Saturday, 9 April 2016

The Secret Doctrine

When I lived in Windsor there used to be a set of The Secret Doctrine. It is ofcourse a great all-time classic...  RS
 
 
 
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For the Morgana Lefay album, see The Secret Doctrine (album).
The Secret Doctrine, the Synthesis of Science, Religion and philosophy
TheSecretDoctrine.jpg
First edition
AuthorHelena Blavatsky
Published1888
Part of a series on
Theosophy
Katie Walking Labyrinth 2.jpg
Theosophy
The Secret Doctrine, the Synthesis of Science, Religion and Philosophy, a book originally published as two volumes in 1888, is Helena Blavatsky's magnum opus. The first volume is named Cosmogenesis, the second Anthropogenesis. It was an influential example of the revival of interest in esoteric and occult ideas in the modern age, in particular because of its claim to reconcile ancient eastern wisdom with modern science.
Blavatsky claimed that its contents had been revealed to her by 'mahatmas' who had retained knowledge of humanity's spiritual history, knowledge that it was now possible, in part, to reveal.[not verified in body]


Volume one (Cosmogenesis)[edit]

The first part of the book explains the origin and evolution of the universe itself, in terms derived from the Hindu concept of cyclical development. The world and everything in it is said to alternate between periods of activity (manvantaras) and periods of passivity (pralayas). Each manvantara lasts many millions of years and consists of a number of Yugas, in accordance with Hindu cosmology.
Blavatsky attempted to demonstrate that the discoveries of "materialist" science had been anticipated in the writings of ancient sages and that materialism would be proven wrong.

Cosmic evolution: Items of cosmogony[edit]

In this recapitulation of The Secret Doctrine, Blavatsky gave a summary of the central points of her system of cosmogony.[1] These central points are as follows:
  1. The first item reiterates Blavatsky's position that The Secret Doctrine represents the "accumulated Wisdom of the Ages", a system of thought that "is the uninterrupted record covering thousands of generations of Seers whose respective experiences were made to test and to verify the traditions passed orally by one early race to another, of the teachings of higher and exalted beings, who watched over the childhood of Humanity."
  2. The second item reiterates the first fundamental proposition (see above), calling the one principle "the fundamental law in that system [of cosmogony]". Here Blavatsky says of this principle that it is "the One homogeneous divine Substance-Principle, the one radical cause. … It is called "Substance-Principle," for it becomes "substance" on the plane of the manifested Universe, an illusion, while it remains a "principle" in the beginningless and endless abstract, visible and invisible Space. It is the omnipresent Reality: impersonal, because it contains all and everything. Its impersonality is the fundamental conception of the System. It is latent in every atom in the Universe, and is the Universe itself."
  3. The third item reiterates the second fundamental proposition (see above), impressing once again that "The Universe is the periodical manifestation of this unknown Absolute Essence.", while also touching upon the complex Sanskrit ideas of Parabrahmam and Mulaprakriti. This item presents the idea that the One unconditioned and absolute principle is covered over by its veil, Mulaprakriti, that the spiritual essence is forever covered by the material essence.
  4. The fourth item is the common eastern idea of Maya. Blavatsky states that the entire universe is called illusion because everything in it is temporary, i.e. has a beginning and an end, and is therefore unreal in comparison to the eternal changelessness of the One Principle.
  5. The fifth item reiterates the third fundamental proposition (see above), stating that everything in the universe is conscious, in its own way and on its own plane of perception. Because of this, the Occult Philosophy states that there are no unconscious or blind laws of Nature, that all is governed by consciousness and consciousnesses.
  6. The sixth item gives a core idea of theosophical philosophy, that "as above, so below". This is known as the "law of correspondences", its basic premise being that everything in the universe is worked and manifested from within outwards, or from the higher to the lower, and that thus the lower, the microcosm, is the copy of the higher, the macrocosm. Just as a human being experiences every action as preceded by an internal impulse of thought, emotion or will, so too the manifested universe is preceded by impulses from divine thought, feeling and will. This item gives rise to the notion of an "almost endless series of hierarchies of sentient beings", which itself becomes a central idea of many theosophists. The law of correspondences also becomes central to the methodology of many theosophists, as they look for analogous correspondence between various aspects of reality, for instance: the correspondence between the seasons of Earth and the process of a single human life, through birth, growth, adulthood and then decline and death.

