I have read some Atlantis books last year and the most interesting things are the ones from mystics, people who claim supernormal powers and thus can see the past and describe them.
A few things I found fascinating is the match up with Buddhism.
First root race is basically god-like, match Buddhism’s devas devolve into humans, and in many stages to get to the 5th root race now.
The mystics claimed that the earlier root race has more subtle bodies, so their bodies are not going to be capable of being fossilized, they all would decay too fast. Which explains why archeology underestimated the total time of humans on earth. To be fair, being of less gross body can be counted as not our human race. It matches the getting grosser part on the devolution of devas to humans.
From the wiki above: the second root race called themselves the Kimpurshas. Sounds like kimpurisa.
Manu is mentioned as ancestor of the 5th root race (us), which is in the Pāḷi words. manussa, manuja, manujinda.
But be warned, researching this doesn’t lead to enlightenment, but maybe it can generate some faith in the mythology of Buddhism, but based on mythology itself.
I was aware of this (root races, Blavatsky’s Theosophy), though I admit I found it to be coincidental correlative quackery. I admit my knowledge of Buddhist cosmology/realms etc. is severely lacking as it seemed less than helpful for a human on the path to cessation of suffering.
I always assumed the realm knowledge was to invoke faith in the laws of karma (good rebirth) and to assimilate many disparate beliefs in outside higher beings that were subscribed to back in the days of the Buddha.
Basically I didn’t think the EBT concerned themselves much with origin myths. Devas devolving into humans is a thing, but the idea that they were the progenitors? So every sentient being was at one time a deva in one of the deva realms‽
I’m rather conflicted when it comes to Blavatsky, she did some large amount of good in Sri Lanka and aided the west’s awareness of some patterns of Eastern thought… but her attempts at a syncretization of metaphysical philosophical thought never seemed to stand up to academic scrutiny. She tended to cherry pick modes of thought and belief systems, cannibalizing as she saw fit to form a bastardized belief that she could hold onto as being the supreme entity with occult knowledge. She was known to come out very strongly for something and then a year later found to be backpedalling and saying the opposite thing. Blaming the inherently secret knowledge and difficulty understanding…
Now we have access to the same resources she claims to have used and see the half truths she promulgated.
It is an interesting thought experiment, I suppose. Are there suttā supporting the idea that at one time there only existed devas and they subsequently fell to unfortunate rebirth, this beginning the origins of man.
As far as the coincidence of terms, the theory of Pan-Indo-European language assimilation is already held pretty strongly amongst linguists as being probable. Remember history has only existed for us as a matter of written words so about 2,500 years. Prehistory such as Fertile Crescent, Ur, Nile River Delta are from 10,000 BC so 12,000 years ago. Cultural interchange and exchange could have been happening on some level that long ago.
It’s just the first beings who reborn back into this universe are devas, it’s certainly possible for beings from brahma realm when they die from there to be reborn as humans now.
According to commentaries, sometimes the destruction of the universe goes to 3rd brahma realm. So likely then people from 3rd brahma realm would die and repopulate this world.
I understand. My point was indirect, but due to this very beginningless-ness there is no root race. If you want to point at the rebirth of a universe as a conventional beginning, I guess it makes sense, but seeing as how it was a conditioned event preceded by other beings…
I too have often been entertained by harmless supposition of coincidence. Personally, it has not much bearing at my point on the noble path, but it certainly is interesting how “great minds think alike.” To imagine at the same time as Lord Buddha there existed the birth of higher philosophical thought in Greece, the democratization of liberation afforded by the Jain path, an explosion of scientific thought in the civilized cities of the times. As today, there was a huge mass of suffering, but beings were awaking to the causes and their ability to put an end to it. No longer were we victims of the gods and happenstance but we recognized all compounded things as going forth with the mind and how a mind of ignorance is incapable of seeing the true nature of existence.
I thank the existence of Mme. Blavatsky for her having brought pieces of the Dhamma to Western attention (as a Westerner) but can’t help but feel sorrow with how it was misused for very worldly reasons. She is the recipient of her own kamma however, so I suppose I should leave it alone.
The human condition of lamenting our suffering yet being thankful for the lessons! How wonderful it is to have been born human and not a deity in a divine realm with eons of sensory delight! Every ache and pain a lesson, every loss a teacher.
