L.—The twelfth letter of the English Alphabet, and also of the Hebrew, where Lamed signifies an Ox-goad, the sign of a form of the god Mars, the generative deity. The letter is an equivalent of number 30. The Hebrew divine name corresponding to L, is Limmud, or Doctus.

 

Labarum (Lat.). The standard borne before the old Roman Emperors, having an eagle upon it as an emblem of sovereignty. It was a long lance with a cross staff at right angles. Constantine replaced the eagle by the christian monogram with the motto en touty nika which was later interpreted into In hoc signo vinces. As to the monogram, it was a combination of the letter X, Chi, and P, Rho, the initial syllable of Christos. But the Labarum had been an emblem of Etruria ages before Constantine and the Christian era. It was the sign also of Osiris and of Horus who is often represented with the long Latin cross, while the Greek pectoral cross is purely Egyptian. In his “Decline and Fall” Gibbon has exposed the Constantine imposture. The emperor, if he ever had a vision at all, must have seen the Olympian Jupiter, in whose faith he died.

 

Labro. A Roman saint, solemnly beatified a few years ago. His great holiness consisted in sitting at one of the gates of Rome night and day for forty years, and remaining unwashed through the whole of that time. He was eaten by vermin to his bones.

 

Labyrinth (Gr.). Egypt had the “celestial labyrinth” whereinto the souls of the departed plunged, and also its type on earth, the famous Labyrinth, a subterranean series of halls and passages with the most extraordinary windings. Herodotus describes it as consisting of 3,000 chambers, half below and half above ground. Even in his day strangers were not allowed into the subterranean portions of it as they contained the sepulchres of the kings who built it and other mysteries. The “Father of History” found the Labyrinth already almost in ruins, yet regarded it even in its state of dilapidation as far more marvellous than the pyramids.

 

Lactantius. A Church Father, who declared the heliocentric system a heretical doctrine, and that of the antipodes as a “fallacy invented by the devil”.

 

Ladakh. The upper valley of the Indus, inhabited by Tibetans, but belonging to the Rajah of Cashmere.

Ladder. There are many “ladders” in the mystic philosophies and schemes, all of which were, and some still are, used in the respective mysteries of various nations. The Brahmanical Ladder symbolises the Seven Worlds or Sapta Loka; the Kabalistical Ladder, the seven lower Sephiroth; Jacob’s Ladder is spoken of in the Bible; the Mithraic Ladder is also the “Mysterious Ladder”. Then there are the Rosicrucian, the Scandinavian, the Borsippa Ladders, etc., etc., and finally the Theological Ladder which, according to Brother Kenneth Mackenzie, consists of the four cardinal and three theological virtues.

 

Lady of the Sycamore. A title of the Egyptian goddess Neїth, who is often represented as appearing in a tree and handing therefrom the fruit of the Tree of Life, as also the Water of Life, to her worshippers.

 

Laena (Lat.). A robe worn by the Roman Augurs with which they covered their heads while sitting in contemplation on the flight of birds.

 

Lahgash (Kab.). Secret speech; esoteric incantation; almost identical with the mystical meaning of Vâch.

 

Lajja (Sk.). “Modesty”; a demi-goddess, daughter of Daksha.

 

Lakh (Sk.). 100,000 of units, either in specie or anything else.

 

Lakshana (Sk.). The thirty-two bodily signs of a Buddha, marks by which he is recognised.

 

Lakshmi (Sk.) “Prosperity”, fortune; the Indian Venus, born of the churning of the ocean by the gods; goddess of beauty and wife of Vishnu.

 

Lalita Vistara (Sk.). A celebrated biography of Sakya Muni, the Lord Buddha, by Dharmarakcha, A.D. 308.

