Causal Body

General description

In Mme. Blavatsky's teachings the Causal Body is defined as higher Manas illuminated by Buddhi, forming the Ego that passes from one incarnation to another:

It is the Buddhi-Manas which is called the Causal body, (the United 5th and 6th Principles) and which is Consciousness, that connects it with every personality it inhabits on earth.

Speaking of Manas, the "causal body," we may call it -- when connecting it with the Buddhic radiance -- the "HIGHER EGO".

Speaking of the different kinds of "doubles" or subtle bodies she wrote:

The third is the true Ego, called in the East, by a name meaning “causal body” but which in the trans-Himalayan schools is always called the “Karmic body,” which is the same. For Karma or action is the cause which produces incessant rebirths or “reincarnations.” It is not the Monad, nor is it Manas proper; but is, in a way, indissolubly connected with, and a compound of the Monad and Manas in Devachan.

After death, the mental elements of the personality fitted to enter in Devachan are absorbed in the causal body:

The “thought power” or aspect of the Mayavi or “Illusion body,” merges after death entirely into the causal body or the conscious thinking EGO. The animal elements, or power of desire of the “Dream body,” absorbing after death that which it has collected (through its insatiable desire to live) during life; i.e., all the astral vitality as well as all the impressions of its material acts and thoughts while it lived in possession of the body, forms the “Spook” or Kama rupa.

Additional resources

Articles

• Kāraṇa-Śarīra in Theosophy World.
• Causal Body at Theosophy World.
• Reincarnating Ego in Theosophy World.
• Buddhi-Manas in Theosophy World.

Books

• The Causal Body - Part 1 and Part 2 by A. E.Powell