Dr. Kenealy and others believed that the calculations of the cyclic seven and forty-nine were brought by the Rabbins from Chaldæa. This is more than likely. But the Babylonians, who had all those cycles and taught them only at their great initiatory mysteries of astrological Magic, got their wisdom and learning from India. It is not difficult, therefore, to recognize in them our own Esoteric Doctrine. In their secret computations, the Japanese have the same figures in their cycles. As to the Brâhmans, their Purânas and Upanishads are good proof of it. The latter have passed entirely into Gnostic literature; and a Brâhman needs only to read Pistis Sophia[1337] to recognize his forefathers' property, even to the phraseology and similes used. Let us compare. In Pistis Sophia the disciples say to Jesus:
Rabbi, reveal unto us the mysteries of the Light [i.e., the “Fire of Knowledge or Enlightenment”], ... forasmuch as we have heard thee saying that there is [pg 598]another baptism of smoke, and another baptism of the Spirit of Holy Light [i.e.the Spirit of Fire].[1338]
As John says of Jesus:
I indeed baptize you with water; ... but he shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost and with fire.
The real significance of this statement is very profound. It means that John, a non-initiated ascetic, can impart to his disciples no greater wisdom than the Mysteries connected with the plane of Matter, of which Water is the symbol. His Gnosis was that of exoteric and ritualistic dogma, of dead-letter orthodoxy;[1339] while the wisdom which Jesus, an Initiate of the Higher Mysteries, would reveal to them, was of a higher character, for it was the “Fire” Wisdom of the true Gnosis or real Spiritual Enlightenment. One was Fire, the other the Smoke. For Moses, the Fire on Mount Sinai and the Spiritual Wisdom; for the multitudes of the “people” below, for the profane, Mount Sinai in (through) Smoke, i.e., the exoteric husks of orthodox or sectarian ritualism.
Now, having the above in view, read the dialogue between the sages Nârada and Devamata in the Anugîtâ,[1340] an episode from the Mahâbhârata, the antiquity and importance of which one can learn in the “Sacred Books of the East,” edited by Prof. Max Müller.[1341] Nârada is discoursing upon the “breaths” or the “life-winds,” as they are called in the clumsy translations of such words as Prâna, Apâna, etc., whose full Esoteric meaning and application to individual functions can hardly be rendered in English. He says of this science that:
It is the teaching of the Veda, that the fire verily is all the deities, and knowledge (of it) arises among Brâhmanas, being accompanied by intelligence.[1342]
By “fire,” says the Commentator, he means the Self. By “intelligence,” the Occultist says, Nârada meant neither “discussion” nor “argumentation,” as Arjuna Mishra believes, but “intelligence” truly, or the adaptation of the Fire of Wisdom to exoteric ritualism for the profane. This is the chief concern of the Brâhmans, who were the first to set the example to other nations who thus anthropomorphized [pg 599] and carnalized the grandest metaphysical truths. Nârada shows this plainly and is made to say:
The smoke of that (fire) which is of excellent glory (appears) in the shape of ... darkness [verily so!]; (its) ashes, ... [are] passion; and ... goodness is that in connection with it, in which the offering is thrown.[1343]
That is to say, that faculty in the disciple which apprehends the subtle truth (the flame) which escapes heavenward, while the objective sacrifice remains as a proof and evidence of piety only to the profane. For what else can Nârada mean by the following?