 

Lama (Tib.). Written “Clama”. The title, if correctly applied, belongs only to the priests of superior grades, those who can hold office as gurus in the monasteries. Unfortunately every common member of the gedun (clergy) calls himself or allows himself to be called “Lama”. A real Lama is an ordained and thrice ordained Gelong. Since the reform produced by Tsong-ka-pa, many abuses have again crept into the theocracy of the land. There are “Lama-astrologers”, the Chakhan, or common Tsikhan (from tsigan, “gypsy”), and Lama-soothsayers, even such as are allowed to marry and do not belong to the clergy at all. They are very scarce, however, in Eastern Tibet, belonging principally to Western Tibet and to sects which have nought to do with the Gelukpas (yellow caps). Unfortunately, Orientalists knowing next to nothing of the true state of affairs in Tibet, confuse the Choichong, of the Gurmakhayas Lamasery (Lhassa)—the Initiated Esotericists, with the Charlatans and Dugpas (sorcerers) of the Bhon sects. No wonder if—as Schagintweit says in his Buddhism in Tibet—“though the images of King Choichong (the “god of astrology”) are met with in most monasteries of Western Tibet and the Himalayas, my brothers never saw a Lama Choichong”. This is but natural. Neither the Choichong, nor the Kubilkhan (q.v.) overrun the country. As to the “God” or “King Choichong” he is no more a “god of astrology” than any other “Planetary” Dhyan Chohan.

 

Lamrin (Tib.). A sacred volume of precepts and rules, written by Tson-kha-pa, “for the advancement of knowledge”.

 

Land of the Eternal Sun. Tradition places it beyond the Arctic regions at the North Pole. It is “the land of the gods where the sun never sets”.

 

Lang-Shu (Chin.). The title of the translation of Nagarjuna’s work, the Ekasloka-Shastra.

 

Lanka (Sk.). The ancient name of the island now called Ceylon. It is also the name of a mountain in the South East of Ceylon, where, as tradition says, was a town peopled with demons named Lankapuri. It is described in the epic of the Ramayana as of gigantic extent and magnificence, “with seven broad moats and seven stupendous walls of stone and metal”. Its foundation is attributed to Visva-Karma, who built it for Kuvera, the king of the demons, from whom it was taken by Ravana, the ravisher of Sita. The Bhâgavat Purâna shows Lanka or Ceylon as primarily the summit of Mount Meru, which was broken off by Vayu, god of the wind, and hurled into the ocean. It has since become the seat of the Southern Buddhist Church, the Siamese Sect (headed at present by the High Priest Sumangala), the representation of the purest exoteric Buddhism on this side of the Himalayas.

 

Lanoo (Sk.). A disciple, the same as “chela”.

 

Lao-tze (Chin.). A great sage, saint and philosopher who preceded Confucius.

 

Lapis philosophorum (Lat.). The “Philosopher’s stone”; a mystic term in alchemy, having quite a different meaning from that usually attributed to it.

 

Lararium (Lat.). An apartment in the house of ancient Romans where the Lares or household gods were preserved, with other family relics.

 

Lares (Lat.). These were of three kinds: Lares familiares, the guardians and invisible presidents of the family circle; Lares parvi, small idols used for divinations and augury: and Lares præstites, which were supposed to maintain order among the others. The Lares are the manes or ghosts of disembodied people. Apuleius says that the tumulary in scription, To the gods manes who lived, meant that the Soul had been transformed in a Lemure ; and adds that though “the human Soul is a demon that our languages may name genius”, and “is an immortal god though in a certain sense she is born at the same time as the man in whom she is, yet we may say that she dies in the same way that she is born”. Which means in plainer language that Lares and Lemures are simply the shells cast off by the EGO, the high spiritual and immortal Soul, whose shell, and also its astral reflection, the animal Soul, die, whereas the higher Soul prevails throughout eternity.

 

Larva (Lat.). The animal Soul. Larvæ are the shadows of men that have lived and died.

 

Law of Retribution. (See “Karma”.)

 

Laya or Layam (Sk.). From the root Li “to dissolve, to disintegrate” a point of equilibrium (zero-point) in physics and chemistry. In occultism, that point where substance becomes homogeneous and is unable to act or differentiate.

 

Lebanon (Heb.). A range of mountains in Syria, with a few remnants of the gigantic cedar trees, a forest of which once crowned its summit. Tradition says that it is here, that the timber for King Solomon’s temple was obtained. (See “Druzes”.)

 

Lemuria. A modern term first used by some naturalists, and now adopted by Theosophists, to indicate a continent that, according to the Secret Doctrine of the East, preceded Atlantis. Its Eastern name would not reveal much to European ears.

