The Secret Doctrine, Vol. 2 of 4: The Synthesis of Science, Religion, and PhilosophyBlavatsky, H. P. (Helena Petrovna)
Religion
The Secret Doctrine, Vol. 2 of 4: The Synthesis of Science, Religion, and Philosophy
Blavatsky, H. P. (Helena Petrovna)
Theosophy
As there may be no occasion to refer to this mystery later, it is as well
to point out at once the dual meaning contained in the Greek myth bearing
upon this particular phase of evolution. It is found in the several
variants of the allegory of Leda and her two sons Castor and Pollux, each
of which variants has a special meaning. Thus in Book XI of the _Odyssey_,
Leda is spoken of as the spouse of Tyndarus, who gave birth by her husband
“to two sons of valiant heart”—Castor and Pollux. Jupiter endows them with
a marvellous gift and privilege. They are semi‐immortal; they live and
die, each in turn, and every alternate day (ἑτερήμεροι(275)). As the
Tyndaridæ, the twin brothers are an astronomical symbol, and stand for Day
and Night; their two wives, Phœbe and Hilaeira, the daughters of Apollo or
the Sun, personifying the Dawn and the Twilight.(276) Again, in the
allegory where Zeus is shown as the father of the two heroes—born from the
Egg to which Leda gives birth—the myth is entirely theogonical. It relates
to that group of cosmic allegories in which the world is described as born
from an Egg. For Leda assumes in it the shape of a white swan, when
uniting herself to the Divine Swan or Brahma‐Kalahamsa. Leda is the
mythical Bird, then, to which, in the traditions of various peoples of the
Âryan race, are attributed various ornithological forms of birds which all
lay golden Eggs.(277) In the _Kalevala_, the Epic Poem of Finland, the
beauteous daughter of the Ether, the “Water‐Mother,” creates the World in
conjunction with a “Duck”—another form of the Swan or Goose, Kalahamsa—who
lays six golden eggs, and the seventh, an “egg of iron,” in her lap. But
the variant of the Leda allegory which has a direct reference to mystic
man is found in Pindar(278) only, with a slighter reference to it in the
Homeric Hymns.(279) Castor and Pollux are in it no longer the Dioscuri of
Apollodorus(280); but become the highly significant symbol of the dual
man, the Mortal and the Immortal. Not only this, but as will now be seen,
they are also the symbol of the Third Race, and its transformation from
the Animal‐man into a God‐man with only an animal body.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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