observer. Hence the dawn as a symbol is a sub¬
stituted secret whereas the dawn of the observer
is a genuine secret. Similarly the sun-rise and the
sunset exist to an observer relative to his span and
position. For this reason many rituals include the
symbolic East and West as the two guiding angels
of man (these two symbols are called Mitra-
Varuna on the cosmic plane, Aswins (Twins) on
the plane of manifestation, sunrise and sunset on
the solar plane, beginning and ending of the day
on the terrestrial plane and awakening and sleep
( birth and death ) on the anthropomorphic plane.
The whole day is taken as a pattern for a ritual.
The symbolic journey of the sun around our earth
during the diurnal motion of the earth is taken
as a path described in the pilgrimage of the evolving

The role of Symbolism in Rituals

soul. The upper half of the circle is called the
Golden Mug and the lower ha)f-the Silver Mug.
Here Golden means Solar and Silver means Lunar
which will be fully explained later. These two mugs
contain the sap of the experience of man (called
Soma Juice in the Vedas ). The sun appears to
fly from east to west while the man on earth is
travelling from west to east. Hence the quest of
man for truth is described as Isis journey from the
west in quest of light. Again the upper half of the
circle represents the illumination side of man’s
consciousness while the lower half represents the
merged-earth (the subconscious and the supra-
conscious planes of man). The upward journey
of man from west to east is symbolised to repres¬
ent the training for perfection in the known levels
while his journey from east to west along the
lower half represents his descending down into the
hidden treasures. Such are the symbols of the
ritualist in short. From this we can know that
the. symbolism of a true ritualist does not include
any man-made symbols like the script of any
language. Man made symbols are never universal
and they confine to a group of people having a
common understanding. The universal symbols form
the language of the gods to be deciphered by man.
They are the archetypes of the universal phenomena
and they give man instructions through the “universal
alphabet.’ 9 This alphabet includes number, shape,
sound, colour, smell, taste, touch and the thought
of man. All these exist as concealed properties
(Sadbyas) and are revealed to the observer ( when
they manifest as Siddhas). In both of these states
they exist as creative intelligences ( Devas). They

Book of Rituals

form the primary alphabet of the ritualist and aid
him to have the sacramental fitness to realise
himself (around himself). The linking principle
of man with his dawn and dusk forms his radius
and the diameter within his objective circle. The
relationship is then worked out in the form of his
process of realization ( which is his evolution from
atom to man), This is expressed by a numerical
ratio called ** Pi *\ Hence the ritualists worship
“ Pi ” as the universal consciousness entering into
man. It is also represented by the glyph that denotes
the two legged entity (man) bearing the wisdom on

his shoulders (*) . Like this we find that all the

ritualistic symbols of man are pre-historic and they
represent the culmination of a branch of formulated
wisdom. The story of the evolutiou of space into a
solar system and the evolution of an atom into a man
also are taken as two grand dramas or mystery
plays that are enacted by the ritualist as exquisite
pieces of rituals. Even the historical stories of a
predominant nature are visualised in the ultimate
fitness of the universal phenomena. Their place
is located in the periodical occurrences in nature
and incorporated in books called Puranas. It is
for us to get ourselves familiarised with tlie nature
of the above said symbols and many such like some
of which will be divulged through (the course of)
this book. If such books are studied in their literary
or historic aspects only, the study is.bound to be
partial and as such fails to give the full import
intended by their authors who happened to be the
great seers.

Operative & Speculative Rituals

Before we go into a detailed study of the
various rituals, let us try to understand the various
methods of classifying the rituals. The terms “opera¬
tive” and “speculative” are in vogue, among the
many modern ritualistic schools and especially of
those belonging to the Masonic Order- By “opera¬
tive rituals” they mean that the one type belongs
to the practical conducting of rituals without going
very much into the deeper study of their signi¬
ficance. This is because they are effective by
practical application irrespective of the rationalistic
approach. The sacramental value of any ritual
depends upon the proper, conducting and the
team work, and the intellectual levels of approach
has nothing t6 do with the energy produced on
the effect obtained. What is required is only a
consistent faith and a training to reach perfection
in conducting the rituals. The speculative rituals
have everything to do with the understanding of
those rituals. A student is expected to think out
and work out the symbolism of a ritual from his own
point of view and self-expression. For this reason
some of the ritualists are of opinion that there
should not be much explanation and literature dealing
with the significance. However great the speculative
theory may be, it is bound to be an understanding
2

Book of Ritual

of a single person which must necessarily b
different from that of another. The ritul bein
the same to all, every person is expected to evolv
his own approach to divulge the symbolism _ am
know the science of building and the composit
effect of the ritual that is figuratively called th
Building of the Temple. This is quite in doin
with the life of a man. Every man lives to wor
out his own path of solving the world problem
and his own problems. However, there is a positiv
need to have a speculative explanation of the variou
parts of the ritual by a more experienced brothe
for the primary guidance of the novice to becom
a- real “Entered Apprentice” in the sacraments
sense. For this, there is a piece of arcbitectur
from time to time by an experienced Director o
Ceremonies. The attempt should be only to rea<
a short passage containing simple non-technics
explanation of the mystic side, in a lucid style

■ The fact is that an entered ritualist has t
complete and perfect the operative side of an
ritual when his mind begins to ponder over th
import of the ritual. Then only the details ar
worked out in a synthetic way, a way in whic
the outline or the unity of a ritual is not lost i:
the mind of the student. Any mind cannot but reac
to any piece of work one repeatedly does in
trained manner. The training is bound to rous
the curiosity of the mind and make the mind t
enter into the concealed mystic side of what h
is conducting. This is what is exactly required an.
this is the only activity that leads the studen
from his human exterior to his divine interio

Operative & Speculative Rituals '

through the veils of his own nature growing less
and less dense and more subtle until the iridescent
veil is also pierced through.

There is a still more deeper explanation of the
terms speculative and operative and the explanation
deals with the esoteric side of- man. All ■ the
normal life activity of man which is not of a
sacramental value is called operative. It includes
the temporal and ephemeral problems of man
trying to work out his own karma- the problem
of discharging his own duties towards his parents,
wife and children, his superiors, inferiors, friends,
associates and enemies, and also his duties towards
his fellow-animals, plants and his environment. A
non-ritualist who is an ordinary man is bound to
create new waves of Karma through his instincts,
reflexes, emotions and thoughts while performing the
above said duties. At this stage if a man takes to
conduct certain rituals there will be a change in his
attitude. This change gradually replaces his idea of
burden and responsibility towards his own work by
a nobler idea of an impersonal duty. Gradually life
ceases to be a problem and begins to become active as
a mystery play. Hitherto he is said to have conducted
the operative rituals in life and henceforLh he is
entering into the speculative side ot the very same
ritual. In the former stage it was his \vork and his
Karina. In the latter stage it becomes the work and
the Krama of the family, the race, the planet, the
solar system and the cosmos. In the former stage
he had an incentive (Sankalpa or conditioned
incentive) to dp his work. In the latter stage he will
have only his sense of duty according to the already

Book .of Rituals

existing plan (Kalpa). In the former stage his mind
is engaged in the fourfold attitude of acting: his
duty, his motive, his results of wages and his happi¬
ness (termed in Sanskrit as Dharma, Artha, Kama
and Moksha, the four Purusharthas). In the latter
stage the whole activity becomes one where the
means and the end merge in the one great motive
force called the ritual of life (Yagnartha). This
is theJ intended explanation of the Masters of
Wisdom about the Operative and Speculative
aspects of the rituals. The difference is mainly that
which is marked in the stages of the student
while he undergoes the required spiritual evolution.
It deals mainly with the activity of the exter-
nalization of man’s principles to realise the principles
of the guiding Hierarchy of Mankind to meet the
needs of the planet through the gate-way of Sham-
balla. In fact, this ritualistic approach is an inevi¬
table process in the syllabus which prepares the
student to have the required fitness to receive and
co-operate with the work ol “the Avatar ol Synthe¬
sis, who is to come”.

Here it is not out of place to mention a few
words about the explanation 01 the two big columns
at tne entrance gate of the ritualistic temple. In iact,
this explanation finds a place among the externa-
lization of the zodiacal mysteries, and the phenomena
of the Hierarchy through the influence of two Great
Stars “Castor” and “Polux” which belong to the
constellation of Gemini. These two stars are the two
great Suns who are much ahead of our Solar System
in their evolution. They are among the spiritual
guides of all the beings of our Solar System. They

Operative & Speculative Rituals

govern the vocal chords of every individual and it is
the duty of the student to identify the activities of
his vocal chords with the sacred mission of the
two above said guiding srars. The function of
those stars is “to establish” the beings “in strength”
and the vocal chords of the student should be
trained to attune the self-expression (externalization
of the word) through the medium of sound (the
province of Jupiter and Uranus). This is done
by the aid of “the tongue of good report” secured
by the student. His tongue should always be of
good report. He should submit his power of judg¬
ment to the power of the Almighty. Expressing
opinions and passing judgments about others should
be vocally and mentally stopped. Then the student
is allowed to enter through the gateway (the gateway
from objectivity into the objective universe) between
the two columns. At every step caution touches
his consciousness as a prick of sword, and fear¬
lessness makes him proceed uniformly and works
as a noose to prevent the student from receding
backwards in his spiritual evolution. Of course
this aspect of the temple symbolism will be once
again touched in the Chapter dealing with the
Zodiacal Mysteries wherein some other parts of
the temple and the implements of the lilual are
explained.

Now we prpose to group the world rituals
under different headings to have a systematic
study. The first system of classification runs
thus *

1. Vedic Rituals. 2. Kabalistic or Jewish Rituals.
3. Masonic Order of Rituals. 4. Agamic Rituals.

5. The Greater Mysteries. 6. The Lesser Mysteries.

Before entering into the details of each of these
varieties the reader should remember that there
is a twofold significance to each and every ritual.
There is the cosmic and the anthropomorphic appli¬
cations intended. The details of every ritual should be
realised externally as well as internally. For example,
the animal sacrifices of Vedic, Egyptian and the
Levite Rituals are intended to conduct either extern¬
ally or internally. In the external application an
animal is brought and its physical flesh and blood
are used for the atonement. Whereas the same ritual
can be conducted with an image which is a symbol
of an animal or even the meditation upon the amimal
in all its nature. These two types of the same
ritual are called respectively the objective ritual
(Bahiryaga) and the subjective ritual (Antaryaga).
These deal with the operative and the speculative
side once again. Since man has crossed the con¬
sciousness of all the living beings on this earth

Book of Rituals

during his course of evolution his consciousness
contains the association (Vasanas) of all the animals
in his behaviour. This is the only possible explanation
of the animal behaviour of man. When man conducts
the rituals first operatively and then speculatively
he crosses the nature of the animal in him and
will have a jerk in the spiritual evolution of his own
soul. Even the human embryo undergoes all the
biological changes of his previous evolution during
the course of his ten months in the womb. The
whole drama of his previous evolution to laborious
spans of years is symbolically enacted within a
period of nine months. This instinctive memory
of the scene of the drama of his previous evolution
will be given a jerk through the sacramental value
of the animal rituals. No doubt, the subjective
application of animal rituals is definitely superior
to the objective application. But the latter is by
no means a bad practice. Thus we find the two
fold application of all the other rituals in the
life of man.

The Vedic Rituals

The subject of Vedic Rituals is so vast and
profound that we are bound to have only a bird’s
eye view that can give us the unity to approach
the detail. First let us be familiar with the essentials
of the Vedic thought. The Vedas are four in
number t 1) Rig Veda 2) Yajur Veda 3) Sama
Veda and 4) Atharvana Veda. It is said that
before the advent of the Black Age, the Veda was
one. Veda Vyasa divided it with a specfic purpose
into the four Vedas, It is for the convenience
of the disciples belonging to the Black Age or the
Rationalistic Age, as the age is different from the
fully or partially intuitional age. There was a time
when the whole of mankind was guided by the
highest type of intuition (cosmic consciousness
working through man). It is called the Golden
Age or the age of the Devas. Then there was
a partial interference by the individual intelligence
of man. Three-fourths of the wisdom was divine
or intuitional and one-fourth was human. After
a time the ratio grew half to half. These two
periods (The second and the third periods) are
respectively called the Silver and the Copper Ages.
Then the fourth age has the domination of the
human intelligence with its empirical and personal
opinions governing the three-fourths of the wisdom.
The remaining one-fourth exists as the undercurrent

The Vedic Rituals

intuition of man concealed under the ever
active waves of the various branches of knowledge
gradually losing their unity. This fourth age is
called the iron age. The magnitude of these ages
is well established in all the Puranas and discussed
enough in the Secret Doctrine of H. P. B. and the
Treatise on Cosmic Fire by A.A.B. This is the inner
meaning of the story that Veda Vyasa divided the
One Veda (Wisdom) into four Vedas (fourfold
application into four different branches of wisdom ).
Of course, there are four different volumes of the
Vedas to the ordinary student but they contain
mainly a common text with some minor differences.

The Rig Veda contains the mystic hymns as
a literary collection* The word ‘ Rik * means a ray of
light as well as an emanation of sound. Consequently
the passage describes the mystery of objectivity
(Aithereya) of the one immanent consciousness
called Cosmic Fire ( Agni). There is the description
of the churning of the fire, the birth of Xswins,
the dawn of the ignition point (Agni) of a universe
which pervades into a globe (Vishnu). Then there
is the description of the mystic globe which is
termed cake which contains the gods as numerical
potencies. Subsequently there is the description of
the origin of the brilliant and the dark beings, the
creative and the reproductive beings and the
constructive and assimilative beings incessantly at
work around an axis of the globe upon which the
potential time of the vast span is arranged in the
form of hours or divisions of the making up of
the activity of the whole universe. The axis is

Book of Ri$ua

further described as a sacrificial mitre or rod
which the cosmic man is tied to „be sacrificed in
the objective beings of the whole universe. Th(
it is described how the one consciousness (fath
consciousness) is killed by the three factors <
objectivity (space, time and consciousness) ar
how the offspring lost the presence of the fath
consciousness in the form of their, own selhexpressic
(word). Such a matchless approaches first giv<
in the Rig Veda, in Purusha Suktha. It is furth
stated that the cosmic man is the parent of tl
microcosmic man and it is the duty of the latt
to sacrifice himself (his consciousness) into tl
former. This is the origin of the Holy Trinity
all the religions. The Book further describes tl
various splendours of the dawn in all its symbol
levels of application. It also describes the kingho*
of light and the king piercing through the laye
of the body of the all devouring vastness oft
serpent (Vrithra) which is the background of darkne;
The symbolic fight and the compromise betwe<
the darker and the brighter forces are also describe
The whole book contains a key to the formula
the whole day with all its splendour. The uni
is lying dormant in the ritualistic application where
the scholarly approach to the text gives only
detached descriptions of the various phenomena
the creation; In fact the order of the mysl
passages (mantrams) is jumbled in the exotei
text of Rig Veda. The real order exists only
its ritualistic application. This order is given
the ritualistic book of that Veda which is call
Aitereya Brahmana. H. P. B. has hinted at ma
places in her work that the Brahmanas of t

The Vedic Rituals

Vedic texts contain the real key to approach the
Vedas, In fact the unity of the Veda exists in the
unity of man, and the text of the Veda is only
a literary relic of the real Veda. This literary relic
enables a man to approach the original Veda Which
is within oneself. Many of the mantrams of the Veda
end with a passage saying “ one who knows this
will be the knower of the Veda This means a
direct key that the reader contains the Veda within
himself as “ the only one copy of it now in existence ”
in the words of H. P. B.

The Yajur Veda is considered to be a text having
the ritualistic approach directly. It deals with the
various sacrifices and the paraphernalia and the
regalia thereof. The construction of the temple,
the altar and the various things including the brick
laying and the dimensions of the bricks and of
the temple are described. The process of invoking the
Cosinic Fire, invitihg Him to the: altar* and the
process of worship are given. : Various patterns of
the Fire-place are- described*; Various food * grains*
milk, curds* butter, ghee, are symbolically described
as the implements of the rituals. Various: animals
and the spirit of various professions of man (that
cause different mentalities to evolve the ego enough
to cross the social levels) are described and the
spirit of offering is glorified. Once again there is
the symbolic man-sacrifice (offering the human
consciousness as a sacrifice into the consciousness
of purusha ( the cosmic man) is described. Hence
we get the Purusha Suktha in this Veda also. A
discussion of the rationale of the various implements
belongings to various rituals is found in a highly

Book of Ritui

interesting manner in a book Sathapatha Brahmai
which forms the speculative side of these operati
rituals of Yajur Veda. Another significant poi
is that the Rig Vedic hymns are all composed
various metres and those metres are glorified ai
the symbolism divulged in the various passages
the Yajur Veda. The mantrams of Yajur Vei
inclulde both of the metrical hymns and of sot
prose. Various metres and the scanning of syllabi
in the Vedic literature is itself a profound ai
sublime aspect. It deals symbolically with the vario
divisions of time and space of the universe. F
example the Gayatri metre (the greatest of all t
vedic metres) contains twenty four ( 24) syllabi
which represent “ the twenty four inch scale ” of t
Masonic Rituals. It denotes the 24 hours of t
day and the 2.4 lunations (12 Full moons and
New moons) of the year and the distribution
man’s work into these divisions. Another ex ami
is the five syllabled metre called Pankthi, It rituali;
man into the activity of “ the five pointed star ”
This ritual opens the five gateways of ma
consciousness between the five sense organs of m
(Sight, Hearing, Smell, Taste and Touch), and i
five states of physical matter in the universe arou
(solid, liquid, light, ether and space). This
allegorised in the Upanisliad as the Revelation
“ Five Great Collections It is further allegori*
by Veda Vyasa in Maha Bharatha as the story
the five sons of the White King. Thus we f
the division of syllables in the Vedic tradition
highly significant. It is also understood that i
verse composed according to any regular me
has a peculiar musical potency that can elevate n

The Vedic Rituals

from the rationalistic to the intnitinT ftSL
through his mystic subconscious nature. The device
is further carried out in the arrangement of the
number of verses in each hymn and the number
of hymns in each book. This tradition is carefully
kept up in the composition of the Puranic literature
also. The Solar allegory Ramayana is composed
in 24000 poems according to the Gayatri Metre.
The Lunar allegory, Maha Bharatha is composed
in 18 books (3/4ths of 24 because three-fourths
of the creation lies as a concealed formula to reveal
the remaining one-fourth ). The Soly-Lunar allegory
Bhagavatha is composed in twelve books after the
12 divisions of the Zodiac and the twelve months
of the year. We, therefore, find a correlation
between the various metres of the Veda and the
splendours of the creation, especially the astronomical
and the astro-biological phenomena of the whole
universe in general and this earth in particular.

The Sama Veda is described as the Wisdom
of the Music. As Music is different from sound,
the Rig Veda deals with the origin of objectivity
as sound and light, while thp Sama Veda intuitively
gives us the origin of Music. Metre is also different
from music and hence the necessity of Sama Veda
differing from Yajur Veda. The origin of the word
from the consciousness of Man includes sound,
syllable and muse (thought before it is differentiated
from the semi-subjective experience). All the rituals
that aie described in the Rig Veda and the Yajur
Veda are reproduced in the light of the origin
and development of music in the sama Veda. The
origin of sound from the muse of man is traced

Book of Rituals

as point ( Bindu) and its creation into the objective
world (externalization ) is described as the line of
music ( Nada). This line further develops into
seven branches that are the seven musical scales
(Swaras). In fact these scales are the working
intelligences (seers) on the plane of Creation.
They exist as seven principles on the cosmic plane.
They descend as seven sound-lights during the
“ churning of the ocean They incarnate as the
seven suns (stars) of the great bear, in each cluster
of solar system. In each sun they externalize as
the seven rays for initiation. From each physical
body of a sun they emerge as the seven colours
of the spectrum. In ether they descend as the
seven musical scales. They remain hidden in
man to be revealed as the moods governed by
the music discovered by man. On the earth they
work out the cycles of the seven races of mankind.
All the potentialities of races are present in every
man to be perfected. The musical potencies serve
to govern the higher emotional side of man to
construct the proper bridge between the consciousness
of man and the wisdom of the universe. They
are, therefore, called Gandharvas, who are in no
way different from the Devas the other planes of
creation. Once again there is the application and
description of all the rituals including the zodiacal
and astro-biological mysteries in terms of music in
Sama Veda. The ritual according to Sama Veda
consists of producing the word into the required
music (Chandogana and Udgeedha). The import
of the rituals of this Veda is much discussed in
a book called Jaiminiya Brahmana. This book

The Vedic Rituals

contains many mystic charges about the above
mentioned rituals.

The Atharva Veda deals with the application
of the higher rituals to the lower (denser) planes
of man. The term Atharva means lower signifying
the lower counterpart of- the upper principles of
Creation. Man’s life in the mundane world is
unguided when untrained. He seeks persons, wealth,
power and possession for his guidance for some
time, in vain. But when he is once initiated into
the path of the ancient seers he will find a place
for himself in the ultimate fitness of things. For
all his personal requirements he discovers the
original counterparts on the impersonal levels.
This gives him a key to ritualise his lower life in
guidance by the higher principles. For his every
thought and emotion he finds a source in the
universe. For every personal requirement he finds
an impersonal solution. All the unsolved problems
of his comprehension will find a culmination in the
higher. Gradually the lower is illuminated by the
higher and sublimated, magnetised and made to
merge in the higher. These two principles, the
higher and the lower will assume the form of the
two great Gurus, Seers and Initiators (termed as
Atharva and Angiras). This is the reason why
we find mantrams fulfilling the daily needs of man in
this Veda. Engineering, medical science, priest-craft,
administration, statesmanship* politics and military
science etc. find their place in this Veda. Once again
we find the presence of the hymn addressed to
the Cosmic Man in Atharva Veda also. This
denotes the necessity of the offering of the whole

Book of Rituals

activity of the personal man to the Cosmic Man.
Life is actually ritualised in this Veda in all its
mundane aspects. The speculative ritualistic key
to this Veda is highly interesting and illuminating.
It contains the divulging of many truths in the
form of many allegories. This book is called
Gopadha Brahmana.

1. Zodiacal Mysteries

A cursory glance at the vast syllabus of the
four Vedas shows the presence and the predominance
of a set of rituals that are called the Zodiacal
mysteries. We find the rotating wheel of the zodiac
and its divisions. The two divisions of the wheel
into the day and night, the increasing and the
decreasing moon, the two half-years with increasing
and decreasing magnitude of the day etc, arc
described. The threefold division of the day as
well as the year is present. There are also the
fourfold, fivefold, sixfold, tenfold, twelvefold anc
twentyfourfold divisions of the day, year etc
The wheel is also divided into 27, 28, and 3(
divisions called “ Nakshatra division ", Elsewhere
in the Vedas it is divided further into 360 degree;
and 720 half-degrees. The various beginnings ol
the day, the lunar month and the year are giver
with their various muses. The cycles of season;
and the bigger cycles of great ages are also described
The various apparent (symbolic) journeys of the
sun and other planets along the path of the zodiac
are given as a master-key to divulge the journey o;
the soul from the stage of the atom to that o;
Man. For this reason we find in Puranas man;

The Vedic Rituals

stories of symbolic journeys. Tiie journey of Arjuna
for one year, the journey of the five sons of the
widow for twelve years in the forests and their great
journey-of-no-return directly into the heaven are all
described in an allegorical sense in the Mahabharatha.
The path of the rituals, it is said in the Vedas,
is concealed along the circumference of the wheel.
In this sense a ritual (more correctly the Cosmic
ritual) is called the great approach to the path
to be traced ( Adhwara). This is the salient reason
for the sacramental value of a sincere pilgrimage
to any holy place conducted by any person.

2. Planetary Rituals

The planetary rituals occur next in prominence
to the Zodiacal mysteries. We find the occurrence
of the Soli-Lunar set of rituals forming the prelude
of many main rituals of the four vedas. In fact
the Soli'Lunar rituals stand as the regularly prescribed
rituals of an initiate. It is said that every initiate
into the cosmic wisdom (Brahma Vidya) should
regularly perform the Soli-Lunar rituals ( Darsa-
Purnimas) for 30 years. This is because the period
of 30 years belongs to the cycle of Saturn, the
Divine Disciplinarian who is the outer guard of
the Temple of Human Fate. The Moon is the cause
of the lunations and he makes a sidereal month of
30 days whereas the Saturn completes his cycle in
30 years. The moon stimulates the seeds of individual
karma once in every month and gives repeated
cycles of experience which serve to equalise the

Book of Ritua

oddities of the lower nature of man. The sair
thing is done in a much bigger scale within 3
years by Saturn. The lessons taught by Moon t
man daily are solidified by Saturn annually. 1
this respect Saturn works as an immediate Pas
Master to Sun in ritualising the life of ma
through his pieces of architecture translated ini
the fruits of the karma of man. All the possib
experiences of man are covered completely by
cycle of Saturn and his emotions and though
are purified and stabilized and the ritualist cross*
many barriers in trying to keep up his regulari
in conducting these rituals for 30 years,

Soma - sacrifice

The Soma sacrifice comes next in prominenc
It also forms a prelude to many advanced ritua:
It is allegorically described as the ritual of drinkii
the juice from the root of the plant Soma. T1
is only an esoteric explanation of an esoteric trut
Soma is the cosmic principle which governs t
phenomena of reflection. Hence it also gover
the experience that is a reflection of the cosn
consciousness upon the life experience of a ms
Our moon, the satellite serves as the reflecti
principle of the Solar ray to our earth. Her
the moon works as a blind to the wisdom of Son
the king of cosmic phenomena. Soma also govei
the mind principle which exists even before t
formation of the brain cells in th embryo a
which arranges the forces to build the brain ce!
Soma, the king is described as governing the oces
and presiding over the construction of boats to cr<

The Vedfo Rituals

the ocean. Hence the ritual Soma Yaga is intended
to give the experience of the Soma Principle as
the sap of human life. Without this plane of
experience, all the practical magic becomes meaning¬
less. To the man on this earth, who is initiated into
higher mysteries the experience of Soma is received
through the mystic rays of the planet Neptune-
Rig Veda describes the glory of Soma in the following
words: “ Soma has his place in the bosom of these
Nakshatras (arks of the circle). When one (man)
squeezes the soma herb, he thinks he has drunk
the Soma. Whom the initiates know as Soma, no
one (except the initiate) ever tastes!” H. P. B,
has many times mentioned in her Secret Doctrine
that the Moon is only a blind to conceal the higher
principle when the sevenfold planetary scale is taken
into consideration. Such is the grand application of
the Soma sacrifice ritual in the Veda that it is
borrowed by the authors of the applied sciences of
the Vedas into the atonement rituals. For example
the health rituals of Ayurveda (medical key to Veda)
describe in detail the performance of the Soma ritual
by using the juice of the Plant Soma ( Ephidro
Vulgaris) to prolong the lease of life. Sage Bharadwaja
is said to have performed a prolonged penance to
realise the king of devas in this plant and through
his grace he secured an immeasurable span of life
enough to conduct researches in the line of the
medical key to wisdom. For many such reasons
the Soma ritual gained much prominence among
the common prelude rituals of the higher mysteries.