 

Leon, Moses de. The name of a Jewish Rabbi in the Xlllth century, accused of having composed the Zohar which he gave out as the true work of Simeon Ben Jachaї. His full name is given in Myer’s Qabbalah as Rabbi Moses ben-Shem-Tob de Leon, of Spain, the same author proving very cleverly that de Leon was not the author of the Zohar. Few will say he was, but everyone must suspect Moses de Leon of perverting considerably the original Book of Splendour (Zohar). This sin, however, may be shared by him with the Mediæval “Christian Kabalists” and by Knorr von Rosenroth especially. Surely, neither Rabbi Simeon, condemned to death by Titus, nor his son, Rabbi Eliezer, nor his Secretary Rabbi Abba, can be charged with introducing into the Zohar purely Christian dogmas and doctrines invented by the Church Fathers several centuries after the death of the former Rabbis. This would be stretching alleged divine prophecy a little too far.

 

Lévi, Éliphas. The real name of this learned Kabalist was Abbé Alphonse Louis Constant. Eliphas Lévi Zahed was the author of several works on philosophical magic. Member of the Fratres Lucis (Brothers of Light), he was also once upon a time a priest, an abbé of the Roman Catholic Church, which promptly proceeded to unfrock him, when he acquired fame as a Kabalist. He died some twenty years ago, leaving five famous works —Dogme et Rituel de la Haute Magie (1856); Histoire de la Magie (1860); La Clef des grands Mystères (1861); Legendes et Symboles (1862); and La Science des Esprits (1865) ; besides some other works of minor importance. His style is extremely light and fascinating; but with a rather too strong characteristic of mockery and paradox in it to be the ideal of a serious Kabalist.

 

Leviathan. In biblical esotericism, Deity in its double manifestation of good and evil. The meaning may be found in the Zohar (II. 34b.) “Rabbi Shimeon said: The work of the beginning (of ‘creation’) the companions (candidates) study and understand it; but the little ones (the full or perfect Initiates) are those who understand the allusion to the work of the beginning by the Mystery of the Serpent of the Great Sea (to wit) Thanneen, Leviathan.” (See also Qabbalah, by I. Myer.)

 

Levânah (Heb.). The moon, as a planet and an astrological influence.
 

Lha (Tib.). Spirits of the highest spheres, whence the name of Lhassa, the residence of the Dalaї-Lama. The title of Lha is often given in Tibet to some Narjols (Saints and Yogi adepts) who have attained great occult powers.

 

Lhagpa (Tib.). Mercury, the planet.

 

Lhakang (Tib.). A temple; a crypt, especially a subterranean temple for mystic ceremonies.

 

Lhamayin (Tib.). Elemental sprites of the lower terrestrial plane. Popular fancy makes of them demons and devils.

 

Lif (Scand.). Lif and Lifthresir, the only two human beings who were allowed to be present at the “Renewal of the World”. Being “pure and innocent and free from sinful desires, they are permitted to enter the world where peace now reigns”. The Edda shows them hidden in Hoddmimir’s forest dreaming the dreams of childhood while the last conflict was taking place. These two creatures, and the allegory in which they take part, are allusions to the few nations of the Fourth Root Race, who, surviving the great submersion of their continent and the majority of their Race, passed into the Fifth and continued their ethnical evolution in our present Human Race.

 

Light, Brothers of. This is what the great authority on secret societies, Brother Kenneth R. H. Mackenzie IX., says of this Brotherhood. “A mystic order, Fratres Lucis, established in Florence in 1498. Among the members of this order were Pasqualis, Cagliostro, Swedenborg, St. Martin, Eliphaz Lévi, and many other eminent mystics. Its members were very much persecuted by the Inquisition. It is a small but compact body, the members being spread all over the world.”

Lila (Sk)  Sport, literally; or pastime. In the orthodox Hindu Scriptures it is explained that “the acts of the divinity are lila ”, or sport.

 

Lilith (Heb.). By Jewish tradition a demon who was the first wife of Adam, before Eve was created: she is supposed to have a fatal influence on mothers and newly-born infants. LIL is night, and LILITH is also the owl: and in mediæval works is a synonym of Lamia or female demon. [w.w.w.]

