Can Yoga and Alchemy Meet?

Expressions can, of course, be combinations of any two or more. How then does one, with this fundamental knowledge, begin? The answer is by considering the eight Yogi Steps. These are:

1. Yama Non-killing; non-coveteousness; truthfulness.

2. Niyama Cleanliness; Contentment; Regular Observations; Austerity; Self-surrender to God. These are the basic moral techniques without which no practice of Yoga will succeed.

3. Asana Posture. A series of exercises mental and physical. Through this much activity goes on in the body. Nerve currents have to be given a new channel. The whole constitution will be remodelled and the main activity will lie along the spinal column.

4. Pranayama Control of breathing. This includes amongst other things, nostril breathing.

5. Pratyahara Restriction of the senses. Checking the outgoing powers of the mind and freeing it from the thraldom of the senses.

6. Daharna Concentration of motion. A fluid state of heightened attentiveness that is highly focussed.

7. Meditation This leads from the former.

8. Super-Conscious Awareness.

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“As one proceeds, the purification of the seven centres, known as the chakras, or spinning vortices of energy, begins until all seven are sublimated in the highest.

“When the serpent power, Kundalini, now coiled up in the base of the spine is awakened, the whole nature will begin to change and the book of knowledge will open. Each chakra is said to have its own particular colour, musical note and geometrical form.

“By the activity of the mind this power, when properly guided and directed towards the internal world, will analyse and illumine facts for us. This is accomplished by the agencies of Surya — Sun and Rayi — Moon.” This is a subject on it’s own and does not come within the range of this article.

“The man who has discovered and learnt how to manipulate the internal forces will get the whole of nature under his control. But he has to start, as was said earlier, with his own nature.

“The Yogi then proposes to himself no less a task than to master the Whole Universe, to control the whole of Nature, internal and external.”

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Now let us turn to Alchemy. I will not take time in discussing the people who have, over the centuries, tried their hands at the transmutation of base metals into gold. A number were certainly genuine experimenters into the metals of their time, and as such were probably the fore-runners of chemistry. To my mind some undoubtedly discovered the Philosopher’s Stone and were able to effect the miracles of truns mutation. Others were charlatans seeking to extract large sums of money from those motivated by greed. We will leave them. As with Yoga, I intend to spend time on the highest aspects of Alchemy … or Spiritual Alchemy, the quest for the Philosopher’s Stone and the discovery of the Universal Medicine. We can then see if there is any basis on which one can consider the title of this chapter to be a possibility.

One must understand that all old alchemical writings are in a special cryptic language. To decipher their meanings one has to learn the language in the same way that one has to learn Sanscrit or Chemical formulae if one wants to understand Yoga and chemistry.

But at the outset it might be useful to examine the quotation from Webster’s Dictionary to give us a start. It is this:

“The mediaeval chemical science, whose great objects were the transmutation of the baser metals into gold; the discovery of the universal cure for disease and the means of indefinitely prolonging life.” But this is not all the story and it is misleading because it makes it appear that various operations of alchemy are directed primarily to those objectives; whereas, the truth is that the Great Work has to do with man himself. Alchemy has been described as ‘A state of consciousness which is reflected into the physical plane as perfect vibratory equilibrium’. But it ] is not exclusively concerned with consciousness. The performance of the Great Work is more than a state of mind and enables him who has succeeded in unfoldment to exercise all the powers that go with it. Eliphas Levi describes the Great Work as follows:

“The Magnum Opus (Great Work) is pre-eminently the operation of man by himself, that is, the full and complete conquest which he can make of his faculties and his future; it is pre-eminently the perfect emancipation of his will.

“This self-command enables him to transform his ‘corruptible’ physical body into a body of ‘incorruptible’. So we see that alchemy is also primarily an interior operation.

“Yet it is by no means wholly metaphysical. Actual physical materials are worked upon, and the operation has for its object the making of a mineral product, which may truly be called a stone. This stone is a product of Art (Mind) though the materials composing it are drawn from nature. Therefore The Great Work may be described correctly as being a Psycho-physiological transformation, directed by human self-consciousness.”

What then are the tenets of Alchemy?

1. The doctrine that “all manifestation is of one substance”

Sulphur– Fiery and passionate.

Mercury– Vital and reflective.

Salt– Arrestive.

2. They recognise five phases of manifestation or five classes of expression of The One Thing. These are:

“Quintessence and the four elements, fire, water, air, earth.”

“But before practical work or experiment can begin in alchemy the student must practice discipline, both mental, emotional and physical and have an understanding of the aims to which he proposes to direct his energies. These are given in the twelve stages laid out in The Great Work. They have strange names but are:

1. ‘Calcination’ – Process which drives from our consciousness the changeable elements of emotion, personal bias, erroneous opinion etc.

2. ‘Congelation’ – This is to work out new patterns for the expression of the ‘Life Force’.

3. ‘Fixation’ – Harmonic balance in the operation of the three principles mentioned earlier.

4. ‘Separation’ – Formulation of the objective towards which the special work of the alchemist is directed.

5. ‘Digestion’ – Transformation of the destructive forces which throws form into perfect comprehension of Reality.

6. ‘Distillation’ – Food, water, air, light. These elements outside our bodies are lifeless. By assimilation or distillation they become living substances.

7. ‘Sublimation’ Diversion of undesirable trends by education, and conscious effort.

8. ‘Purification’ Decomposition and disintegrat ion of former structures of false opinions.

9. ‘Incineration’ A step further where something has to be brought to bear which the alchemist cannot do for himself. A Higher Power is invoked. The Great Work is only achieved by the Grace of God.

10. ‘Fermentation’ – When the leven of a super-consciousness has been received through the suspension of personal identification with events and actions, the leven begins to operate subconsciously.

11. ‘Dissolution’ – Process of meditation which be gins by concentration on some particular object.

12. ‘Multiplication’ – Is the tingeing of the whole body with Super-Conscious awareness.

“In alchemy one hears much about the seven metals; gold, silver, copper, mercury, iron, tin and lead. Each has its own appropriate colour and is related to plexuses and glands in the body. They are the same as the seven chakras of Yoga.

“In the transformation of the Alchemist these metals are so modified that the lower rates of vibration are transmuted and sublimated … or lifted up. This transformation of the subtle Scorpio force which works through the interior stars has a triple consequence.

1. It leads to spiritual illumination.

2. It gives the perfected Adept a new body which is absolutely healthy.

3. It enables him to exercise powers which remain latent in most human beings.

“In meditation the subtle changes in consciousness are effected whereby the scorpio force is raised from its natural centre in the body to become an active power awakening other centres in the brain.” By what agencies is this accomplished? In Alchemical terminology … “Sol is its Father, Luna its Mother”. It is clear from this that there are many similarities in the two methods of spiritual unfoldment … the philosophy of Yoga of the East and Alchemy of the West. I will now, to make this clearer, show in diagrammatic form a comparison of the two systems.

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