As we go through the texts of the four Vedas
and the corresponding Brahmanas we are made to
understand that all the four Vedas have the ritual

Book of Rituals

as the main object. The subject matter of these
Vedas bears definitely a secondary importance to the
meaning part of the wisdom. This is because the
object of the Vedic Seers is the realization and
the becoming of a man and not his acquiring a
scholarly hold over the various branches. The import
of the Vedas is secondary in importance to the
performance of the Vedic Rituals, Thus all the
four Vedas have their ideal in the Ritual. A true
student will understand that the ritual existed long
before the present edited versions of the Vedas.
The tradition of the Ritual is far more ancient than
the text of the Vedas. Ritual made its appearance
with the beginning of the creation and man came
out of the ritual of the cosmic, solar and planetary
forces. For this reason it is proper to say that
the ritualistic Veda preexists the present round of
humanity and there are repeated attempts of man
to develop a literature about it. The present version
of the Vedas is but one of the many such attempts.
This version forms but part of the Veda which
always exists in the Ritual of the Gods. It is
said “ the gods conducted the ritual (in due and
ancient form) according to the formula of the
ritual (which exists beyond any creation eternally
to reveal the creation periodically) and those laws
(properties) of the ritual ever exist as the set ol
the first laws ” in Purusha Suktha. The orientalists
may try to prove philologically that the Rig
Veda is the oldest. It only means that the
present Rig Veda version may be the oldest ol
the four present Vedic versions. This exoteric
study of chronology can never solve the sequential
problems of the essential spirit of the Veda. Jusi

The Vedic Rituals

as there is germination and fertilization before the
existence of the text book of biology and just as
there is the social spirit existing in man before
the science of sociology, so also the ritual exists
before the Vedic texts of any cycle. This clearly
proves the esoteric truth that Yajur Veda
( Ritualistic Wisdom ) had existed before the Vedic
Texts come into existence. The unity of man exists as
a synthesis within and around himself before he can
systematize his knowledge about it This is the
rationale of the theory of the impersonal nature
of Veda without any author. The various persons
who attempted (individually and collectively through
a group contact with the creational heirarchies)
to get at the already existing unity into the various
mantrams have designated themselves as seers and
not authors of the hymns. Even then they did
not give them under their personal names as proper
nouns. They attributed the seerhood to a higher
and impersonal principle in themselves and the
name of this principle is given as the seer of each
mantram. Vasistha, Viswamitra, Kanva, Praskanva,
Medathidhi, Dirghatamas, Hiranyasthupa and the
like are the names of the seers of various mantrams.
These names signify certain cyclic phenomena in
nature or in man or in both. This is further proved
by the fact that at many places these numbers are
used not only in singular but also in plural numbers
like Vasisthas, Kanvas etc. Of course, the orientalists
tried to interpret this plurality to mean the leniage
of each original seer. This is one of the aspects to
be taken into consideration before we can correctly
understand the tradition of the Vedas. Each sound,
each syllable, each metre and each hymn is said to

Book of Rituals

have a seer by some name who is in some pleaces
the presiding deity himself. There are also hymns
that invoke the reader himself as the seer or the
deity of the Mantra. Gayatri, the greatest of all
the mantrams of the four Vedas invokes the presence
:>f that deity in man, who stirs up the intellect into
:he actions of man.

Incidentally it should be mentioned that the
jrocess of invocation forms the main content of the
itual. If man is not invoked into the role of the seer
>r deity he cannot enter into the spirit of the ritual,
n its workings the ritual is a mystery play or a
Irama to be enacted by men as actors who play
he role of the creative lights. This is after the
ashion of the various gods enacting the role of
he deity of omnipresence, during the workings of
ne creation. The whole creation is properly under-
tood as a mystery play enacted by the God. Just
s the script of a drama exists long before the
ctors enact it, so also the ritual of creation exists
efore the ritualists (whether Gods or men ) take
p the play. For this reason the process of invoca-
on should be mastered. Every one can invoke the
resence of any god of any plane in himself provided
3 can sacrifice his memory about himself during
ie time of the ritual. The science of invocation
itself an extensive subject in the Vedic studies. In
aglish it was well introduced by A. A. B. A
tionalistic belief in the existence of the subtler
rces at work, a well cultivated social temperament
entertain those intelligences and invite them into
mself and a good amount of conscious self-
nfidence about one’s own uprightness and equality

The Vedic Rituals

of behaviour should be present and further they
should be synthesized and crowned by an uncondi¬
tional hope and confidence-are the necessary
requirements to produce the phenomena of invoking
a presence. All these aspects are existing in every
ordinary man but they are ill-arranged, haphazard
and miscellaneous- Lack of synthesis makes them
serve no significant purpose on the impersonal levels.
By being allowed into the performance of a ritual
after achieving a spirit of surrender, a novice can
get the ability to invoke through a regular atten¬
dance to the ritual. The process is similar to that
of an iron rod being magnatized. Thus the true
spirit of prayer should be understood and the process
of invocation familiarized before one becomes a
good ritualist. Attaining mechanical perfection in
conducting the various parts of the ritual is the
fundamental requisite of the student. The various
implements and their handling should be mastered.
His mundane activity should become less prominent
than his ritualistic activity in his mind. Then he
begins to realise the ease of getting things done.
Hitherto he was toiling with his work due to his
own limitations of Karma. Henceforth he ceases to
do the things to discover that things are done
through him. Mundane activity ceases to exist to
him and his things are looked after automatically
by the higher intelligences. This holds good as long
as he keeps the spirit of submission. Such an attitude
is described as devotion and self-surrender by the
subsequent spiritual authors but the realization is
always linked up with the conducting of rituals.

With these introductory remarks about the
preparation for a ritual we propose to enter into the

Book of Rituals

practical side of the leading vedic rituals. According
to the intention and utility of the ritualist many
of the rituals are classified into various types like
atonements, correctives, and achievements (occult
and mundane ) etc. We are not concerned with the
study of the rituals according to this classification
because it is relatively unimportant- Widely speak¬
ing there are two different injunctions to the two
types of ritualists ( utilitarian and sacrificial). The
one is “ one who wants to achieve enjoyment and
fulfilment should conduct rituals. ” The other is
“ the candidate of a second birth (spiritual birth)
should conduct rituals for nothing (for no end )”.
Lord Krishna clarifies the statements further in the
Bhagavad Gita like this “ Those who conduct rituals
to fulfil desires are the dabblers in the workings
of the various rituals and are motivated- .For those
who aim at the highest poise (yoga), his work
( of the rituals) serves as a stimulating cause. ” The
same work of the ritual serves to keep the adept in
his own level and prevents a fall. Hence the two
injunctions will classify all the rituals according to
the aim and intention of the ritualist. Nothing
more is necessary about the classification according
to the requirements.

The commentaries on the Vedic rituals devide
the whole activity of man mainly under two
headings, one the worldly and the other, the spiritual.
The first is non-ritualistic (unrealised) action of
man ; the second is the ritualistic (sanctified) activity
of man. Then the ritualistic activity comes under
three headings; 1) Offering the whole activity to
a deity or the highest deity of omnipresence.
This is called Yaga. 2) Offering something to the

The Vedic Rituals

creative or reproductive gods through the vehicle
of fire or water is the second type. This is called
Homa and Tarpana, and 3) giving up the right
of something in favour of a person or persons in
a spirit of sacrifice considering the persons as
the living forms of the deity of the ritual. This
is called Dana. These three types of offerings when
conducted with a co-operative and well meant attitude
will purify the environment as well as the inner
nature of the ritualist so that the place and the
mind of the ritualist form a congenial harbour for
the invisihle intelligences to lodge and work out
the building of the ritualistic temple on the higher
planes and thereby bring down the fulfilment of
the whole ritual. The creative forces are invoked
through fire; the reproductory, the vegetative and
the germinative forces are invoked through water.
The consciousness of the cosmic man himself as
the intended deity of the sacrifice is invoked by the
offering to human beings. Satiating the hunger and
thirst of any living being that is mentally attracted
to the 1 place of the ritual, is absolutely necessary to
touch the love aspect of the deity and hence ] there
is ho sacrifice without an offering of food; blothirtg
and money among the whole of the Vedic rituals.

Another division of the Vedic rituals into two
classes according to the intention of the ritualist
is as follows : 1) a ritual conducted fo i the
fulfilment of the sacrifice, 2) a ritual conducted
to accomplish things desired by the ritualist. ■ In
the first case the performance of the rituals becomes
an unavoidable duty of the initiate. In the second

Book of Rituals

case the performance is optional and is based upon
the type of attainment aimed at by the initiate.
Always the first of the two categories is considered
as the first part to lead one to liberation and
unconditional bliss ( Swarga) by the wise men of
the old. In the second category the performance
binds the ritualist to the result and unavoidably
leads him to pain or pleasure.

According to the nature of the rituals there is
another division in the regu'ar and the optional
groups of rituals. The regular rituals form part
of the daily routine of the initiate as will be
explained later in detail. The initiation ritual, the
two twilight-rituals of the daily routine, prayers
and the worship of fire form part of the regular
ox compulsory type of rituals. The grand Vedic
sacrificial rites like the horse sacrifice and the
Soma sacrifice are considerd to be the optional
or occasional sacrifices conducted by. the ritualist
with the aid of the congregation of fellow ritua¬
lists. They may be conducted to achieve an intended
result or merely as a part of their life mission, as
is previously explained. (Even the performance of
any such ritual to achieve a result is not considered
as something bad or unimportant as long as the
result remains universal and not individual in its
end. For example, the ritual of Varuna conducted
for the specific purpose of getting rains is by no
means of a secondary nature since the result is
not individual).

There is still another division of all the Vedic
rituals according to the nature and scope of each
ritual into the following four classes: 1. Thearchetypal

The Vedic Rituals

rituals, which imitate the phenomena of the creation.
The twilight rituals and the fire kindling (kindling
the three fires that correspond with the dawn, the
dusk and the noon ) etc. come under this category.
2. The archetypal group of rituals which recur at
longer intervals. The kindling of the monthly fire
is an example of this group. 3. The mixed type
is that which partakes the nature of the two types
mentioned above. For example the occasional ritual
conducted to invoke the double deity Agni-Soma
comes under this division. It resembles the New
Moon and the Full Moon sacrifice in its frame.
Since New Moon and Full Moon are the monthly
phenomena in nature, the ritual is conducted after
the fashion of archetypal. Yet this monthly fire
ritual differs from the Soli-Lunar ritual of the Full
Moon and the New Moon and part of it takes the
pattern of another annual ritual (Savaneeya). Hence
it is of a mixed type. 4; There are independent and
miscellaneous rituals that do not come under any
one of the above three headings. For example the
fire offering with laddies which symbolises the earning
of the daily wages and their proper distribution 1 in
the life of the ritualist ( both in the operative and
speculative sense) comes under this heading.

All the types of divisions explain the nature and
purview of the province of the Vedic rituals. Subse¬
quently there is another grand division fo all the
rituals of the world by the Masters of Wisdom
through the course of the Kali Age. The initiation
rituals are separated from all the other types of
rituals and various schools of the temple initiation
were established to form the various orders of

Book of Rituals

rituals. More correctly all the world rituals are
renovated and given with a new light of application*
From that time onwards the main purpose of the
esoteric temple rituals is only initiation into the
comparatively higher degrees of realisation. Initiating
man into the ever expanding layers of conscious¬
ness through planetary, solar and cosmic gateways
has ^become the main object of the world rituals.
Gradually the secondary forms and motives of the
application of the world rituals will fade into
insignificance and only the path of initiation will gain
prominence. This is the true renovation of the most
ancient form of the rituals of mankind. This is also the
reason why the majority of the Vedic rituals are
congregational in their nature and more freely
accessible for the public to attend than the rituals of
the medieval ages. Welfare of the whole creation in
general and the mankind in particular, seems to be
the sole object and benediction of the Vedic rituals.
The spiritual consciousness or light produced as
a result of any Vedic ritual is meant to be distributed
among those who attended and also among those
who could not attend. The welfare that is meant by
the ritualist is in its highest form, the invocation
of God consciousness in every living being on this
earth. Thus there is a higher and more sublime
concept to every Vedic ritual and this concept
unified all the rituals into the One Ritual, i. e.
the initiation of man into the human and solar
mysteries. This sublime aspect is stressed by the
Masters of Wisdom. The attempt of Veda Vyasa to
rearrange the code of rituals into the present Vedic
and Puranic lore proves the work of these Masters
in the line. Lord Krishna revealed and discussed

The Vedic Rituals

this renovation and unification of the ritualistic
wisdom in Bhagavad Gita. The Bhagavatha Purana
contains stories of Maitreya initiating disciples like
Vidura into the new set up. Of course there is a
simultaneous existence of the lower type of the
application of various rituals in various religions
in the centuries after the advent of Kali Yuga,
but none of these secondary applications could
survive to stand the test of time. Only one school
stands unchanged and it is the school of the initiation
of man through ritualising his life. Through the
medieval ages we find the various esoteric temples of
initiation under the name of various ritualistic orders
maintaining the same theme and purpose. In the
modern age there is again an attempt for the
re-unification of the various ritualistic orders and
such a one is found in the example of the Trans-
Himalayan festivals and rituals that are being
conducted by the direct and indirect disciples of
the Masters. The Vaisakh festival, the Ashadi
festival and other Pull Moon Festival rituals and
the initiations conducted under the guidance of the
various inner spiritual heads are the. good examples
of the new approach. Mr, Leadbeater describes
the details of a few such rituals which aid initiation
and soul contact in his books named MASTERS
AND THE PATH and HIDDEN LIFE IN FREE¬
MASONRY. Some more examples of the still
modern-aged versions of these rituals can be seen as
detached conversations, and the graphic descriptions
in the Volumes of Alice A. Bailey dealing with the
Rays and Initiations. The attempt in framing the
modernised versions of the ancient most rituals
is to remove the non-essentials that have accumulated

Book of Rituals

as crusts around the standardised ritualistic truths
of the ancients. The second half of the twentieth
century is exactly the period during which all
the ancient mysteries will be modernised, renovated
and conducted at first under various names and
finally under the name of a single ritualistic order.
Some of these future versions of the rituals are
already prepared and only a few specimens are given
out. Even those that are given out exist in manu¬
scripts though they are being conducted in some
initiation temples. One such ritual (really classed
among the grandest of rituals) is given as an
example of the future versions of the ancient my¬
steries at the end of this book and it is the
MYSTERY PLAY OF ST. MARK.

3. The Fire Ritual :

This forms the starting point almost of all the
Vedic rituals. Invoking the fire and gathering the
fire are the two main aspects of this ritual. We know
fire only as a phenomenon of fire. The process of
ignition, combustion and emiting light and heat are
ever mystical in their nature^ Thousand sciences
may explain the phenomena but the existence of
fire before any phenomena is always a mystery. It
is highly symbolical and bestows a fund of revela¬
tion to the one who ponders over the aspects of the
externalisation of the flame. Kindling the fire and
the utterance of the word are the two grand similies
used to depict the objectivity of creation in the
Vedas. The fire sacrifice usually begins with the
ritual of consecration. Two phenomena of fire
ignition and pervasion are symbolised and formula-

The Vedic Rituals

ted. The two are respectively presided over by two
deities called Agni and Vishnu. The first is the
beginning .and the second is the culmination of the
creation of the deity. It is said that all the other
deities are Agni and at the same time Vishnu. This
means that every pheomena is preceded by ignition
(the emergence of the point or the centre of the
circle ). It is followed by the pervasion (the circum¬
ference of the circle in one plane and the globe in all
planes). This globe is called the offering which is
prepared upon 11 counterparts. This means that
the point is the first number of creation (Number
One )* the circumference is a Zero which completes
the number Ten as the units of creation. In the
meanwhile there are nine numbers that evolve and
work as the creative potencies. That is why the
cosmic man is said to have stood upon ten digits.
The puranic terminology describes the workings of
the other nine numerical potencies as the nine
creators of the creation.

A few words of explanation are required about
the concept of numbers that belonged to the ancients.
The seers posit that numbers are creative potencies
or intelligences that exist in eternity as seeds of
creation. They evolve into the workers of the
creation. These numbers of the decimal system are
not man made. They exist as cosmic thought-forms
in space and the living being contains their
counterparts as seeds to be germinated into the
intelligence of the individual.

The above said 11 units of the formative globe
of one creation are further grouped into two groups
of three and eight. On the geometrical plane the

Book of Rituals

globe evolves the threefold activity of the universe.
The symbologists represent this as the equilateral
triangle within the circle. © This means that the
creation is made manifest on three different planes
mainly. There are three levels of the utterance of
sounds in the vedic musical scales. Also the content
of the whole globe of creation is mainly divided into
three groups, the material, the ethereal (astral and
etheric) and ideational. Each of these contains
eight sub-divisions (the seven planes and the parent
spirit). The whole phenomena is described as a
versification into three lines of eight syllables each.
This is the mystic scanning of the Gayatri metre
which contains 24 syllables divided into 3 equal
parts of eight syllables each. Vishnu, the Lord of
Pervasion, is said to pervade the whole in three
strides. In the puranic allegories he is described to
have started his Avatar as a dwarf who grew up
and pervaded the earth (material universe), the
heaven ( causal universe ) and the realms in between.
The story of Vamana contains this whole symbolism.
Space, time and mind form one example of the
three strides. Past, present and futre in time form
another example. Length, breadth and thickness
in space form another example. The conscious,
the sub-conscious and tbe supra-conscious mind
forms a third example.

The ritualist prepares a globe of the flour of
corn with ghee and offers it to fire in the sacrifice.
Ghee symbolises the reproductive activity (female
force because ghee is got from the female animal)
and rice grain represen is the creative activity ( male
principle because the seed represents germination).

The Vedic Rituals

Such an offering to fire with the above said specula¬
tive architecture of the ritual is considered to be the
beginning of the full moon and new moon ritual. This
is because the sun and the moon represent the creative
and the reflective principles on the solar plane while
they represent the creation and reproduction on the
planetary plane. They are the father and mother
principles in creation. Astrology also teaches us
that the sun represents the father and the moon
represents the mother in the horoscope. In the
individual the sun represetns the spirit of man
and the moon represents the soul of man. Ou
a lower plane the sun represents the consciousness
of man (the ‘I AM’ in man) and the moon
represents its reflection which is the thought of
man. The earth represents the physical sheaths
of man. Every lunar month, the moon-principle
describes various apparent angles with the sun while
reflecting the ray as the^oondight.of the sixteen
phases. All these phases control,the tides of ocean, the
etheric currents that keep; up the earth’s magnetism,
the liquid content of the various physical bodies
and also the mental activity of the beings. Thus
we see that the ghee and rice grains have a pro¬
found symbolism representing the creative and
reproductory principles that guide the whole creation.

Then the activity of the ritual extends into
seventeen items. The evolution of the formula of
Yajna (that is concealed in one year as the
specimen ) is into twelve months (.corresponding
with the twelve signs of the zodiac ) and five
seasons (corresponding to the division of the year

Book of Rituals

into the formula of the five pointed star). Thus
the time aspect of creation is scanned into the
formula of one year and the personality of the
year is called the first great patriarch (prajapathi).
The terms patriarch and prajapatbi mean the
Father-king. Time as the year is the father as
well as the ruler of this creation. A sublime concept
of time indeed! Here the ritualist invokes the
prajapathi in seventeen stanzas called the kindling
verses.

There is an allegory about the year God. The
ritual once deserted the Gods. Again the Gods
sought to bring it out and they brought it through
their offerings. This means that the whole globe
which manifests the rotation into the formula of
the year merges into dissolution periodically. Then
the Gods who formed the counterparts of
the year existed as principles though withdrawn into
seeming nothingness. They existed as seeds. They
once again offered themselves as parts of the whole
when the year once again externalised itself into
the form of the globe. This whole process is
allegorised into the story of the emergence of the
egg that contained Prajapathi (the patriarch) after
the previous merging. This proves that the whole
creation ever exists eternally though it undergoes
evolution and involution periodically.

4. Consecration Rituals

The actual beginning of the consecration ritual
is highly interesring. It is exactly an imitation of
the birth of man from the mother’s ,womb. This
bestows the sacramental value of the rebirth. The

The Vedic Rituals

person who wants to be consecrated into the
discipline of this ritual is asked tb lie down in the
posture of the baby in the womb. Water is sprinkled
upon him and this represents the sprinkling of the
seed in the mother’s womb. The water represents
the seed of the father. Then the ritualist is called
“ possessed of seed ”, He fs then annotated with
fresh butter and is considered to have been consecrated
to God. His eyes are anointed and this act represents
the descending of light to the eyes of the embryo. It
means light-consciousness has entered the man in the
womb to serve as his physical and spiritual sight. He
is then purified With 21 handfuls of dharba grass. This
represents the construction of the body of purusha
(the embryonic man in the manner of the cosmic man)
with 21 sticks of fuel in seven layers. “ Seven are
the layers and three times seven are the sticks
of fuel for the Purusha”, says the MantJrain
in Purusha Suktba. Then he is conducted to the
hut of the consecration. This represents his
abode in the Womb, whereih he enacts die drama
bf bis individual evblutibnas an embryo. In
and from a firm womb he lives and mbves, Sun
should hot enter? the hut except through a passage
in the east. Nor does he come out into the sun
unlil the ceremony is completed. This also represents
the slumbering state of consciousness in the
subluminary caves of his preparation ih evolution.
He is covered with a ganhent and above that he
is again covered with the skin of the antelope.
The garrhent represents “the coat of skin” that
is given to him by God ih the Womb. The skin
of the antelope represents the placenta. He lies
there with closed hands because it is th6 very

Book of Rituals

posture of the babe in the womb. Also, it is the
passgrip representing his reception of the polar
and tbe lateral consciousnesses. Through this
passgrip he is Allowed to come out of the mother's
womb by the Gods who initiate him into the
path ”, The skin of the antelope is torn and he
is taken out. This represents the breaking of the
placenta and the child coming out into the world.
He is made to lie with his head to the east and the
hands and legs folded into his trunk. From that
posture he is made to rise gradually, through a
symbolic time of six hours. The head in the east
is highly symbolic. When a man is born on this
earth his head represents his east. The east is the
symbol of the dawn of man. It marks the ascendant
of an individual in the horoscope. Astrology also
leaches us that the sign and the planets on the
ascendant govern the head of a subject. The twelve .
sings therefore govern the whole body from head
to foot ip twelve divisions. When a man is made to
lie on his back with his head to the east and closed
his hands and legs into the trunk, then the whole
globe of space aiound him serves as the egg in the
mother's womb in its spiiitual sense, it is
actualjy the case in the physical seise when a
child is physically lying in the mother’s womb.
The egg in the mother’s womb contains all the
potentialities of the ,36v>° of the zodiac with the
geometrical centre lying in the heart of the embryonic
man. The stalk of the egg represents the eastern
horizon because the head is located there in the first
stages. Here the whole of the ritual of consecration
bestows upon the ritualist the sacramental value
of the second birth (the spiritual birth of the

The Vedic Rituals

consciousness which is different from rebirth ). Since
this part of the ritual is dramatic in its nature and
it contains the imitation of the corresponding
phenomena in nature it belongs to the category of
the mystery plays. After this ritual the person is
called Devarata which means that he is given away
to and brought up by the Gods. In the mystery
temples of the various schools of east and west,
both modern and ancient we find such a type of
ritual by many names since the mystery temple
of nature conducts this during its workings of
bringing out an individual from the universe. The
symbolic time of six hours represents the period of
six hours from sun rise (the birth of the solar god
as the child ) to noon. During this time the apparent
sun (the individual) is observed to travel from
east to the midheavens. Relatively the individual
is made to change his position from horizontal
(level) to the vertical (plumb). Thus he describes
a right angle which is the corner of a square through
the changing position of his head. The square
forms the fourth part of the circle around him. In
evolution this represents the journey of the soul
from the horizontal to the vertical levels. Horizontal
level is the level of the vertebral column of an
animal while vertical level is the level of the
vertebral column of man. The evolution of man
from the stage of an animal comprises the fourth
part of his evolution from the stage of an atom to
that of a man (through the inorganic, plant, animal
and human stages).

Then follows the ceremony of the installing
fire and protecting it to survive throughout the
ritual. Here the fire represents the inner conscious-

Book of Rijtuals

iess of man which is brought out from the
ubjective to the objective stages. Fire is secured
>y a processof churning two pieces of wood that
re carved out and arranged into a position of the
all and the socket (the container and the
ontained). The container represents space and the
ontained represents time. Life is churned out of
ais mystic implement of the ritual. Lingam which
the subsequent development of the idea of this
nplement is worshipped in all the temples
msecrated to Siva. The fire that is churned out
fthis implement and secured into proper fuel is
itablished first at one place “in the east, then in
le west and then in the south.” This is after
ie formation of the day with its east and west
arked by the first ray of sun and then the
eridian which is approached by the sun. These three
*es correspond with the invocations of the morning,
ening and noon. In the lighting ceremony of
e rituals of various schools we find the same order
llowed till today. The fire on the altar in the
st is first worshipped by many offerings containing
;h food grains, butter and ghee. Various herbs
3 also present in the offering and the herbs are
ose that are capable of producting medicinal
ects, to elevate the consciousness of man.
bsequently there is a main altar in the centre of
3 ritualistic field in some schools of the rituals.
iis represents the light in the centre of the temple
illuminate the very sacred lore that is concealed
the heart of the man (love). Thus comes to an
I the consecration ritual. Then follows the
roductory ritual for the main ritual of fire
'ocation.

Vedic Rituals 47

Hie Introductory and concluding rituals :

The introductory and the concluding rituals
3 sent the exhalation and the inhalation of the
ion. Astronomically they correspond with the
rise and the sun set- In the,text it is given that
introductory ritual causes an advance ( of the
god) to the heaven. The goddess Adithi
tnordia! Deep) comes to prominence here,
hi is the mother of gods and she begins to
eive and deliver the gods beginning with the
god. This represents the poise of breath which
s before, within and after the exhalation and
ation. Astronomically it represents the back-
□d of the day which exists before, within and
the sun rise and the sunset.