 

Lil-in (Heb.). The children of Lilith, and their descendants. “Lilith is the Mother of the Shedim and the Muquishim (the ensnarers)”. Every class of the Lil-ins, therefore, are devils in the demonology of the Jews. (See Zohar ii. 268a.)

 

Limbus Major (Lat.). A term used by Paracelsus to denote primordial (alchemical) matter; “Adam’s earth”.

 

Linga or Lingam (Sk.). A sign or a symbol of abstract creation. Force becomes the organ of procreation only on this earth. In India there are 12 great Lingams of Siva, some of which are on mountains and rocks, and also in temples. Such is the Kedâresa in the Himalaya, a huge and shapeless mass of rock. In its origin the Lingam had never the gross meaning connected with the phallus, an idea which is altogether of a later date. The symbol in India has the same meaning which it had in Egypt, which is simply that the creative or procreative Force is divine. It also denotes who was the dual Creator—male and female, Siva and his Sakti. The gross and immodest idea connected with the phallus is not Indian but Greek and pre-eminently Jewish. The Biblical Bethels were real priapic stones, the “ Beth-el” (phallus) wherein God dwells. The same symbol was concealed within the ark of the Covenant, the “Holy of Holies”. Therefore the “Lingam” even as a phallus is not “a symbol of Siva” only, but that of every “Creator” or creative god in every nation, including the Israelites and their “God of Abraham and Jacob”.

 

Linga Purâna (Sk.). A scripture of the Saivas or worshippers of Siva. Therein Maheswara, “the great Lord”, concealed in the Agni Linga explains the ethics of life—duty, virtue, self-sacrifice and finally liberation by and through ascetic life at the end of the Agni Kalpa (the Seventh Round). As Professor Wilson justly observed “the Spirit of the worship (phallic) is as little influenced by the character of the type as can well be imagined. There is nothing like the phallic orgies of antiquity; it is all mystical and spiritual.”

 

Linga Sharîra (Sk.). The “body”, i.e., the aerial symbol of the body. This term designates the döppelganger or the “astral body” of man or animal. It is the eidolon of the Greeks, the vital and prototypal body; the reflection of the men of flesh. It is born before and dies or fades out, with the disappearance of the last atom of the body.

 

Lipi (Sk.) To write. See “Lipikas”in Vol. I. of the Secret Doctrine.

 

Lipikas (Sk.). The celestial recorders, the “Scribes”, those who record every word and deed, said or done by man while on this earth. As Occultism teaches, they are the agents of KARMA—the retributive Law.

 

Lobha (Sk.). Covetousness: cupidity, a son sprung from Brahmâ in an evil hour.

 

Lodur (Scand.). The second personage in the trinity of gods in the Eddas of the Norsemen; and the father of the twelve great gods. It is Lodur who endows the first man—made of the ash-tree (Ask), with blood and colour.

 

Logi (Scand.). Lit., “flame”. This giant with his sons and kindred, made themselves finally known as the authors of every cataclysm and conflagration in heaven or on earth, by letting mortals perceive them in the midst of flames. These giant-fiends were all enemies of man trying to destroy his work wherever they found it. A symbol of the cosmic elements.

 

Logia (Gr.). The secret discourses and teachings of Jesus contained in the Evangel of Matthew—in the original Hebrew, not the spurious Greek text we have—and preserved by the Ebionites and the Nazarenes in the library collected by Pamphilus, at Cæsarea. This “Evangel” called by many writers “the genuine Gospel of Matthew”, was used according to (St.) Jerome, by the Nazarenes and Ebionites of Beroea, Syria, in his own day (4th century). Like the Aporrheta or secret discourses, of the Mysteries, these Logia could only be understood with a key. Sent by the Bishops Chromatius and Heliodorus, Jerome, after having obtained permission, translated them, but found it “a difficult task” (truly so!) to reconcile the text of the “genuine” with that of the spurious Greek gospel he was acquainted with.
(See Isis Unveiled II., 180 et seq.)

 

Logos (Gr.). The manifested deity with every nation and people; the outward expression, or the effect of the cause which is ever concealed. Thus, speech is the Logos of thought; hence it is aptly translated by the “Verbum” and “Word” in its metaphysical sense.

 

Lohitanga (Sk.). The planet, Mars.