Volume two (Anthropogenesis)[edit]

The second half of the book describes the origins of humanity through an account of "Root Races" said to date back millions of years. The first root race was, according to her, "ethereal"; the second root had more physical bodies and lived in Hyperborea. The third root race, the first to be truly human, is said to have existed on the lost continent of Lemuria and the fourth root race is said to have developed in Atlantis.
According to Blavatsky, the fifth root race is approximately one million years old, overlapping the fourth root race and the very first beginnings of the fifth root race were approximately in the middle of the fourth root race.[citation needed]
"The real line of evolution differs from the Darwinian, and the two systems are irreconcilable," according to Blavatsky, "except when the latter is divorced from the dogma of 'Natural Selection'." She explained that, "by 'Man' the divine Monad is meant, and not the thinking Entity, much less his physical body." "Occultism rejects the idea that Nature developed man from the ape, or even from an ancestor common to both, but traces, on the contrary, some of the most anthropoid species to the Third Race man." In other words, "the 'ancestor' of the present anthropoid animal, the ape, is the direct production of the yet mindless Man, who desecrated his human dignity by putting himself physically on the level of an animal."[2]

Volumes three and four[edit]

Blavatsky wanted to publish a third and fourth volume of The Secret Doctrine. After Blavatsky's death, a controversial third volume of The Secret Doctrine was published by Annie Besant.[citation needed]

Three fundamental propositions[edit]

Blavatsky explained the essential component ideas of her cosmogony in her magnum opus, The Secret Doctrine. She began with three fundamental propositions, of which she said:
Before the reader proceeds … it is absolutely necessary that he should be made acquainted with the few fundamental conceptions which underlie and pervade the entire system of thought to which his attention is invited. These basic ideas are few in number, and on their clear apprehension depends the understanding of all that follows…[3]
The first proposition is that there is one underlying, unconditioned, indivisible Truth, variously called "the Absolute", "the Unknown Root", "the One Reality", etc. It is causeless and timeless, and therefore unknowable and non-describable: "It is 'Be-ness' rather than Being".[a] However, transient states of matter and consciousness are manifested in IT, in an unfolding gradation from the subtlest to the densest, the final of which is physical plane.[4] According to this view, manifest existence is a "change of condition"[b] and therefore neither the result of creation nor a random event.
Everything in the universe is informed by the potentialities present in the "Unknown Root," and manifest with different degrees of Life (or energy), Consciousness, and Matter.[c]
The second proposition is "the absolute universality of that law of periodicity, of flux and reflux, ebb and flow". Accordingly, manifest existence is an eternally re-occurring event on a "boundless plane": "'the playground of numberless Universes incessantly manifesting and disappearing,'"[7] each one "standing in the relation of an effect as regards its predecessor, and being a cause as regards its successor",[8] doing so over vast but finite periods of time.[d]
Related to the above is the third proposition: "The fundamental identity of all Souls with the Universal Over-Soul... and the obligatory pilgrimage for every Soul—a spark of the former—through the Cycle of Incarnation (or 'Necessity') in accordance with Cyclic and Karmic law, during the whole term." The individual souls are seen as units of consciousness (Monads) that are intrinsic parts of a universal oversoul, just as different sparks are parts of a fire. These Monads undergo a process of evolution where consciousness unfolds and matter develops. This evolution is not random, but informed by intelligence and with a purpose. Evolution follows distinct paths in accord with certain immutable laws, aspects of which are perceivable on the physical level. One such law is the law of periodicity and cyclicity; another is the law of karma or cause and effect.[10]

Theories on human evolution and race[edit]

In the second volume of The Secret Doctrine, dedicated to anthropogenesis, Blavatsky presents a theory of the gradual evolution of physical humanity over a timespan of millions of years. The steps in this evolution are called rootraces, seven in all. Earlier rootraces exhibited completely different characteristics: physical bodies first appearing in the second rootrace and sexual characteristics in the third.
Some detractors have emphasized passages and footnotes that claim some peoples to be less fully human or spiritual than the "Aryans". For example,
"Mankind is obviously divided into god-informed men and lower human creatures. The intellectual difference between the Aryan and other civilized nations and such savages as the South Sea Islanders, is inexplicable on any other grounds. No amount of culture, nor generations of training amid civilization, could raise such human specimens as the Bushmen, the Veddhas of Ceylon, and some African Tribes, to the same intellectual level as the Aryans, the Semites, and the Turanians so called. The 'sacred spark' is missing in them and it is they who are the only inferior races on the globe, now happily – owing to the wise adjustment of nature which ever works in that direction – fast dying out. Verily mankind is 'of one blood,' but not of the same essence. We are the hot-house, artificially quickened plants in nature, having in us a spark, which in them is latent" (The Secret Doctrine, Vol. 2, p 421).
When discussing "sterility between two human races" as observed by Darwin, Blavatsky notes:
"Of such semi-animal creatures, the sole remnants known to Ethnology were the Tasmanians, a portion of the Australians and a mountain tribe in China, the men and women of which are entirely covered with hair. They were the last descendants in a direct line of the semi-animal latter-day Lemurians referred to. There are, however, considerable numbers of the mixed Lemuro-Atlantean peoples produced by various crossings with such semi-human stocks – e.g., the wild men of Borneo, the Veddhas of Ceylon, classed by Prof. Flower among Aryans (!), most of the remaining Australians, Bushmen, Negritos, Andaman Islanders, etc" (The Secret Doctrine, Vol. 2, pp 195–6).
Blavatsky also asserts that "the occult doctrine admits of no such divisions as the Aryan and the Semite, accepting even the Turanian with ample reservations. Semites, especially the Arabs, are later Aryans – degenerate in spirituality and perfected in materiality" (The Secret Doctrine, Vol. 2, p 200). She also connects physical race with spiritual attributes constantly throughout her works:
"Esoteric history teaches that idols and their worship died out with the Fourth Race, until the survivors of the hybrid races of the latter (Chinamen, African negroes, &c.) gradually brought the worship back. The Vedas countenance no idols; all the modern Hindu writings do" (The Secret Doctrine, Vol. 2, p 723).
According to Blavatsky, "The MONADS of the lowest specimens of humanity (the "narrow-brained" savage South-Sea Islander, the African, the Australian) had no Karma to work out when first born as men, as their more favoured brethren in intelligence had" (The Secret Doctrine, Vol. 2, p 168).
She also prophesies of the destruction of the racial "failures of nature" as the "higher race" ascends:
"Thus will mankind, race after race, perform its appointed cycle-pilgrimage. Climates will, and have already begun, to change, each tropical year after the other dropping one sub-race, but only to beget another higher race on the ascending cycle; while a series of other less favoured groups – the failures of nature – will, like some individual men, vanish from the human family without even leaving a trace behind" (The Secret Doctrine, Vol. 2, p 446).
In The Secret Doctrine, Blavatsky states: "Verily mankind is 'of one blood,' but not of the same essence." Yet, she also said: "True, again, that if the characteristics are accepted literally". (The Secret Doctrine, Vol. 1, p. 255).