The sunrise, noon and sunset form the three
;rs or cardinal points of the day and with
midnight (the womb of Adithi) there are
four comers plotted. They stand as the four
:s of the cross within the circle described by
pparent sun during the day. In another plane
four points are located at the sunrise, the
;t, the north pole and the south pole relative
le vertical position of man standing on the
ce of the earth. They form the east, west,
i and south. They exist only to an individual
ng on the earth. They form the horizontal
of man. The horizontal cross within the circle
le horizon around man, when juxtaposed are
sd at the centre along with the vertical cross
e four points of the day gives the six points
id man (the east, south, west, north, above
below). This gives the six armed ritualistic

Book of Rituals

symbol which is called Shanmukha in the later
symbolism. When the four corners of the horizontal
cross are linked up there is the horizonral square
containing the cross and fixed in the horizontal
circle. When these four points are linked up with
the upper point of verticality which denotes the
midheaven (high twelve) there is the figure of

the pyramid q. Each side of the pyramid is a

triangle and the base is a square. Numerically the
triangle represents three (sides) and the square
represents four. These two numerical potencies 4
and 3, when added give 7 the number of rays.
When multiplied (4x3) they give the number 12
which is the number of the months in a solar year
(the signs of the zodiac). The same esoteric
significance is denoted by the pyramid symbolism
of the Egyptian rituals. Every esoteric student
knows that the Egyptians used the pyramid to
initiate the student into the mysteries of the solar
year with the Sun as King and the Moon as Queen.

Another Pyramid is formed when the four points
of the same square are linked up with the lower
pole of verticality (below which represents the
mid-night sun or the way to hidden treasures). The
candidate is expected to dwell deep into the musk
and mire of matter and its subluninary caves
of consciousness to cross the lower point and emerge
in the east as the next rising sun (next step in
his evolution or realization) after bearing the burden
of the hidden treasures on his shoulders. The
double pyramid is a very essential symbol in the
daily morning and evening rituals of a twice-born
initiate who belongs to the Vedic rituals. During

The Vedic Rituals

the twilight invocations of the sunrise and sunset
the ritualist invokes the presence of the angels to
the east, south, west, north, above and below before
he describes the circle around himself by rotating on
his own axis (like the earth) along his right hand.
He invokes in the following manner :

“I bow down to the East and to the Gods

dwelling therein

I bow down to the South and to the Gods

dwelling therein

I bow down to the West ,,

I bow down to the North „

I bow down to the above „

I bow down to the below ,»

I bow around along the circumference and to
the Gods dwelling therein. 99

This formula of the double pyramid seems
not practised by the Egyptians, Chaldeans and
any other ritualists except those of the Vedic order.
Here we must correlate the relationship between
the pyramid, double pyramid and the cube of the
ritualists. If the. pyramid is separated from the
pyramid below and then the pyramids are made to
stand on the vortex of one another, the solid figure
formed by these two pyramids becomes one fourth
of a cube. If four other pyramids are made to
stand meeting at the -ame vortex we will have the
perfect cube that is to be polished by the ritualist;
The cube is the symbol of the perfect arrangement
of the year. There are 8 corners to a cube and
each corner is surrounded by three right angles,
(which crush fourth right angle of the cross

Book of Rituals

into thickness, The three villains who crush the
father-consciousness or the builder to cause his
untimely death into the matiet* of this universe).
Thus the 8 corners of the cube contained 8x3-24
right angles which form the objective lunations of
the year and the 24 hrs of the day. There are 8
more-right angles crushed into the thickness of
the cube and they exist as the subjective conscious¬
ness of the year god and arranged as the hours
on the axis. This is the reason why the point, the
circle, the straight line, the cross, the square, the
line of horizontality (the level) the line of verticality
(the plumb) and the set square (right angle) stand
as most important among the implements of
masonry. The construction of a building positively
requires these implements because they are required
for the construction of the whole universe. These
implefnents form the symbols of man borrowed
from nature. Trutb is concealed in tjiem and is
allegorically revealed as the trained experience of
the ritualist. The technical names of the potencies
ascribed to the four corners of the horizontal square
are as follows:

The East represents brilliance or splendour ;

The South represents the spiritual food ;

The West represents the beasts or cattle (the
?easts of the heavens that stabilize as the figures of
he Zodiac);

The North represents the Soma Juice.

Among the two other points the upper vertical
die represents heaven (the subtler principles of
reation and man). The then text says that “ these
-orlds are turned towards one another ” meaning

The Vedic Rituals >

"tv*

that a pyramid is made to stand inverted on anothiF r
erect pyramid. This ritualist, said to bring the
magnetic currents of creation (maruts) into order.
These currents are said to be the subjects of Gods.
By establishing an order among them one gets at
the grip to establish order among human beings.
Such a man who establishes this order lives in
safety. The invocatory verses of Rig Veda that ate
used in this connection and which are composed
in a metre called Thrishtup convey the same
meaning. They invoke “ prosperity to us in the
ways of wilderness ”, “ the highest safety in the
way ”, “O' Agni, lead us by a fair path to wealth ”
iC We have come to the path of the Gods ”, “ O *
Soma skilled in thought-the God of all, the Lord
of the good.”

6 . The Soma Ritual :

The ritual of purchasing of Soma is the next to
follow. It also is symbolic in the astrological sense.
Soma is made available when it is brought in a
cart drawn by two bullocks. One of the two
bullocks should be yoked and the other should be
loosened in the East to purchase Soma. Soma
belongs to North but the herb is purchased in the
East. This shows that the whole phenomena of
creation in its astrological symbolism travels from
North to East. The position of the midnight Sun
is turned north for the reason of some very deep
astronomical phenomena that follow the various
rotations of the earth through ages on its poles.
Hence from north to East means-the emergence of
the whole creation from the subjectivity of midnight
to the objectivity of dawn. The north pole of the

Book of Rituals

earth gradually shifts towards the position of the
equator through ages producing cyclic geographical
phenomena and this fact has a direct connection
with the purchase of Soma in the east. North
represents the subjective consciousness of man
and East represents the dawn of the objectivity. In
between there lies the north-eastern corner where
the first foundation stone is laid down to the
construction of the whole building. All this
imbeds a fund of wisdom that becomes revealed
through a proper meditation and the ritual of the
student. Of course much is to be explained to fill
up the missing links but it takes volumes after
volumes. Of the two bullocks “ that which is
unyoked is the symbol of creation at the point of
stability and the one yoked is the symbol of the
creation that is on a journey This sentence of
the text denotes nothing more than the two points of
the compass while describing a chcle, according to
the language of the modern ritualists. It is also
described that there is a constant fight between the
forces of light and darkness. On the four directions
(East, -South, West and North) the forces of
darkness conquer those of the light. Then there is
a fight in the north eastern-corner and the forces
of light conquer those of darkness' at this point.
Hence the notth-eastern corner is the unconquerable
quarter of the ritualist, it denotes that aspect of
man’s consciousness which we call effort. At this
point man clears off his debts ( obligations) to gods
and men. He stands conquered.

The, forces of light could not conquer those of
darkness at the four points because they had no
kmgv At* the north-eastern coiner Soma is made

rhe Vedic Rituals

he King. With Soma as king they conquered
gain the four corners. Here Soma represents the
ragical power of man borrowed from the cosmic
rinciple Soma through the solar symbol Neptune,
'he abode of Soma is located somewhere about the
ap between the peneal gland and the pituitary
ody in the human machanism. The point between
le eyebrows is the cast and the vertex of the head
where Sahasrara is located) is the north according
) the symbolism of practical magic. The abode
flndra, Rudra and Soma that is located between
ie peneal gland and £the pituitary body is, therefore,
.lied the north-east. Here Soma is made a king
id the brighter forces of man conquer the darker
les. This consciousness that which is invoked
Soma in man is considered to be the guest
1 the ritualist, and there is the ritual of receiving
>ma.

Then follows the ritual of bringing Soma forward
meet Agni. There is an allegory here that the
?ds purchased (secured) Soma by offering him
eir utterance in the form of a naked woman,
ma sold himself for the cost of the woman,
.is is because that Soma is a Gandharva and
>es woman. For this reason the ritualist should
sak his mantrams inaudibly when Soma is brought,
e whole allegory means that the consciousness
ma belongs to the Gandharva plane (musical
ne). Music sells itself out (secured) to the
.erance of the word. What a woman is to a
m (in the highest sense of reproduction of the
jansion of the objective universe ) the word is to
ma. The utterance is made naked means that
i power of speech in man should be filtered

Book of Rituals

away from his emotions, instincts, reflexes and other
influences. Even the impression of the man made
language should be kept away. The power of speech
should be given up to the descending consciousness
of Soma. At this stage when the word is uttered,
it is uttered only on the mental plane when it includes
the music as an expression. It is interesting to note
that the astrologers located the powers of practical
magic and devotional music in the planet Neptune
to be received by the sun of our earth through Venus
on the higher levels and to the moon working as a
satellite via the solar ray on the lower planes. Once
again ponder over the significant statement of H.P.B.
that the moon works as a blind to a higher planet.
With this ritual the Agni is not only seen but also
heard by man through the word on higher planes. The
other nine creative gods along with their off-shoots
that form the clusters of the hierarchies of the
creative intelligences follow Agni in the path of
Soma to make their presence externalised into
the consciousness of man. Agni is here glorified
as a god made for life (the god with whom the life
of the whole planet is made). He serves as the
fooKstep of the ritualistic food ; (the mystic food
of wisdom) on the navel of the earth. That is why
in the ritual the navel of the high altar is invoked as
the foot-step of the sacrificial food. This means that
the activity of man at his solar plexus serves as the
food of gods through Agni. In the physical sense
it is true because the solar plexus rules over the
peristalsis of the abdomen to prepare the food of
the forces of the whole body. In the spiritual
sense the activity of the chakra at the navel governs
the emotions and instincts of man that are to be

The Vedic Rituals

eaten away by the higher intelligences above to
work out the whole p|an of the ritualistic wisdom
of man. The whole process signifies the bringing
of Agni forward to meet Soma. The Agni of man
is brought to march upward to the north-east to
receive thg cosmic consciousness of Soma there.
All this process is included in the training of
the eight fold path of yoga prescribed by Patanjali
but the ancient most ritualistic keys are not linked
up therein. This is because Patanjali’s object was
only to give the practical instructions in short
avoiding the rationalistic and the ritualistic
discourses. This whole process of ritualisation
should be instigated by someone at first. Here the
instigator is called Savita (who corresponds with
that potency in man called Sankalpa). Sankalpa
is not the only requisite to lead the student to
success. There should be a power produced (like
that of the effort of utterance in man). This
power is there innate and it is personified as
Brahmanaspati, the Lord of the utterances.
Brahmanaspati presides over the power that is
concealed in the arrangement of things. He is a
cosmic principle who manifests himself through the
ray of the planet Jupiter. That is why the astrologers
say that Jupiter is the Lord of the wisdom coming
down to the levels of speech whereas Mercury is the
translator of the speech into the language of man.
Here the reader is advised to go through the
chapters on Jupiter, Mercury and Neptune in my
previous work “ SPIRITUAL ASTROLOGY”.
At this juncture the ritualist is expected to mediatte
upon Vishnu the Lord of Pervasion because all the
gods from Agni to Soma and Brahmanaspati are

Book of Rituals

made up of his pervasion. Thus ends the ritual of
bringing Soma as the guest to be received by
Agni the householder. In this process we find that
the ritual of invoking and establishing Agni is
closely connected with (in fact it forms a part of)
the discovering and inviting Soma. Herein comes
the necessity to sacrifice the animals in man. This
is called the symbolical Animal Sacrifice.

7. The Animal sacrifice :

The subject is so vast that the reader is expected
to know the detailed procedure of the ritnal only
from the fifth book of Aitareya Brabmana. It is
fully worked out there. We now deal with the
significance and the collective symbolism of the
ritual. It is already mentioned that man contains
all the animals of the creation ( animal nature ) in
the form of his associations through past birth.
It is the purpose of god to make the master of all
the animals, plants and minerals of the universe.
Man is expected to be the guardian, the trainer
and the caretaker of all the other forms of creation.
Such a position of higher responsibility is got
only by attaining the mastery over the animals in
him. For this reason some spiritualists of the vedic
path hold that man should abstain from eating
anything by killing. There are some practices
prescribed to achieve this. The practices include
the practice of eating some leaves of high food valne
after they fall of from the tree. Eating fallen leaves
and drinking water makes a man perfectly fit to
conduct the rituals of the animal sacrifice.

Vedic Rituals

Another phase of the animal sacrifice is that
3 is a symbolism about the study of the animals
nd man. Every form of living being whether
i or an animal or a human being is a concealed
ncy in space. I he arrangement of the clusters
tars around the globe of space that forms the
;t of visibility from this earth is presented
o many shapes. The matter of this earth
es the bodies of its living beings as models of
above said forms of visibility. The body of
■ species on this earth has its original in the
5 of the clusters of stars. This original
5 is called the symbolic animal sacrifice into
ion for the evolution of the living being. The
list is expected to meditate upon this shape
ery animal and plant and the meditation should
ghly devotional to that torm. The form should
iahsed as a form of God. The animals of the
.c stand as translators between the shapes of
stars and the bodies of the beings on any globe.

'he sacrifice of the Ram stands as a section
le animal rituals. Ihe ritual descirbes the
s of bringing the ram to the place of ritual
cutting the head of the ram with a pair of
rs. Ihe head is oft’ered to Agni and it serves
mrpose of the head of the Patriarch. ‘ As we
seen previously, the Patriarch represents the
The scissors signifies the vernal equinox formed
s path of the bun and the path of the Equator
□g one another on the epuinoxial day. This
import of is cutting the ring of the year

Book of Ritual

to make a new beginning (cutting the throat o
the ritualist as penalty to express the truth ou
because the head represents Aries astiologicaliy)
Locating the solar year and its beginning through
the aid of astronomical and stellar phenomena form:
a beparate ritual by itself and the ram sacrifice
serves as the complementary to it. By conducting
this ritual on a subjective and speculative , leve,
man crosses the ram in him which represents
the rashness and recklessness of his^ primitiv<
nature. Ihis ram ritual is subsequently allegorisec
by the Puranic Author Veda Vyasa as the story
of Daksha performing the ritual without inviting
the Lord beyond time and the son of the Lord
cutting the throat of Daksha, the Prajapati. Further,
his head is replaced by that of a Ram and the
sacrifice is once again conducted. On the astronomi¬
cal level this ritual signifies the phenomena of the
beginning of the great year when the equinoxes
cross the„ constellation Aries that is formed by the
stars /vlpha ana netu, Aneutis. ihe Loiu beyond
lime. Who culs me iieaa ol Daksha to leplace it
by tne head of me Ram Lhat is tocamd m the
constellation Anes is ttimeu me Lord of ihe
bourn, or Lhe Lord lacing the south (Daksiuna-
rnuithy in the iaiti 1 manic anemones ). n is lunher
described ibat this Loia sns at the root ot the
banyan uee and conveys the import of the word
(bacred word; in siiente to ms own ioliowers.
Ihis gives us the ritualistic cite that a smotm who
has Anes prominent in his horoscope should follow
this path during which couise his lood should be
from the banyan uee (the leaves ana the fruits
ol the tree).

The Vedlc Rituals
8. The Horse Ritual

This has got a greater symbolism than the
Ram ritual. The horse sacrifice is one of the main
sacrifices of the Vedic path. The invocation of the
fire and Soma also form part of this ritual. The
horse symbolism is a grand and a very poetic one
that extends from the texts of the Vedas to those
of all the Puranas. It is supposed to have been
performed by the kings to spread their splendour
far and wide. Any man can perform it in the
speculative path and he becomes the king of his
own sphere. The horse is brought, purified, decorated
and consecrated to the gods. It is then left to
wander freely for a time. During which time it
is protected by a band of followers of the ritualist.
Then it is brought back and sacrificed at the altar.
The sacrifice is fully symbolic in all its detail.
Even the number of persons who tie the horse
and bring it to ritual is symbolic. 13 people
bring it. Twelve of them represent the twelve lunar
months of the year tVhile the thirteenth (called
the guest ) represents the extra lunar month that
occurs once in every three years when we attempt
to equate beginning of the lunar year with the
solar year. At the same time it represents a
counterpart in the consciousness of the ritualist.
That counterpart is the consciousness that brings the
symbol of the sacred horse into the conscious levels
of man.

The last book of the Sathapatha Brahmana
abounds with highest speculative passages divulging
the significance of the horse sacrifice. The last
section of this book is famous as the Brihadaranyaka

Book of Rituals

Upanishad. This section begins with the description
of the day as the various parts of the body of
the sacrificial horse. The first mantram therein
reads thus : ts The glow before the dawn is verily
the head of the horse”. In the astrological sym¬
bolism the whole zodiac is divided into 27 equal
parts and the first division is called the lunar
mansion having the horse (Aswani). Meditating
the day and the year as the horse-headed god
bestows the best revalations from the astronomical
wisdom of the Veda. In the Puranic speculative
symbolism the horse-headed form of the absolute
deity presides over the branches of the wisdom
of life. The emanation of the red ray at the time
of the symbol dawn has a direct connection with
this horse-headed god. The sacred tree Ficus Religiosa
is said to contain the horse god within itself. The
activity of the whole universe is to be meditated
as the above said tree with its roots upwards and
branches downwards. Then it forms the gateway
between the speculative ritualist and the highest
concept of god. This is given in the Vedas and
Upanishads and is again glorified by Lord Krishna
in the 15th Chapter of the Bhagavad Gita. The
tradition provides us a practical clue in magic that
a ritualist in whose horoscope the sign Sagittarius
is prominent should take up this path living upon
the leaves of the above said tree and residing
under that tree.

in the Puranas the solar god is said to have
followed his wile who came down to this earth
in the name of symbol. She came down t • earth
in the form of a Mare and he followed it in the

The Vedio Rituals

form of a Horse. The allegory means that the
spiritual sun makes himself visible on the physical
plane through his Solar symbol (the brilliance of
the sun .) and the earth receives it as the fire of
life. Then again the spiritual sun descends into
whatever form that is provided by the brilliance
and impregnates it with the spiritual spark that
serves as the highest principle above the soul in
all the beings to be realised by a man.

In the allegories of Maha Bharatha the horse of
the rituals is described as the omnipotent generator
Of the spiritual sparks that are covered by the
Souls of the multifarious beings on this earih.
It is described to have been going round and round
the solar path with the solar lord of sacraments
(Indra) on its back. It exists on a level transcending
all the sublunary chasms of darkness and even
beyond the planes of the serpents. The serpents
represent the time bound wisdom concealed in man.

In the Vedas the horse is described as a form
of Agni when it represents the cosmic fire. The
jerk in creation from subjectivity to objectivity
is symbolised as the ritualistic horse in many places.
Thus in all the levels the horse represents the
immanent fire that exists beyond the physical,
mental, planetary and the solar phenomena of flame.
A full comprehension of the flame and fire on the
cosmic plane can only be got by a proper siudy
of the extensive thes.s of A. A. B. on the Cos.nic
hire. The incorporation of the ever concealed
subjective, spiritual consciousness as a seed of the
higuest prmc.ple in every living being is the whole
import of tue Horse Ritual in the Veda. Until

Book of Rituals

the physical concept of flame according to the
modern approach of the scientific thought is well
transcended through the future decades by means
of the would be advanced nuclear splendours that
bridge the gulf between the space principle and
the atom is attained, the modern man cannot
easily dream of having a full comprehension of the
Horse symbol and the Horse Ritual.

9. Man sacrifice and all sacrifice :

Among all the rituals the ritual of sacrifice
is the highest. When man ritualises with a spirit
of sacrifice the ritual becomes a sacrifice. After
sacrificing all the animals in him gradually man
transcends his animal levels and becomes conversant
with the animals of the zodiac. After transcending
their nature (the traits of man stimulated by the
twelve signs in his horoscope) he enters into the
solar plane of consciousness. Then he comes into
contact with the animals in space (the moulds of
all beings in Space). After transcending this level
he feels the presence of the cosmic man who is
training him silently all through. Then it is the duty
of the ritualist to sacrifice the man consciousness in
him to merge in the consciousness of the cosmic man.
Many associations of his past karma and present
karma should be skilfully neutralised (they should
neither be purged nor attacked but neutralised )
among the associations he comes across in his
own. nature, the association of the profession and
livelihood assumes importance. There is a level
in man which makes him accustomed and fit for
a profession or a change in profession. A man

The Vedic Rituals

chooses his profession or is necessarily driven to
his profession. This necessity is created by the
Saturn in him. in both the cases his associations of
the past births work upon his mind in a cumulative
manner to make him decide “ independently ”
or reasonably, it is very difficult to transcend
this profession consciousness because every mau
has got many layers of his past professions
as his associations. The man sacrifice with it
various allied sacrifices in the Veda prescribes the
sacrfice ot various persons of various professions
as victims to be burnt up in the fire. For this
reason we find the list of victims which contains
many animals in some rituals and the people of
many professions in some rituals each being offered
to a god among the cosmic gods. Here the terms
‘god’ and‘gods* do not refer to any idea of
either monotheism or polytheism, but the gods
represent the varaous forces who fit in as counterparts
in the body of the one god. One should contemplate
in himseil as belonging to one profession and
offer hirLSt.il v his pioitssion consdousness ) up to
the fue thiough the meoium ol the oliering material.
1ms pitussis repeated to exhaust the list when
the riiuajisi tiansctncs tie ie\ei ot the prOiession
consciousness. Ihe man remains as simply a man
ieao> to eher linsejl up into the spiiit ol the
cosmic man. Ihe process of this last offering rs
given wen in the mystic hymn called Purusha
buktha. The hymn describes the man sacrifice of
the cosmic man conducted by himself thiough a
process ot offering himself up into the vastness
ol the tihiveue thiough the aid of the vaiious
aevas that came out/ from him. These devas tied

Book of Rituals

the cosmic man up to a vertical pole (and made
him the sacrificial being. From his flesh and
blood came out the pith and marrow of the whole
universe. The same description holds good to mean
the process of the ritualist tying himself upto the
rod of verticality ( his vertebral column in the
microcosmic scale and the line connecting his noon
and midnight on the sacrificial scale) and offers
himself up in imitation of what the cosmic man
did (in due and ancient fashion). The same
description once again holds good to mean the
process of the father becoming the son when he
initiates the son into the mystery temple which
is the egg in the mother’s womb. Then the
construction of the body of the man m the embryo
is done by imitating the formula of the body of
the parent man. Herein comes the need to invoke
a new god Viswakarman {who presides over the
shape consciousness, he being the architect, imitator,
copyist and the artificer of the metals in cosmic
chemistry ). Viswakarman is described as the divine
engineer, sculptor, architect and master-builder.
His role helps to keep the tradition ol the father’s
shape and nature to be inherited by the son. The same
text Purusha iSuktha applies to the ritual of man
leaving his physical body and coming out (dying)
to expand into the likeness and imge of the parent
man once again. This is the reason why this hymn
has got an application in all the ritualistic ceremonies
of man on all occasions, the auspicious and the
so called inauspicious. To a speculative ritualist
this hymn offers a complete procedure to eondpct
the human sacrifice to cross all the barriers of his
existence.

The Vedic Rituals

Next in order comes the All Sacrifice in which
the ritualist offers up all the implements of sacrifice
into the invoked fire. Herein lies the culmination
of the wisdom of man. All the motives, purpose,
hopes and incentives are burnt up and man lives
as an eternal principle having identified himself
with the supra-cosmic principle (the level of
existence that is lived by Lord Sri Krishna).
The later Hindu concept of Sanyasa has its origin
in this ritual. We find this ritual being conducted
by people on the occasion of becoming ascetics.

The above set of rituals roughly forms the
main syllabus of the Vedic ritualist. Of course
there are many items that are to be covered still
but the main outline is present in the above said
plan. The remaining rituals mainly include the
following items: .

1. Vajapeya or the food-sacrifice.

2. Southramani or the divine-sacrifice.

3. Rajasuya or the King-Sacrifice.

4. Specific sacrifices to acquire wealth, victory,
splendour, cattle, ■ villages, children etc.

5. The ritual of The Preparation of the ground
for fire.

6. The ritual of brick laying.

7. The Ritual for Rudra.

8. The piling of the fire altar.

9. The Satra Rituals.

10. Gavamayana Ritual.

Book of Rituals

Among these the ritual of brick laying is very
significant and symbolic. There is every detail
worked out from the description of,the dimensions
of the brick npto the arrangement of the bricks
in layers which are mainly five. Various arrangments
are found in brick laying to form various patterns
that represent the activities of the creation. The
arrangement of bricks in the form of the great
eagle (Suparna ) is profound and matchless. It
contains all the forms and the numerical potencies.
Each brick and each cluster of bricks is governed
by a Deva, a number and name for invocation.

The Satra is a very noble and enlightening ritual
and it includes the gathering of many great scholars
renowned in many branches. There are many types
of this highly speculative ritual and each type differs
from another iu its duration. For' example there
is the Satra of 12 days, 13, 14, 15, 17 and 21 days.
There are also Satras conducted for 12 months,
12 years, 100 years "and even 1000 years. Thus
the Satra ritual runs as an inheritance. We find
many occasions of the Satras conducted by kings
and great sages in the Puranas. The very narration
of all the Puranas is done during the ritual of the
Satras. Sages used to gather in the forests and
cave temples into units of prolonged Satras. The
conducting of each such Satra included the composing
and the editing of the various books of wisdom.
Various points are discussed and problems settled
during the Satras, At present there is going on a
grand Satra which began just before the advent
of the Kali Age. It runs until the end of the present
age and the intention is that the Sages wanted
to live that sacrifice to tide over the influence of

The Vedic Rituals

the Kali Age. Various Masters are being trained
and hierarchies are being hatched within the spiritual
womb of this Satra. These sages have evolved a
mighty rotating wheel of their cumnlative thought
form to keep them off the influence of the Kali
Age. The various members of this Satra exist in
various groups on the seven magnetic centres of
this earth. All of them live in group contact and
work out the plan of their syllabus from time to
time to train the disciples into Masters and
Hierarchies of Wisdom. One of these groups exists
in a place between Kalapa and Shamballa. Veda
Vyasa presides over the whole activity and Lord
Mait'reya came down as the Christ of the present
age according to this plan. The ‘concept of the
Satra ritual is profound and sublime. We can
understand that it is really the grandest of alt the
Vedic rituals of the speculative order.

