- The outgoing
forces from a center play upon the etheric counterpart of the entire intricate network of
nerves which constitute the nervous system. These counterparts of identical subjective
correspondences are called in the Hindu philosophy, the "nadis"; they constitute
an intricate and most extensive network of fluid energies which are an intangible,
interior, paralleling system to that of the bodily nerves, which latter system is in fact
an externalization of the inner pattern of energies. There is as yet no word in the
English language or in any European tongue for the ancient word "nadi," because
the existence of this subjective system is not yet recognized, and only the materialistic
concept of the nerves as a system built up in response to a [196] tangible
environment yet holds sway in the West. The idea of these nerves being the dense physical
result of an inner sensitive response apparatus is still undefined and unrecognized by
modern Western science. When recognition is accorded to this subtle substance (composed of
threads of energy) underlying the more tangible nerves, we shall have moved forward in our
approach to the entire problem of health and disease, and the world of causes will be that
much nearer. This network of nadis forms a definite life pattern which varies according
to the personality ray.
- The nadis,
therefore, determine the nature and the quality of the nervous system with its extensive
network of nerves and plexi covering the entire physical body. The nadis, and consequently
the network of nerves, are related primarily to two aspects of man's physical equipment -
the seven major centers in the etheric body (the substantial body which underlies the
dense physical body), and the spinal column with the head. It must always be remembered
that the etheric body is a physical body, though composed of subtler material than the one
we can see and touch. It is made of substance or of that which "substands," or
underlies, every part and particle of the dense physical vehicle. This is a point which
will later receive attention from healers and from enlightened medical men in the New Age.
When this relationship existing between the nadis and the nerves, and their joint
relationship to the centers and spinal column is recognized, we shall see a great
revolution in medical and psychiatric methods. Experience will tend to show that the more
closely the interplay between these two - the nadis and the nerves - can be brought about,
the more rapidly will the control of disease also be implemented. [197]
- The nadis in
the physical body correspond to the life or spirit aspect; the nerves are the
correspondence to the soul or quality aspect. That which demonstrates as their united
externalization is the endocrine system which corresponds to the form or matter aspect.
These three - the nadis, the nervous system and the glands - are the material
correspondences to the three divine aspects; they are esoterically responsive to these
three aspects and they make the man upon the physical plane what he is. These three groups
are themselves conditioned (via the seven centers, as we have earlier seen) by the astral
or mental vehicles, or by the integrated personality, or by the soul which begins to use
the personality as a transmitting and transmuting agency, and - at the close of the Path
of Discipleship - by the monad, via the antahkarana, using that self-created path as a
direct channel of communication to the seven centers and from there to the threefold
system of nadis, nerves and glands.
- These three
major systems within the human being express through the medium of the physical body the
condition or the state of development of the centers. The life, the quality and the energy
which they represent are conveyed to every part of the physical vehicle via the blood
stream. This, modern science is already recognizing as a fact, indicating that the blood
stream conveys certain elements released by the glands. It does not yet recognize the fact
of the relationship of the glands to the centers, with the intermediate systems of nadis,
and nerves. The next great move in medicine will be to recognize the fact of the etheric
body, the physical substance which underlies dense matter.
- When the
centers are awakened throughout the body, there will then be present a highly electric
nervous system, responsive with immediacy to the energy carried by [198] the nadis; the
result of this will be a well-balanced endocrine system. The vitality and life pouring
through the entire body will then be of such potency that automatically the physical body
will be resistant to disease, either innate, hereditary, or of group origin. In these
words I express for you a future probability but not an immediate possibility. Man will
some day have the three systems perfectly coordinated, psychically responsive to the inner
pattern of nadis and centers, and consciously integrated with the soul, and later - via
the antahkarana - with the Life principle.
- Today as
there is uneven development, with some centers unawakened, others over-stimulated, and with
the centers below the diaphragm over-active, you have consequently, whole areas of the body
where the nadis are in an embryonic state, other areas where they are highly energized but
with their flow arrested because some center along the path of their activity is still
unawakened or - if awakened - is still non-radiatory. These uneven conditions produce
potent effects upon the nervous system and upon the glands, leading to over-stimulation in
some cases, subnormal conditions in others, lack of vitality, over-activity, and other
undesirable reactions which inevitably produce disease. Such diseases either arise from
within the body itself as the result of inherent (or should I say indigenous) or
hereditary tendencies or predispositions, present in the bodily tissue; or they arise as
the result of the radiation or the non-radiation of the centers, which work through the
nadis; they can also arise as a result of external impacts or contact (such as infectious
or contagious diseases and epidemics). These, the subject is unable to resist, owing to
the lack of development of his centers.
- To sum all
up: Disease, physical disability of any kind (except of course those due to accidents and,
to some [199] extent, to planetary conditions inducing epidemics of a peculiarly virulent
nature such as war oft produces), and the many differing aspects of ill health can be
directly traced to the condition of the centers, as they determine the activity or the
non-activity of the nadis; these, in their turn, affect the nervous system, making the
endocrine system what it is in the individual man, and the blood stream is responsible for
this condition reaching every part of the body.
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