Study of the Secret Doctrine[edit]

According to PGB Bowen, Blavatsky gave the following instructions regarding the study of the Secret Doctrine:
Reading the SD page by page as one reads any other book (she says) will only end us in confusion. The first thing to do, even if it takes years, is to get some grasp of the 'Three Fundamental Principles' given in the Proem. Follow that up by study of the Recapitulation – the numbered items in the Summing Up to Vol. I (Part 1.) Then take the Preliminary Notes (Vol. II) and the Conclusion (Vol. II)[11]

Writings about "The Secret Doctrine"[edit]

  • Alice Bailey: "But those of us who really studied it and arrived at some understanding of its inner significance have a basic appreciation of the truth that no other book seems to supply. HPB said that the next interpretation of the Ageless Wisdom would be a psychological approach, and A Treatise on Cosmic Fire , which I published in 1925, is the psychological key to The Secret Doctrine. None of my books would have been possible had I not at one time made a very close study of The Secret Doctrine."[12]
  • Blavatsky and The Secret Doctrine by Max Heindel (1933; from Max Heindel writings & with introduction by Manly Palmer Hall): "The Secret doctrine  is one of the most remarkable books in the world... Behind her [H.P.B.] stood the real teachers, the guardians of the Secret Wisdom of the ages, who taught her all the occult lore which she transmitted in her writings."[full citation needed]

Critical reception[edit]

Historian Ronald H. Fritze has written that The Secret Doctrine presents a "series of far-fetched ideas unsupported by any reliable historical or scientific research."[13] According to Fritze:
Unfortunately the factual basis for Blavatsky's book is nonexistent. She claimed to have received her information during trances in which the Masters of Mahatmas of Tibet communicated with her and allowed her to read from the ancient Book of Dzyan. The Book of Dzyan was supposedly composed in Atlantis using the lost language of Senzar but the difficulty is that no scholar of ancient languages in the 1880s or since has encountered the slightest passing reference to the Book of Dzyan or the Senzar language.[13]
Scholars and skeptics have criticized The Secret Doctrine for plagiarism.[14] It is said to have been heavily influenced by occult and oriental works.[15][16]
L. Sprague de Camp in his book Lost Continents has written that Blavatsky's main sources were "H. H. Wilson's translation of the ancient Indian Vishnu Purana; Alexander Winchell's World Life; or, Comparative Geology; Donnelly's Atlantis; and other contemporary scientific, pseudo-scientific, and occult works, plagiarized without credit and used in a blundering manner that showed but skin-deep acquaintance with the subjects under discussion."[17] Camp described the book as a "mass of plagiarism and fakery."[18]
The book has also been accused of antisemitism and criticized for its emphasis on race. Historian Hannah Newman has noted that the book "denigrates the Jewish faith as harmful to human spirituality".[19] Historian Michael Marrus has written that Blavatsky's racial ideas "could be easily misused" and that her book had helped to foster antisemitism in Germany during World War II.[20]

See also[edit]

Notes[edit]