The performance of the above said ritual is
for the attainment of certain levels and privileges.
Those who perform them with the object of any
attainment will attain the desired object. The.
highest aim of such ritualist is the bliss of the
heaven (the experience of the Devachanic plane).
The purification of the physical, astral, mental and
buddhic planes becomes possible very easily by the
performance of these rituals. The. student is freed
from-the. bondage of his past associations of his
previous karma. The effect of the good karma
caused by the performance of the rituals is accumu¬
lated in one birth. As he leaves the body and
goes to the devachanic plane he experiences the
level of that plane as long as the impact of the
ritualistic accumulation of good karma exists. Again

Book of Rituals

when it is exhausted completely his evolutional
urge comes to the fore and he again comes down to
the comparatively denser levels with, his consciou¬
sness dispersed among the duties of the various
layers. Thus the effect of the Vedic rituals is only
temporary when conducted with a spirit of attain¬
ment. There are others who perform the rituals
their duty without having any motive. The thought
of attainment is totally absent in them and yet they
perform the sacrifices simply as a duty. For them
these rituals work out for purification and the result
is their liberation instead of any attainment. All
the attainments, come to them in order according
to the law of evolution which is a part of the
planetary and the solar k&rma. Thus they have
the twofold advantage conferred upon them
though they do not take it as an enjoyment.
Enjoyment is the innate and unconditional with
them and no attainment or loss can condition
their inner nature which is the bliss of liberation.
These are classed among the highest category of
ritualists. Of course the vedas include all the
levels , but it is the duty. of the highest student
to receive only according to his own right of
choice. If his choice is attainment he is hound
to by it. If his choice is nothing he is liberated.

It is said that the performance of these vedic
rituals should be done by a person who is' qualified
to do it. This, qualification is got by certain
regular rituals that work as initiations. They are
called the sacraments to initiate the student.
There are quite a number of such individual rituals
( as they are different from the previous ritual

The Vedic Rituals

that are conducted collectively). These sacraments
are to be conducted to initiate the individual
from the time of his fertilization in the mother’s
womb during the prenatal period,; at the time of
birth and during the various stages of his growth.
Strangely they coincide with the biological,
physiological, metabolical, psychological and
emotional changes of man due to the influence
ofhisageand growth, One important sacrament
is that which is performed by the father jnst
after fthe birth of the ■ child even before the
cutting of the umbilical cord. The father touches
the head of the child and invokes the string of
consciousness that links the father and the son
by uttering .mantrams which mean “You are horn
from body to body. You are the ‘1AM’ in me
in xhe form of my child,”. This invokes the
subconscious hature of the child into the path of
evolution. It works to develop the gradually
unfolding mind in an orderly way. The mind of
the newly born babe is clear as mirror and
receives whatever impressions that ares 'made during
the first few hours after his birth; These impressions
form the basic initiation through which bis mind
grows into objectivity. The astrologers know that
the impressions received by a babe during the
first six hours after his birth ( 90 degrees rotation
of the earth on its own axis ) will progress into
his behaviour through 90 years of span. The
planets in the heavens at the time of his birth
will receive his twelve houses of the horoscope
in various angles and produce a frame work of
individual karma to work out of 90 years. This
can be sanctified and elevated into nobler terms

Book of Rituals

of translation into the mundane life by performing
the above said ritual at the time of birth.

Secondly there is the ritual of the first hair
cut with significant mantrams. The import is about
the rays of sun being cut to stimulate the solar
consciousness that will be utilised for the brilliance
of the inner man (the sun as the dweller in man J.
During the age between 7 and 14 years, the mind
of the boy gets a second stimulation. The behaviour
is gradually transformed from the imitative faculty
to the questioning faculty. During this age the
ritual of second-birth is performed. The boy is
familiarised for the first time with the ideas of the
existence of a grand universe around him and a
centre within him which stimulates the thoughts
of man to meet the outer world. Gayatri the
greatest of all the vedic mantrams is awakened in
the boy. He should meditate that Gayatri is his
spiritual mother and the solar god is his spiritual
father through the world, of the physical . path.
From that time onwards the boy is initiated into
the mysteries of fire and its rituals. He is expected
to leave his house, approach the Guru and get
conversant with the Vedas and the allied literature.
He is also expected to be simple in his food and
rest. Begging for his daily food is imposed upon
him as another sacrament.

Next in order the student attains an age when
the polarity of sex begins to have its influence lupon
him. His intelligence is influenced by his emotion
and evolution brings sweeping changes in his persona¬
lity. At this .stage his marriage is conducted as
a sacrament. For a trained soul sex life is definitely

The Vedic Rituals 71

a sacrament and a necessity but never a .source
of enjoyment or indulgence. It is the duty of a
grown up to aid the creation and the plan of
evolution by providing his sex life as an opportunity
for the reincarnating souls to take birth'. So to
the .ritualist old life is a duty and is bound to
be within his own mental control.- .A thorcugh
knowledge of the process of creation and reproduc¬
tion is provided during the study of the scriptures
at the feet of the Guru. It is said that two groups
of intelligences preside over the whole process of
creation. One set belongs to the activity of creation
and another set belongs to reproduction. Creation
is a cyclic activity of the subtler planes and reproduc¬
tion is ati imitation of that activity to produce
the grosser, planes in the same order and arrange¬
ment. All the phallic mechanism of the physical
body of various beings is only a copy of the higher
implements of creation. The urge of sex . is also
a copy of the urge of the absolute to come down as
creation. These two levels should;be well understood
and equated by the student. Then only he can live
in the reproductory duties' without failing to provide
the necessary behaviour for the dreative planes.
If. the string is broken the reproductory activity
becomes an end in itself and an enjoyment by itself
due to which man fails into the level of indulgence.
Here . comes the difference , between the duties
of a ritualist and those of the ordinary man.
The latter is only an animal, responding to the
biological behaviour. The difference is that the
animal kingdom lacks in the . intelligence of man
and is hence mercifully guided by nature through
instinct. Man breaks this link with nature anc

Book of Rituals

satiates his appetites without his fitness in nature.
This is the reason for the so many evils man is
suffering from. Every biological step including
maternity and child bearing becomes risky. The
health of man gradually decreases. Unlike the
animal he requires the aid of the medical science
to protect him at every step. When birth control
is natural with the animals due to the specified
mating seasons, it becomes a problem to man and
he seeks so many debased means to escape the
problems confronting him,, the problems that are
the products of his own misbehaviour. Such a
risk is easily tided over by man through a, process
of ritualising his emotional activity. Once again
the aid of nature is acquired and the harmony is
established. For so many such reasons it is
imperative that one should be conversant with the
functions of the creative and the reproductive
activities in him. The devas who govern the two
activities are called respectively Devas and Pitrus.
It is many times misinterpreted by some orientalists
that the Pitrus of the Vedic literature are the dead
forefathers of the individuals that are worshipped
in their memory. What a foolish concept of a
profound truth ! It is true that the Pitrus are our
forefathers but not in the individual sense. They
are the forefathers of the present mankind in every
round. For the present mankind (which belongs
to the fifth root-race) the forefathers came down
from the present moon globe. This is because the
present moon was the previous earth. It was
inhabited by a race of mankind who are now
promoted to the level of Pitru Devas and who once
came down to this earth to people this earth. That

The Vedio Ri.tuals

is why they still keep up the link between this
earth and our satellite moon to conduct the
functions of reproduction to aid the evolution of
this earth. The evolution of the four kingdoms
of this earth has much to do with the intelligences
that travel to earth from Moon through the
moonbeams. It is a biological fact that any seed
cannot germinate without the aid of the moon-phase.
The growth of crops has a direct bearing with the
moon phase. Every true astrologer knows that
the menstrual cycles of woman, the ovation, the
fertilization, the parturition and the growth of the
foetus are all guided by the activity of the lunations.
Verily the Moon is the mother force of all the
reproductory phenomena of this earth. Thus much
is only about the Pitrus of our earth. Similarly
there are fitrus belonging to every planet and even
every Solar System. They form part of the cosmic
intelligences. The Vedic lore has brought much
light about the workings of the Pitrus.

Among the fiist races of mankind fdrmed
on this earth there Was a time when the human
beings had no sex division. There was a race
hermaphrodites trained in the path of evolution
under the direct guidance of the Solat Gods Hermes
and Aphrodite (Venus and Jupiter). People multi¬
plied by a process of binery fission. Gradually
there was the intravention of the Lucifer intelligences
who came down to earth from Mars. They caused
the polarity of sex. Gradually the lower pole was
stimulated in man when the construction of the
south pole to this earth was complete (See the

Book>f Ritual

Chapter on Virgo in my previous hook SPIRITUAI
ASTROLOGY). Even then the higher creativ<
intelligences held the activity of Mars under checl
and the activity of sex worked only as an occasions
necessity to" aid the evolution by procreation anc
it t Was never a source of enjoyment or indulgence
Gradually the martian ray gained prominence (in
accordance with V higher necessity on the solai
plane), and man developed a craving for the sex
act irrespective of its higher purpose. It was the
beginning of the lower and the debased phallic
activity" in the psychology of man and the phallic
worship iu the religion of certain races. Even today
the ray of Mars interferes with the pure love ray
of Venus in the horoscopes of the majority of
mankind. ^ Of course the masters and many
spiritualists of white Magic' are an exception to
this. In the zodiacal activity the two signs Taurus
and Libra that are governed by Venus have their
opposite signs Aries and Scorpio governed by Mars
in the majority of horoscopes. This shows the
nature of the difficulty that a spiritual student
comes across while he attempts to neutralise the
polarity of sex in him by making the lower re*
productive pole passive and the higher creative pole
active., Ihe Vedic rituals that formed the sacra¬
ments marriage, consummation, love and reproduc-
tiun are all skillfully formed by the Hierarchies and
seers to tide over the above said complication.
The creation of god and the reproduction of man
are both compared to the effort to utter forth
? 8em ^ 8 ubjective concept emergingfrom subjectivity
into an .objective word that is impregnated in its
turn by the concept itself. The allegory of Brahma

Lie Rituals

y SarasWathi from within himself and follow-
r to impregnate to bring out the creation
jejcliviiy explains the whole mystery to one
itt 'meditate, upon the whole phenomenon.
Id Testament of the Bible also borrowed a
sto/y from its originals that Eve is taken
tbe breast of Adam (.wrongly translated as
in "English ) and the whole creation came
Adam and Eve.

e role of the house-holder after the sacrament'
riage is itself a symbol of man living in his^
in. the Vedic lore. The body of man is
ed to the house of man because house
g is an imitation of man after the model*
acquisitim of the physical body through
action. The sanctity of marriage and the
L "behaviour of the husband and wife towards
Lother is itself a part of the Vedic rituals
is intended to keep the purity of the phallic
tents of man so that the soul descending
>dy undergoes no pollution. To a ritualist
LCtity of sex means much more than a social
iemce and a moral conviction. Witfr due;
Les to the modern age it can be said that :
ban half of the evils of man at the present day
e<3 upon the carelessness towards the sanctity
Even the trend of thinking of the whole
leading maukind towards destruction in
>f the advancement of the scientific thought
at: is no wonder.

e vedic literature ritualised the daily life
louse-holder also and the intended rituals
mposed of the formulae in the imitation of

Book of Rituals

the cosmic order. Prayer, worship, duties towards
parents, keeping up social relations, preparing
food and maintaining the upkeep of the whole
house are all ritualised and sanctified. Of course
a man lives in his own level of happiness without
any sense of sanctity. Yet if he cares to sanctify
his daily routine he can know the difference in
the nature of his experiencing the same life.

Among the daily rituals of a householder We
find the two twilight invocations and the Noon
invocation most important. They represent the
invocation of the chairs in the East, west and
south in the modern rituals. The twilight invocation
is to invoke directly the Lord of the Dawn, who
awakens man periodically every morning. It is
explained that the dawn is not at all the Sun-
god but it, is always relative to the observer. Sleep
is compared with darkmss and awakening with
light. Twilight denotes the link of consciousness
that brings us out from sleep to human consciousness.
Again death is compared with darkness and life
with light. The Dawn denotes the emerging of
man from death into life. This linking consciousness
is named Savitri (a potency of Gayatri) in the
Puranic symbolism dealing with the death and
raising of the man as truth bearer ( Satyavan).
During the twilight-ritual the ritualist offers prayers
to this linking consciousness as goddess Gayatri
and Savitri.

The preparation of the daily food Should be
ritualised through an intention of preparing it
for some guest at first and the householder to
eat next. The very intention changes the nature

The Vedic Rituals ^

of man and the process of preparation is also
necessarily sanctified being prepared with care.
There are five more ritualistic duties to be
performed by the householder and they are termed

as the five great Yagnas. They include his duty
to Devas, Pitrus, human, animals, and to the
elementals. Man is a product of the activity of
so many intelligences at work. Hence he has to
pay his homage to those gods in the name of Devas
and Rishis. His duty to the Devas binds him to keep
the air, water, space, etc. around him free from
impurities and if possible he should decorate them
with pure and finer things. The use of incence in a
ritual sanctifies the whole atmosphere and even the
neighbours may be benefitted by it. His duty
towards Rishis includes the effort of educating
himself and his family along with certain disciples
and to enlighten them about the intellectual and
spiritual work of the great men of the past. In fact
everyone is really indebted to all the great thinkers
of the past. His duty towards mankind is to give
food and shelter according to his own ability. The
Upanishads of the ritualistic school (Taittireeya
Upanishad) sayss “Nobody should be denied
any space being provided*—man exists in space and
space exists in man. Space and mahare both matter”
This means that man is always indebted to space
at least that much volume which his physical body
occupies. The householder’s ritualistic duty to
animal includes his domesticating certain animals
and feeding them besides giving something to the
birds. So many ethereal beings and disembodied
souls gather around the house of a householder at
the time of the feed. They enter into the bodies

Book of Rituals

of animals and birds and return with blessings and
unseen favours if they are fed. It is said that the
broomstick, the grinding stones, the fire place and
other implements of the house holder daily cause
some unseen harm to many little living beings in
his house. To tide over the evil effect and to repay
the compensation to the order of the creation the
Vedas prescribe the above said five great rituals.
The morning twilight ritual invokes the emerging
consciousness and the evening twilight invokes the
merging consciousness of man. In between there
is the noon ritual which invokes the highest point
of man’s illumination.

10* The Significance of the Cremation Rituals :

Every student of Theosophy knows that man
does not cease to exist after‘death’. Scientifically
speaking death is only a disappearance of the
temporary physical vehicle of man. Whenever the
present physical sheath is worn out by age or disease
which is the result of the evils of the individual
or race, the inner man has every right to drop off
the soiled vehicle to choose a .better one. Hence
death is a separation only to the physical senses.
Many states of the planetary matter pertaining to
the mineral, plant and animal kingdoms are initiated
by the embryo into a poise and an influx that
continues from birth to death. Hence the physical
span is only an osmotic pressure of the consciousness
that keeps the matter state of spirit well arranged
in tact due to the ritualised activity of the Devas
and the Pitrus., The mind of an average man is
not expected to know all these things and to get

The Vedio Rituals

reconciled with the universal and inevitable truths.
Hence there is also an inevitable jerk in the
thoughts and emotions of the dying person and
the berieved relatives, At times this jerk causes
an impediment to the progress of the soul on
its way to the next step. The vedic cremation
ritual is intended to neutralise this impediment
by setting it free from the strangulatory sorrowful
thoughtforms and sentiments of the individual
and his relatives. There is a purificatory sacrament
to relieve the disembodied soul from the impurities
of the etheric and the astral planes, It purifies
the subtler bodies of the subject himself and also
those of the relatives that take part in the ritual.
These impurities work as contagion to others
in producing gloomy thoughtforms and certain
diseases to the people around. (The materialis¬
tic medical science cannot suspect any such thing
though the founders of the more advanced medicine
called Homoeopathy could perceive and give
satisfactory explanations'about the vital body and
the diseases engraved therein). For such „ reasons
the Vedio path keeps the close relatives of the depar¬
ted off from touching others during the first ten
days after the incident occurs, Carrying the corpse
by four men indicates the proper decomposition of
the physical body to return into the four king¬
doms below in man. The presence of the angels at
the four corners of the earth is automatically
invoked into these four persons and the work of
the four scribes in squaring up the accounts of
the completed span is fulfilled, As soon as the
person is dead the corpse is placed with the head
towards the north. Before the life is out it is

Book of Rituals

imperative that the body should be placed ou bare
floor. The earth’s magnetic current should work
through the body, and the local magnetism working
should be merged into the total magnetism of the
earth, Here it is interesting to notice that a healthy
man should sleep with bis head towards the
south (keep the attraction of his two poles with
the unlike poles of the earth). Perfect silence
should he kept during the time of departure and
the name of God in any language should be in¬
voked by uttering in the right ear of the dying
person. Then it becomes conducive for the proper
raising of the inner man from the tomb (physical
body) on the doom’s day. The implements of
masonry are broken (the functions of the physical
body are neutralised) and the soul enters into i
cave of darkness (the temporary unconsciousnesi
which is the passage of death) only to come ou
into greater light from the other side.

As soon as the life is out a lamp is placet
near and opposite to his head. This attracts th
various subtler forces of the body and prevenl
the downward flow of the ethers of man escapin
from ‘ the nether regions ’ (the lower nature c
man). Then the body is purified by bath and
properly decorated to he carried by four peop
on a vehicle constructed in the fashion of a ladde
This vehicle symbolises the ladder of the subtl
bodies of man serving as a path to tread fro
the lower to the higher natures until he reach
the Devachanic plane. Fire is carried inthehai
of the eldest son which signifies that fire of 1
that is handed down from father to son whi
periodically consumes the physical vehicles and ke<

the Vedic Rituals 6

up the tradition of the activities of life. With the
same fire the body is burnt in the cremation ground.
The fire m man is the real inheritance of manhood
that is concealed amidst the brilliance of Godhood
and this fire is the lamp in the hand of man to
snow the path of life, from time to time consumiug
his physical vehicle. This subsidiary process of
consuming the physical vehicles includes the
promotion of the physical atoms into higher
planes, by virtue of their serving the various
physical tissues of man in the behaviour of the
disciples of the inner man. The whole process of
ritual after cremation continues for ten days and
on the tenth day the soul is said to have secured
the path of swarga (Devachan). The sons of the
dead man performs the ritual during these ten
days. The mantram used invoke the intelligences
that work out the heredity of man under the direct
guidance of the Pitrus. The presence of the finest
traits of the departed soul should be invoked into
the Offspring to be handed down to their children.

Every return of the moon to the same point
in the zodiac where the Moon was at the time of
the departure will be observed and ritualised. These
monthly rituals will trace the lunar path (the path
of the pitrus) along which the departed person
takes his journey into Devachan and the counterpart
in the offspring traces the reproductory activities
of the offspring to reproduce the composite counter¬
part in the form of children. Every true astrologei
knows the relationship between the position of th<
Moon of the father and the Moon of the son

Book of Rituals

These monthly rituals are conducted during th<=
first twelve months and then the first annual ritual
is conducted to denote the return of the spirit
of man (enacting the role of the Sun-god in the
ritual of life) to the same point of the year but
more advanced and enlightened. Then the monthly
rituals are stopped and the annual rituals are
observed throughout the household career of the
children. The rationale is highly scientific and it
includes the zodiacal mysteries of the solar return
and other astrological phenomena. ( The working
detail of all these rituals and the man trams used
is left out here for lack of space and the subject
requires an independent treatise).

Puranic Rituals

There are many Vedic rituals which escaped
mention in the present book. Even a sum total
of all these rituals forms only a part of the once
existed Vedic rituals. Sathapatha Brahmana describes
some and mentions many of the rituals that are
not found in the present texts of the Vedas.
Strangely enough, many of them are found in the
operative injunction described in the Book of Dzyan
(which is not yet given out to the world and
which will not be given out until the sacred work
of the present Christ is completely free from the
political motives of the various Churches of
various religions working at present). Some of
the rituals are projected in the form of narratives
and allegories in the Puranas. The allegories in
the puranas were in vogue long before the composi¬
tion of the present versions of the puranas. They
were being directly narrated as stories by Gurus
to their disciples during the time of the vedic
initiations. Parasara, the father of the present Veda
Vyasa, could foresee the trend of the Kali Age.
He could know that the chain of the path will
be broken among the followers of the.one religion.
He could also see that the one religion of
man will be broken up into many through the
imperfections of the rationalistic (non-intuitional)
approach of the age. He, therefore, wanted to

Book of Rituals

incorporate allegories in 1 ' his ' treatise, “ Vishnu
Purana 5 *. Vishnu, the Lord of Pervasion, who
presided over a grand sum total of the Vedic Rituals
and in whose name all the rituals of Agni were
invoiced, is taken as the outline formula or the
synthesising personality of the total wisdom. Jn
the model of the ritualistic cosmic man of the Veda,
Parasara incorporated the Vishnu of the purana.
He initiated his son Veda Vyasa into the unity
of his life work. Then Veda Vyasa gave out the
eighteen main puranas that elucidate the work of
bis father. Again he Composed the grand work
‘Maha Bharata’ which contained the whole Vedic
wisdom with all its ritualistic keys. A grand historical
incident of the Maha Bharatha war was taken to
serve as an allegory of the whole wisdom. The
original version of Maha Bharatha was in the form
of a grand mystery play to be enacted in the
ritualistic enclosures. It still exists in some cave
temples and is still being enacted by an order of
ritualists. The present version of the epic poem
is given out to the exoteric students and scholars
of the Kali Age and it is edited by the disciples
of Vyasa with many extracts of the original version.
Of course, the ritual is to be concealed away from
the outer world and should be kept in secret because
a ritual means the manifestation of great power
and occult phenomenon.

The dratna of Maha Bharatha is incorporated
in the epic as the main story of the war between
the KUrus and Pandavas- Kurus are described as
the 100 sons of the blind king (the ego of man
by which man i£ hoodwinked from the brilliance
of god-nature jn him). The five sons of the white

Puranic Rituals

king represent the five senses of man who belong
to the Light in Man. The birth of the five sons
marks the death of the father and they are brought
up as the sons of the widow (as long as the five
senses of man work in the world without a connecting
link wiih the father consciousness in man, he is
called the son of the widow ). These five children
have their fathers among the devas though the
physical father is their vehicle. Hence the mother-
nature of man is not a widow in the true sense.
The five devas who preside over the five senses of
man continue to guide vheir sons from time to time
until the five children retrace their path to the
capital to regain the lost kingdom from the sons of
the blind king. In their quest they secure the com¬
panionship of Lord Krishna (the highest God-
principle incarnated in man). The whole kingdom
is bifurcated and a new capital is erected by the
Magic of Lord Krishna through the aid of Viswa-
karma. Then comes the performance of the grand
royal vedic ritual Raja Suya ( conceiving a king
out of man). It is conducted under the direct
guidance of Lord Krishna. It is performed in a
big hall erected by Asuramaya and consecrated to
the five sons of the widow. The construction of
this hall, marks the construction of the spiritual
body of man which is the Antahkarana of the
Raja Yogis and the higher bridge invoked by
Master G V. V- among his disciples. It is a filling
up of the gap between the known and unknown
worlds of man. A detailed scientific explanation
of the whole process is described under the title of
the “Building up of Antahkarana ,s in the book
Treatise on the Seven Rays by A. A. B.

Book of Rituals

After completing the royal ritual, the Pandus
lose their kingdom in a gamble with the sons of
the blind king. They leave the kingdom and make
their exit into the wilderness showing that the
divine principles in man will lose themselves into
the objectivity leaving a full play to the humanised
activity of the divine powers. After this the Pandus
live incognito for one year keeping all their divine
weapons *in a corpse tied to a tree. The corpse
represents the flesh and blood of man wherein the
treasures are buried. The tree represents the tree
of evolution. These Pandus live in the kingdom
which is named after the great fish. The fish
represents the prophecy of the promised land or
the divine wisdom that will be once again handed
down to man after attaining spiritual levels. At
the end of this period the great war of Niaha
Bharata was fought between the Pandus and the
Kurus for eighteen days. Eighteen squadrons partook
in the battle. The whole book of Maha Bharata
is composed in Eighteen Volumes. Before the
beginning of the battle there is the initiation of
Bhagavad Gita, the message of the Lord to Man
in Eighteen chapters (Eighteen is three-fourths
of twenty-four which represents the rotation of
the whole globe through 3 x 90° which includes
eighteen lunations in the year). This represents the
emergence of the fourfold word of God in its
first three planes (when the utterance of the fourfold
word is applied to the birth and span of man,
three-fourths of the year is completed in the
mother’s womb and the remaining one-fourth is spent
as his objective span with a progression of one day
responding as one year in the span. This is better

Puranic Rituals 87

understood by the astrologers who know the method
of secondary progression to read the horoscope
of man ).

The theme of the above-said mystery play Maha
Bharata includes also the marriage of the five
sons of Pandu with a maiden who is the daughter
of the ruler of the laud where five rivers meet. The
middle of the five brothers Arjuna who is the
disciple of Lord Krishna represents the man-con¬
sciousness in man being initiated into God-conscious¬
ness. A rotating fish is arranged above and Arjuna
hits the fish with five arrows looking at the image
of the fish in the waters below. The fish above
represents the divine wisdom which is the prophecy
of man and the image represents the lower principles
of man arranged in the worlds below as above.
By the hitting of the fish the five sons married a
maid. In the Zodiac the fish represents the sign
Pisces, and the maiden represents the opposite sign
Virgo. Arjuna with his bow and five arrows
represents the sign Saggittarius wherein the passage
for initiations is concealed. The whole story is an
allegory of the sign Virgo being raised to the level
of Pisces when the twelve signs in man are elevated
to only six pairs of signs, to represent the activity
of the six chakras in man. To such a man who
has achieved this through a ritual of Maha .Bharata
the sun (the spirit of man) never experiences a fall
(debilitation in Libra) after completing his journey.
Then he again enters Aries because there are only six
signs to him. This means that the Kundalini rises
to the chakras above after touching the solar
plexus.

fiook of Rituals

In the Maha Bharatha there are also the
symbolic journeys of the soul allegorised. The
pilgrimage of Arjuna for one year after the marriage
includes his another marriage with a sister of Lord
Sri Krishna. This is the mystic marriage of the
human soul with divine nature. Then there is the
journey of the five brothers into the forests indica¬
ting the wiiful journey Of the initiated man into
the buzzling wilderness of the mundane world. There
is also the upward journey, of Nahusha, a king upto
the level of the king of the Devas and his fall into
the generation again in the form of a serpent. There
is also the upward journey of his son to the same
level, his coming down again to his fellowmen and
his next upward journey into the eternal Path.
This represents the march of man into the realms
of the ritualistic wisdom, his coming down to serve
his fellow beings and thereby attaining the path
to liberation. Finally there is the journey of no
return undertaken by the five sons with their wife.
Of all the six only the eldest of the five sons (called
the son of Death ) reaches the goal by not leaving
back his father who followed him in the shape of
a Dog (the vigilance of man that is controlled by
the Dog Star in Heavens). All these journeys
are being still enacted in the mystery temples by
the followers of the Order which is called the Ancient
ritualistic Order of the Mystery Circle. During the
next fifty years some of these rituals will be externa¬
lised and published in detail and will be conducted
in ritualistic halls all over the world under the
direct guidance of the Masters of the Seventh Sub
Ray under the Second Ray. This is mentioned
in many places by the Tibetan Master in the

Quranic Rituals

works of A. A. B. At one place it is mentioned
in the following words: “This second group will
implement the new religion ; by the time they come
into control, the old theological activities will
have been completely broken. Judaism will be
fast disappearing. Buddhism will be spreading and
becoming increasingly dogmatic; Christianity will
be in a state of choatic divisions and upheaval,
When this takes place and the situation is acute
enough, then Master Jesus will take certain initial
steps towards reassuming control of His Church.
The Buddha will send two trained disciples to
reform Buddhism; other steps will also betaken
in this department of religion and of education,
over which the Christ rules and he will move to
restore the ancient spiritual land mark, to eliminate
that which is not essential, and to reorganise the
entire religious field-again in preparation for the
restoration of the mysteries. These mysteries
when restored will unify all faiths.

