Spiritual Inquiries: 4. Space, Time and Consciousness

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What is the relationship between Space, Time and Consciousness?

 

"What is it that ever is?"

"Space, the eternal Anupadaka."

 

"What is it that ever was?"

"The Germ in the Root."

 

"What is it that is ever coming and going?"

"The Great Breath."

 

"Then, there are three Eternals?"

"No, the three are one.

 

That which ever is is one, that which ever was is one, that which

is ever being and becoming is also one: and this is Space."

 

-- The Secret Doctrine, I, II by H.P.Blavatsky

 

The Void and the Fullness

-------------------------

Aum Poornamadah Poornamidam

Poornaat Poornamudachyate

Poornasya Poornamaadaya

Poornameva Vashishyate

Om Shanti Shanti Shantihi

 

That is perfect - this is perfect. What comes from such perfection

truly is perfect. What remains after perfection from perfection

is yet perfect. May there be peace, peace and perfect peace.

 

To modern Astronomy, space is empty. But if this idea means absolute

vacuity, something which is non-existent, we reject it.

 

When cornered by probing questions, the scientists would admit that

the term empty merely signifies portions of space or cosmical fields

which contain no matter, that is, no physical matter which they with

their instruments can cognize or see.

 

Modern space research using powerful telescopes has brought up

images of what seem to be "apparent cosmic emptiness sprinkled

throughout with glittering stars, and with millions upon millions of

wisps of light that are nebulae," as G. de Purucker says in his book

Fountain-Source of Occultism.

 

These nebulae are seen to be universes of the stars and star

clusters that are, apparently, vast bodies of cosmic gas. But many

of the nebulae, if not all, does not merely contain physical matter

in the form of cosmic gas. They are composed of ethereal matter of a

higher plane than our physical plane.

 

Thus the universe is not empty, but full, whereever we look. The

doctrine of Void, then, is really the doctrine of Fullness. But

there is a distinction. The doctrine of Void concerns the

Unmanifested, the doctrine of Fullness concerns the Manifested.

 

The Void refers to the divine-spiritual or formless aspect of the

One, whereas the Fullness, the Pleroma of the Greek, refers to the

prakriti, or matter aspect, which vanishes away like a dream when

the great manvantara or period of world activity is finished.

 

So the Fullness (prakriti) aspect is only an illusion or maya,

because it is not eternal. In whichever form it is, atom, man,

nature or universe, it ultimately dissolves into the Void, when its

time is up. Maya on a cosmic scale is called mahamaya.

 

We should note that maya as illusion does not mean that it does not

exist. Illusion here means transitory, and therefore, maya is real

so long as it exists. But it is not the Reality. The Reality, as we

know, is the One, the Paramatman or Parabrahman. Maya is included in

the Parabrahman and is not separate from Him. This is what Adi

Sankara teaches as advaita vedanta.

 

In the words of Shri Kanchi Paramacharya, "The term Maya indicates

that this universe is not non-existent like the horn of a rabbit,

but seems to exist like a mirage. While the term adyanta asat

indicates that which is not existent, the term pradipasika satyam

indicates that which seems to exist.

 

Space, Time and Cosmic Consciousness

----

Space, we have noted, is external as well as internal. Outer space

and inner space. The inner space, of course, is not visible or

perceptible to the physical senses.

 

Space is actually seven-folded, the seven planes with different

aggregations of matter. Space in the physical plane has three

dimensions. The higher dimensions map to the higher planes.

 

Space, comprises Koilon (ether) and the bubbles (ultimate atoms),

representing the unmanifested and manifested aspects of the One. The

Cosmic Consciousness pervades the Koilon and the bubbles. It is the

Cosmic Consciouss that preserves the shape of the ultimate atoms of

each plane. If He chooses to withdraw His consciousness, the atoms

will instantly dissolve and the planes simply vanish, like light

goes out of an extinguished lamp.

 

So we have Space and Consciousness that animates it. Where does Time

fit in?

 

Time, as we commonly know, is the duration or interval between two

events. Where do these events happen? In space, inner or outer. . As

H.P.Blavatsky in her book The Secret Doctrine (I, 37) says:

 

"The present is only a mathematical line which divides that part of

eternal duration which we call the future, from that part which we

call the past.

 

"Nothing on earth has real duration, for nothing remains without

change--or the same--for the billionth part of a second; and the

sensation we have of the actuality of the division of 'time' known

as the present, comes from the blurring of that momentary glimpse,

or succession of glimpses, of things that our senses give us, as

those things pass from the region of ideals which we call the

future, to the region of memories that we name the past."

 

What she means is that time is essentially cyclic in nature, and is

eternal. The consciousness of eternal time is inherent in the Hindu

psyche, for the Hindu rituals start with these lines of mantra that

call time from its eternal beginnings:

 

 

adhya brahmaNa divtIya parArdhe

svetha varAha kalpe

vaivasvta manvantare

aShTavimshati tame

kaliyuge prathame pAde..."

 

In the second half of the currently reigning Brahma, on the first

day of his current year, in the Svetha Varaaha kalpa, in the

manvantara of the Vaivasvata manu, in the first part of the Kali

yuga that is repeated for the twenty-eightth time (in the

manvantara)..."

 

And the desciption zeores in on the current moment of time and

space, through a seires of references from their higher levels.

 

Occultism affirms that in all things both great and small, whether a

universe, a sun, a human being, or any other entity, there is a

constant secular cyclical diastole and systole, similar to that of

the human heart.

 

Einstein's general relativity speculations state that space and time

are essentially one. It is impossible to think of space apart from

time, or of time, as existent apart from space.

 

So we have Cosmic Mind (or Consciousness), Cosmic Space and Cosmic

Time, an unending duration. Since these cannot be separate entities,

all the three are one, being three aspects of the One.

 

Our concept of solar time in year, month and days is just a

conditional break (khandakala) of the infinite time (kala). Because

it is cyclic in nature, we have the illusion of a continuous flow of

time.

 

The Space-Time continuum of modern Science is a hesitant step

towards the ultimate truth. When Consciousnes is included in this

continuum, we would realize that everything ultimately resolves into

space, when the cycle ends, and this would be the indrawing of the

Great Breath, or the beginning of kosmic pralaya.

 

"To what does this world go back?"

 

"To space (akasa)," said he. "Verily, all things here arise out of

space. They disappear back into space, for space alone is greater

than these; space is the final goal."

 

-- Chhandogya-Upanishad (I, 9, 1)

 

With these considerations, we shall discuss the formation of the

solar system, and the seven planes, in the next instalments.

 

Regards,

saidevo