  1. Jump up ^ "An Omnipresent, Eternal, Boundless, and Immutable PRINCIPLE on which all speculation is impossible, since it transcends the power of human conception and could only be dwarfed by any human expression or similitude."[3]
  2. Jump up ^ "The expansion 'from within without'..., does not allude to an expansion from a small centre or focus, but, without reference to size or limitation or area, means the development of limitless subjectivity into as limitless objectivity. ...It implies that this expansion, not being an increase in size—for infinite extension admits of no enlargement—was a change of condition." Manifest existence is often called "Illusion" in Theosophy, owing to its conceptual and actual differentiation from the only Reality.[5]
  3. Jump up ^ "Everything in the Universe, throughout all its kingdoms, is CONSCIOUS: i.e., endowed with a consciousness of its own kind and on its own plane of perception. We men must remember that because we do not perceive any signs—which we can recognise—of consciousness, say, in stones, we have no right to say that no consciousness exists there. There is no such thing as either 'dead' or 'blind' matter, as there is no 'Blind' or 'Unconscious' Law".[6]
  4. Jump up ^ Blavatsky states that each complete cycle lasts 311,040,000,000,000 years.[9]

References[edit]

  1. Jump up ^ Blavatsky 1888a, pp. 272–274.
  2. Jump up ^ Blavatsky 1888b, pp. 185–187.
  3. ^ Jump up to: a b Blavatsky 1888a, p. 14.
  4. Jump up ^ Blavatsky 1888a, pp. 35–85.
  5. Jump up ^ Blavatsky 1888a, pp. 62–63.
  6. Jump up ^ Blavatsky 1888a, p. 274.
  7. Jump up ^ Blavatsky 1888a, p. 17.
  8. Jump up ^ Blavatsky 1888a, p. 43.
  9. Jump up ^ Blavatsky 1888a, p. 206.
  10. Jump up ^ Blavatsky 1888a, pp. 274–275.
  11. Jump up ^ Bowen 1988.
  12. Jump up ^ Bailey, Alice A., "Chapter VI", The Unfinished Autobiography, Lucis Trust 
  13. ^ Jump up to: a b Fritze, Ronald H. (2009). Invented Knowledge: False History, Fake Science and Pseudo-Religions. Reaktion Books. pp. 43–44. ISBN 978-1-86189-430-4
  14. Jump up ^ Floyd, E. Randall. (2005). The Good, the Bad and the Mad: Some Weird People in American History. Fall River Press. p. 23. ISBN 978-0760766002 "Scholars and critics were quick to claim that much of the work was stolen from books by other occultists and crank scholars like Ignatius Loyola Donnelly's book on Atlantis."
  15. Jump up ^ Cohen, Daniel. (1989). Encyclopedia of the Strange. Marboro Books. p. 108. ISBN 978-0380702688 "When the book was finally published, critics snickered, Oriental scholars were outraged, and other scholars pointed out that the work was largely stolen from books by other occultists and crank scholars like Ignatius Donnelly's book on Atlantis."
  16. Jump up ^ Sedgwick, Mark. (2004). Against the Modern World: Traditionalism and the Secret Intellectual History of the Twentieth Century. Oxford University Press. p. 44. ISBN 0-19-515297-2 "The Secret Doctrine drew heavily on John Dowson's Classical Dictionary of Hindu Mythology and Religion, Horace Wilson's annotated translation of the Vishnu Purana, and other such works."
  17. Jump up ^ L. Sprague de Camp. (1970). Lost Continents. Dover Publications. p. 57. ISBN 0-486-22668-9 "The Secret Doctrine, alas, is neither so ancient, so erudite, nor so authentic as it pretends to be. When it appeared, an elderly Californian scholar named William Emmette Coleman, outraged by Mme. Blavatsky's false pretensions to oriental learning, made an exegesis of her works. He showed that her main sources were H. H. Wilson's translation of the ancient Indian Vishnu Purana; Alexander Winchell's World Life; or, Comparative Geology; Donnelly's Atlantis; and other contemporary scientific, pseudo-scientific, and occult works, plagiarized without credit and used in a blundering manner that showed but skin-deep acquaintance with the subjects under discussion."
  18. Jump up ^ L. Sprague de Camp. The Fringe of the Unknown. Prometheus Books. p. 193. ISBN 0-87975-217-3 "Three years later, she published her chef d'oeuvre, The Secret Doctrine, in which her credo took permanent, if wildly confused, shape. This work, in six volumes, is a mass of plagiarism and fakery, based upon contemporary scientific, pseudoscientific, mythological, and occult works, cribbed without credit and used in a blundering way that showed only skin-deep acquaintance with the subjects discussed."
  19. Jump up ^ Newman, Hannah. Blavatsky, Helena P. (1831-1891) . In Richard S. Levy. (2005). Antisemitism: A Historical Encyclopedia of Prejudice and Persecution. ABC-CLIO. p. 73. ISBN 1-85109-439-3
  20. Jump up ^ Marrus, Michael. (1989). The Origins of the Holocaust. Meckler. pp. 85–87. ISBN 0-88736-253-2 "In her esoteric work, especially The Secret Doctrine, originally published in 1888, Blavatsky emphasized the concept of races as paramount in the development of human history... Blavatsky herself did not identify the Aryan race with the Germanic peoples. And although her racial doctrine clearly entailed belief in superior and inferior races and hence could be easily misused, she placed no emphasis on the domination of one race over another... Nevertheless, in her work Blavatsky had helped to foster antisemitism, which is perhaps one the reasons her esoteric work was so rapidly accepted in Germanic circles."