Groups of spiritually-minded financiers, who
are conscious members of an Ashram will take
hold of the world economic situation. The Christ
and the Masters are occupied with the task of
preparing for the restoration of the mysteries.
This restoration will fall into three phases and will
cover and include in its symbolism. all phases of
human unfoldmeat. The story of mankind will be
pictorialised. These three phases correspond broadly
aud in a general sense to the three degrees of the
Blue Lodge in Masonry. The a.nalogy is not
entirely accurate, owing to the unavoidable

Book of
vu

degenerecy of Masonry, but with the restoration
of the mystery, Masonry also will come into us
own, These .phases are *

1, The stage of a general recognition of Light
in all departments of human living* This
is inferred in the first stanza of th© New
Invocation. If the ritual of iho E. A. is
studied in the Light of this information
the significance will emerge. The poor and
destitute candidate emerges into the Light*

2. The stage of complete economic reorienta¬
tion; in this, humanity is relieved of all
economic anxiety and is free to receive its
due wages and the right reward of all
service rendered in the building of fh'O
Temple of the Lord.

•.spiritual status'is recognised through the

medium of what is regarded as a major
initiation for which the first two initiatory
degrees are only preparatory. This first
great initiation will be objectively staged
and the genera] public will recognise it
as the major rite and ritual of the new and
religious institution of the period , , **
(The Externaltsation of the Hierarchy"bv
A.A.B.pp, 57i to.575)

a wiii S hf Version of tlie Mahft-

ua i» u.jj' ntualls ®d as a set’or a succession'

Sr : Ho :changes here

Mk is unr^ 0V ( ° propcr nouns so that
understood on the intended bro§<J

’uranic Rituals 9l

ense. The whole version will be enacted in English,
"here are two more rituals that form part of
he mysteries of Maha Bharatha. The first is the
iescent of ” The Point of Light M from the creative
svels (Brahma Loka ) to the physical plane. This
acludes the allegory of the fall of Ganga from the
svel of the creator (appointed God who is the
"etragrnm or the fourfaced deity expressed by the
orimila of the cross within the square) to the
arth. The story is available in all its detail in the first!
ook of Maha Bharatha. A lunar king, Maha Bhisha
the great divide healer) falls in love with Ganga
the three fold flow or outpouring of the spiritual
ctivily ). Brahma curses the pair to go down to
arth and return after experiencing the life there,
ti the meanwhile eight deities among the Pitrus
re also ordered to take their birth on the earth,
ranga and Mahabhisha come down as Santhanu
nd Ganga to reproduce the first seven pitrus as
ying gods and the eighth to establish himself
n earth and cause the birth of the lineage
ithout himself getting married. Satyavathi (the
•uth bearing word or the utterance of the sacred
r ord in its third manifestation) gives birth to
'edavyasa while she was a virgin through the
oiritual impregnation of Parasara. Satyavathi oame
ut of the belly of the fish and Vedavyasa causes
ie birth of the blind king and the while king,
his fronts a grand mystery in itself though it is
part of the drama of Mahabharatha, This gives
le initiation of the sacred word as Gayatri and
estows upon the student the capacity to reorganise
le whole Vedic wisdom in a fourfold manner
>r himself.

Boole of Rituals

The second mystery play is the tracing of the
lineage in which the highest Lord takes his physical
incarnation as Lord krishna. An ancestor of the
Kurus and the pandus who belonged to the lunar
lineage ( the order of thepitrus) and who is called;
Yayathi (the pilgrim ) marries two virgins: 1. The
creative path of the devas or the upward path and
1 The reproductive path of the pitrus or the down¬
ward path. The first one is the daughter of Sukra, :
the preceptor of the forces. The second one is the,
daughter of a king lower who belonged to the lower,
(grosser) lineage of forces. Sukra himself is a Deva
(creative force) though he is a preceptor of the Asuras
(physical forces). On the human scale sukra governs
upward path of the reproductory fluid of man,
through the path of Rajayoga. The king of the
demons, the second father-in-law of the pilgrim
represents the intelligence that governs the lower
worlds of man. Yayathi begets children through both
of his wives, but the inheritance of the objective
kindom is got only by the sons of the Asura
wife. The sons of the upward path live to bear their
order only as a prophecy of the birth of ,Lord Sri
Krishna in their line. This part of the mystery
play represents the twofold activity of the creation
in man and the realisation of the highest god through
the upward creative activity. In fact this forms
the main part of the mystery because the five
sons of the Pandu become his followers and
disciples to gain victory jn the great war of Malm
Bbaratba. Strangely enough this whole story was
fully externalised into the physical historical .play
and the externalisation was complete by the time
of the composition of this work. Veda Vyasa

Puranic Rituals

happened to be the contemporary of Lord Krishna

not only on the spiritual plane but also on the
physical plane. He had the opportunity of depicting
the historicity of the whole story. For the disciples
of the posterity who live in the Kali Age, the
ritual is left as an inheritance to make “ the Lord
walk, on earth with Man” on the spiritual plane
until the return of the Christ and on the physical
plane for the time of the return when thistles shed
honey and ; swords are beaten into ploughs. By
that time the oddities of man are rounded up into
the nectar of love, the universal solvent and the
unifying principle of all religions through the work
of the Christ. Also by that time politics becomes
out of date and ceases to be a necessity to man.
Equal distribution of the wealth on the physical
plane will be conducted by the aid of spiritual
consciousness expressed through love-wisdom (the
activity of the second ray).

It is evident from the above mystic charge of
the Maha Bharatha ritual that the main grand
mystery of the return of the Lord to earth is made
secondary in the vastness of the whole drama. For
this, Veda Vyasa has separated this mystery into
an independent allegory dealt directly in detailin
three more books of jjMaha Bharata under the title
Hari Vamsa .

Again the whole Puranic approach is given by
him as another mystery in which the descent of the
Lord forms the main key and into it the others
fit in as parts. This is the composition of his last
work Maha Bhagavatha which is again a dramatised
version’in its original. The formula of the twelve

§4 Book of Rftuats

solar months in the year and the twelve signs of
the zodiac formed the basis of the composition of
the Book in twelve volumes. The highest Deity is
first introduced as a Solar Deity (Vasu Deva) who
is invoked by a Mantram of twelve syllables. The
birth of the Lord takes place in the 10 th Volume
and his death in the 1st volume. The key to this
mystery lies in the zodiacal rituals starting with the
meridian or the 10th house and covering the 1st
house of the cosmic horoscope as marking the
death of god»consciousriess to give birth to man-
consciousness. On the physical plane also man
is' born into earth in the 10th month of his
embryonic development and travels to meet his
starting place. The whole formula of this book
is initiated to Veda Vyasa by Narada. Narada
is the grand Master of all the solar and lunar
rituals of creation. He initiated Valmiki into the
solar allegories and Vyasa into the Lunar allegories.
On the cosmic plane Narada works as an eternal
principle ( not the name of a person whose activity
is. one unit including the activity of Mercury*
the Planet on the one end, Neptune on the other
via Venus). Sanat Kumara is his colleague on the
plane of Venus-consciousness. On , the plane of
Mercury Narada works as the intelligence to
compare and contrast things (figuratively called
thebringer of conflict ). On the plane of Neptune
he is the founder of the musical heirarchy
who bestows the word of the Lord through the
power of music. This much is enough for the
present to give the proper clues to approach
the Puranic mysteries that are rearranged by Veda
Vyasa to stabilise the Vedic wisdom on earth

P uranic Rituals 9*.

through the dark age of Kali. Lord Krishna has
lost himself into the soul and spirit of Lord
Maitreya at the time of the physical departure of
Lord Krishna. Hence Maitreya, the present Christ
has taken the burden of renovating the school
of the mysteries with the aid of the Masters
through their Ashrams in the modern age. Of
course English becomes necessarily the medium of
tile whole plan of Wisdom. For this reason the
phonetical and etymological, imperfections of
English will be corrected from time to time to ;
prepare it as a language of the initiates and in the
meanwhile English is bound to be the World
Language through political, economic and spiritual
reasons.

The cosmic principle Narada comes down to
the earth and lives as sage to initiate some seers.
Through his initiation Valmiki reproduced the sola®
allegory which deals with the mission of the Sungod
to create the activity of the year on this earth.
.The solar intelligences come down to earth through
many realms that are allegorised in the story of
Rama by Valmiki as the many Solar Kings that
came down to earth to produce the incarnation
of Lord as Rama. In the Vedas India, the king
of Gods, is called Rudra in a particular sense.
The rainbow is called the bow of Indra in the poetic
imagery of the epic. The water on the earth is
raised by the sun’s rays to form as clouds upon
which the bow is formed. The southern solstice
(the sign Cancer which forms the ascendant of
Rama with Moon, the lord of the sign in the
same place) breaks the bow for the water to come
down. The furrow of the flow in the field is

Book of Rituals

ompared with the virgin who is the daughter of
le earth and Rama marries her by breaking the
ow. The story of Rama is thus mainly a mystery
lay having the whole year with the upward and
ownward paths of water as its theme. This forms
ae two fold activity of man (coming down to
latter and going up into the spirit through the
Mar ritualistic activity). Thus the story of Rama
an amplification of the ritual of the year and
L so an initiation into the import of the Gayatri
Lantram. It is noticeable that the story of Rama
composed in 240J0 verses representing the 24
nations of tne year and the 24 syllables in the
.etre of Gayatri, Towards the end of the book
is hinted that the whole story is enacted as a
-ama by a set of Deva intelligences who are
ained as actors. This shows that the original
rm of this book also was a drama to be enacted
a ritual. Vaimiki also had the advantage of
dng contemporary of the whole story when it
curxed on the physical plane as a historical incident,
lese epics are so powerful in the symmetry of
sir composition and the model of writing that
3y serve as great Mantras to raise the readers into
: ritualistic consciousness and work as sacraments
purify the feelings, thoughts and actions.

Various traditions among the Furanic Rituals

If a student of the ritualistic symbolism of the
itions surveys the whole literature concerned we
id certain traditional links sustained and being
nsistently worked out as an under current of the
parently varying ideology. The differences are
e to the difference in time and clime but the
der current is due to innate unity of man which
always the same. It is this innate unity that
to be studied properly by following the similar
its of various ritualistic traditions. Among them
following aspects appear prominent and demand
careful study of the students.

a) The tradition of the dying God.

b) The tradition of the eternal fight between
the Serpent and the Eagle.

c) The tradition of Man vanquishing the
serpent.

d) The tradition of brick laying and building,
the temple.

Now let us survey these four main traditions
hat we may have an easy approach towards
>asic unity of all religions through the speculative
listic key.

Book of Rituals

a) The tradition of the dying god

We find this item in the symbolic man sacrifice
that is found in the Veda. Purusha, the Cosmic
Mao is said to have sacrificed himself into the
ritualisation of the whole universe. All the second¬
ary gods that came from him used him as a
sacrificial being. They tied him to the pole and
from him they raised the existence of the beings
of the whole universe. The passage describing this
ritual and its splendours is found in all the four
Vedas. In the Upanishads we find the story of
Nachiketa being given away to the God of death
( who is the lord of the south) by the the father.
The son enters into the kingdom of death, conducts
a good conversation with death, gets initiated into
the mysteries of the whole creation and returns
to the father with gifts and boons. In the Maha
Bharatha we find that the king Pandu dies before
the death of his fiive sons. In his place Lord Krishna
is found by the five sons of the widow. In the same
book we find that four of the sons of the Pandu were
taken by the God of Death. Then the eldest son (who
is the son of God of Death) conducts a conversation
with the father about the various aspects of creation.
Then the four brothers are again raised to life by
the same God of Death. In the story of Savithri*
the Virgin wanted to marry Satyavan. It is prophecied
that Satyavan (truth bearer of the light in man )
would die exactly one year after the marriage.
When the pair has been to a forest Satyavan dies
at the time of sunset. The God of Death takes
him to the nether regions but Savithri also follows
him. She conducts an elaborate conversation with
God of Death and through his favour she receives

tic Ritualf

>oon to beget children. Then it becomes impe-
e to God of Death to bring Satyavan baclT
ife. Just after miduight Satyavan is brought
ife and the pair returns home.

In the rituals of the Egyptians we find the death
raising at many places. Many myths of the Greek
;d lore contain the stories of death and raising,
story of Jesus in the Christian Bible describes
a by Crucifixion and the rising of the prophet
tviour from the Cross to the heaven. The rituals
ie modern mystic schools contain the story of the
nely death of a builder and an effort to raise
toiifeagainto find out the lost word. The stories
idonias describe his death in various versions,
bese stories mean only one truth, one ritualistic
iiila and that is the soiar mystery.

Sun God comes from mid-heavens to set in the
sacrificing his brilliance to dwell deep into the
its of nether regions at the point of midnight
again rises in the east every time with a new
rience. “ Today is again new with its ever
.experience *’ is the ritualistic prayer of the
c Seers. This gives the formula of the symbolic
tey described by the annual Sun in the course
re solar year. The vernal equinox marks the
ation or the brilliance of the annual sun at High
ve, Tne summer solstice marks the sunset and
autumu equinox marks the lowest point reached
he Sun-god. The winter solstice again marks
dawn. Tnese four points mark the four corners
he cross in the year. Again the midheaven
;s the brilliant) spiritual consciousness of

100

Book of Ritual:

man at bis High Twelve (the head centre). Froir
that consciousness man wilfully descends into the
matter of oreation touching the mineral kingdom,
plant kingdom and animal kingdom to emerge
once again into the man of his next round as a
leader and saviour of the three lower kingdoms.
Thus the stories of the dying solar God to take
up a new birth convey more than one meaning
covering the whole phenomena of the creation
passing through birth and death in the course of
a rotation of the great wheel.

The various sets of conversations conducted by
the characters with the God of Death in these
stories contain the highest truths to the mysteries of
existence and the non-existence, in ail these stories
the Lord of Death is called the Lord of the South
according to the Vedic and Puranic tradition. Yarna,
the Lord of Death is said to be the guardian angel
of South. In the rituals South is located in
midheavens for various mystic reasons. The southern
tilt of the earth during the year marks the position
of the Sun at the northern most point (towards
north pole) and the raid-point where the sun
crosses the equator from south to north is
called the annual meridian. For this reason and
for so many other ritualistic reasons South is
located in midheavens. Ihe fact that it is presided
by the Lord of Death proves that the highest
wisdom of man includes his giving away of himself
to permeate and enlighten the whole universe.
This is the fact that binds the underlying tradition
of ali similar stories. :

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101

b) The Tradition of the Eternal fight Between the

Serpent and the Eagle :

The bird and the serpent have a similar origin
and that is from the, stage of the egg.. Both the
bird and the serpent lay eggs and the young ones
are hatched out of the eggs- Jt is said that the
Patriarch (Prajapathi Kasyapa) who presides over
the upper half-globe of the visible space (the vault
of heavens to the man oh this earth) had two
wives, the dawn and the dusk. He offered to confer
the gift of children to them, 'the dusk longed for
children with prolonged bodies. She wanted to
beget thousand sons. The dawn wanted two sons
who are mightier than the sons of the dusk. He
conferred the boon. The sons of dusk learnt to
enter the chasms of the earth. The sons of dawn
learnt to rise up to the heavens with wings, This
story is evidently a solar myth with many significant
points. The serpents who are the children of the dusk
represent the time bound wisdom that is concealed.
The birds represent the wisdom liberated from the
limitation and brought into light. These are called
respectively the lower and the higher activities in
man. Wisdom lies in man concealed and buried
in his nature at the lower pole. It is to be raised
to the higher pole when the conflict of man is solved
and the life of man enlightened. The eagle is
described in the Vedas as the highest formula of
the revealed wisdom in Man. The various parts
of the body of the eagle are constructed by the
systematic arrangement of bricks in the Vedic
rituals. The form of the eagle erected by the
arrangement of bricks includes all the other arrange¬
ments of various shapes of the fire place with all

jO^ Book of Rituals

the possible combination of numbers, into which
the bricks are arranged. The Rig Veda describes
the ritualistic eagle as a twofold eagle (the man
in man and the god in man) on the tree (the tree
of this whole creation symbolised by the seed
principle and the expanding principle through
germination ). The one bird eats from the tree and
rejoices while the other bird rejoices without eating.
This twofold bird corresponds with the emblem of
the ritualist eagle with two heads that is used by the
modern ritualists. The story of the mystic bird
Phoenix which burns its body in the fire of fuel and
comes out again by the fall of the drop of rain
on the ashes is also commonly described in the
various eastern and western scriptures. This also
signifies the periodical dissolution of the creation
and the return of the essence of the creation.
This allegory speaks of the immortality of the
bird through various bodies. In the allegory of
Maha Bharatba the eagle Garuda is said to have
brought the drink of immortality from heaven to
earth. What a wonderful proof of the basic unity
of truth lurking as the subconscious muse of man
through ages and religions! The pious mission
of the fusion of the East and the West in the
modern age definitely requires a careful study of
such basic truths.

The eternal fight between the serpent and the
eagle in man and the solution are concealed in the
sign of Scorpio among the Zodiacal mysteries. To
an ordinary man Scorpio represents the genitals
and the animal act of reproduction under the
instigation of the Martian Ray. For this reason
Mars rules this sign in ordinary horoscopes, To

Furanic Rituals

103

an adept Scorpio represents Scorpio-Taurus. This
is because there are only six higher signs working
in his horoscope as the activity of his six chakras.
Since the activity of the six lower signs (the signs
that mark the downward path of the Sun in the
year) is sublimated, the adept has the twofold higher
nature of each sign. Taurus represents the voice
of man and the activity of the lower pole is raised
to the level of the well trained voice to create
through the power of the word raised or regained
after it was long lost through births. Among the
rigelia of the Egyptian High Priests the head dress
in certain rituals is decorated by the head of a
Snake representing the Snake of the nether worlds
(Kundalini at the base centre) raised to the level
of Taurus, the word and the sight of man.
The jewel of the emblem with double eagle is
decorated as his breast plate indicating that his
higher nature which raised the Serpent to the
higher levels is located as the Love in His Heart.
Description of Lord Siva bearing a snake as a jewel
in His neck has the same import of the Kundalini
raised to the level of the throat centre after
returning from the higher centres for the sake
of the welfare of this creation.

c) The Tradition of Man Vanquishing the Serpent:

The symbolism is much discussed and divulged
by H. P, B. in the Secret Doctrine and by many
subsequent Theosophical writers. We have a general
survey of the ritualistic tradition right from the
Vedic literature, in the Vedas Indra, the Lord
of the Devas is glorified as the slayer of Vrillira.

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Book of Rituals

The fight between Vrithra and India and the final
slaying of Vrithra by Indra contains almost one-
fourth of the Rig Vedic Mantrams. In many forms
Vrithra engulfed Indra, and the Devas. Every time
Indra; conquered Vrithra, the serpent outlined
Indra in a subtler form. Finally he caught Indra
within and without.; Indra and his Devas are all
kept in the impregnable darkness. No weapon was
found capable of slaying the serpent. Then Vak
< the sacred word ) was given asVajra (the thunder
bolt ) by Brihaspathi, the : preceptor of the Gods.
Then Indra could strike Vrithra with it forever. He
then placed the body of the serpent among the units'
of time and space (kastas) thafserved as the chips of
fuel that are ever moving. Indra Represents the
cognizing aspect of the consciousness of Agni and it
presides over the firuitofall the rituals; of.the building
process^ In the puranic symbolism it is said that
the Gods approached the Seer Dadheecbi ( the
bearer of the pure buddhic plane) and begged for:
his vertebral column. He conceded to it and so
Indra could slay the serpent with that as his weapon.;
In the stories about Lord Krishna in the Puranas,
He is described to have vanquished the wicked
serpent Kaleeya, elevated and sent him into the
sea with ennobled traits: A major portion of the
first book of Maha Bharatha which forms prelude
to the whole story we find a number of stories
connected with the eternal tug between the seers
and the serpents, the Gods and the serpents and
ultimately the Eagle and the Serpents. A set of
Risbis who belonged to the level of the cosmic
and microcosmio Devas who are called by the

ranlc Rituals

105

me of Bhrugus are described to have a constant
ht with the serpents until there was finally a com-
)mise through matrimonial relationships between
: Bhrugus and the serpents. The Bhrugus are
s descendants of Varuna, the Lord of the West,
ere is a Vedic ritual in the form of a conversation
ween Varuna, the father and Bhrugu, the son,
gives the sacrament to initiate the disciple into
i details of analysing the existence of man into the
ysical, physiological, mental, buddhic and the
conditional or blissful planes of his own existence,
e characters of the father and son indicate that
s ritual takes place while man is coming down
ough father into the womb of the mother. In the
crocosmic scale the west represnts the activity of
: lower pole of man wherein the son is differentiated
■ough the activity of the sign Libra at the navel
hich sign intervenes subsequently between the
rgin nature of Virgo and the polarity of sex in
)rpio). The control of the lower pole is the strength
the spiritualist and hence the west represents
sngth in the temples of rituals. Bhrugus fighting the
pents denote the tug between the cosmic conscious-
is and the time-bound-consciousness in man.
the same fiirst book of Maha Bharatha there
the solar allegory of the disciple of a Guru
nacting as the annual solar-god conducting the
nbolic journey ordered by the Guru) who is
leived by a cunning snake Takshaka ( the etcher
the digger of holes in space). That gradually
is to the colossal incident of the grand serpent
rifice conducted by the descendant of the Pandus.
was intended that all the serpents in creation

106

Book of Rituals

should be burnt as holocaust into the sacrificial
fire of the ritual. The main target was to eliminate
Takshaka from creation. Many thousand of serpents
were burnt in the fire but Takshaka escaped because
the ritual was stopped in the middle and was
completed only by substituting the remaining portion
with a regular recital of the text of Maha Bharata-
Many of the divine serpents were also saved by
this sacrifice. The sacrifice was stopped due to the
noble request of a great seer Asthika whose father
is a descendant of the Bhrugus and the mother
a descendant of the serpents. All these stories
form part of the rituals conducted in imitation of the
cosmic and microcdsmic phenomena which deal with
the apparent opposition and the true relationship
between the creative activity and the reproductive
activity. The activity of the lower pole is an opposed
activity of the higher pole to an ordinary man.
To a ritualist the two activities are complementary
to one another like the activity of the two poles
of a magnet, and the two poles of our earth. The
polarity between the earth and the moon, the earth
and the sun and also between the Moon and the
Sun are all mutual complementaries though they
appear as mutual opposites. They are like the
pairs of heat and cold, night and day, life and
death etc. The survival of Takshaka in the snake
sacrifice shows that the existence and the survival
of the lower pole is a cosmic necessity which has
nothing wrong or detrimental about it. Man can,
at best transcend it and neutralise it but he can
never destroy it* The created universe incorporated
in matte! is as much true of its god-content as the
uncreated subtler essence before it came down as

Puranic Rituals

107

creation. The created universe is called the
conditioned truth or the definable aspect while
the uncreated forms the unconditional or undefined
aspect of truth. Here the Veda says “ the definable
and the undefinable put together form the
definition. The aboded and the unaboded put
together form the abode. Truth (absolute) and
untruth (relative) put together become Truth”.
This is the proper approach from the operative
level to the speculative level of the ritual of whole
creation in the concept of the Vedic seers. In all
the scriptures of the world there are the stories
of many heroes vanquishing the serpent or the
dragon. All of them deal with the process of man
transcending the lower pole to neutralise it and
elevate it into the higher.

d) The Tradition of Bricklaying and Building the

Temple :

Every Vedic ritual necessarily includes the
building up of the sacrificial enclosure and the
constructing of the fire place with various arrange¬
ments of bricks. The fire altar mainly contains
five layers of bricks arranged in the ordained
fashion. About the shape of the bricks also there
are many injunctions. The various shapes of the
varieties of bricks with their various names denote
the various minor activities of the creation. For
example the bricks of the first layer are called the
invisible bricks and they represent the invisible
outline of the visible creation. There are also
the life-bearing bricks in the first layer and they
include two varieties, those of Prana and Apana

108

Book of Rituals

(the activity that is centripetal and centrifugal)*
In the second layer there are the Aswini bricks
who deal with the working of the twin-gods in
nature (beginning and ending, life and death,
awakening and sleep etc.) There are also the
bricks of the flying span in the second layer. Like
this there are a number of variety of bricks used
in the rituals of brick laying. Among the shapes
of the bricks two varieties stand prominent and
they are the perfect cube (isha) and the proportional
brick (urja). The Isha-brick is the ashlar of the
Vedic rituals. It was built on a side of twelve
inches representing the twelve months of the year.
Each corner or the cube is made up of three sides
of twelve inches each, the sum total of the length
being 3xl2«=36 that are equal to the 36 divisions
of the year each containing 10 days. The ten days
denote the ten digits of the growth of Cosmic
Purusha (his ten fingers on both his hands). They
correspond with the 36 deacons that stand around
the hall in one of the Egyptian rituals whose
symbolism is concealed until the days of Greece
in the 36 decanates of the horoscope. In the
rituals of the Egypt and also in some of the Vedic
rituals the 36 deacons encircle the candidate at the
time of initiation with drawn swords. As we have
previously seen, the cube contains eight corners of
three right angles each, the sum total of the right
angles being 24 which correspond with the syllables
in the Gayatri metre, the lunations in the lunar
year and the hours in the day. In some rituals
this brick is analysed into and composed by six
pyramids juxtaposed with their vertices, arranged
at a point- For this reason this brick contains the

Puranic Rituals

109

symbolism of the triangle (the side of the pyramid ),
the square (the base of the pyramid or the side
of the cube), the point (the vortex of each pyramid),
the straight line ( the line of the pyramid ) and
the cube. The ritual conducted as brick laying with
this cube is called the fulfilment (ishti). The Sanskrit
term “ishtaka” meaning a brick is derived from
this tradition.