 

Loka (Sk.). A region or circumscribed place. In metaphysics, a world or sphere or plane. The Purânas in India speak incessantly of seven and fourteen Lokas, above, and below our earth; of heavens and hells.

Loka Chakshub (Sk.). The “Eye of the World”; a title of the Sun, Surya.

 

Loka Pâlas (Sk.). The supporters, rulers and guardians of the world. The deities (planetary gods) which preside over the eight cardinal points, among which are the Tchatur (Four) Maharajahs.

 

Loki (Scand.). The Scandinavian Evil Spirit exoterically. In esoteric philosophy “an opposing power” only because differentiating from primordial harmony. In the Edda, he is the father of the terrible Fenris Wolf, and of the Midgard Snake. By blood he is the brother of Odin, the good and valiant god; but in nature he is his opposite. Loki Odin is simply two in one. As Odin is, in one sense, vital heat, so is Loki the symbol of the passions produced by the intensity of the former.

 

Loreley. The German copy of the Scandinavian “Lake Maiden”. Undine is one of the names given to these maidens, who are known in exoteric Magic and Occultism as the Water-Elementals.

 

Lost Word (Masonic). It ought to stand as “lost words” and lost secrets, in general, for that which is termed the lost “Word” is no word at all, as in the case of the Ineffable Name (q.v.) The Royal Arch Degree in Masonry, has been “in search of it” since it was founded. But the “dead”—-especially those murdered—do not speak; and were even “the Widow’s Son” to come back to life “materialized”, he could hardly reveal that which never existed in the form in which it is now taught. The SHEMHAMPHORASH (the separated name, through the power of which according to his detractors, Jeshu Ben Pandira is said to have wrought his miracles, after stealing it from the Temple)—whether derived from the “self existent substance” of Tetragrammaton, or not, can never be a substitute, for the lost LOGOS of divine magic.

 

Lotus (Gr.). A most occult plant, sacred in Egypt, India and else where; called “the child of the Universe bearing the likeness of its mother in its bosom”. There was a time “when the world was a golden lotus” (padma) says the allegory. A great variety of these plants, from the majestic Indian lotus, down to the marsh-lotus (bird’s foot trefoil) and the Grecian “Dioscoridis”, is eaten at Crete and other islands. It is a species of nymphala, first introduced from India to Egypt to which it was-not indigenous. See the text of Archaic Symbolism in the Appendix Viii. “The Lotus, as a Universal Symbol”.

 

Lotus, Lord of the. A title applied to the various creative gods, as also to the Lords of the Universe of which this plant is the symbol. (“See Lotus”.)

 

Love Feasts, Agapae (Gr.). These banquets of charity held by the earliest Christians were founded at Rome by Clemens, in the reign of Domitian. Professor A. Kestner’s The Agapæ or the Secret World Society (Wiltbund) of the Primitive Christians” (published 1819 at Jena) speaks of these Love Feasts as “having a hierarchical constitution, and a groundwork of Masonic symbolism and Mysteries” ; and shows a direct connection between the old Agapæ and the Table Lodges or Banquets of the Freemasons. Having, however, exiled from their suppers the “holy kiss” and women, the banquets of the latter are rather “drinking” than “love” feasts. The early Agapæ were certainly the same as the Phallica, which “were once as pure as the Love Feasts of early Christians” as Mr. Bonwick very justly remarks, “though like them rapidly degenerating into licentiousness”. (Eg. Bel. and Mod. Thought, p. 260.)

 

Lower Face or Lower Countenance (Kab.). A term applied to Microprosopus, as that of ”Higher Face” is to Macroprosopus. The two are identical with Long Face and Short Face.

 

Lubara (Chald.). The god of Pestilence and. Disease.

 

Lucifer (Lat.). The planet Venus, as the bright “Morning Star”. Before Milton, Lucifer had never been a name of the Devil. Quite the reverse, since the Christian Saviour is made to say of himself in Revelations (xvi. 22.) “I am . . . the bright morning star” or Lucifer. One of the early Popes of Rome bore that name; and there was even a Christian sect in the fourth century which was called the Luciferians.