Bibliography[edit]

External links[edit]

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Tuesday, 5 April 2016

Zelator


Zelator.jpg
Weiser edition cover


The source of the info here is from the following site  http://thecasswiki.net/index.php?title=CassWiki:Home

Blogger Ref  http://www.p2pfoundation.net/Multi-Dimensional_Science



The Zelator: A Modern Initiate Explores the Ancient Mysteries, by Mark Hedsel, edited by David Ovason, is a spiritual autobiography relating one man's travels through much of Western and some Eastern esoteric teaching. This style of free, individual searching is called the Way of the Fool in the book.
The Zelator is a rich commentary on representations of esoteric principles in art, tradition, architecture, living schools and much more. At one point Hedsel discusses his studies in Paris, probably under George Gurdjieff, although the latter is not specifically named.
The book is very well sourced, with extensive appendices and references. This is an excellent source for an overview of Western esoteric tradition.

See also

The following pages explore concepts and contain quotes from this work:


The Fool is an important archetype in esoteric lore. We see the Fool in places from the tarot deck to medieval feasts to medieval art and literature and treatises of alchemy.
Mark Hedsel discusses this concept in his book The Zelator. Specifically, the Way of the Fool is an independent path of initiation where the student can at different times study under many masters but will not make any lifelong commitment to any one path nor enter into vows of secrecy.
The following excerpts from The Zelator may shed light on the spirit of this way:
"The Way of the Fool is no easy way, for it involves a balancing act, in which the Fool may stumble and become a fool. It is a cunning way, a way of strange knowledge. It is 'the Way that Is Not a Way' - 'the Way that Cannot Be Named'. Such titles alone should alert us to the ignorance of this Way, save among esotericists. Perhaps, when the ecclesiastical authorities attempted to root out the Festum Fatuoruin - the Feast of Fools, in the 15th century, they succeeded in driving underground any esoteric groups linked with the Way of the Fool.
[…]
"And what is the result of such a journey? The result is a wise Fool. A fool is the one who gives up everything for an idea. The wise Fool is the one who knows that he never had anything to give up in the first place. Is that foolish?"
[…]
The old man has committed himself. He has made a stand. Life has made him do that. He has drawn a circle around himself, and said, "This is where I stand, this is what I must do." He has committed himself to an action. Because he has drawn a circle around himself, others can see where he stands. He can be attacked by others, His position is weak. Those who have not committed themselves can mock, if they are so inclined. This is the age-old battle between youth and age. The one who has committed himself appears to be in a weak position. Yet the Spiritual truth is quite otherwise. It is the one who accepts commitment who is strong.
[…]
Creativity is the giving away of Spiritual energy. Creativity is the soul in the expenditure of a bottomless purse. One gives sulphur away - initially perhaps through an excess of joy - for that is the foolishness of young men. Later, one gives away energy through commitment to an idea.
[…]
Let me tell that Fools like myself become Teachers, because we find suddenly that there is no one else. It is as simple as that. One day, you are wandering through Florence, after a day in the libraries, surrounded by books. You are carrying under your arm further books, to pursue further dreams. You see a young child playing with a ball near the Baptistery. His mother stands some way off. She is paying no attention to the child. She has a cigarette dangling from her mouth. You can tell a great deal about that woman, and about the future of her child. Suddenly, there is an illumination. You realize how great is the gulf between yourself and those others. There is a curtain between you. You understand that this curtain is good for neither of you. The house out there is burning. You can see the flames, but those others cannot see the flames. All you have learned from those books, and from those conversations with wise men, from all those meditations, is to see the flames.
Now the question is, can you leave those people in the flames? Would it not be the act of a Fool to snatch one, or perhaps two, out of the conflagration?' 'If that is what they want.' 'They cannot see the flames, but they do not wish to be burned. You see, my friend, you are an alchemist. You know that there are two sorts of flame. There is the soft and slow flame of the inner heat, and that terrible burning flame which consumes, and which feels no human pain. Both are the flames of burning sulphur, but they produce very different results."


     
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Monday, 4 April 2016

Snakes and Ladders....an Ancient Indian "Esoteric" Connection...