The proportional brick is called the trick of
establishment in strength (Urja). It is a cube
having its length, bieath and thickness in the
ratio of 4, 3, and 2. The number 432 forms a major
key to divide time into various ages that mark
the periods of ethereal, geological, biological and
historical periods of this earth. Ibis number is
found in almost all the world scriptures in relation
to the division of the time into ages. For example,
the Puranas use these numbers with some zeros to
divide the four ages of a Maha Yuga that forms a
part of the day of Brahma. The length of the Kali
Age is 432,000; the Dwapara Age is twice, the
Treta Age is thrice and the Krita Age is four times
the magnitude of the Kali Age. All the four put
together form the great age Mahayuga in 4+3+2+
1=10 units of the Kali age and hence 4,3,2,0000 of
the mortal years. There are various types of
ritualistic and speculative applications of the number
4, 3, 2 and this subject itself can fill volumes.

Ihe founders of various religions and the
discoverers of the various spiritual and ritualistic
schools are figuratively called the brick-layers of
the universe. Polishing a brick is the phrase used
to denote the silent spiritual growth of a candidate

Book of Rituals

shing the ruggedness and the angularities of
’s own personality. Every ritualist is expected
give a final finish to his own brick though the
k differs in shape from all the other bricks
i to construct the temple of creation. Hence
:y ritualist is expected to mark his key-note of
ue upon the shape and size of his own brick
he can be sure that some day his brick is also
Hired by the Master Builders to complete build-
though it was many times rejected in the first
;es-

The process of constructing a building or an
osure for ritual also includes much symbolism
ie divulged. The land is first to be consecrated
the angel of rituals and outlined in due and
ent manner. Then the ritualist has to till the
l for himself with sanctifying mantrams which
>ke the angel of the plough, the bull and earth,
these mantrams the earth is compared with a
and the bull is compared with the annual solar-
fertilising the earth with his masculine solar
gy. The evolving ritual is compared with the
niline calf representing the aspect of man in
;ion. This is very profound and compound
Holism which should be meditated much. A
r king named Kuru is said to have tilled a
, of space to cultivate the whole creation and
e the tract is thereafter called Kurukshetra,
ield of Kuru. This name is borrowed by the
nosers of the Puranas and the story of Maha
atha is said to have occurred in Kurukshetra*
described as the field of the Law (of existence).
is body is verily called the field for cultivation \

Rituals

111

>rd Krishna in Bhagavad Gita while He
the ritual to the microcosmic level. After
le field the stones and thistles are cleared
the ground levelled with the aid of the
sense of equality in man upon the basis
Jh two ritualists are expected to meet).
>oints are marked in the middle of the
and joined in the following manner in
rizontal rows two on the upper row, three
middle row and two on the lower row.

the Vedic ritualists this figure is called the
itualistic Bird, Suparna, which is the Great
f the modern ritualists. The two lines
epresent the head, the three lines in the
■epresent the body and the two lines below
t the divulging tail of the bird. The
jure is worshipped as the emblem of man
; on two opposite triangles with his arms
1 horizontally to point out the East and
it and form a cross with the meridian
nadir. Some of the ritualists visualise the
s the axe to chap off the branches of the
be used in the ritual. The bricks of the
i ritualists are generally marked by the
f the axe. Then follows the construction
vhole ritualistic enclosure around this figure
s head of the ritual at the fire place in
t. The temple of the latter Hindus-that
ructed in brick and mortar-represents the

112

Book ofRituals

Vedic ritualistic enclosure with certain supple¬
mentary changes. The main entrance is either
towards the east or north and it has a tapering
tower upon it containing seven storeys. Just after
the entrance the path goes round the various
enclosures of the inner temple and again leads to
the same place where the Vertical Column is erected.
On the column there is the emblem of the Great
Eagle. This represents that man raises himself
through the activity of the vertebral column to
the level of the eagle from the ground levels. This
is done after the first symbolic journey is over
and hence the devotee entering the temple is
first asked to go round and come to the column
of the eagle. The column is composed of various
septa, fixed in number, representing the construction
of the vertebral column in man. Then he is allowed
to enter into the second gate leading into the main
hall. Then he has to go round again to cover
his second symbolic journey. Then there is the
third gate leading into the inner chamber which is
the Sanctum Sanctorum of the later Hindus. Herein
the image of God is installed after the required
fashion. Again the devotee goes round the image
to cover his third symbolic journey and bows down
before the God. This temple in brick and mortar
is but an exoteric representation of the sacrificial
hall of the Vedic rituals. The inner and the outer
halls have only one gate for entrance and exit
while the three other sides are closed. This is the
case with the temples of all religions of the world.
The whole symbolism was much discussed and
divulged by H. P. B. in the Secret Doctrine under
the heading “THE HOLY.OF THE HOLIES”.

Puranic Rituals

113

In the temples consecrated to Siva, the zodiacal
emblems are also included. After the vertical
column and before the second gate the image of
the Bull is erected facing the inner chamber. The
devotee is expected to come to the tail of the bull
and first have a look into the inner chamber through
the two horns of the bull. The significance is
well discussed in my first volume “ Spiritual
Astrology” in the chapter dealing with the sign
Taurus, The temples of the later Hindus are
consecrated to the male aspect and the female
aspect of God separately. In the temple worship
of the female aspect of God, the aspect is called
power (Sakthi) and many western Orientalists wonder
that how power is represented in the feminine
aspect. The truth is that the Vedic and Puranic
tradition believes that power is feminine while
strength is masculine. Power requires a master to
steer it both in its mechanical and spiritual aspects.
This dependency of power upon strength makes the
aspect feminine. In the Vedas also the power
of the word or the utterance is called Devi and
Saraswathi while the word himself assumes the
role of Brahma. The one is not complete without
the other and the two form the counterparts of
one whole. For this reason almost all the Vedic
and the Puranic rituals require the presence of a
woman to make manifest and to amplify the light
of the ritual. In a mystic sense these two aspects
are explained in their numerical aspect of the ritual
of creation by H. P. B. in her Secret Doctrine in
the following manner: The number of man is

114

Book cf Rituals

9 and the number of woman is 10. On the physical
plane also man contains 9 and woman contains 10
functional orifices. In the spiritual and the phallic
significance as well, 9+10 « 19 and this number
represents the wheel of creation. The two digits
1 and 9 in the compound number 19, when added
together (1 + 9 ) once again give lu, the number
of power to reproduce 1 (God) multiplying into
the 9 numerical potencies. This aspect of truth
is highly symbolical and requires a profound
spiritual state of pondering to visualise the
significance of the background.

Temple building bears the same significance in
almost all the rituals of the world. The Book of
Leviticus in the Christian Bible gives the construc¬
tion of the pre-Christian Hebrewic temple as a
modification of the temple of Egypt. Again the
Book of Solomon in the Old Testament gives full
details of the construction of a comparatively later
model of the temple. Both these temples conceal
the wisdom of erecting the moral and spiritual
edifices of man in silence without the kindling of
the single hammer heard.

The object of the temple rituals of the various
centuries and religions is of two types, the esoteric
and the exoteric. The esoteric aspect corresponds
with the developing of the inner side of man ; it
concerns with the purification of the human
emotions ; the rearrangement of the mental and
the psychic faculties and neutralising the mutually
counteracting forces in man. It also concerns with
the sacrament of invoking the presence of the
Omnipresent Light in man. The lamp of the

anic Rituals

115

sonal and the individual consciousness in man
radually dimmed by the presence of the light
miversal consciousness and the whole mechanism
he inner man is illuminated by the new light,
iceforth man lives as a steward of the property
3od. Such a change is aptly called the ritual
nan crossing the death. The first step of the
pie rituals of the stoic side is the training of
outer layer of human mind which is the impulsive
ure of man. The realm of impulses, reflexes
instincts is to be regularised and the student
the ritualism during the first steps requires a
tine with many details. The detail engages
mind to regularise the impulses. Keeping
ct timings to attend the ritualistic temple,
<es his mind time-conscious. This gradually,
Uifies him with his own timings, and there
les a necessity to cut short the non-essentials
t may sometimes include many temptations and
igations. A minor conflict arises in the mind
awaits to be settled by the awakened will
/er of the student. This is the reason why the
lodox school of every religion insists upon temple
dee and worship.

Every shape of the environment has a definite
»act upon the subconscious mind of the man
: it may be or may not be through his conscious
id. The shape of a room and the arrangement
furniture in the room along with the tiny detail
t is present will definitely influence the mind
the one living within the room. Moreover the
our sense of man is stimulated by the articles
the various colours in his room. The mind is

Book fe of Rituals

:thei influenced by the number of items of any
of article and the number of persons existing in
5 room. , The expression of the personality bears
iharacteristic means of alisuch effects. The number
persons in a family has got such an influence upon
5 mind of each member of the family that an
vanced student of psychism can feel the number by
5 presence of the person. All such factors are
cen into consideration in the ritual of constructing
3 temple and the detail of the ritual is arranged in
;h a way that the maximum advantage of all the
ove mentioned factors is derived for the spiritual
nefit of the ritualist- The rule that there should
an odd number of persons attending a temple
meditation is the significant one among the
uahstic rules. The reason for this rule is that
3 divine spark in every man is only one (the
st and the last odd number in infiinty) and
iponds favourably when there are odd number of
rsonst The impact of the environment upon the
e senses of man is properly utilised in the
triple through a sense of consecration and sacrifice,
le objects of senses exist in man as associations to
ake the senses project into the objective world or
e environment. Hence to the esoteric ritualist,
e various parts of the temple exist in him as the
arranged associations. To the ordinary man before
idergomg any spiritual training the whole temple
ould be constructed to serve as a rearranged
ivironment. The architecture of the temple is the
st to impress upon his mind through the eye; the
usic of the prayers through the ear etc. The
chitecture, brick and mortar bring the shape
nsciousness in bis mind into the required order or

Puranic Rituals

117

symmetry. Gradually the physical temple of the
environment leaves its complete print upon the
mind when the mental temple begins to unfold into
himself. Hence the path is from the architecture
to the architect into man. The entered Apprentice
gradually feels the presence of the builder conscious¬
ness in him as the architect in him. In this way
the objective temp|e initiates the ordinary devotee
into the process of building the subjective temple s
This is true with respect of the shape of the temple
not only through the eye, but also through the
ear as the music of the prayer, the incantations
and the intonations which leave the mind stirred
up into a regularised activity through some ennobling
meaning. It can be stirred through the sense of
smell by the incense used and through the tongue,
by the taste of the spiritual food eaten after it
is offered as a sacrifice in the ritual. Ihe sense
of touch is also made use of by the various etheric
and astral currents produced in regular order by
the team work of the ritualist. Thus there is the
proper use of all the five senses of man to build
the inner temple with the aid of the outer one.

Subsequently, there will be a further development
in the degree of consciousness that works through
the five senses. The newly awakened and regularised
consciousness illuminates the inner temple and its
workings. More about the secrets of the five
senses and their objects ( is revealed, ^unknown truths
of known things present themselves to the mind
of the ritualist. The universal consciousness that
is present everywhere begins to speak with him.
The consciousness that governs the surface of

Book of Rituals

in keeping it perfectly horizontal, the
jusness that keeps suspended objects perfectly
1 and the consciousness that erects the cross
r right angles when the verticals and the
ntals of the creation meet - all such immanent
reveal their existence and their sway over
tiole architecture of the universe. In other
the architecture reveals the various branches
s in creation whereby the ritualist is no more
observer of the architecture but a craftsman
iegins to work with the tools of the level
uids), the plumb (the verticality) and the
(L) which forms the fourth part of the cross
the circle. The geometry of the globe in
he is living will be understood by him. All
snces and the arts find their proper place
Law and legislature have a new meaning,
eauing of self imposed discipline to him.
two steps, the first step of the Apprentice
3 second step of the Craftsman will directly
he ritualist into the inner chamber of temple
he crosses death. Subsequently he experiences
timely death of his personality while the
within him continues the quest for wisdom
ss within himself as the impression of the
eared father-consciousness.

ie temple rituals of the various races include
shapes and the images of the various living
and they serve the purpose of creating the
d impact upon the mind of the ritualist,
mges-of men and various animals that are
) and at times mythical cannot be condemned
atory. Idolatory has nothing wrong in it

Puranic Rituals

119

as long as it serves to stimulate the required effect
by the systematised impact upon the minds of men.

Man lives among the world of idols on the
physical and the mental planes. He meets, greets
and interacts with other people only through the
aid of the physical bodies which serve as idols of
the inner deity of existence. To an untrained
man these idols cause various thoughtforms in
the mind and lead the mind into a labyrinth of
thoughts and emotions that bind him to the
mundane level, creating new karma, being stimulated
Dy the associations of the past karma. The training
>f the temple rituals causes a change in attitude
o that the ritualist takes these idols as the various
ymbols of the one truth which is the existence of
he one light in all. Meditating upon a mere
bstraction without any form is altogether impossible
or a man to manage as long as he exists within
he frame of his physical body. The images of
he temples serve the purpose of sanctifying the
tready existing thoughts in the mind about the
irious persons and other living beings on this
irth. If an idol can kindle god-consciousness
man there is. nothing wrong about idol worship,
he various forms of the living beings in this
cation are meant for the purpose of training the
ind to transcend the various levels and they belong
the art aspect of the creation. The fact that
3 various races of mankind invent the various
•ms of art through centuries itself proves that
: and beauty are the necessary implements of
> ritual side of creation to elevate man from
; subhuman to the divine levels. All the fine

i Book of Rituals

ts of the ancient races and nations were necessarily
nsecrated to divine worship and the temple service,
nse of decency and the concept of beauty are
e two god-given gifts to man and they serve
the fountain heads of the finest inventions and
scoveries of man through centuries;

Life exists as vibration, and sympathy is the
ynote of life. A healthy man meets a smiling
ce with a smiling face and a grim face with a
im face. The life in him tries to equalise the levels
him with the levels in the other person. All
le good features of a human face are gathered in
le mind of a sculptor in a creative synthesis and
hen the totality is expressed as a beautiful and
mobling smiling face of an idol, the idol really
ands as an image of god and can truly bring
ut an equally powerful image of god in the mind
f the devotee who looks at the image in adoration,
his is the reason why the ancient Hindu, Egyptian
nd Greek temples had images installed. The
nages of various animals like the lion, the elephant,
tie horse and the bull in some temple architectures
srve the same purpose of the animals in the
acrificial rituals of the Vedic Order and the various
ther ritualistic orders of the world. Sometimes
hey represent the zodiacal emblems and sometimes
be various evolutionary levels in man that are
o be sacrificed or transcended. We also find
ertain compound symbols in the form of the images
nth human bodies and the heads of animals. They
epresent the humanised and ennobled emotions
hat serve higher purposes in ereation. Gods with the
leads of an elephant (Ganapathi), lion (Nrusimha),

Puranlc Rituals

121

a monkey (Hanuman), a horse (HayagreevU) etc;
are common among the Hindu temples. The
Egyptian, Greek, Babylonian and Assyrean tetanies
also contain such god-symbols in abundance. To
the average worshipper in the temple they induce
veneration and devotion through a mystifying
activity of the mind. To the trained ritualist of
the inner temple they serve as the zodiacal'and
the archetypal symbols of creation. For example’
the image of the goddess Durga in the Hindu temples
is found riding on a Lion, This represents the
activity of the sign Virgo and the previous sign
Leo when the direction of the wheel is reversed*
The Lion-headed god represents the activity of
the two signs Leo and Aquarius. To a true ritualist
the physical temple in brick and mortar represents
the splendour of the physical plane of creation With
its unity as the law of existence and the origin
concealed as a thought form within the tablet of
the subtler planes of matteri Hence the outer
temple ritual is only an expression of the; activity
of the inner temple. The temple on the physical
plane will give the preliminary training to the
mind of an ordinary devotee to lead him through
the entrance of his subjectivity (inner guard) into
the real temple rituals. The Vedic rituals of the
various types represent this whole process without
ignoring the preliminary steps.

There is a certain stage which marks the
completion of the individual spiritual development
of man. This is followed by the expansion of
man into the outer world in quest of something
of which he is not definite. Then he is compared
16

122

Book of Rituals

to a wayfarer, a pilgrim. The second phase of his
development is therefore ritualised as a pilgrimage
(Adhwara). In the tradition of the Vedic seers,
the student is expected to travel far and wide or
foot living on alms after the phase of finishing his
education at the feet of his Guru in some hermitage,
During this journey he meets so many great people
and witnesses so many wonders of the world. This
being done in the outward sense, the soul of the
man plays the role of the spiritual pilgrim in quesl
of something which he does not know, the something
which gives him the urge. In the modern rituals
this stage is marked as a journey to Jerusalem,
By that time the ritualist is supposed to hav*
completed the building of one temple and beinf
guided by fellow pilgrims who also take the roa<
to Jerusalem. This marks the stage of man tryinj
to do something to the outer world in the name o
God after the completion of the proper preparatioi
of the inner man. This marks a stage in the lif
of a man who wants to ritualise his economic
social and professional activities. He is expects
to discover the spirit of service in discharging hi
own duties to his Master, superiors, parents, wil
and children. He is also expected to discover a
opportunity to serve through his own monej
intelligence and physical strength. In the worshi
of the exoteric temple, this phase is represente
by the distribution of the offered material to thos
who attended the ritual The flowers, the incensi
the holy water and the holy food aie to b
distributed among all those who partake theritui
and this includes the distribution of the ritualist
light amonghis fellow beings.

Puranic Rituals

123

To sum up the whole activity of the esoteric
ritualistic order the ritual in the first stage concerns
with the individual development of the ritualist.
This includes the purification of the emotional,
the intellectual and the intuitional levels of man.
The purification of the physical, etheric, astral*
mental and buddhic planes is covered at this stage.
It marks the completion of the building of the
first temple. During the second stage the ritualist
applies his purified and ennobled traits to the world
with which he is connected through birth, marriage,
friendship and profession. He is trained to gain fitness
to serve the fellow beings belonging to the ahove
set of his environment. This marks the beginning
and completion of the second temple. Then there
is a third stage where he leaves the second temple
also to serve the comparatively wider temple of
the Universal Lord. He is expected to break off
all his ties that specify his relationships with only
a set of beings in the world. Symbolically be is
taught to leave off his‘previous ritualistic duties
to enter into the ritual of giving himself up to
the beings of the universe at large. He is verily
a source of the mother-force of creation. At this
stage he represents the pelicon feeding its seven
young ones with the blood of its own heart. He
comes out into the world-temple to serve every-body
without any distinction. He is neither a father nor a
son, neither a husband nor a wife. He has no abode
of his own where he can hide his head. His heart
is the rose, fragrant with universal love and he
bears the cross (the responsibilities and sufferings)
of all his fellow beings. His whole life becomes
a ritualistic cup filled with his blood as holy water

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Book of Rituals

to quench the thirst of the pilgrims of life. He
becomes one with the Saviour to distribute his
blood as wine and his heart as bread for the
suffering lot. Such a stage is marked in the Vedic
rituals by the rite called the “Sacred Man-Sacrifice”
and all Sacrifices which are described previously.
It includes two stages of social life: 1) Living
in forests (Vanaprastha) and 2) Living wherever
he is required (Sannyasa). The advent of this
stage is marked by ttie symbolic rejection of the
performance of the precious rituals. All the seers
of the Vedic path attained this stage but they
never physically left off the rituals. Since the whole
process is symbolic, the leaving is also symholic
and it represents the leaving of the mental grip
and a change in attitude. “Sacrifice, offering, penance
and the duty are not to be relinquished and they
are to be performed ever.-They are the purificators
of the wise men”, says Lord Krishna in Bhagavad
Gita, It is imperative that the ritualists should
leave off the sense of attainment and not the ntual.
The rejection of rituals by Lord Buddha and Christ
denotes the same term and the teachings thereof
are intended only for the inner circle of students
who have attained that stage. Lord Krishna says
to Arjuna, “Leave off all the laws and take refuge
in Me”. Christ says to his disciples, “Leave all

your people and come to Me.I am the way”.

All these are intended to be understood in their
proper spirit and such teachings are never intended
for the public in general. They are highly misleading
to the common man who abstains from following
the purificatory processes of the holy orders. It
may be very easy for the many so called Christians

Puranio Rituals

125

of the modern age to leave off the atonements
and the rituals of the Old Testament but the vehicles
of man follow their own order in their biological and
psychological and astral phenomena. This third stage
of rituals marks a relinquishing of the limited sphere
of service to enter into an unlimited sphere. His
world-service is more important than his domestic
vocational and temple services. Such a stage is
marked by the special temple ceremonies of the
Hindu temples conducted on certain special occasions
corresponding with some astronomical phenomena.
Then the image of the temple is brought out of the
outermost gate of the temple to be taken round
the streets once so that all the people of the
town may bow down and worship it in splendour.
Among the speculative rituals of the modern ritualists
this third stage is represented by the attainment
of the final degrees of perfection that is dependent
upon the faithfulness and the service of the person
without any special order of ritual attached to
the degree. Blue, Red and White are the colours
denoted to symbolise three stages of development
that is described above*

Tantric and Agamic Rituals

These are the two types of rituals that are
adopted by the Hindus of a comparatively later
age. The term Tantra means craft and the term
Agama means a holy order. There is an extensive
literature developed about this branch subsequently.
The science of architecture to build exoteric temples
of various designs in hrick and mortar belongs
mainly to this branch. The rituals of this order
can be divided into the following groups*

a) Worshipping rituals.

b) Penetential rituals.

c) Healing rituals.

d) Attainment rituals.

e) Atonement rituals.

f) Yogic rituals.

These rituals include various mantrams,
invocations, incantations, holocausts and worshipping.
The daily routine of the ritualist is specifically
described for the following up of each ritual. Each
3uru follows one of the above said branches of rituals
ind initiates disciples into his order and the order
ls maintained through generations. Every order
necessarily contains the invocation of the highest
xmcept of God through specific traits that are
prescribed so that the traits may capture the mind

ntric and Agamic Rituals 127

the disciple and train it to experience the deity

Omnipresence.

The worshipping rituals mainly resemble those
the invocation of Agni in the Vedic rituals. The
ual starts with the purificatory routine of the
ualist. All the items of the daily routine starting
)m getting up in the morning are all included
the programme of the ritual and they sanctify
e daily routine. The bath is also conducted with
vocations to the angels of water, air, fire, earth,
m and the cosmic plane of Devas. Then the
esence of the deity is first invoked in the peneal
and and the pituitary body by touching the centre
‘the brow with some powder to mark (wrongly
illed the caste mark by some orientalists). The
•esence of the deity is invoked in a handful of
ater that is sipped to purify the three internal
:es of man (intellectual fire, digestive fire and
le reproductory fire). The sense organs are
mched with the fingers invoking the deity therein,
he ritual of Pranayama is conducted by inhaling
id exhaling with the invocatory mantram meaning
He is myself and I am himself 9 ’. Then the
tualist invokes the space and time in which he
located, describing the various divisions of time
ad the geographical position of the earth. Then
e invokes the mantram of life into the deity to
e worshipped that is located in the image. The
lace is purified, the four corners are sanctified
y describing the cross and the square. Then he
ecorates the image with the best of flowers and
icense and conducts the worship with invocatory
ymns. ^Mentally he chants the mantram belonging

128

Book of Rituals

to the deity for a specific number of times. He
prepares his daily food in the name of the deity
with special care and offers it to the deity. The
whole family eats the food thus sanctified and they
should not eat anything that is not sanctified by
the offering. Even then the food is not considered
sanctified if it is not first offered to a guest who
is considered to be a living idol of the invoked
god. The daily life in its sum total is thus
ritualised and gradually one is trained to live as
a ritualist. . }

The penetential rituals are considered to be
occasional. The whole routine corresponds with
that of the worshipping ritual but the routine
includes fasting or living upon liquid food. When¬
ever a ritualist transgresses the rules of his daily
routine he is expected to conduct the corresponding
penetential rituals. The use of certain herbs and
specific items of offering by way of charity are also
prescribed. Visiting holy places and touching the
feet of great persons with spiritual splendour and
purity are also prescribed. These rituals are mainly
intended to neutralise the associations of bad
karma.

Healing rituals are generally in the form of
chanting mantrams in meditation and the offering
of various plants having medicinal value into the
sacred fire. These include the worship of and
the offering to the various deities and mainly the
planetary angels. These rituals are intended to
heal various incurable diseases and ward off the
spell of ill-health from the environment. Bathing

Tantric and Agamic Rituals

129

the invoked image in Coconut water, milk, curds
and fruit juices is also involved in this process.
The planet or planets that are afflicted in the
horoscope are invoked and talismans prepared by
the herbs and metals corresponding to the concerned
planets are offered to ward off the evil effects.

The attainment rituals are intended to invoke
the occult powers in man. They also contain the
items of worshipping, meditation, pranayama
and the use of the herbs. These rituals are used
to stimulate the associations of his good karma
in the past to come to his aid and elevate the will
of the ritualist to attain powers. According to
the estimate of the ancient seers these rituals do
not come'under the desirable category of rituals.

Atonement rituals correspond with the
penetential rituals and are used to free the ritualist
from the sin of his impure behaviour with regards
to food, drink and social values. Bad speech and
bad thinking also require these rituals for
rectification. Generally the ritualist repeats the
Gayatri mantram for a long time and distributes
charitable gifts that are offered in the name of God.

