The Theosophical Seal - Canadian Theosophical Association

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The Theosophical Seal by Arthur M. Coon so called from the fact that each arm is divided at the end into three pointed segments resembling the petals of a flower. This Cross refers especially to the Third Logos (in Christian nomenclature the Holy Ghost or the Third Person) and represents the threefold power of Spirit flowing out into a fourfold universe. This particular cross is most commonly found embroidered upon tapestries and ecclesiastical vestments, carvings upon church furniture, interior and window decorations and over cathedral doors. This form of the cross calls to mind its universal- that is, catholic or cosmic- significance. Other forms of the cross are the Swastika (d) and the Tau (e), each of which carries a message distinctively its own; and since each of these crosses forms an integral part of the Theosophical Seal, they will be the subject of special studies. The form of the cross with which the Christian world is most familiar is the Latin Cross (f) in which the lower section is twice the length of the upper section or the arms. A RELIGIOUS SYMBOL The Cross, in the minds of most of us, is associated with the Christian religion. Nevertheless history has proven that it was not originally a Christian symbol. Carvings upon rocks and walls of caves are evidence that as a religious symbol it is vastly older than Christianity. We may correctly assume therefore that Christianity appropriated the cross and made it her own particular symbol. That is to say,the idea of the Cross as a Christian symbol of hope and victory had its origins ages before the crucifixion of Jesus. We say this, not in any sense of irreverence,but with a deep conviction that due to the essential nature of the cross,the death of the Christos, following the pattern of the Divine Sacrifice throughout all ages, could only have taken place upon a cross. For Christianity was given to mankind as the latest in the line of mystery religions, a fact lost sigh of after the disappearance of the Gnosis. Like all mystery religions,she veiled her truths under the guide of allegory and symbol. That men have mistaken the symbol for the reality is the greatest tragedy of the age. We may truly say that Christianity dramatised, historically in the life of Jesus, and continuously through her rituals, the great cosmic or universal truths which are embodied in the symbol of the Cross. For the critic to deny the historic reality of the Christian drama and its "dramatic personae" because he learns that it fits into the mould of a universal or cosmic pattern is as illogical as it would be for the scientist, beholding in the atom under his microscope a miniature solar universe, to deny the existence of that atom on the grounds that it "copies" the larger pattern. Indeed, of no other religion upon our planet, at least in the memory of man, can it be said that it presents its philosophy and its theology (I use this word in a universal sense) in the pattern of a divine or sacred drama - a pattern which loses nothing of truth or uniqueness because it is a replica (in time) of that drama of creation whereby worlds and all living Page 36
The Theosophical Seal by Arthur M. Coon forms come into being. However, the :"descent" of spirit into manifestation, the "Incarnation" or "the Word made flesh" - these words express only half the story of the Cross. We have suggested that the cross is a dual symbol. It represents God descending to earth, the "Divine Sacrifice". It also represents man ascending to God, the eternal "Resurrection". So the other half of the story of the cross pictures the way of the return. The "Way of the cross" is not only the way to Calvary. It is the way whereby the Spirit (Son) of God, having descended to earth to become man, through definite "stages" or initiations (expansions of consciousness) ascends again to become divine. This is the heat of every true religion; Christianity has dramatised this in the life of Jesus. We might truly say it is her complete and only story. We have only to look into the world about us to see how the hieroglyph of the cross types Nature in so many of her phases. The earth rotating upon its axis divides the day into four quarters, and the sun rising in the east,crossing the meridian, and setting in the west, forms what we might call the Mundane Cross - its arms extending outward in time and space. Again, the rotation of the earth around the sun,passing as it does through the twelve signs of the Zodiac,draws a circle or ecliptic within which is inscribed another cross. The horizontal line of this cross extends from Aries to Libra, its vertical line from Cancer to Capricorn, into unthinkable distances, and they form in the heavens the Sidereal or Celestial Cross. Combine with this the annual motion of the earth by the inclination of its axis forming the twelve months and four seasons of the solar year and we have what might be called the Cosmic Cross extending outward in time as well as space. We may trace a series of correspondences between the Mundane and the Cosmic Crosses. For instance,the 2 x 12 hours of the day and the 12 months of the year, the four quarters of the day and the four seasons of the year find many close relationships: morning and springtime,noonday and summer,afternoon and autumn, midnight and winter. Poets often have related the ages of man with the quarters of the day and the seasons of the year; youth with morning and spring, maturity with noontime and summer, middle age with afternoon and autumn, old age with midnight and winter. Like many of the older religions, Christianity has not hesitated to fit the critical points of its drama upon this cosmic cross. At the winter solstice, the sun reaches his most southern point. He stands still. Darkness covers the land and grips it in its icy hand. Fear and hopelessness paralysed the primitive mind. The sun is dead, and with his death all life has departed from the earth. After three days (December 25th) he begins his northward journey. He is reborn. Then as he rises again into the heavens,the whole earth begins to respond to his life-giving rays. At the spring equinox he crosses the earth's equator and days and nights are equal; and at the summer solstice he reaches his most northerly point ,hesitates for a moment to begin to retrace his path southward. At the autumnal equinox he gathers in the harvest and prepares again for his death and burial. The religions of all peoples,from the most primitive to our own, have fixed these cardinal points of the solar cross as the times of their most sacred festivals. And should we be surprised to learn that Christianity has chosen the points from which start the vertical and the horizontal lines of the solar cross in setting the dates of its two major festivals- Christmas and Easter It is said that Plato, contemplating this solar cross exclaimed "The world soul is crucified!" THE CROSS AND THE CRUCIFIX When one thinks of the Cross, particularly the Latin Cross, he thinks instinctively of Christianity, so Page 37
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The Theosophical Seal - Canadian Theosophical Association

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