 

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For other uses, see Snakes and Ladders (disambiguation).
"Chutes and Ladders" redirects here. For the song by Korn, see Shoots and Ladders (song).
Snakes and Ladders
Snakes and Ladders.jpg
Game of Snakes and Ladders, gouache on cloth (India, 19th century)
Years activeAncient India to present
Genre(s)Board game
Race game
Dice game
Players2+
Age range3+
Setup timeNegligible
Playing time15–45 minutes
Random chanceEntirely
Skill(s) requiredCounting, observation
Synonym(s)Chutes and Ladders
Snakes and Ladders is an ancient Indian board game regarded today as a worldwide classic.[1] It is played between two or more players on a gameboard having numbered, gridded squares. A number of "ladders" and "snakes" are pictured on the board, each connecting two specific board squares. The object of the game is to navigate one's game piece, according to die rolls, from the start (bottom square) to the finish (top square), helped or hindered by ladders and snakes respectively.
The game is a simple race contest based on sheer luck, and is popular with young children.[2] The historic version had root in morality lessons, where a player's progression up the board represented a life journey complicated by virtues (ladders) and vices (snakes). A commercial version without morality lessons and published by Milton Bradley is named Chutes and Ladders.


Equipment[edit]

The size of the grid (most commonly 8×8, 10×10, or 12×12) varies from board to board, as does the exact arrangement of the snakes and ladders, with both factors affecting the duration of play. Each player is represented by a distinctly coloured game piece token. A single die is rolled to determine random movement of a player's token in the traditional form of play.

History[edit]

Snakes and Ladders originated in India as part of a family of dice board games, that included Gyan chauper and pachisi (present-day Ludo and Parcheesi). The game made its way to England and was sold as "Snakes and Ladders", then the basic concept was introduced in the United States as Chutes and Ladders (an "improved new version of England's famous indoor sport"[3]) by game pioneer Milton Bradley in 1943.[4]
Gyan Chaupar (Jain version of the game), National Museum, New Delhi
Gyan chauper/Jnan chauper (game of wisdom), the version associated with the Jain philosophy[5] encompassed the concepts like karma and Moksha.
The game was popular in ancient India by the name Moksha Patam. It was also associated with traditional Hindu philosophy contrasting karma and kama, or destiny and desire. It emphasized destiny, as opposed to games such as pachisi, which focused on life as a mixture of skill (free will[6]) and luck. The underlying ideals of the game inspired a version introduced in Victorian England in 1892. The game has also been interpreted and used as a tool for teaching the effects of good deeds versus bad. The board was covered with symbolic images, the top featuring gods, angels, and majestic beings, while the rest of the board was covered with pictures of animals, flowers and people.[7] The ladders represented virtues such as generosity, faith, and humility, while the snakes represented vices such as lust, anger, murder, and theft. The morality lesson of the game was that a person can attain salvation (Moksha) through doing good, whereas by doing evil one will inherit rebirth to lower forms of life. The number of ladders was less than the number of snakes as a reminder that a path of good is much more difficult to tread than a path of sins. Presumably, reaching the last square (number 100) represented the attainment of Moksha (spiritual liberation).
When the game was brought to England, the Indian virtues and vices were replaced by English ones in hopes of better reflecting Victorian doctrines of morality. Squares of Fulfillment, Grace and Success were accessible by ladders of Thrift, Penitence and Industry and snakes of Indulgence, Disobedience and Indolence caused one to end up in Illness, Disgrace and Poverty. While the Indian version of the game had snakes outnumbering ladders, the English counterpart was more forgiving as it contained each in the same amount.[8] This concept of equality signifies the cultural ideal that for every sin one commits, there exists another chance at redemption.
The association of Britain’s Snakes and Ladders with India and gyan chauper began with the returning of colonial families from one of Britain’s most important imperial possessions, India. The décor and art of the early English boards of the 20th century reflect this relationship. By the 1940s, very few pictorial references to the Indian culture were found due to the economic demands of the war and the collapse of British rule in India.[9] Although the game’s sense of morality has lasted through the game’s generations, the physical allusions to religious and philosophical thought in the game as presented in Indian models appear to have all but faded. There has even been evidence of a possible Buddhist version of the game existing in India during the Pala-Sena time period.
In Andhra Pradesh, this game is popularly called Vaikunthapali or Paramapada Sopana Patam (the ladder to salvation) in Telugu.[4][9] In Hindi, this game is called Saanp aur Seedhi, Saanp Seedhi and Mokshapat.
In the original game the squares of virtue are: Faith (12), Reliability (51), Generosity (57), Knowledge (76), and Asceticism (78). The squares of vice or evil are: Disobedience (41), Vanity (44), Vulgarity (49), Theft (52), Lying (58), Drunkenness (62), Debt (69), Murder (73), Rage (84), Greed (92), Pride (95), and Lust (99).[7]

Gameplay[edit]

