The Moon is the deity of the mind (Manas) but only on the lower plane. Says a Commentary:
Manas is dual—Lunar in the lower, Solar in its upper portion.
That is to say, it is attracted in its higher aspect towards Buddhi, and in its lower descends into, and listens to the voice of, its animal Soul [pg 521] full of selfish and sensual desires; and herein is contained the mystery of an Adept's and of a profane man's life, as also that of the post mortem separation of the divine from the animal Man. The Mahâbhârata—every line of which has to be read Esoterically—discloses in magnificent symbolism and allegory the tribulations of both Man and Soul. Says the Brâhmana in the Anugîtâ:
In the interior (within the body), in the midst of all these (life-winds) [? principles], which move about in the body and swallow up one another,[1141] blazes the Vaishvânara fire[1142] sevenfold.[1143]
But the chief “Soul” is Manas or mind; hence, Soma, the Moon, is shown as making an alliance with the solar portion in it, personified as the Prachetasas. But of the seven keys that open the seven aspects of the Râmâyana, as of every other Scripture, this is only one—the metaphysical.
The symbol of the “Tree” standing for various Initiates was almost universal. Jesus is called the “Tree of Life,” as are also all the Adepts of the Good Law, while those of the Left Path are referred to as the “withering trees.” John the Baptist speaks of the “axe” which “is laid to the root of the trees”;[1144] and the king of Assyria's armies are called “trees.”[1145]
The true meaning of the Garden of Eden has been sufficiently given in Isis Unveiled. Now the writer has more than once heard surprise expressed that Isis Unveiled should contain so few of the doctrines now taught. This is quite erroneous. For the allusions to such teachings are plentiful, even if the teachings themselves were withheld. The time had not arrived then, as the hour has not struck even now, to say all. “No Atlanteans, or the Fourth Race which preceded our Fifth Race, are mentioned in Isis Unveiled,” wrote a critic on Esoteric Buddhism one day. I, who wrote Isis Unveiled, maintain that the Atlanteans are mentioned as our predecessors. For what can be plainer than the following statement, when speaking of the Book of Job:
In the original text, instead of “dead things,” it is written dead Rephaim (giants, or mighty primitive men), from whom “Evolution” may one day trace our present race.[1146]
It is invited to do so now, now that this hint is explained quite openly; but Evolutionists are as sure to decline nowadays as they did ten years ago. Science and Theology are against us: therefore we question both, and have to do so in self-defence. On the strength of hazy metaphors scattered throughout the prophets, and in St. John's Revelation, a grand but reëdited version of the Book of Enoch, on these insecure grounds Christian Theology has built its dogmatic Epos of the War in Heaven. It has done more: it has used the symbolical visions, intelligible only to the Initiates, as pillars upon which to support the whole bulky edifice of its religion; and now the pillars have been found very weak reeds, and the cunning structure is foundering. The entire Christian scheme rests upon this Jakin and Boaz—the two contrary forces of Good and Evil, Christ and Satan, αἱ ἀγαθαὶ καὶ αἱ κακαὶ δυνάμεις. Take away from Christianity its main prop of the Fallen Angels, and the Eden Bower vanishes, with its Adam and Eve, into thin air; and Christ, in the exclusive character of the One God and Saviour, and the Victim of Atonement for the sin of animal-man, becomes forthwith a useless, meaningless myth.
In an old number of the Revue Archéologique, a French writer, M. Maury, remarks: