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the sevenfold classification is the right one. For it is simply a convenient division which prevents in no wise the recognition of but three groups—which Mr. Subba Row calls "four principles associated with four upadhis, and which are associated in their turn with four distinct states of consciousness."*[1] This is the Bhagavad Gita classification, it appears; but not that of the Vedanta, nor—what the Raj-Yogis of the pre-Arya sanga schools and of the Mahayana system held to, and still hold beyond the Himalayas, and their system is almost identical with the Taraka Raj-Yoga,—the difference between the latter and the Vedanta classification having been pointed out to us by Mr. Subba Row in his little article on the "Septenary Division in different Indian system." The Taraka Raj-Yogis recognize only three upadhis in which Atma may work, which, in India, if I mistake not, are the Jagrata, or waking state of consciousness (corresponding to the Sthulapadhi); the Svapna, or dreaming state (in Suhshmopadhi); and the Sushupti, or causal state, produced by and through Karanopadhi, or what we call Buddhi. But then, in transcendental states of Samadhi, the body with its Lingasarira, the vehicle of the life-principle, is entirely left out of consideration: the three states of consciousness are made to refer only to the three (with Atma the fourth) principles which remain after death. And here lies the real key to the septenary division of man, the three principles coming in as an addition only during his life.
As in the Macrocosm, so in the Microcosm: analogies hold good throughout nature. Thus the universe, our solar system, our earth down to man, are to be regarded as all equally possessing a septenary constitution—four superterrestrial and
- ↑ * A crowning proof of the fact that the division is arbitrary and varies with the schools it belongs to, is in the words published in "Personal and Impersonal God" by Mr. Subba Bow, where he states that "we have six states of consciousness, either objective or subjective...and a perfect state of unconsciousness, etc." (See "Five Years of Theosophy," pp. 200 and 201.) Of course those who do not hold to the old school of Aryan and Arhat Adepts are in no way bound to adopt the septenary classification.