Milton Bradley Chutes and Ladders gameboard c. 1952. The illustrations show good deeds and their rewards; bad deeds and their consequences.
Each player starts with a token on the starting square (usually the "1" grid square in the bottom left corner, or simply, off the board next to the "1" grid square) and takes turns to roll a single die to move the token by the number of squares indicated by the die roll. Tokens follow a fixed route marked on the gameboard which usually follows a boustrophedon (ox-plow) track from the bottom to the top of the playing area, passing once through every square. If, on completion of a move, a player's token lands on the lower-numbered end of a "ladder", the player must move the token up to the ladder's higher-numbered square. If the player lands on the higher-numbered square of a "snake" (or chute), the token must move down to the snake's lower-numbered square.
If a player rolls a 6, the player may, after moving, immediately take another turn; otherwise play passes to the next player in turn. The player who is first to bring their token to the last square of the track is the winner.
A variation exists where a player must roll the exact number to reach the final square to win. Depending on the particular variation, if the roll of the die is too large the token either remains in place or goes off the final square and back again. For example, if a player requiring a 3 to win rolls a 5, they would move forward three spaces and then back two again. In certain circumstances (such as a person requiring a 1 to win rolling a 6), a player can end up further from the final square after this move than before it.

Specific editions[edit]

The most widely known edition of Snakes and Ladders in the United States is Chutes and Ladders released by Milton Bradley in 1943.[10] The playground setting replaced the snakes, which were received negatively by children at the time.[10] It is played on a 10×10 board, and players advance their pieces according to a spinner rather than a die. The theme of the board design is playground equipment, showing children climbing ladders and descending chutes. The artwork on the board teaches a morality lesson, the squares on the bottom of the ladders show a child doing a good or sensible deed and at the top of the ladder there is an image of the child enjoying the reward. At the top of the chutes, there are pictures of children engaging in mischievous or foolish behaviour and the images on the bottom show the child suffering the consequences. Black children were depicted in the Milton Bradley game for the first time in 1974.[10] There have been many pop culture versions of the game, with graphics featuring such children's television characters as Dora the Explorer and Sesame Street. It has been marketed as "The Classic Up and Down Game for Preschoolers".
In Canada the game has been traditionally sold as "Snakes and Ladders", and produced by the Canada Games Company. Several Canadian specific versions have been produced over the years, including a version substituting Toboggan runs for the snakes.[11] With the demise of the Canada Games Company, Chutes and Ladders produced by Milton Bradley/Hasbro has been gaining in popularity.
The most common[citation needed] in the United Kingdom is Spear's Games' edition of Snakes and Ladders, played on a 10×10 board where a single die is used. Another early British version of the game depicts the path of a young boy and girl making their way through a cartoon railroad and train system.[citation needed]
During the early 1990s in South Africa, Chutes and Ladders games made from cardboard were distributed on the back of egg boxes as part of a promotion.[citation needed]
Even though the concept of major virtues against vices and related Eastern spiritualism is not much emphasized in modern incarnations of the game, the central mechanism of Snakes and Ladders makes it an effective tool for teaching young children about various subjects. In two separate Indonesian schools, the implementation of the game as media in English lessons of fifth graders not only improved the students' vocabulary but also stimulated their interest and excitement about the learning process.[12][13] Researchers from Carnegie Mellon University found that pre-schoolers from low income backgrounds who played an hour of numerical board games like Snakes and Ladders matched the performance of their middle-class counterparts by showing improvements in counting and recognizing number shapes.[14] An eco-inspired version of the game was also used to teach students and teachers about climate change and environmental sustainability.[15]

Mathematics of the game[edit]

The cumulative probability of finishing a game of Snakes and Ladders by turn N
Any version of Snakes and Ladders can be represented exactly as an absorbing Markov chain, since from any square the odds of moving to any other square are fixed and independent of any previous game history.[3] The Milton Bradley version of Chutes and Ladders has 100 squares, with 19 chutes and ladders. A player will need an average of 39.6 spins to move from the starting point, which is off the board, to square 100. A two-player game is expected to end in 47.76 moves with a 50.9% chance of winning for the first player.[16]
In the book Winning Ways the authors show how to treat Snakes and Ladders as an impartial game in combinatorial game theory even though it is very far from a natural fit to this category. To this end they make a few rule changes such as allowing players to move any counter any number of spaces, and declaring the winner as the player who gets the last counter home. Unlike the original game, this version, which they call Adders-and-Ladders, involves skill.

