Logos

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Logos (λόγος) is a Greek word that means "word," "speech," "reason." It became a technical term in philosophy beginning with Heraclitus (ca. 535–475 BC), who used the term for a principle of order and knowledge.[1]

H. P. Blavatsky talks about three Logoi: "the unmanifested 'Father,' the semi-manifested 'Mother' and the Universe, which is the third Logos of our philosophy or Brahmâ."[2] These three Logoi can be seen as "the personified symbols of the three spiritual stages of Evolution."[3] Yet all the three Logoi are one.[4]

There is no differentiation with the First Logos; differentiation only begins in latent World-Thought, with the Second Logos, and receives its full expression, i. e., becomes the "Word" made flesh--with the Third.[5]


First Logos

When the first Logos radiates through primordial and undifferentiated matter there is as yet no action in Chaos. “The last vibration of the Seventh Eternity” is the first which announces the Dawn, and is a synonym for the First or unmanifested Logos. There is no Time at this stage. There is neither Space nor Time when beginning is made; but it is all in Space and Time, once that differentiation sets in.[6]


Second Logos

The Second Logos partaking of both the essences or natures of the first and the last.[7]

Third Logos

Notes

  1. Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy (2nd ed): Heraclitus, 1999.
  2. Helena Petrovna Blavatsky, Collected Writings vol. X (Wheaton, Ill: Theosophical Publishing House, ???), 332.
  3. Helena Petrovna Blavatsky, Collected Writings vol. X (Wheaton, Ill: Theosophical Publishing House, ???), 334
  4. Helena Petrovna Blavatsky, Collected Writings vol. XI (Wheaton, Ill: Theosophical Publishing House, ???), 487.
  5. Helena Petrovna Blavatsky, Collected Writings vol. X (Wheaton, IL: Theosophical Publishing House, ???), 359.
  6. Helena Petrovna Blavatsky, Collected Writings vol. X (Wheaton, IL: Theosophical Publishing House, ???), 358.
  7. Helena Petrovna Blavatsky, Collected Writings vol. X (Wheaton, IL: Theosophical Publishing House, ???), 359.

Further reading