The Yogic Type of Rituals form the main core
of the Tantric literature. The many types of
worship, prayer, invocation and the discipline
prescribed deal with the various approaches for
the training of a devotee in the yogic line. The
power in man that is termed Kundalini is traced
as the same power that is making these worlds

130

Book of Rituals

work. This power is glorified as the female aspect
of the deity and worshipped through many rituals
and liturgy. This power is considered to be the
aura and the glory of the one god of Omnipresence
God and the power that pervade the worlds are
described as the Lord and his wife. In man the
seat of god as creator is located in the head centre
(Sahasrara) and the seat of Devi in man where
she is latent is located in the base centre (Muladhara]
as Kundalini. She is described as the coiled serpenl
(the potential energy) that is to be roused by the
conscious effort of man. The whole path ol
Kundalini from Muladhara to Sahasrara forms the
main content of the description of the inner worlds
in the Tantric literature. The god who is located
in Sahasrara is described as the absolute without
any attributes and hence there is no use of
approaching him by man directly and the onlj
approach possible is through Kundalini. The powei
in man is approachable by man through the Variou:
powers in man. Hence it is the duty of man tc
worship the female aspect of the deity to mak<
an approach to the male aspect (here the term:
male and female denote only the absolute and tht
relative phases of the god of omnipresence). Henct
the path is as follows s The path to the highes
god is through the power of the word. The patl
to the word power can be followed only by followin
the path of Kundalini. The approach of Kundalin
to Sahasrara from Muladhara makes a man abl
to meet the highest creative god of the whole work
At this stage man transcends all the personal level
01 existence and can live as a realised spark c
God, The completion and the culmination c

Tantric and Agamic Rituals

131

such a realization lies in the last step of the yogi
bringing the pair of principles (that are made to
meet in his Sahasrara) back to the heart centre
(Anahata) and live there iu the presence of this
double principle of one god through the power
of universal love-will principle.

The practical method includes many tantric
rituals some belonging to the objective worship
and some to the subjective or meditational aspect.
This tantric concept of god is not a later invention
since it exists in the various invocatory hymns
of the vedas itself. The concept of Devi as a
young lady, as the fountain of a river, as the
source of the uttered word etc, is found in the
Rig vedic hymns. The power of the creation that
upholds the whole creation just like the desire
to utter a word upholds the emergence of the
whole word from man, is described in the Rig
Veda as the concept of Saraswathi. The three-fold
aspect of this word power is also described as the
three Devis—Ida, Saraswathi and Lakshmi. We find
this ideology specialised in the Tantric school of
worship forming a part of the yogic practices of
man. In fact, the Puranic symbolism dealing with
the three-fold aspect of God (the creating, the
supporting and the culminating aspect) with their
powers as their wives existing on the tongue (as
the expression of the word), the heart (as the
love which preserves the expression through eternity)
and as a half of the deity himself, corresponds with
the Tantric symbolism of the double aspect of
the three-fold deity. Gayatri itself is described
as the highest god in its female aspect at times.

132

Book of Rituals

This is done in many places of the Vedic lore.
This is because the deity is the sum total of the
splendour of the ever invisible sun or the spiritual
sun. The visible sun forms only part of the
splendours of Gayatri. The Puranas and the
Tantras amplified this symbolism into a world of
allegories and rituals.

The ritualist who follows this path is expected
to worship the splendour and beauty of the whole
creation as the female aspect of god. He should
hold woman in highest veneration. The motherhood
of woman should be rememberd even in one’s own
wife. The ritualistic practices of Kali worship
include the training of man to neutralise the polarity
of sex and the practice should be started with
experimenting upon one’s own power (esoterically
meaning one’s own wife). It is also believed that
man is having a woman in his heart and the woman
is having a man in her heart. This means the god
and the power of the worlds are interpenetrating
one another and man is the meeting place. The
ritualist is asked to use the finest things in the
world in his ritualistic worship and test himself
if he is above temptation. Even spirituous liquors
have got their role in some of the Tantric schools.
Of course there are many dangerous deviations from
the original school and these are the result of
the sensuous and weakminded slaves of emotions
who produced a counterfeit of ihe Tantric school
with its disruptive literature. The original Tantric
school of the Rishis deals with the worship of
the beautiful things in the world to train the man
in overcoming the polarity of objectivity including

Tan trie and Agamic Rituals

133

the aspect of sex. The approach of Kundalini
from Muladhara to Sahasrara is enacted as a
pilgrimage in many forms. The path is described
as the path of the seven hills resembling the body
of the serpent from tail to head. The seven hills
are the six chakras and the seventh is Sahasrara.
The whole ritual is objectively conducted by the
exoteric pilgrims even today as a journey to a holy
place that is beyond seven hills in South India*
The tradition seems to exist in many parts of the
world. Rome is called the city of seven hills.
Beyond the man-made religious differences truth
exists as a tradition through legends and symbols.

All the colours and sounds perceptible to the
human consciousness are grouped according to the
activity of the spectrum of human consciousness
in the Tantric literature. The grouping is according
to the planes of consciousness working in man
and each group exists as a potency of certain
colour effects and sound effects in each of the
six chakras of man. Numerical potencies govern
the colour sense and the sound sense in man and
hence the colours and the sounds at each chakra
exist as definite numbers. The symbolic description
of each chakra with the number and colour of the
petals and the meditative shape as a Lotus with
petals conceals the secrets of yogic unfoldment
through the tantric path. A faithful following
of the ritualistic practices of the Tantra stimulates
the chakra in the required manner and makes
each chakra unfold in regular succession so that
the activity of the cnakras is transmitted into the
activity of the lotuses. During the first steps of

134

Book of Rituals

preparation the candidate experiences certain colours
presented to his mind’s eye. He meditates upon
them. Certain sounds are heard by him. The
mind hears through the etheric and astral activity
produced by the rituals to rearrange the matter
of the respective plane in him. Gradually he locates
each chakra on the vertical line that exists about
and within his own spinal chord. The existence
of a chakra is first located as a new grip that is
working at a particular place on the spine.
Gradually the grip becomes more prominent and
then a pulsation works to cause a new experience
in colour and sound. The student will be able to
notice the activity of each chakra by the change
of the colours and sounds working as the coloured
lights and mantrams in the ritualistic temple of
his own subtler body. .Even in actual temples
where these rituals are conducted on the physical
plane, a change in the degree of the ritual can be
detected by an advanced student through a change
of the colour pervading the whole inner temple.
The consciousness of the ritualist shows different
types of responses to the objective world when
he is existing in different chakras.

Part of the symbolism of the Tantric rituals
deals with the origin of the human word and
the emerging of the sound link between the
consciousness and the sound. The theory proposes
that mental sound preexists vocal sound in the
utterance of a word. The dawn of the effort to
utter a word is traced back to the place of
Kundalini at the base centre. It exists there as
the point of consciousness with its periodical

Tantric and Agamic Rituals

135

merging and emerging- This phenomenon again
serves as a specimen to the original merging and
emerging of the point in space in terms oi one
creation. The periodical merging.of the consciousness
is compared with Pralaya and the emergence with
the next dawn of creation, The circle with
central point is worshipped as an emblem
initiating the ritualist into the whole concept. The
speculative rituals of the Tantra dealing with the
Devi aspect of creation are collectively called
“ Sree Vidya ” or the wisdom of the Goddess.
According to this school the point emerges in three
stages- They are respectively the dawn to itself, the
shining forth as objectivity and the comprehension
or becoming self-consciousness. To represent these
stages of light-sound ( colour-sound) the ritualist
is asked to proceed towards the light in three
regular steps. We find the same procedure in the
modern rituals also. Then the student is expected
to feel the muse of the word in him from the
imperceptible subjective level to the semi-subjective
slumber of Kundalinf in his Muladhara. Henceforth
the utterance of the word is through seven stages
that are called the seven levels of utterance and
these levels correspond with the seven-fold nature
of man’s own existence. The pulsation that governs
the respiration and that which is called prana is
invoked through a conscious inhalation and exhalation
of air in a particluar process called Pranayama,
This links the consciousness with the evolving
word from within. The consciousness that is
evolving and the consciousness that is experiencing
meet. They both serve as the thread of consciousness
(Sutra atma) that travels from centre to build

Book of Rituals

136

circumference and Antahkarana that travels from
circumrereu centre of consciousness,

the circumference to the centre th

The identifying nature in man is
identity of the world mother and the identity
descend into the centre of identification. Hence-
Jo ththe disciple ceases to ident.fyh.msdf as one

his identity. Hitherto there are T.he uden
two centres to the comprehension of the student.
The outer space with its centre forms the one circle.
The inner man surrounded by h.s own horizon
form “he second circle with centre in himself.
The ritualistic Pranayama dips h.s consciousness

deep into the one world over and makes the “ ntre ^
meet”. The individual time expands into the
universal time and man ceases to exist in terms
of the relative time. All this process is achieved
only through a practice of Pranayama and the
prescribed meditation upon the origin of the word.
“From the unmanifest the point emerges. From
the point of existence emerges the point of brilliance.
From it the point of comprehension—and from
the three-fold one point the muse sprouts-from
the muse, the variations-from the variations the
whole word is uttered forth as this creation in
existence”, says a Tan trie text. The dawn of the
point is the dawn of its circumference. The
circumference exists revealed to the centre as long
as the centre exists in man. Before and after the
existence of the centre there was and there will
be the “ hidden circumference ” . As long as the
disciple lives in the one centre using his individual
centre, his individual horizon lies as a hidden
circumference within the bosom of the mother-lorce-

Tantric and Agamic Rituals

137

Thus there is a never ending array of the speculations
of the most sublime cosmological significance
concealed in the Tantric rituals pertaining to the
Yogic practices. The symbols used in these ritualistic
temples contain mainly the following figures *
the circle with the central point, the circle with
an equilateral triangle, the circle with the double
triangle and the central point, the circle with seven
triangles and the central point and finally the
figure of nine triangles, five with apex upwards
and four downwards each having its own circle
circumscribed, the whole figure placed within a
bigger circle and this circle within a square. This
forms the complete tracing board of the Devi
rituals of the Tantric School. It includes the
symbols of all the cosmic, solar, planetary and
microcosmic phenomena. For example the nine
triangles touch the outer circle at 27 places
producing 27 equal arcs. These arcs represent
the 27 lunar mansions in the zodiac and their
corresponding phenomena on the constitution of
the woman who represents the mother force. The
cylces of ovation and menstruation follow the cylces
of the lunar mansions that are traced by the
monthly moon. This is only a single example for
the application of the symbolism of the tracing
board of Sri Chakra.

The ritualist of this path has much to observe
in the outer world by way of chastity, equality
and charity. The unfoldment comes from within
but much of the ritual lies in his behaviour
towards his fellow beings.

138

Book of Rltuais

There is one more aspect of the Agamic and
Tantric rituals and this is the application of these
rituals in the temple service. This is conducted on
a congregational scale and the effect resembles that
of Egyptian temple rituals and the congregational
mass of the Christian Church ritual. The whole
ritual consists of a path of worship in a temple
where many people gather and take part. Mantrams
are chanted by the whole group and prayers are
uttered to invoke the concealed deity from the
minds of all. This causes a cumulative thought-form
which brings out the light of spiritual outpouring
and it pervades the whole temple. A student with
clairvoyant vision can see the flow and the direction
of the flow outlined by certain magnetic lines of
force. The success of the whole ritual depends
upon the team work and the spirit of co-operation
of all who partake in it. Everyone can attend
the ritual without any distinction and can enjoy
the benefit of the spiritual force produced. The
image o i the deity in the inner chamber is the
centre of the whole ritual and the procedure of
the ritual corresponds with the daily sanctifying
routine of man. It contains the items of awakening
from sleep, bathing, decoration, receiving the
offerings and blessings of those who attend the
ritual. Every bit of procedure is sanctified by
invocatory passages- The articles that are used
for the purpose of worship of sanctification and
distribution seive as the media for the distribution
of the spiritual light. Incense and camphor are
used as the immediate media to distribute the light
of the blessing through the sense of smell. Fresh,
green twigs of a holy and medically important plant

Tantric and Agamic Rituals

139

(Oscimum) are used in worship and they are
distributed to all after the worship is finished.
Bells are rung and a type of music is given to
attract the minds of the mass into the workings
of the etheric and astral currents that are produced
and fertilized by the spiritual force. The whole
process is called the invoking and the distribution
of the light of God (Archana). This congregational
ritual necessarily includes the lighting up of the
sacred flame and the ritual of the fire place. Both
of these are done according to the Vedic ritual
of fire invocation. The distribution of the spiritual
light that is produced by such a process confers
the minor benefits of not only improving the health
and increasing the vibrations of luck, but also
creating a tranquil mood in the agitating minds
of so many devotees. This has got a double benefit;
the one is creation of tranquillity in the individual
mind and increasing peaceful vibrations among the
whole crowd. After the first few minutes of the
beginning of the service ritual every one is charged
to emit favourable vibrations and the whole crowd
works as a big power station. All the energy that
is produced by the presence of the living souls and
the spiritual charge that is produced by induction
are automatically pooled at the centre without being
known to anybody. The light that is thus pooled
is again distributed to the benefit of the same
people in the mass. The whole procedure bears
a close resemblance with the activity of the sun’s
rays that gather water from the pools and rivers
through evaporation to form clouds that return
pure water to the same pools and rivers, 'ihe
materials for the worship that are brought by

140

Book of Rituals

everybody are mixed up and distributed equally.
This is once again a symbolic representation of the
cosmic sacrifice. The quantity of the spiritual
light that is produced depends upon the sincerity
and the spirit of submission in those that are
present. Flowers and fruits are inevitable for such
a mass worship in the Hindu temples. This is
because the flower is a true symbol of fruit bearing
and the fruit is the symbol of bearing the seed.
The life cycle of a tree is a true dramatic
representation of the whole creation. The light that
is invoked is properly and immaculately reproduced
by the presence of the flower and the fruit as the
true symbols of creation. Also the fragrance of
some flowers forms the speedy vehicle for the
distribution of the light. In the temple rituals
consecrated to Lord Siva the use of the ashes of
the wood of certain sacred trees is prevalent. The
ashes of the plant matter and the water used serve
as the best condensers of the light thus produced,
and they induce good thought currents and hypnotic
vibrations even after a long time. Coconut water
is also one of the best vehicles of the creative
spiritual light that is produced in the ritual. These
congregational rituals serve a better purpose in a
large scale than the esoteric rituals conducted in
the secret temples of initiation. The higher rituals
are intended to create spiritual beings on the
individual scale and the congregational rituals are
used by the created spiritualists to distribute the
benefit of a ritual on the large scale-

The origin of every religion in the world can
be traced back to the inner urge of man to know
something about the creation. Religious instinct
is born with man and the activity of the whole
creation remains in the subconscious levels of man
as a muse. The human mind has got so many
layers in which the memories of nature and the
memories of the evolution of man through many
stages are concealed. A right play of this memory
into an orderly recollection is stimulated whenever
the atmosphere is congenial. For this reason the
mankind of so many races and centuries originated
the ideas of religion independently. Curiously
enough we find that the basic essence of these ideas
showed a commonness. This common property of
man is attributed to a superhuman soul that always
imparts it as a formula of wisdom through gradual
unfolding. In the light of this wisdom the activity
of man is regularised from time to time and the
result is the order of the disciplined souls who are
later venerated and worshipped through legend as
the primitive instructors of mankind. The wisdom
that is propagated by such people to their followers
includes certain allegories, conversation and dramatic
representation. This is because of the abstract
nature of the subject, and the conveyance of the

142

Book; of Rituals

communion of the subject require an oral tradition
and an amount of magnetic charge that is produced
by the trained will and soul-force of the people
who communicated. Later the whole course is
formulated into the respective ritualistic formulae
which were initiated first in the forests and
caves. The wisdom consisted of the splendour
of the sun and the moon, light and darkness, life
and death and such phenomena that formed the
splendours that filled the space under “the canopy
of heavens The terms “ Brahma Vidya, mystery,
Kabala ” etc. mean the same thing and that is,
the oral tradition from man to man. The main
object of study and teaching was about man himself.
Man found his role in the creation as something
significant and this concept of his role amidst the
other living beings originated the idea of the drama
or the mystery play into which man formulated his
whole content of wisdom. After certain time we
find the stage of the enlightened people initiating
others into the secrets of the mystery ' of life.
Various secret cults were formed and people were
admitted into the schools of the cults where they
were trained to prepare their mind to expand into
the mysteries of creation. Among the oldest of
these cults we find the Vedic and the Egyptian
traditions, the earliest known specimens to mankind.
The Egyptian ritual of the temples of initiation is
no doubt the earliest from which all the other
subsequent cutis are developed. Leadbeater and
some other authors of books about the rituals
trace the origin of the Egyptian ritual back to the
rituals of the followers of Manu in Jndia.

Rituals and Mystery Compared

143

The rituals of Egypt like those of the ancient
India begin with steps of initiation that cover a
period of the preliminary preparation of the candidate-
After this initial period of purification follows in
mystic communication of certain secrets of the
creation in silence. “ From mouth to ear and
in a low tone” is the preliminary teaching for
the preparation and through silence with the lips
closed, the higher secrets are communicated. In
the Vedic ritual also the role of Brahma is
always silent though he instructs the other
personnel of the ritual to conduct the whole
proceedings through the power of his thought*
The communication of the secrets included
gestures, attitudes, grips and mental words (pass
words). These are called “ Mudras ” in the Indian
tradition. Just as'an actor produces the required effect
upon the mind of the audience through his gestures
and action, the preceptor communicated the required
effect into the personality of the disciple who is
to be initiated. When man is roused by certain
spectacular scenes into his emotional level, he is
found to produce certain gestures automatically
and these gestures are imitated by the ritualist
( like the actor ) to produce the emotions in a
systematic way so that the emotions can be filtered
and recollected in tranquillity. After this process
of purification the major content of the mysteries
of any nation contains the representative phenomena
of the birth of the child (human soul) from the
father (the parent source or god nature) through the
aid of the mother (the role of nature in creation ).
Then followed the drama of the evolution of the
universes. Then followed the mystery of death and

144

Book of Rituals

raising (rebirth). All the mysteries of Egypt contained
the same theme. Moses went away from Egypt
along with his fellowmen and established the same
tradition of mysteries with some modifications.
Through centuries and nations the same tradition
is maintained in the mystery schools and we find
the same type of initiations entertained by the
priests and the rulers of the Greece. For example
the rituals of Dionysus, Trophonious, Eleusis etc.
contain the same import through various rituals
of various levels. In course of time the teaching
of the mystery schools included the wisdom of
the stars and planets, chemistry, biology and a
much misunderstood subject, alchemy. The science
to master the elements and the departed souls
was also practiced. The evolution of the present
mankind gradually elevated the levels of rituals
and initiations. A purely metaphysical and
spiritualistic turn is gradually given by the Masters
of all cults. Pythagorus gathered a number of
disciples and renovated the nobler side of the
mysteries initiating his followers into the geometrical
and the numerical symbolism of the universe and
man. The order is maintained in secrecy without
a break from his time upto the present age through
the aid of the various masters of wisdom trying to
aid the evolution of man on this earth. One of
such masters is Comte de St. Germain who initiated
many disciples besides Cagliostro into the tradition
of the same rituals under new names. About the
divine light of the ritualistic initiations and the
nature of the man initiated into such a light, St.

Germain comments thus * “.then did I hear

of the divinity ot this temple. I cast my core upon

Rituals and Mystery Compared

145

I avoid not only with those who are,-but,.;with

those who were.I found it eminently delectable

to know all without studying anything, tp dispose
off the treasures of the earth without the solicitations
of monarchs, to rule the elements rather than
men. Heaven made me liberal; I have sufficient
to satisfy my taste ;all that surround pie, is rich,
loving, predestinated, To achieve such an end
the master rennovated the ancient order of,masonry,
rejuvinated the order of the Rose? Gross and the
knights Templor and finally he established his
new order of rituals which he termed the Holy
Trinosophia. He had disciples belonging to the
three ritualistic orders to achieve the same - end
of realisation. Through so many bodies this Master
stands as a mystery figure still presiding over the
various Holy Orders of rituals. The many ritualistic
schools of the present day are deeply indebted
to him.

Iu the meanwhile a separate order of;,temple
rituals was established and followed by the ancient
Jews till two thousand years,, ago* The origin
of the order was traced to their previous prophet
who was a pastoral Shepherd wandering in the
fields playing his musical instruments and protecting
sheep, cattle and his followers operatively and
speculatively. He promised to come down to earth
once again and he gave them the signs to show
his return. The sign of the star appeared at
Bethleham when the spiritual birth of a boy took
place out of the life of a Jew in secrecy. The birth

146

Book of Rituals

of this spiritual child (which means the highest
order of initiation into the role of a saviour)
started the ritualistic order of giving a second
birth to a disciple into the collective spiritual life
of the Christ through soul contact with the aid
of Mercy and Love. The order is maintained till
today with god-speed though there are many
imitations of the order in a lower religious level
in the names of so many Christian churches warring
against one another and some other churches which
play politics in the name of the Saviour. The
original order of Jesus is being secretly maintained
in many mystery schools and this will be continued
until the false churches disappear into the chaos
and hatred created by themselves. Bigotry, conceit
and a sense of separation stand as impediments
created by the pseudo Christian Churches in the
present time on the way of the working path of
the Christ. Once again the original form of the
ancient rituals and mysteries will be reestablished
under the guidance of the present Masters of the
Wisdom. Disciples are being trained at present
to achieve the same end and within a period of
the next fifty years to come the mystery schools
will come into existence openly. Children education
will also be ritualised and sanctified. The laborious
process of teaching and memorising the non-essen¬
tials of the various subjects will be removed by
the would be ritualists who play an active role
in the political, economic and educational fields
of the various nations. There will be stunning
changes in the curriculum and syllabus of education.
The method of soul-training through group contact
will be established and the science of Teaching

Rituals and Mystery Compared

747

through Impression will be introduced. A thorough
ritualisation of the whole activity of man is not
far off. Since the present wave of materialism and
the wave of false religion are going to end in a
war against one another, man will be once again
left exposed to the age old methods of elevating
himself through the ritualised values of his life-
The gulf between science and spiritualism will be
bridged when the aim and purpose of the modern
civilisation will be fulfilled. The present Aquarian
age which leads man into the direct commuuion
with space and its invisible intelligences is aptly
the age of such a fulfilment. The [missing link
between the nuclear phenomena and the space
unbound will be filled up and this ends the age
of war. Then it is time for the full play of the
mysteries of the ancients which ritualised the
whole activity of life in man.

Language and the Concepts of the Vedic Hymns

The language of any scripture is some what
different from the language of any other book- A
mysteiY surrounds the language, the description,
the narratives and the composition of any scripture
belonging to any race or nation. A scripture is
the sum total of the subconscious activity of a race.

It should be translated in terms of the known
things on the conscious plane. Without such an
attempt there is no use of a mere literary approach
to a scripture like the Veda with the aid of grammar,
phylology and dictionary. Grammar and phylology
deal with man-made linguistic symbols, but a
scripture is first composed into a subconscious
language and then only it is incorporated in terms
of the man-made language. The Vedic seers
distinguished between the worldly and the divine
aspects of the language of the scriptures.

When taken in the literary aspect the Vedic
mantrams contain but mere descriptions of the
various emblems and symbols which denote some¬
thing else. A true student of the esoteric schools
finds certain clues (necessarily ritualistic) to the
real unity that is underlying in the whole theme
of the Vedas. This unity is called the Veda by
the Seer- We find the term Veda to denote some¬
thing different from the literary version ot the
Vidas and \\e find this in the veiy text itself. This

149

Concepts of the Vedic Hymns

underlying unity which they called Veda is introduced
as a grand compound emblem that exists in man
himself. The import of the Vedic hymns is this
unity and the intention is to drive the mind of man
towards this unity. At first it is done in an objective
manner when the reader tries to comprehend the
import objectively. This attempt gives a stir to
the inner substratum of the reader to receive the
objective import as a reflection upon his mind’s eye.
Then the whole activity of the reader is sanctified
and ritualised. It is rearranged and brought within
the focus of the already existing unity in him.

It is not proper to expect any consistent
meaning to the various vedic passages. This is
because what we call the meaning of the passage is
only one of the minor keys of realisation. No doubt
we find some detached flashes of poetic and scientific
descriptions that form the different concepts of
the literary version. They also serve the purpose
of unlocking the one emblem of unity that is
underlying. The real import of the Vedic
passages is but the response of the soul of the
individual in its high rate of vibration, to a set of
emblems of thoughts arranged into a story like
sequence. Then there occurs the drama of the soul
enacting the various roles of the emblem and
experiencing the sequence. Thereby the soul enters
into the import which is a plane of experience
(unconditional) and which forms the totality of
the Veda. The plane of experience aimed at, is
the product of the chain actions of emotion, thought
and feeling that are fused aud lost into the oneness
of the individual with all. The cumulative effect

150

Book of Rituals

can be compared with that of a poem or more
correctly a drama.

Any exoteric attempt at the explanation or
tbe “ meaning *’ of these passages and emblems on
the mental plane is bound to be partial and defective
because these emblems mean something eternal.
Generally they are interpreted by the intelligent
scholars in the light of the concepts that are
common to that age. The field of application
and interpretation depends upon the plane in
which the consciousness of the scholar is playing.
Generally the level of the scholarly mind represents
the level of the day and this level of the day is
determined and governed by the stage of evolution of
that particular race of mankind. This is the reason
why the sacred books of so many races and ages
are interpreted in the light of various branches of
knowledge in vogue at time. Some understand them
as primitive prayers of the savages; some as the
relics of the material sciences of the past; some
as the highest abstractions of philosophy; some
as the confounded and distorted documents of
history or geography and still others as mere
speculations. No matter in whatever plane the
interpretation is made these passages live for ever
from century to century and from language to
language and at times from religion to religion
under the direct guidance of the Masters of the
Wisdom. Such books live as living forces to attract,
induce and choose certain minds of all ages and
these minds are gradually introduced into the higher
order of evolution with the aid of the physical,
intellectual and spiritual halls of initiation.

Concepts of the Vedic Hymns

151

Now we can understand why the passages of
Rig Veda do not present any unity of contents
to a random reader who opens the book for
himself without being initiated by any Master.
Let him be a great scholar and it is not an excuse.
Every Sukta of Rig Veda contains several passages
which do not appear to have a connection between
each other. The present grouping and indexing
of these Suktas is also evidently arbitrary. The
original order lies with the Masters of Initiation
like Veda Vyasa, Sanat Kumara and Maitreya.
A really careful study of the content that pervades
the whole text is very difficult but highly interesting.
Such a study proves that there is a grand unity
running as an undercurrent through the descriptions,
narrations and the prayers of the Book. We do
not find this unity in the contents but we find
it through the content* Such a study undoubtedly
proves that :

a) The Veda is different from the Vedic text.

b) The present text of the vedas is a part
of the original text which must be exist
somewhere in the hands of somebody.

c) The purpose of the Vedic passages is not
to make us understand any point or points
relating to any branch of knowledge.
The r*.al purpose is to focus the personality
of the reader upon a higher centre of
self expression.