In popular culture[edit]

The phrase "back to square one" originates in the game of snakes and ladders, or at least was influenced by it – the earliest attestation of the phrase refers to the game: "Withal he has the problem of maintaining the interest of the reader who is always being sent back to square one in a sort of intellectual game of snakes and ladders."[17][18]
The game is a central metaphor of Salman Rushdie's Midnight's Children. The narrator describes the game as follows:
All games have morals; and the game of Snakes and Ladders captures, as no other activity can hope to do, the eternal truth that for every ladder you hope to climb, a snake is waiting just around the corner, and for every snake a ladder will compensate. But it's more than that; no mere carrot-and-stick affair; because implicit in the game is unchanging twoness of things, the duality of up against down, good against evil; the solid rationality of ladders balances the occult sinuosities of the serpent; in the opposition of staircase and cobra we can see, metaphorically, all conceivable oppositions, Alpha against Omega, father against mother.[19]

References[edit]

  1. Jump up ^ "Chutes and Ladders - Snakes and Ladders". About.com. 
  2. Jump up ^ Pritchard, D. B. (1994), "Snakes and Ladders", The Family Book of Games, Brockhampton Press, p. 162, ISBN 1-86019-021-9 
  3. ^ Jump up to: a b Althoen, S. C.; King, L.; Schilling, K. (March 1993). "How Long Is a Game of Snakes and Ladders?". The Mathematical Gazette (The Mathematical Association) 77 (478): 71–76. doi:10.2307/3619261. JSTOR 3619261. 
  4. ^ Jump up to: a b Augustyn (2004), pp. 27–28
  5. Jump up ^ Bornet, Philippe; Burger, Maya (2012). [1] Religions in Play: Games, Rituals, and Virtual Worlds]. Theologischer Verlag Zürich. p. 94. ISBN 9783290220105. 
  6. Jump up ^ "Playing with fate and free will". Devdutt Pattanaik. September 17, 2007. 
  7. ^ Jump up to: a b Bell, R. C. (1983). "Snakes and Ladders". The Boardgame Book. Exeter Books. pp. 134–35. ISBN 0-671-06030-9. 
  8. Jump up ^ Masters, James. "Moksha-Patamu (Snakes and Ladders)." The Online Guide to Traditional Games. N.p., n.d. Web.
  9. ^ Jump up to: a b Topsfield, Andrew (2006). The art of play. Board and card games of India. Marg Publications. ISBN 9788185026763. 
  10. ^ Jump up to: a b c Slesin, Suzanne. At 50, Still Climbing, Still Sliding New York Times 15 July 1993
  11. Jump up ^ "Snakes and Ladders". Elliott Avedon Museum & Archive of Games. 
  12. Jump up ^ Sari, Candrika Citra, and Siti Muniroh. "Developing Snake and Ladder Game Board as a Media to Teach English Vocabulary to Elementary School Students." SKRIPSI Jurusan Sastra Inggris-Fakultas Sastra UM (2012). Web.
  13. Jump up ^ Yuliana, Ita. "The Implementation of Snakes And Ladders Game to Improve Students' Vocabulary Among the Fifth Grade Students of SD N Bapangsari in the Academic Year 2012/2013." SCRIPTA - Pendidikan Bahasa Inggris 1.2 (2013). Web.
  14. Jump up ^ Siegler, Robert S., and Geetha B. Ramani. "Playing Linear Numerical Board Games Promotes Low-income Children’s Numerical Development." Developmental Science 11.5 (2008): 655-61. Web.
  15. Jump up ^ Morrison, Sarah. "Battling Climate-change: How Snakes and Ladders Could Save the Planet." The Independent, 14 Apr. 2013. Web.
  16. Jump up ^ Audet, Daniel (Dec 2012). "Probabilités et espérances dans le jeu de serpents et échelles à deux joueurs" (PDF). Bulletin AMQ. 
  17. Jump up ^ "Back to square one", The Phrase Finder, Gary Martin.
  18. Jump up ^ Hugh-Jones, E. M. (June 1952). "The American Economy, 1860–1940. by A. J. Youngson Brown". The Economic Journal (Wiley) 62 (246): 411–414. doi:10.2307/2227038. JSTOR 2227038. 
  19. Jump up ^ Rushdie, Salman (2006). Midnight's Children. Random House. p. 160. 
Bibliography
  • Augustyn, Frederick J (2004). Dictionary of toys and games in American popular culture. Haworth Press. ISBN 0-7890-1504-8. 
  • Tatz, Mark; Kent, Jody (1977). Rebirth: The Tibetan Game of Liberation. Anchor Press. ISBN 0-385-11421-4. 

Further reading[edit]

  • Berlekamp, Elwyn R; Conway, John H; Guy, Richard K (1982). Winning Ways for your Mathematical Plays. Academic Press. ISBN 0-12-091150-7. 
  • Shimkhada, Deepak (1983) "A Preliminary Study of the Game of Karma in India, Nepal, and Tibet" in Artibus Asiae 44:4, pp. 308–22.
  • Topsfield, Andrew (1985) "The Indian Game of Snakes and Ladders" in Artibus Asiae 46:3, pp. 203–26.
  • Topsfield, Andrew (2006) "Snakes and Ladders in India: Some Further Discoveries" in Artibus Asiae 66:1, pp. 143–79.

External links[edit]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Snakes and ladders.
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