Theosophy -Living the Life

Psychic Powers and the Astral Light: Behind the Veil of Illusion

2) Beyond the Five Senses – Explanations of Phenomena

Related References

(Wm. Q. Judge, The Ocean Of Theosophy, Ch. 16)
The field of psychic forces, phenomena, and dynamics is a vast one. Such phenomena are seen and the forces exhibited every day in all lands, but until a few years ago very little attention was given to them by scientific persons, while a great deal of ridicule was heaped upon those who related the occurrences or averred belief in the psychic nature.

This lack of an adequate system of Psychology is a natural consequence of the materialistic bias of science and the paralyzing influence of dogmatic religion; the one ridiculing effort and blocking the way, the other forbidding investigation. The Roman Catholic branch of the Christian Church is in some respects an exception, however. It has always admitted the existence of the psychic world — for it the realm of devils and angels, but as angels manifest when they choose and devils are to be shunned, no one is permitted by that Church to meddle in such matters except an authorized priest.

(Wm. Q. Judge, Articles, “Elementals -Karma”)
Student. – How then about the doing of phenomena by adepts?

Sage. – The production of phenomena is not possible without either the aid or disturbance of elementals. Each phenomenon entails the expenditure of great force, and also brings on a correspondingly great disturbance in the elemental world, which disturbance is beyond the limit natural to ordinary human life. It then follows that, as soon as the phenomenon is completed, the disturbance occasioned begins to be compensated for. The elementals are in greatly excited motion, and precipitate themselves in various directions. They are not able to affect those who are protected. But they are able, or rather it is possible for them, to enter into the sphere of unprotected persons, and especially those persons who are engaged in the study of occultism. And then they become agents in concentrating the karma of those persons, producing troubles and disasters often, or other difficulties which otherwise might have been so spread over a period of time as to be not counted more than the ordinary vicissitudes of life. This will go to explain the meaning of the statement that an Adept will not do a phenomenon unless he sees the desire in the mind of another lower or higher Adept or student; for then there is a sympathetic relation established, and also a tacit acceptance of the consequences which may ensue. It will also help to understand the peculiar reluctance often of some persons, who can perform phenomena, to produce them in cases where we may think their production would be beneficial; and also why they are never done in order to compass worldly ends, as is natural for worldly people to suppose might be done, – such as procuring money, transferring objects, influencing minds, and so on.

Wm. Q. Judge, The Ocean Of Theosophy
Are there psychic forces, laws, and powers? If there are, then there must be the phenomena. And if all that has been outlined in preceding chapters is true, then in man are the same powers and forces which are to be found anywhere in Nature. He is held by the Masters of Wisdom to be the highest product of the whole system of evolution, and mirrors in himself every power, however wonderful or terrible, of Nature; by the very fact of being such a mirror he is man.

The genuine psychic — or, as they are often called, magical –phenomena done by the Eastern faquir or yogee are all performed by the use of natural forces and processes not even dreamed of as yet by the West. Levitation of the body in apparent defiance of gravitation is a thing to be done with ease when the process is completely mastered. It contravenes no law. Gravitation is only half of a law. The Oriental sage admits gravity, if one wishes to adopt the term; but the real term is attraction, the other half of the law being expressed by the word repulsion, and both being governed by the great laws of electrical force. Weight and stability depend on polarity, and when the polarity of an object is altered in respect to the earth immediately underneath it, then the object may rise. But as mere objects are devoid of the consciousness found in man, they cannot rise without certain other aids. The human body, however, will rise in the air unsupported, like a bird, when its polarity is thus changed. This change is brought about consciously by a certain system of breathing known to the Oriental; it may be induced also by aid from certain natural forces spoken of later, in the cases of those who without knowing the law perform the phenomena, as with the saints of the Roman Catholic Church.

(HPB, Articles, “What of Phenomena?”)
Never were the phenomena presented in any other character than that of instances of a power over perfectly natural though unrecognized forces, and incidentally over matter, possessed by certain individuals who have attained to a larger and higher knowledge of the Universe than has been reached by scientists and theologians, or can ever be reached by them, by the roads they are now respectively pursuing. Yet this power is latent in all men, and could, in time, be wielded by anyone who would cultivate the knowledge and conform to the conditions necessary for its development

An occultist can produce phenomena, but he cannot supply the world withbrains, nor with the intelligence and good faith necessary to understand and appreciate them. Therefore, it is hardly to be wondered at, that word came to abandon phenomena and let the ideas of Theosophy stand on their own intrinsic merits.

(HPB, Articles, “Occult Phenomena”)
Theosophy believes in no miracle, whether divine or devilish; recognizes nothing as supernatural; believes only in facts and Science; studies the laws of Nature, both Occult and patent; and gives attention particularly to the former, just because exact Science will have nothing to do with them. Such laws are those of Magnetism in all its branches, Mesmerism, Psychology, etc. More than once in the history of its past has Science been made the victim of its own delusions as to its professed infallibility; and the time must come when the perfection of Asiatic Psychology and its knowledge of the forces of the invisible world will be recognized, as were the circulation of the blood, electricity, and so forth, after the first sneers and lampoons died away. The “silly attempts to hoodwink individuals” will then be viewed as honest attempts at proving to this generation of Spiritualists and believers in past “miracle-mongers,” that there is naught miraculous in this world of Matter and Spirit, of visible results and invisible causes; naught-

(Wm. Q. Judge, Articles, “Imagination and Occult Phenomena”)
The faculty of imagination has been reduced to a very low level by modern western theorisers upon mental philosophy. It is “only the making of pictures, daydreaming, fancy and the like”: thus they have said about one of the noblest faculties in man. In Occultism it is well known to be of the highest importance that one should have the imagination under such control as to be able to make a picture of anything at any time, and if this power has not been so trained the possession of other sorts of knowledge will not enable one to perform certain classes of occult phenomena.

9Wm. Q. Judge, The Ocean of Theosophy)
But the lay mind infested by the materialism of the day wonders how all these manipulations are possible, seeing that no instruments are spoken of. The instruments are in the body and brain of man. In the view of the Lodge “the human brain is an exhaustless generator of force,” and a complete knowledge of the inner chemical and dynamic laws of Nature, together with a trained mind, give the possessor the power to operate the laws to which I have referred. This will be man’s possession in the future, and would be his today were it not for blind dogmatism, selfishness, and materialistic unbelief. Not even the Christian lives up to his Master’s very true statement that if one had faith he could remove a mountain. A knowledge of the law when added to faith gives power over matter, mind, space, and time.

. . . the human Will is all powerful and the Imagination is a most useful faculty with a dynamic force. The Imagination is the picture-making power of the human mind. In the ordinary average human person it has not enough training or force to be more than a sort of dream, but it may be trained. When trained it is the Constructor in the Human Workshop. Arrived at that stage it makes a matrix in the Astral substance through which effects objectively will flow. It is the greatest power, after Will, in the human assemblage of complicated instruments.

Additional Related References of Interest

Articles by Wm. Q. Judge:
– Occult Teachings
– Elementals – Karma
– Imagination and Occult Phenomena
– Occult Arts

Articles by H.P. Blavatsky:
– Occult or Exact Science?
– Practical Occultism
– What of Phenomena?