 

Lully, Raymond. An alchemist, adept and philosopher, born in the 13th century, on the island of Majorca. It is claimed for him that, in a moment of need, he made for King Edward III. of England several millions of gold “rose nobles”, and thus helped him to carry on war victoriously. He founded several colleges for the study of Oriental languages, and Cardinal Ximenes was one of his patrons and held him in great esteem, as also Pope John XXI. He died in 1314, at a good old age. Literature has preserved many wild stories about Raymond Lully, which would form a most extraordinary romance. He was the elder son of the Seneshal of Majorca and inherited great wealth from his father.

 

Lunar Gods. Called in India the Fathers, “Pitris” or the lunar ancestors. They are subdivided, like the rest, into seven classes or Hierarchies, In Egypt although the moon received less worship than in Chaldea or India, still Isis stands as the representative of Luna-Lunus, “the celestial Hermaphrodite”. Strange enough while the modern connect the moon only with lunacy and generation, the ancient nations, who knew better, have, individually and collectively, connected their “wisdom gods” with it. Thus in Egypt the lunar gods are Thoth-Hermes and Chons; in India it is Budha, the Son of Soma, the moon; in Chaldea Nebo is the lunar god of Secret Wisdom, etc., etc. The wife of Thoth, Sifix, the lunar goddess, holds a pole with five rays or the five-pointed star, symbol of man, the Microcosm, in distinction from the Septenary Macrocosm. As in all theogonies a goddess precedes a god, on the principle most likely that the chick can hardly precede its egg, in Chaldea the moon was held as older and more venerable than the Sun, because, as they said, darkness precedes light at every periodical rebirth (or “creation”) of the universe. Osiris although connected with the Sun and a Solar god is, nevertheless, born on Mount Sinai, because Sin is the Chaldeo-Assyrian word for the moon; so was Dio-Nysos, god of Nyssi or Nisi, which latter appelation was that of Sinai in Egypt, where it was called Mount Nissa. The crescent is not—as proven by many writers—an ensign of the Turks, but was adopted by Christians for their symbol before the Mahommedans. For ages the crescent was the emblem of the Chaldean Astarte, the Egyptian Isis, and the Greek Diana, all of them Queens of Heaven, and finally became the emblem of Mary the Virgin. “The Greek Christian Empire of Constantinople held it as their palladium. Upon the conquest by the Turks, the Sultan adopted it . . . and since that, the crescent has been made to oppose the idea of the cross”. (Eg. Belief.)

 

Lupercalia (Lat.). Magnificent popular festivals celebrated in ancient Rome on February 15th in honour of the God Pan, during which the Luperci, the most ancient and respectable among the sacerdotal functionaries, sacrificed two goats and a dog, and two of the most illustrious youths were compelled to run about the city naked (except the loins) whipping all those whom they met. Pope Gelasius abolished the Lupercalia in 496, but substituted for them on the same day the procession of lighted candles.

 

Luxor (0cc.). A compound word from lux (light) and aur (fire), thus meaning the “Light of (divine) Fire.”

 

Luxor, Brotherhood of. A certain Brotherhood of mystics. Its name had far better never have been divulged, as it led a great number of well-meaning people into being deceived, and relieved of their money by a certain bogus Mystic Society speculators, born in Europe, only to be exposed and fly to America. The name is derived from the ancient Lookshur in Beloochistan, lying between Bela and Kedjee. The order is very ancient and the most secret of all. It is useless to repeat that its members disclaim all connection with the “H.B. of L.”, and the tutti quanti of commercial mystics, whether from Glasgow or Boston.

 

Lycanthropy (Gr.). Physiologically, a disease or mania, during which a person imagines he is a wolf, and acts as such. Occultly, itmeans the same as “were-wolf”, the psychological faculty of certain sorcerers to appear as wolves. Voltaire states that in the district of Jura, in two years between 1598 and 1600, over 600 lycanthropes were put to death by a too Christian judge. This does not mean that Shepherds accused of sorcery, and seen as wolves, had indeed the power of changing themselves physically into such; but simply that they had the hypnotizing power of making people (or those they regarded as enemies), believe they saw a wolf when there was none in fact. The exercise of such power is truly sorcery. “Demoniacal” possession is true at bottom, minus the devils of Christian theology. But this is no place for a long disquisition upon occult mysteries and magic powers.