The above said purpose can be achieved by
a gradual rearrangement of all his objective and

152

Book of Rituals

subjective centres. The process does not include
mainly the reading, teaching or understanding
though they form part of the process. The main
conrse of the object includes an unfolding and
an attainment. An approach to the Vedas is
called “ Adhyayana’’ which Sanskrit term means
an approach for attainment

This process of Adhyayana requires an
altogether new method of approach. The method
is qnite different from the known methods of
teaching and learning. It has a different language
and the alphabet of this language is quite new to
the minds of the present age and as such requires
to be familiarised. Numher, shape, colour £nd
sound form part of the alphabet. It is necessary
to clarify that these four phenomena do not come
under the class of man-made symbols. They exist
as potentialities in space long before the appearance
of man. They bear seed in man and sprout into
the tree of human comprehension by the objective
stimulation of their counterpart. To the mind
of man they emerge as primary and secondary
patterns of the universe. The individual mind
receives them as reflections when it is purified by
ritual and initiated into the order. The purificatory
process stops the unnecessary activity of the human
mind from superimposing the human reflections
upon the above said universal patterns. The path
of passive objectivity and active sujectivity is
bestowed upon the human mind by purifying it
through rituals. Then man realises the unity of
the whole creation within himself and again around
himself. The outline of his vehicle that has hitherto

Concepts, of the Vedic Hymns 153

divided the realms of subjectivity and objectivity
will be understood as only an epitome of the
outline of the vastness of one creation. Then the
man experiences the unconditioned existence of
the individual in a poise. This state is the state
of liberation which is termed “ Apurva ”, and
“ Swarga ” in the Vedas, Mufcthi in the Vedantha
Philosophy and Nirvana by the Buddhistic followers
of the path. The same thing is called the rising
after death in the language of the later ritualists.
It denotes freedom of self conditioning. Herein
lies the purpose of the Veda.

The descriptions of the Rig Veda give us a
thorough understanding of the manifestation of
one universe into the light of objectivity from the
inner light of subjectivity. The process of the
ignition and pervasion of the Agni is described
as two interdependent splendours of the Lord of
the omnipresence* The ignition is symbolised by
the emergence of tho point and the pervasion as
the circle arouad it. The point is described as
being self willed ( Swayambhu) in its emerging
and merging. The circle is only relative to the
existence of the centre and is called the encircling
glow of its own objectivity ( Paribhu). The first
emblem of the circle with the central point is called
Agni-Vishnu (ignition-pervasion). The emblem
is said to have been composed of three counterparts *
the centre, the circumference and the content in
between. The content is geometrically the area
of the circle in one plane and the volume of the

154

Book of Rituals

globe in all planes. Numerically speaking the
centre is called the first or number one, the circum¬
ference is the zero from which the one emerges
and into which it again merges. The content forms
the secondary emanation of the numerical potency
of the nine numbers. In the language of the Vedic
hymn, these entities are called the three strides
of Vishnu. The secondary geometrical properties
of length, breadth and thickness depend upon the
primary properties of the rotating globe. For the
comprehension of the above said three-fold nature
of the emblem, the next step is denoted by the
shape of the circle with centre and an equilateral
triangle within the circle. According to the
explanation of the Aithereya Brahmana this emblem
contains the key to the unity of Rig Veda. The
import of this emblem is commented elaborately
in the last portion of this Brahmana. That school
of seers who solved and explained secrets between
objectivity and subjectivity is called the Aithereya
School. « Ithara ” means “ the other ” in Sanskrit
and the term Aithereya (the-other-ness of objectivity)
is derived from it. Many of the names of the
schools of thought in Sanskrit and the names of
the seers to whom the authorship of the vedic
formulae are attributed are not proper nouns as
is supposed by some. These names are symbolic
and they explain the import of the content. They

serve as subheadings also to the content of the
Mantram.

This emblem of an equilateral triangle within
a circle is the emblem of the three lines that make
up the Gayatri metre. The 24 syllables of the

Concepts of the Vedic Hymns

155

Gayatri metre are divided into three lines of 8
syllables each as is previously explained. These
three sides of the triangle are also described as
the three utterances of the sacred word in three
subjective worlds to bring forth the fourth state
of the word in the objective form. In the activity
of the objective universe this triangular emblem
represents the three-fold flow of eternity into the
three divisions of time (present, past and future)
and the three-fold activity of the created entities
in space (as the doer, the doing, and the done).
Three sets of seven scales of sounds and three
fires of seven lights (colonrs) each is said to
emanate from the three sides of the triangle. Hence
the third phase of this emblem is that each side
of the triangle is divided into 7 equal parts, the
total being 21 plus centre divided by 7 ( which is
the true value of Pye). In some mystery halls
this ritual is enacted by three people coming together
and uttering the three parts of the sacred word
as one. The same is the ithport of the three Hebrew
syllables standing on the circumference of the glory
of the Lord that encircles the fire place in some
modern rituals.

The next emblem is the Cross and the Square
within the circle. This is called the four-faced
deity Brahma who is described in the puranas
and who is said to have uttered the sacred word
or the name of God in four syllables. The four
points of the Cross represent the four states of
the utterance of the word. It is uttered forth
as the four cardinal points of the day. The
Kabalists call this the sacred Tetragram. The other

156

Boole of Rituals

emblems and the solid figures that come out of
the emblems are well described previously. The
ritualistic emblems and the instructions when taken
in their essential nature will be in the followine
manner: ®

The first set r Meditate upon a circle with a
<*ntral point; the circle rotates; a radius is formed;
the diameter is formed horizontally. This marks

Sht'fJ tVTl la ' f ,° fthe oirc,e sl 'P»ifie S the
face inH *? f 8ba a the u PP er half is the angelic
5“h, , ♦ 6 'r er half is the d >'abolical face

wSfS

s '.rir “=“T » d

the cross nass anntu Through the centre of

^ t v r:' 'r

This subtends twelve rieht T enMonal moss.
centre. Six are the anr s^f 8 6S around lhe
Construct this figure with th figU . re thus formec1 '
each of twelve inches length let S th ^ ^
three different colours - ihi,t u, th ? e rods he of
Construct a globe hl e ’., b,ac h and red.
dimensional figure. Join . Umscnbin S this three

You get the double nvramiH the ver,ic a< column
eight faces and eachK e ^

Concepts of the Vedic Hymns

157

The third set t Take six pyramids and arrange
them so that all of them stand with their apexes
touching one another at a point. The cube is
constructed. Imagine a globe within the cube
and the cube within a globe. This figure contains
all the previous measurements of the above three
sets. This traces the invisible forces working in
space to bring out the whole creation from
subjectivity to objectivity.

The fourth set: Construct a brick with the
length, breadth and thickness having four, three
and two inches respectively. Place the brick upon
the cube. Erect the fire place upon the brick*
This will be the altar upon which the sacred book
containing the word of God is placed.

The fifth set: Draw three radii within the
circle so that they divide the circle into three equal
areas. Join the three points and you get the
equilateral triangle within the circle. The three
sides of the triangle represent the following aspects :

a) Length, breadth, thickness.

b) Past, present, future.

c) First, second, third persons,

d) Subject, verb, object

e) Emerging, equilibrium, merging.

f) Activity, poise, rest.

The three fold nature of the above figure is called ;

a) Bhu, Bhuvar, Suvar.

b) A, U,

158

Book of Rituals

Numerically the square is represented by four:
the triangle by three; the diamter by two ; the circle
by zero. Meditate upon the compound number
thus formed, 4320. These numbers come out of the
zero (circle) and go into the zero in the same
order of succession. The centre of the circle is
numerically one. It cannot be geometrically or
numerically divided into two. Every circle has got
only one centre. All lines in the circle start from
the centre and diverge. Yet the centre cannot be
disturbed. It can never be erased, as long as the
circle exists.

The sixth set: In the compound number given
above, replace the value of the circle (zero) by the
value of the centre (one). You get the compound
number 4321. Arrange them in a geometrical pattern
in the following manner. You get an equilateral
triangle containing 10 points. Trace them in blue
spots on a white background of a circle within
the black background of the square. This figure
represents a deity with many names in many cults:
Padmapani, Dattatreya, Kumara and the Avatar
who is to come. The ten points in the figure are
called the ten digits of the Cosmic Person in the
Vedas* The ten Avatars in the Puranas. They
are enacted as the activity of the ten months in
the embryonic development of man. This figure
is also an emblem representing the scales of time.
The one point at the apex represents KaliYuga;
the next row of two points represents Dwapara
Yuga; the next row of three points represents
Treta Yuga and the fourth row of four points
represents Krutha Yuga. The stories of the various

Concepts of the Vedic Hymns 159

world scripture dealing with these periods of time
and the above said names of the deities reveal the
whole set of secrets pertaining to this emblem.

• •

• » •

• to*

We find an elaborate explanation of many of
the above mentioned emblems and symbols in the
Secret Doctrine, For example the emerging of the
point and the arrangement of the numerical potencies
in the form of the geometrical representation as
the point and the triangle with 10 points is very
clearly explained in that Book. For example Page
No. 187 in the fifth Volume of the Secret Doctrine
(Adayar edition) we find

“The creation (the evolved Universe) is
the garment of that which has no name,
the garment woven from the deities own

substance.....between that which is Ain

or “ Nothing” and the Heavenly Man, there
is an Impersonal First Cause, however, of
which it is said:

Before It gave any shape to this world,
before It produced any form, It was alone, without
form or similitude to anything else. Who, then
can comprehend It, how was It before the creation*
since It was formless ? Hence it is forbidden to
represent It by any form, similitude, or even by Its
sacred name, by a single letter or a single point, ”

160

Book of Ritoals

These sentences are extracts taken from the
Kabalistic book Zohar.

Again the glory of the triangle with ten points
is given as the traditional allegory and its meaning
divulged in pages 420 and 421 of the same book
in the following manner:

“.Let the student remember that number

underlies form, and number guides sound. Number
lies at the root of the manifested Universe. Numbers
and harmonious proportions guide the first
differentiation of homogeneous substance into hetero¬
geneous elements ; and the number and numbers
set limits to the formative hand of nature.

Know the corresponding numbers of the funda¬
mental principle of every element and its sub-
elements, learn their interaction and behaviour on
the occult side of manifesting nature, and the law
of correspondences will lead you to the discovery
of the greatest mystery of macrocosmical life.

But to arrive at the macrocosmical, you
must begin by the microcosmical, i. e. you must

study Man, the microcosm.an this case, as

physical science does-inductively, proceeding from
particulars to universal, At the same time, how¬
ever, since a keynote is required to analyse and
comprehend any combination of differentiations of
sound, we must never lose sight of the Platonic
method, which starts with one general view
of all and descends from the universal to the
individual..

Concepts of the Vedic Hymns

.The mystic sentence, OM MANIPADME

HUM, when rightly understood,.contains a

reference to this indissoluble union between man
and the universe rendered in seven different ways
and having the capability of seven different appli¬
cations to as many planes of thought and action.
From whatever aspect we examine it, it means :
“lam that I am”; “ I am in thee and thou are
in Me*'. In this conjunction and close union the
good and pure man becomes a god.*

..The supreme Buddha, or Amitabha, they

say, at the hour of creation of man, caused a rosy
ray of light to issue from his right eye. The ray
emitted a sound and became Padma Pani Bodhi-
sattwa. Then the Deity allowed to stream forth
from his left eye a blue ray of light, which, becoming
incarnate in the two virgins Dolma, acquired the
power to enlighten the minds of the living beings

.Then Padmapani, vowed never to cease

working until he had made humanity feel his
presence in itself and had thus saved it from the
misery of rebirth. He vowed to perform the feet
before the end of the Kalpa, adding that, in case
of failure, he wished that his head should split
into numberless fragments. The Kalpa closed;
but Humanity felt him not within its cold, evil
heart. Then Padmapani’s head split and was
shattered into a thousand fragments. Moved with
compassion, the Deity reformed the pieces into
ten heads, three white, and seven of various colours.
And since that day man has become a perfect
number, or Ten. **

162

Book of Rituals

The three white heads are denoted by the three
outermost points of the triangle and the remaining
seven represent the spectroscopy of the whole
universe, passing through man into objectivity as
his own vision. H. P. B. further explains: “In
this allegory the potency of sound, colour and
number is so ingeniously introduced as to veil the

real esoteric meaning.It is pregnant with

spiritual and divine, physical and magical meaning.
From Amitabha—no colour, all the white glory—are
born of the seven differentiated colours of the prism.
These each emit a corresponding sound, forming the

7 of the musical scales. As geometry.is specially

related to architecture and also (proceeding to
cosmogony, so the ten jods of the Pythagorean
Tetrad; or Tetraktys, being made to symbolise the
macrocosm.

After comprehending the full significance of
the above quoted passage which is highly esoteric
and ritualistic, one can know the full import of the
statement in the Man Sacrifice that “he multiplied
by ten digits. " The Cosmic Man is said to have
multiplied himself by tens (into ten, hundred,
thousand etc. which are but the repetitions of
number 1 or the first cause in the decimal scale).

All the symbols and emblems that are described
above and that are to be used in the present and
fmure rituals find their elaborate explanation
throughout the Secret Doctrine of H. P. B We
find explanations of the triangle, the cross, the

square, the cube etc. In page lts9 of the same book
it is said *

Concepts of the Vedic Hymns

163

.One is the Spirit of the living God.who

liveth for ever. Voice, Spirit, ( of the Spirit ) and
Word. This is the Holy Spirit.

.And the Quarternary. From this Cube

emanates the whole Cosmos , says the Secret
Doctrine: it is called to lie. The mystic Cube in
which rests the Creative Idea the manifesting Mantra
( or articulate speech—watch) and the Holy Purusha
(both radiations of prima materia) exists in the
Eternity in the Divine Substance in their latent
state—during Pralaya.”

For further explanations the reader is requested
to read the concerned passages in the Secret Doctrine
or their originals which form the commentaries some
of which are in Sanskrit and some are remaining
still in the Sacrodotal Language, Senzar.

The Future of the Rituals

The present set up of humanity is in a real
need of a ritualistic training. The play of mind has
gained a tremendous momentum and has assumed
thousands of applications upon the day to day
problems of man. In fact, the problems are created
by the speedy haphazard activity of the mind of
the present day mankind, The evolution of man
on the mental and intellectual planes has reached
the required area of expansion and even more.
Hence the restlessness of the present day mankind
trying to solve the self imposed problems. War on
a colossal scale is an expression of such a stage
in evolution- After two grand world wars the
whole humanity is found enmeshed within the ever
expanding net work of iudividual war on the mental
plane. Such a war has already set in and the
results are gradually making their appearance. The
break up of races and nations into small political
units and the break up of the institution of family
in a local scale denote the same thing, the unrest, the
war and the rushing of man for something which he
cannot visualise through his mind and intellect. The
political, religious, scientific, social and economic
splendours created by maa have grown to unveil the
myth, and man the creator of these splendours is
being crushed under the very splendours. Nowu
is time that he wants a solution which means tb v

165

Future of Rituals

urging of a new faculty in man. The analysing
ces and the unifying forces are at the beck and
l of man today but the synthesising and creative
ces that are in him are concealed from his
n comprehension. They still live in him to be
iscovered as the word lost to be regained.

The Masters of the Wisdom and their followers
ow the solution since they are living it as their
y life. The secret of liberation, the experience
the elixir of life which is the unconditioned
ss of man, the wealth of no wants still stand
the beacon-star of the goal of life to the followers
the Masters who live in peace amidst the self
sated struggle and panic of the humanity at large.
ie y feel it their duty to open the gates of the
th of nature for man to approach the God
thin himself. They want to recruit as many
smbersofthe human society as possible but the
itiation fee is too heavy for the common man
pay easily. He has to earn his daily wages
r many days and save it to pay the gate fee
tread the path. This fee is the self proposed
bmission of man to the working of nature,
ae path of least resistence, a passive dynamism
wards the mundaae world and an active
ibmission to the spiritual Hierarchy to open the
ues and bring the student into a direct group
rntact with one of the concerned persons. Then
i actively confused maa becomes a passively
mtained disciple. Since the initiation fee is so
savy, the admission into the my'tery schools
in ns real sense) is too slow and laborious. Yet
ature gives the required urge to the true inner

166

Book of Rituals

“o'en.efi^rth 10 retrace ‘ he P a * of the wheel,
to r ' t , he Pr J ° mised land which belonged

»„“X “• ?'""

f nd 31 bea' rUDS f ° r goodness J ^aTesTo conquer

skeleton 8 ”r v Unf ° ld; and the brilhant

and blood of Iove^ThfT r‘ th ^ P ° tent flesh

the stase of r Jf, rltuallsts who have reached

will transmit ^ MaSterS ° f their own i° d ge s

group soul li t STwodd 0f R tl t ei r CUmUlatiVe
will be multiplied in numbe r Se U tlC SCh ° 01
butes more and more to ^ f Llterary art con tri-
Of advanced types of dm ^ i° rm and struct nre

The power that is activised bTmM n ^i!^ 8 else '

day will be harnessed hv / “ ey ln tlle present
of vary Wgh financial

on the international scale work for th^ financ,ers
integration of the whol* V econ °nnc
followers of the Master a !?*?* Sorae of these
*e future scientists artist bem S.r e incarnated as
financiers All thew ’ r f ists * Philosophers and
again rearranged and d?" 3110118 ° f man wilJ be °nce
story of the civilization ,nt ° a wel1 P |anned

of the present day evil shouhTh ? f °° Ursc mucil
thankless workers and it ah faCed by these
the power of their goodwill° U Th b6 f utralised b y
'rial, tribulation, persecution lave t0 face

but they know and thev at tlmes murder

a Part of the d “ ma VeTf? ^ h is a "
spiritual light they normal f u f ° r the flame of
spiritual charge produced bv !h r ° Ugh th ° m is the '
weekly, monthly P an d annuaf i® , S ° many regular

The Future of Rituals

167

the temples of initiation. As their work gains some
prominence, there will be an astonishing stir in
the astral substance around the whole earth. In
the light of this changed vibration of the astral
matter it becomes impossible for the common man
aii a ,? aSS . wealth > material or spiritual benefits.
Ail the spiritual practices on the individual scale
will contribute only to the cosmic benefit so that
the immediate occult phenomena and the advantage
gradually fade away from the average followers of
occultism. Cosmic Kundalini is awakened whenever
individual Kundalini is invoked. The less one
thinks of oneself, the more healthy one is. The
span of man will be increased by a decrease in
the quantny of the daily food. Such are the effects
of the changed rate of vibration in the astral matter
of this earth. This change is a necessity in the
evolution of the present man and is implemented
by nature through the Masters and followers who
co-operate with the Great Plan. Gradually every
man feels the inner union as an urge of necessity.
The urge increases until he is forced to co-operate
his mind with the inner plan. At first this co¬
operation takes place in the name of a membership
m , t .° a Political party, a social organisation, a
philanthrophic society or a religious order. He
works in co-operation with the so many activities
and gradually trains himself to accommodate with
the subtler forces of his neighbour. This leads to
the level of soul-contact and by that time he will
be entering the gateways of initiation even without
his own knowledge- The presence of his spiritual
associates will be felt by him in the shape of fine
impersonal thoughts of a unifying and glorifying

168

Book of Rituals

nature in which the individual finds peace and
appiness for the first time. He gradually grows
selfconscious of the peace and sends his mind
in that direction. Now by this time he is already
one ^ with the plan. Beyond this there is no*
much to be revealed openly through a book at
the present stage.

in J he content of some rituals will be composed

n/ lI° rm n J lterary Dramas °f a mystic nature
and they will be enacted publicly in the theatres.

Such literary compositions of the dramatic form
npnn| re i dy V08U ® thou 8 h the scholars and the

The P mi°d< ! n0t f exact yknOW What t0 d0 with them,
he minds of certain modern poets will be

stimulated into the ritualistic line of thought and

they will obey the instinct to produce such dramas

, 18 • already made through the two

celebrated American play writers. Maxwell Anderson
and Thornton Wilder. Maxwell composed the
semi-religious and semi-ethical mystery ni av a
Journey to Jerusalem. This contains the contemporary
human mind in terms of the Biblical Story. Wildw
has more successfully produced two dramas of Ihl
type of the ancient mysteries The twn i

« “A. «. JfJTnSP

contain exactly the same theme as that of the
mystery Dramas of the ritualistic temples of
imt.at,on. For example, the main contend of the

who, TV 0 *:!” forms the splendour of Se
whole day from dawn via noon and sunset. The

beginning of the day is declared as practically the
ending of the previous day and the pnd
drama records the beginnings of the next. The

The Future of Rituals

169

character of the Stage Manager corresponds with
the character of the immediate Pastmaster of some
rituals. He announces the events of the play from
time to time in the form of broken conversations-
The dawn of the globe and the opening of the
day into the detail of the mundane aspect of a
village in America is a peculiar attempt to mingle
the daily life of man with the ritualistic plan of
creation. The birth of the twins, the death of certain
persons, a marriage and the daily life of a set of
people are all symbolic and the significance should
be studied in between the lines with the aid of
the ritualistic keys. Time sense is transcended in
this drama. The first act begins at dawn and runs
to noon. The second act begins after noon and
runs to midnight. The third act links the night
with the next dawn, the periodical beginning
of things. The hours of the night are compared
with the subconscious nature of man wherein lie
concealed the minds and work of the great
thinkers of the past. "9*0 Clock, Spinoza; 10*0
clock Plato;,11*0 clock Aristotle; 12’0 clock Bible’*
is an examlpe. At the time of the sunset there is
an order that all the documents should be burnt
up except the Holy Bible and the works of Shakes¬
peare. These two dramas made their way into the
outward world as the first set of the mystery plays
that are openly thrown to public in the modern
age. The missing links and the necessary explanations
that are required fora slow and proper understanding
of the nature of these mysteries will be made
possible by the leisurely descriptions that are given in
the form of some spiritual fiction. For this purpose
22

170

Book of Rituals

some novels will be written by certain induced
minds of a Master or a disciple himself directly.
Readers of the most materialistic levels will be
allured and attracted by the sense of mystery
and wonder that surround such plots. They read
these books only as imaginary stories, positively
disbelieving the truth of the existence of such a
line. The impressions that are made upon their
mind will work through their subconscious nature
and bring the recollection of the past associations
of these souls (many of them are necessarily
Atlanteans) and prepare the path either in this life
or the next. Thus there is a conscious well planned
scheme on the line of literature and fine arts. The
language and similies of poetry are also undergoing
peculiar changes leaving the non-essential and leading
the readers to the intuitive realms through cryptic
writings using archetypal similies. Such a change
is predicted by Sri Aurobindo about the future of
the poetry. A successful example of such poetic
composition can be found in the grand cryptic
poem, The Wasteland by T. S. Elliot. We will
gradually witness the enacting of the ritualistic
dramas in open theatres when the aspired benefit
is conferred as the part of the aesthetic appreciation
and the emotional alchemy of the audiences.

The Content and Form of the Future Rituals

The externalisation of the Hierarchy includes
the renovation of the ancient rituals as an
important item. This is much discussed in the book
“The Externalisation of the Hierarchy” written
by A. A. B. The Masters and the disciples who
have undertaken the activity of the second and
seventh rays of initiation will work for this renova¬
tion especially. Various schools of initiation will
be founded under different names having different
orders of rituals, the content being the same. There
will be a definite attempt to transcend the differences
of the so many outward religions which formed the
non-essential part of the spiritualistic path. Such
differences are bound to crop up through centuries
from time to time due to the differentiation of the
work of the Masters. Many of the ritualistic orders
remained above religion from times immemorial
though they are temporarily modified by the various
exoteric religious missionaries and their political
effects. The rituals of the medieval ages and the
present age are partly coloured by the local
religious influences and partly remain original in
their nature. The inner content of the rituals
which forms the theme of the life of man as
a drama remained the same and the names of
characters changed according to the local religious

172

Book of Rituals

nomenclature. The leading rituals of the future aee
exist as spiritual dramas above religion and form a

of Sin 8 P H Ce 0f * he religion > Philosophy and science

nLni f HenCe there Wl11 be a wide r scope for the
people of many walks of life to be initiated into
the orders. In the light of the above sludy o e
can easdy Vlsuahse the set ofntua , d *

The scheme will be as follows :

(1) The initiation ritual.

(2) The Theme of the Birth of the Father as
Son through the Mother.

(3) The Journey of the Soul.

(4) The Story of Death and Rebirth.

(5) Zodiacal and Planetary Dramas.

(h) The Day ” of Creation.

(7) The Allegories of Number and Form.

mysteries of oral°tradhToT" The ^ COn ! ains three
the training and harnessing of the fnteiwf 3 i™ h
emotional powers of man and man " ! lectual and
over them. The theory of ni J 8 “ 8 mas tery

of correspondences" f”
a new ^ht The student is made m fin ^
Mnlr the UniVerSe and the “hirriate fitness df

the S5MS ^1? son de «

Of the Vedic and Puramclure *" SaraswatI mystery

Form of the Future Rituals

773

glory are respectively represented by the father,
the mother and the son concepts, The secret of
creation before it is reflected upon mind and matter
as the secret of reproduction will be inculcated
in all details. The first stage of seerhood is thereby
conferred upon the student and he begins to grow
and permeate into his objective presence through
his consciousness until he meets Jthe consciousness
of the spiritual sun (this becomes the subplot of
the son going out into the wider world in quest
of his father).

The Journey of the Soul contains the essentials
of the theme of the Mahabharata and the Bible.
The Exodus of the sons of Israel in quest of the
Promised Land and the Journey of the five sons
of Pandu in quest of their lost kingdom are
synthesised to form a grand mystery play. Climbing
up the hills, conducting pilgrimages and undertaking
sea voyage in the arc with the aid of the great
fish and undertaking air travel on the face of the
Sun after assuming the form of the eagle taking
up the serpents will all be enacted in an organised
way.

All the sublime aspects of the various stories
of the dying Gods will be edited and rearranged
into a drama. This contains the story of Savitri
and Satyavan and the story of the crucifixion
and raising. Portions of the rituals from the
Book of the Dead and the stories of Isis and
Osiris will be synthesised. This ritual serves as a
sacrament to give a second birth ( spiritual birth )
which is above death to the student.

174

Book of Rituals

Here also the drama of the day is introduced
and the whole play had the background of the
rotating wheel and the planetary angels coming
and going partaking the chorus and the circle
dance. The stories of various Prajapathis (Patriarchs)
form part of the Drama. There will be twelve
zodiacal rituals conducted during the twelve months
of the year and each having a different theme.
Of course all the themes are now found as
descriptions and episodes in the Mahabharata and
the Book of Revelation of the St. John and
St. Mark Gospel of the New Testament.

The day of creation is a profound allegory
dealing with the journey of man along the wheel
of life from one birth to the next. All the
divisions of the day ( the 24 inch scale, the four
divisions of six hours each etc ) are found in a
dramatised form. The whole set up is now found in

of the Mahabharata wherein
allegorised into the story of

tne opening chapters
the life of a man is
a disciple.

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