A second look at the planes

In an older post I presented my thoughts on organizing the planes. Since then I did a deeper dive into the French version by partly translating the third edition to learn more. Using what I’ve learned, along with some old articles by Ramos-Tavener, I’ve got some revisions for my cosmology.

The earthly plane consists of both material and spiritual sides that exist in concert. Raw Ka gives rise to matter, and all matter contains residual Ka. Ka is the essence of energy, life and the soul.

Additionally, there is a second wholly spiritual level of reality: the astral. The astral planes are wholly spiritual in nature, composed entirely of Ka, without matter or even space. The astral planes are are divided into the upper planes and the lower planes. 

The upper planes, or Akashas, are composed of elemental Ka contained by sheaths of Solar-Ka. These are shaped by the hopes and dreams of humans, inhabited by myths and legends come to life. Agarthans reside here, elemental summoners call their summons from here, and some powerful sorcerers and alchemists even create their own elemental realms here. Generally speaking, those other than Agarthans or bodiless spirits can only visit these planes via astral projection.

The lower planes, or Antichthons, are composed of elemental Ka contained by sheaths of Black Lunar-Ka. Some are contaminated by Saturnian-Ka. These are shaped by the fears and nightmares of humans, inhabited by demons and dragons. Khaibans, Black Summoners, and Anamorphs all call their demons from here and build their dark realms here. Some of these planes are at least partly material in nature and may be visited physically via Gates, although doing so is quite dangerous.

The astral planes are organized into multiple strata based on their spiritual distance between the earthly plane and either of the astral poles: Agartha at the peak of the Akashas, Abaddon at the nadir of the Antichthons.

This explanation is heavily simplified and I haven’t gone into detail on the planar geography, but I think it’s sufficient for now. However, if I did need to go into more detail on the planes, then I'd probably use Atomik Psioniks as a resource. The pages 35–40 go into details on astral projection, including overviews of both the upper and lower planes collated in esotericism. Without going into further detail, it lists the upper planes in order of (from lowest to highest) Physical (it is possible to have out-of-body experiences at this level analogous to astral projection), Astral, (in between here are Akashic Records), Mental, Buddhic, Atmic, Anupadaka and Adi, while the lower planes are listed in order of (from highest to lowest) Shadow (negative physical), Abyssal (negative astral and mental), Hell (negative Buddhic, Atmic and Anupadaka) and Oblivion (negative Adi). The lower planes directly parallel, or "negatively shadow", the upper planes. As such, fumbling astral projection can result in the projector entering the lower planes instead!

Hope you enjoyed!

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