Mithra
The worship of the Indo-Iranian god of light Mithra (in Sanskrit Mitra). The religion originated in Persia from where it spread to Asia minor and then to Rome and much of the Roman empire. It was the chief rival to Christianity. The Avestan hymns, particularly in Yasht, depict Mithra as the god of heavenly light, all-seeing, protector of the virtuous in this world and the next and, most importantly, the foe of the powers of evil and darkness.
Guru Nanak
A religion which started in the Punjab in northwest India in the late 15th century by Nanak (1469-1539), now called by his followers Guru Nanak Dev, the title guru meaning “teacher,” but having the connotation of deep respect or reverence, and dev being the Punjabi form of deva or “god,” “divinity.” The name Sikh is Punjabi for Sanskrit sisya or “pupil.” Nanak is identified in Theosophical literature as a genuine Prophet or Saint (cf. Besant, Sikhism, 1920, p.4) and a bas relief placard commemorating Sikhism is on the wall of the main hall of the headquarters building of The Theosophical Society (TS) in Adyar, Chennai (formerly Madras), India. The religion numbers some 6 million adherents. They are found mainly in the Punjab, but are also in other parts of India (especially the northern states) and in many other countries of the world where Sikhs have built temples, called gurudwaras (“gateways to the teacher”). Their spiritual center is the beautiful Golden Temple located in Amritsar.
A method of healing employing a knowledge of human energy fields. The system was developed by Dr. Dolores Krieger and Dora Van Gelder Kunz. Krieger was for many years head of the New York University’s School of Nursing, and Dora Van Gelder Kunz grew up with clairvoyant power which allowed her to see, with the aid of this faculty, areas of energy imbalance in the human body.
Playing cards that are used either as a card game or for divination and character reading.
Darkness is the absence of light and light is caused by the presence of radiation in the visible part of the electromagnetic spectrum. Helena P. BLAVATSKY and other writers have, however, used the word “darkness” with more subtle implications.
A term found in Theosophical writings equivalent to Primordial Space or Akasa. In Greek mythology it refers to the “Great Deep” or “Abyss” in cosmogony. It is the pre-cosmic substance before the universe came into manifestation, equivalent to the MULAPRAKRTI of the Hindus, the BYTHOS of the Gnostics and the “Waters” of Genesis. The Oxford Dictionary defines chaos as “the formless void of primordial matter.” The word is now encountered in a number of different contexts and with different connotations. There is of course the common usage with the meaning “without order;” then there is the meaning ascribed to it in theosophical writings; finally, it has emerged in the expression “chaos theory” used in physics.
The application of water to a person by immersion, pouring, or sprinkling, as a religious rite, symbolical of purification or regeneration, and betokening initiation into the church.
The most important baptism in Christian church history is undoubtedly John the Baptist’s baptism of Jesus. On this Helena P. BLAVATSKY quotes from the N.T.:
“I baptize you with water, but . . . he shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost and with fire,” says John of Jesus (Matt. iii, 2); meaning this esoterically. The real significance of this statement is very profound. It means that he, John, a non-initiated ascetic, can impart to his disciples no greater wisdom than the mysteries connected with the plane of matter (water being a symbol of it). His gnosis was that of exoteric and ritualistic dogma, of dead-letter orthodoxy; while the wisdom which Jesus, an Initiate of the higher mysteries, would reveal to them, was of a higher character, for it was the “Fire” Wisdom of the true gnosis or the real spiritual enlightenment. (SD II:566)