The Serpent Power. Arthur Avalon
gains for the Yogī power to destroy and create the world.
It is also said that mastery of the centers may produce various Siddhis or powers in respect of the predominating elements there. And this is, in fact, alleged.{115} Pandit Ananta Shāstrī says:{116} “We can meet with several persons every day elbowing us in the streets or bazaars who in all sincerity attempted to reach the highest plane of bliss, but fell victims on the way to the illusions of the psychic world, and stopped at one or the other of the six Chakras. They are of varying degrees of attainment, and are seen to possess some power which is not found even in the best intellectual of the ordinary run of mankind. That this school of practical psychology was working very well in India at one time is evident from these living instances (not to speak of the numberless treatises on the subject) of men roaming about in all parts of the country.” The mere rousing of the Serpent power does not, from the spiritual Yoga standpoint, amount to much. Nothing, however, of real moment, from the higher Yogīs’ point of view, is achieved until the Ājnā Chakra is reached. Here, again, it is said that the Sādhaka whose Ātmā is nothing but a meditation on this lotus “becomes the creator, preserver, and destroyer, of the three worlds”; and yet, as the commentator points out (v. 34), “This is but the highest Prashangsā-vāda or Stutivāda—that is, compliment—which in Sanskrit literature is as often void of reality as it is in our ordinary life. Though much is here gained, it is not until the Tattvas of this center are also absorbed, and complete knowledge{117} of the Sahasrāra is gained, that the Yogī attains that which is both his aim and the motive of his labor, cessation from rebirth which follows on the control and concentration of the Chitta on the Shivasthānam, the Abode of Bliss. It is not to be supposed that simply because the Serpent Fire has been aroused that one has thereby become a Yogī or achieved the end of Yoga. There are other points of difference which the reader will discover for himself, but into which I do not enter, as my object in comparing the two accounts has been to establish a general contrast between this modern account and that of the Indian schools. I may, however, add that the differences are not only as to details. The style of thought differs in a way not easy shortly to describe, but which will be quickly recognized by those who have some familiarity with the Indian Scriptures and mode of thought. The latter is ever disposed to interpret all processes and their results from a subjective or idealistic standpoint, though for the purposes of Sādhana the objective aspect is not ignored. The Indian theory is highly philosophical. Thus, to take but one instance, whilst Mr. Leadbeater attributes the power of becoming large or small at will (Animā and Mahimā Siddhi) to a flexible tube or “microscopic snake” in the forehead, the Hindu says that all powers (Siddhi) are the attribute (Aishvaryya) of the Lord Ishvara, or creative consciousness, and that in the degree that the Jīva realizes that consciousness{118} he shares the powers inherent in the degree of his attainment.
That which is the general characteristic of the Indian systems, and that which constitutes their real profundity, is the paramount importance attached to consciousness and its states. It is these states which create, sustain, and destroy, the worlds. Brahmā, Vishnu, and Shiva, are the names for functions of the one Universal Consciousness operating in ourselves. And whatever be the means employed, it is the transformation of the “lower” into “higher” states of consciousness which is the process and fruit of Yoga and the cause of all its experiences. In this and other matters, however, we must distinguish both practice and experience from theory. A similar experience may possibly be gained by various modes of practice, and an experience may be in fact a true one, though the theory which may be given to account for it is incorrect.
The following sections will enable the reader to pursue the comparison for himself.
As regards practice, I am told that Kundalinī cannot be roused except in the Mūlādhāra and by the means here indicated, though this may take place by accident when by chance a person has hit upon the necessary positions and conditions, but not otherwise. Thus the story is told of a man being found whose body was as cold as a corpse, though the top of the head was slightly warm. (This is the state in Kundalī Yoga Samādhi.) He was massaged with ghee (clarified butter), when the head got gradually warmer. The warmth descended to the neck, when the whole body regained its heat with a rush. The man came to consciousness, and then told the story of his condition. He said he had been going through some antics, imitating the posture of a Yogī, when suddenly “sleep” had come over him. It was surmised that his breath must have stopped, and that, being in the right position and conditions, he had unwittingly roused Kundalī, who had ascended to Her cerebral center. Not, however, being a Yogī, he could not bring her down again. This, further, can only be done when the Nādīs (v. post) are pure. I told the Pandit (who gave me this story), who was learned in this Yoga, and whose brother practiced it, of the case of a European friend of mine who was not acquainted with the Yoga processes here described, though he had read something about Kundalī in translations of Sanskrit works, and who, nevertheless, believed he had roused Kundalī by meditative processes alone. In fact, as he wrote me, it was useless for him as a European to go into the minutia of Eastern Yoga. He, however, saw Idā and Pinggalā (v. post), and the “central fire” with a trembling aura of rosy light, and blue or azure light, and a white fire which rose up into the brain and flamed out in a winged radiance on either side of the head. Fire was seen flashing from center to center with such rapidity that he could see little of the vision, and movements of forces were seen in the bodies of others. The radiance or aura round Idā was seen as moonlike—that is, palest azure—and Pinggalā red or rather pale rosy opalescence. Kundalī appeared in vision as of intense golden-like white fire rather curled spirally. Taking the centers, Sushumnā, Idā, and Pinggalā, to be symbolized by the Caduceus of Mercury,{119} the little ball at the top of the rod was identified with the Sahasrāra or pineal gland,{120} and the wings as the flaming of auras on each side of the center when the fire strikes it. One night, being abnormally free from the infection of bodily desires, he felt the serpent uncoil, and it ran up, and he was “in a fountain of fire,” and felt, as he said, “the flames spreading wing-wise about my head, and there was a musical clashing as of cymbals, whilst some of these flames, like emanations, seemed to expand and meet like gathered wings over my head. I felt a rocking motion. I really felt frightened, as the Power seemed something which could consume me.” My friend wrote me that in his agitation he forgot to fix his mind on the Supreme, and so missed a divine adventure. Perhaps it was on this account that he said he did not regard the awakening of this power as a very high spiritual experience or on a level with other states of consciousness he experienced. The experience, however, convinced him that there was a real science and magic in the Indian books which treat of occult physiology.
The Pandit’s observations on this experience were as follows: If the breath is stopped and the mind is carried downwards heat is felt. It is possible to “see” Kundalinī with the mental eye, and in this way to experience Her without actually arousing Her and bringing Her up, which can only be effected by the Yoga methods prescribed. Kundalinī may have thus been seen as Light in the basal center (Mūlādhāra). It was the Buddhi (v. post) which perceived Her, but as the experiencer had not been taught the practice he got confused. There is one simple test whether the Shakti is actually aroused. When she leaves a particular center the part so left becomes as cold and apparently lifeless as a corpse. The progress upwards may thus be externally verified by others. When the Shakti (Power) has reached the upper brain (Sahasrāra) the whole body is cold and corpse-like, except the top of the skull, where some warmth is felt, this being the place where the static and kinetic aspects of Consciousness unite.
The present work is issued, not with the object of establishing the truth or expediency of the principles and methods of this form of Yoga (a matter which each will determine for himself), but as a first endeavor to supply, more particularly for those interested in occultism and mysticism, a fuller, more accurate, and rational presentation of the subject.
An understanding of the recondite matters in the treatise here translated is, however, only possible if we first shortly summarize some of the philosophical and religious doctrines which underlie this work, and a knowledge of which in his reader is assumed by its author.
The following sections, therefore, of this Introduction will deal firstly with the concepts of Consciousness{121} and Unconsciousness, and their association in the Embodied Spirit or Jīvātmā. Nextly the kinetic aspect of Spirit, or Shakti, is considered; its