Esoteric Christianity, or The Lesser Mysteries by Annie Wood Besant

Author:Annie Wood Besant [Besant, Annie Wood]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Mysticism, Theosophy, Christianity -- Miscellanea
Published: 2008-10-15T16:00:00+00:00

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Chapter VIII.

RESURRECTION AND ASCENSION.

The doctrines of the Resurrection and Ascension of Christ also form part of the Lesser Mysteries, being integral portions of "The Solar Myth," and of the life-story of the Christ in man.

As regards Christ Himself they have their historical basis in the facts of His continuing to teach His apostles after His physical death, and of His appearance in the Greater Mysteries as Hierophant after His direct instructions had ceased, until Jesus took His place. In the mythic tales the resurrection of the hero and his glorification invariably formed the conclusion of his death-story; and in the Mysteries, the body of the candidate was always thrown into a death-like trance, during which he, as a liberated soul, travelled through the invisible world, returning and reviving the body after three days. And in the life-story of the individual, who is becoming a Christ, we shall find, as we study it, that the dramas of the Resurrection and Ascension are repeated.

But before we can intelligently follow that story, we must master the outlines of the human constitution, and understand the natural and spiritual bodies of man. "There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body."[239]

There are still some uninstructed people who regard man as a mere duality, made up of "soul" and "body." Such people use the words "soul" and "spirit" as synonyms, and speak indifferently of "soul and body" or "spirit and body," meaning that man is composed of two constituents, one of which perishes at death, while the other survives. For the very simple and ignorant this rough division is sufficient, but it will not enable us to understand the mysteries of the Resurrection and Ascension.

Every Christian who has made even a superficial study of the human constitution recognises in it three distinct constituents—Spirit, Soul, and Body. This division is sound, though needing further subdivision for more profound study, and it has been used by S. Paul in his prayer that "your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless."[240] That threefold division is accepted in Christian Theology.

The Spirit itself is really a Trinity, the reflexion and image of the Supreme Trinity, and this we shall study in the following chapter.[241] The true man, the immortal, who is the Spirit, is the Trinity in man. This is life, consciousness, and to this the spiritual body belongs, each aspect of the Trinity having its own Body. The Soul is dual, and comprises the mind and the emotional nature, with its appropriate garments. And the Body is the material instrument of Spirit and Soul. In one Christian view of man he is a twelve-fold being, six modifications forming the spiritual man, and six the natural man; according to another, he is divisible into fourteen, seven modifications of consciousness and seven corresponding types of form. This latter view is practically identical with that studied by Mystics, and it is usually spoken of as seven-fold, because there are really seven divisions, each being two-fold, having a life-side and a form-side.

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