Transactions of the Blavatsky Lodge of the Theosophical Society. Discussions on the stanzas of the first volume of The secret doctrine

A. This would eliminate the idea of absolute rest, if this absoluteness of rest were not counteracted by the absoluteness of motion. Therefore, one expression is as good as the other. There is a magnificent poem on Pralaya a period of cosmic rest or dissolution, written by a very ancient Rishi an inspired poet or sage, who compares the motion of the Great Breath during Pralaya to the rhythmical motions of the unconscious Ocean.

Q. The difficulty arises when the word "eternity" is used instead of "Aeon" a long period of time; in Gnosticism, an emanation of God.

A. Why should a Greek word be used when there is a more familiar expression, especially since it is fully explained in the Secret Doctrine? You may call it a relative eternity, or a Manvantaric and Pralayic eternity, if you wish.

Q. Is the relationship between Pralaya and Manvantara a period of cosmic activity and manifestation strictly analogous to the relationship between sleeping and waking?

A. Only in a certain sense. During the night, we all exist personally and individually, even though we sleep and may be unconscious of living. But during Pralaya, everything that was differentiated—every individual unit—disappears from the phenomenal universe and is merged into, or rather transferred into, the One noumenal the underlying reality beyond the reach of the senses. Therefore, in fact original: "de facto", there is a great difference.

Q. Sleep has been called the "shady side of life"; can Pralaya be called the shady side of Cosmic life?

A. It may be called that in a certain way. Pralaya is the dissolution of the visible into the invisible, the heterogeneous into the homogeneous—a time of rest, therefore. Even cosmic matter, indestructible as it is in its essence, must have a time of rest and return to its Layam a state of neutral equilibrium or dissolution state. The absoluteness of the all-containing One essence must manifest itself equally in rest and in activity.

Sloka (2). TIME WAS NOT, FOR IT LAY ASLEEP IN THE INFINITE BOSOM OF DURATION.

Q. What is the difference between Time and Duration?

A. Duration is; it has neither beginning nor end. How can you call that which has neither beginning nor end "Time"? Duration is beginningless and endless; Time is finite.

Q. Is Duration, then, the infinite conception, and Time the finite one?

A. Time can be divided; Duration—at least in our philosophy—cannot. Time is divisible within Duration—or, as you put it, one is something within Time and Space, whereas the other is outside of both.

Q. The only way one can define Time is by the motion of the earth.

A. But we can also define Time through our concepts.

Q. You mean Duration, perhaps?

A. No, Time; for as to Duration, it is impossible to divide it or set up landmarks within it. For us, Duration is the one eternity—not relative, but absolute.

Q. Can it be said that the essential idea of Duration is existence?

A. No; existence has limited and definite periods, whereas Duration, having neither beginning nor end, is a perfect abstraction that contains Time. Duration is like Space, which is also an abstraction and is equally without beginning or end. It is only in its concreteness and limitation that it becomes a tangible representation and a distinct thing. Of course, the distance between two points is called space; it may be enormous or it may be infinitesimal, yet it will always be space. But all such specifications are divisions created by human thought. In reality, Space is what the ancients called the One invisible and unknown (now unknowable) Deity.

Q. Then is Time the same as Space, both being one in the abstract?

A. As two abstractions they may be one; but this would apply to Duration and Abstract Space rather than to Time and Space.

Q. Space is the objective side and Time the subjective side of all manifestation. In reality, they are the only attributes of the infinite; but "attribute" is perhaps a poor term to use, because they are, so to speak, co-extensive with the infinite. It may, however, be objected that they are nothing but the creations of our own intellect—simply the forms in which we cannot help conceiving of things.

A. That sounds like an argument from our friends the Hylo-idealists a philosophy suggesting the universe is a product of the mind's interaction with matter; but here we are speaking of the noumenal and not the phenomenal universe. In the occult catechism (see Secret Doctrine), it is asked: "What is that which always exists, which you cannot imagine as not being, no matter what you do?" The answer is—SPACE. For there may not be a single human in the universe to think of it, not a single eye to perceive it, nor a single brain to sense it, but still Space is, ever was, and ever will be, and you cannot do away with it.

Q. Because we cannot help thinking of it, perhaps?

A. Our thinking of it has nothing to do with the question. Try, instead, to see if you can think of anything with Space excluded, and you will soon discover the impossibility of such a concept. Space exists where there