Theosophical
Teachings in an Ancient Legend
Carlos Cardoso
Aveline
Self-delusion is
often pessimistic, and misinformed people may believe that “life is too
painful” and “the law of impermanence provokes suffering”.
Esoteric victimization is useless at best.
Blaming “Kali Yuga” for human mistakes is particularly
unintelligent. Every aspect of the universe evolves and learns under the blissful
law of renewal and rebirth. Instead of complaining about difficulties, we
should remember the philosophy of Epictetus and not lose energy with facts
outside our field of action, but do our duty with regard to that which actually
depends on us.
Bliss, not pain, is at the center of life.
Everyone can expand his connection to such center, and
old forms are of course abandoned in due time so that a rebirth can take place.
To each end corresponds a new beginning. Decay prepares renewal, and every
night of time has a mission: its duty
or dharma is to prepare the new morning.
Old myths are true in their own ways. The law of Karma,
for instance, confirms the legendary fact that storks bring new babies from
celestial regions, and deliver them to their proper families.
The stork is the popular variety of Phoenix. In Egyptian
mythology, the reincarnating soul of a person was represented by a stork. Every
1,000 or 2,000 years - and sometimes 3,000 years, according to the Mahatma
Letters -, the sacred stork or spiritual soul gives us a new baby as a vehicle
to use in material life. Incarnations take place according to the evolutionary
need of spirit.
Like the heron, storks are symbols of divine science. [1]
In Leviticus, 11: 13-19, it is established that it is an
abomination to eat birds of some species, among them the heron, the pelican and the stork.
The pelican is sometimes connected to the phoenix, and has been used as a
symbol for Christ, besides being associated to sacrifice and resurrection (or reincarnation).
[2]
The Dharma of the
Phoenix
Hans Christian Andersen wrote in a fairy tale about
the phoenix:
“In the Garden
of Paradise, beneath the Tree of Knowledge, bloomed a rose bush. Here, in the
first rose, a bird was born. His flight was like the flashing of light, his
plumage was beauteous, and his song ravishing.”
“But when Eve
plucked the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, when she and Adam
were driven from Paradise, there fell from the flaming sword of the cherub a
spark into the nest of the bird, which blazed up forthwith.”
“The bird
perished in the flames; but from the red egg in the nest there fluttered aloft
a new one - the one solitary Phoenix bird. The fable tells that he dwells in
Arabia, and that every hundred years, he burns himself to death in his nest;
but each time a new Phoenix, the only one in the world, rises up from the red
egg.”
Andersen goes on:
“… The Phoenix
is not the bird of Arabia alone. He wings his way in the glimmer of the
Northern Lights over the plains of Lapland, and hops among the yellow flowers
in the short Greenland summer. Beneath the copper mountains of Fablun, and
England’s coal mines, he flies, in the shape of a dusty moth, over the hymnbook
that rests on the knees of the pious miner. On a lotus leaf he floats down the
sacred waters of the Ganges, and the eye of the Hindoo maid gleams bright when
she beholds him.”[3]
In a different story, Andersen discusses the
difficulties faced by adult storks in educating their children. This is due, among
other circumstances, to the fact that storks and young storks are sometimes
ill-treated by humans. Our humanity has much to improve.[4]
The stork is a bird of good omen. It is a symbol of
filial piety, for it is supposed that it feeds its old father. In some places
it is said that one single glance from a stork can make a woman pregnant. In
China, such a vitalizing power is attributed to the heron.
The stork, the heron and the ibis fight evil. [5] That may explain the obstacles
faced by storks according to Andersen. The sacred bird ibis is extensively
discussed in the book “The Secret Doctrine”, by Helena P. Blavatsky.
A life-giver like the phoenix, the stork is one of the
most popular symbols of longevity. It is said that storks can live many
hundreds of years. When a stork reaches the age of 600 years, it stops eating,
and starts living on water only. This bird is especially admired by Taoist
alchemists. [6]
Like the ibis, the storks express the eternally
renewed wisdom and the energy of universal compassion. Students of esoteric
philosophy can learn to be born again spiritually each day by living in syntony
with these legendary birds.
NOTES:
[1] According to the entry for “Garça-Real” on page 460
in the book “Dicionário de Símbolos”, Jean Chevalier, Alain Gheerbrant. The
volume was published by José Olympio Editora, 8th edition, Rio de Janeiro,
Brazil, 1994, 996 pages. Original title, “Dictionnaire des Symboles”. Copyright
in French, 1982. See also the entry for “Cegonha” on page 218.
[2] “Pelicano”, on page 705 of “Dicionário de Símbolos”,
Jean Chevalier, Alain Gheerbrant. See note above.
[3] Click to see “The Phoenix Bird”, by Hans
Christian Andersen.
[4] “The Storks”, in
“The Complete Hans Christian Andersen Fairy Tales”, edited by Lily Owens, Avenel
Books, New York, 803 pages, 1981, pp. 27-30.
[5] Second paragraph of the entry on “Cegonha”, at page
218 of “Dicionário de Símbolos”, Jean Chevalier, Alain Gheerbrant.
[6] Fourth paragraph at the entry on “Cegonha”, page 218
of “Dicionário de Símbolos”, Jean Chevalier, Alain Gheerbrant.
000
The article “Storks, the Phoenix, and Rebirth” was
published in the independent websites on 08 November 2021. An initial, anonymous
version of it can be found in the June 2017 edition of “The Aquarian Theosophist”,
p. 08, under the title “Storks, Babies and the Phoenix”.
000
Read more:
000
Helena Blavatsky
(photo) wrote these words: “Deserve,
then desire”.
000
