THE CRYSTALLINE BODY OF LOGOS
The landscape of the self, which is revealed by the diamond thunderbolt, rather than being a featureless continuum, is a quantized continuum, which contains its own ideal structure and dynamics.
More specifically, it contains an ideal crystalline structure—literally, a structure of consciousness, a structure of pure knowledge.This structure is ideal in the sense that it represents the most symmetrical pattern of periodic geometry that can be conceived intuitively in three dimensions, while allowing for these three dimensions to be complementary of each other. This follows from the notion that it is conceived by pure intelligence, which is the source of all order, symmetry, and coherence in nature. It is also conceived on the basis of pure subjectivity, which allows for complementary points of view on any subject.
The crystalline geometry of the Logos may be transparent and transcendental, but it can nevertheless be modeled and visualized by the ordinary mind. It corresponds to a unique crystalline lattice known in modern crystallography as the sodium-chloride lattice: the internal crystalline geometry of ordinary table salt. Yet the crystalline geometry of the Logos does not represent a physical lattice composed of material particles. Instead, it represents an infinite, metaphysical lattice composed of immovable point values of consciousness.
Because the lattice consists of two complementary sets of point values organized into face-centered cubic sublattices, it may be called the transcendental superlattice, whose unit cell is illustrated here.
The cubic cell represents a single cell in the infinite crystalline body of Logos, which the Vedic seers described as the imperishable diamond body (vajra-deha). This transparent, crystalline geometry represents the structure of pure knowledge that is cognized after all mental activity has been transcended and the knower, process of knowing, and known have merged on the level of pure consciousness.
The Vedic texts state: “When mental activity disappears, then knower, knowing, and known become absorbed one into another, [and take the form of] a transparent crystal, which assumes the appearance of that upon which it rests.”6
Fig. 2.1. This shows the unit cell of the transcendental superlattice, with the point values enlarged and their geometric relations indicated by lines. In actuality, the point values are infinitesimal and the entire lattice geometry is transparent.
That upon which the crystalline geometry of consciousness rests is none other than the underlying continuum of pure consciousness. Because both are transparent, the discrete crystalline geometry assumes the appearance of the continuum. In other words, it assumes the appearance of the self. The Vedic seers referred to this ideal form of pure geometry as the self-referral form (svarupa) of the self.
The Greek philosophers sought to study the ideal geometry of the self on the basis of pure intuition and reason. For this reason, two aphorisms were supposedly inscribed above the entrance to Plato’s academy: “Know thy self ” and “Let no one ignorant of geometry enter here.” These two go hand in hand: By knowing the self, we automatically come to know the geometry of the self—that is, we automatically come to know the crystalline body of Logos.
Like an organic body, the crystalline body of Logos has a cellular structure, but in this case the cells are ideal and nonorganic—they have the form of perfect cubes within which sits an immortal point value of consciousness, the knower of the cell. In Sanskrit, the word for a cube is aksha, and the word for imperishable is akshara, which is derived from aksha + ra, meaning “that which illuminates the cube.” The imperishable soul that sits at the center of the cube represents the illuminator of the cube.
When the veil of ignorance is removed and the soul takes its seat in the imperishable point value of consciousness, the soul becomes the illuminator of its own crystallographic cell, which is part of the infinite crystalline body of Logos. Although the crystalline body of Logos is immovable, it is pervaded by the movable substance of pure consciousness, which constitutes the immortal lifeblood (amrita rasa) of the self. It is also pervaded by the transcendental light and sound of consciousness, which exist in the form of spherical waves centered on every point value.
Whether this immortal reality was called the Logos, Veda, Duat, or Etz Chaim (Tree of Life) is immaterial. It was, is, and always will be the true abode of the enlightened soul. When the soul spirals onto the immortal point and the veil of ignorance is removed, it falls effectively through a “rabbit hole” and enters into a whole new world—the imperishable world of Logos. We want to see just how far the rabbit hole goes.