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THE WEB OF LIFE

by John Davidson

Part 7 – Up to the Eyes

This series of articles is derived from the author’s book, The Web of Life (publ. C.W. Daniel, 1988)

John Davidson is the author of a series of six books on Science and Mysticism which look at the natural world from a mystical perspective.

The author is a Cambridge science graduate with a life-long interest in mysticism.

8 Copyright 1988, 2015

John Davidson

www.johndavidson.org

The Ajna Chakra, the Pituitary Gland and the Hypothalamus Just as in any administrative system there are points of control carrying varying degrees and kinds of jurisdiction, so too in the inner realms and chakras. Whilst the akashic centre, therefore, maintains one kind of control and administration, the control exercised by the ajna chakra in the brain is of a different nature. If the throat centre is the general manager of bodily activities, then the ajna chakra is the president - who is himself answerable to the central government of the brain and higher centres. The ajna centre is situated behind and between the two eyes. "Ajna" actually means "command", referring to this centre as the command or control centre of the other five chakras. It is also said to be so named because it is here that the command of the guru is received from within. It is also known as the Eye Centre, at which the guru instructs the disciple to meditate and focus concentration at the commencement of the inward spiritual journey, being the point at which mind and soul are knotted together. It is not, however, the true Third Eye, which lies further in, beyond the antashkarans, on the threshold of the astral world. Being the focus for our thoughts, this is also the centre of mental balance. Mostly, our attention is scattered throughout the body and into the world. But when we can still our mental gyrations sufficiently, we automatically find ourselves back at this point. Even Thomas a Kempis comments, in the Imitation of Christ, "What can be more at rest than at the single eye." The human quality of our thoughts is influenced directly by our level of consciousness. The higher our inner ascent and ability to withdraw consciousness and attention to the eye centre, then the higher the quality of our thought processes and the more control we can exercise over our emotions. Conversely, by controlling our mind, our emotions and our scattered thoughts, we automatically raise our consciousness towards the eye centre, because that is our focus of thought.

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It is a two-way process. Just as mind affects biochemistry from above, so too do changes in biochemistry affect mental processes from below. The ajna chakra is described as having two petals, one white and one black. These are the wings atop the Cadduceus the staff of Hermes, the insignia of the wise physician, the ancient symbol of life portraying the six chakras in the physical body. Part of the gross physical reflection of this centre would seem to be a combination of the pituitary gland and the hypothalamus. These two glands between them are considered to be the control or command system for all the other endocrine glands in the body. Considering that the ajna or command chakra was so named perhaps thousands of years ago, it would seem a sensible move for modern life sciences research to at least investigate the expositions of both ancient and modern yogic teachings and philosophy. Yoga, after all, is a far older science of life and has stood a greater test of time. The hypothalamus represents the most obvious point of fusion and functional contact, physiologically and anatomically, between the nervous and endocrine systems. Consisting of specialized nervous tissue, fed by nerve connections from the brain, and lying below the thalamus it takes its primary orders from the mid-brain, by a nervous message encoding as yet unidentified. From there, hormones are carried in two special veins to the anterior lobe of the pituitary gland. The posterior lobe of the pituitary, on the other hand, is almost an extension of the hypothalamus in that it is "fed" by a tract of nerve fibres down which at least two major hormones travel for release upon a nervous impulse command from the hypothalamus. The complexity of the roles played by these tattwas is reflected in the number of petals that are spun into the chakras by the morphogenic pranic vibration, creating the pranic pathways or nadis. At the lower levels, there is actually some degree of correspondence between the number of these petals and the hormones produced. There are, for example, four petals to the rectal chakra and four main groups of adrenal hormones. But this may not be such a meaningful parallel, for we are dealing with areas of functionality that are administered through each chakra and though the endocrine glands represent a major aspect of this functioning, they do not, of course, represent the whole. At the sacral centre, which has six petals, the gonads are responsible for germ cell genesis and maturation, as well as maintenance of the reproductive organs and secondary sexual characteristics. The subtle watery tattwa also gives rise to the fluids in the body and their local organization. One could probably figure out six functional headings for this area, but I am by no means sure that this would be a valid way of understanding the manifestation of the more subtle pranic functionality. And the interrelationship of the tattwas and chakras would also require consideration and elucidation in any such model. Then, proceeding higher, we find the eight-petalled fiery centre with part of its organizational reflection lying in the pancreas, also possessing both exocrine and endocrine activity. Above that, lies the airy centre with twelve petals and an even more complex and far reaching function. On the one hand, it is responsible for the distribution of bodily oxygen from the lungs to the tissues and the transport of carbon dioxide back to the lungs for elimination, and in the more inward biochemistry, the protective aspects of the immune defence system is overseen from this subtle centre. Similarly, as we have described, the increasingly detailed and far reaching control of the akashic element is reflected in the sixteen petals of the throat chakra with its endocrine aspect of general metabolic rate control, its finger resting upon every molecular and subatomic button. Here the complexity is such that the endocrine function is separated into two glands containing

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opposite functional polarities, as we see in the converse roles of their hormones. In the ajna chakra, we are presented in most yogic texts with just the major polarity inherent in its twin petals and reflecting in the endocrine and neurophysical linkage of the anterior pituitary and the posterior pituitary/hypothalamus. Leadbeater and other theosophists have claimed, long before the advent of current knowledge concerning these glands, that each of these two lobes are themselves split into forty-eight further sub-lobes or petals. Bear in mind the complex interactions of these two endocrine centres with each other and with the lower centres. Then add to this, our knowledge concerning the host of recently discovered neuropeptides in both of these glands, plus the multitudinous neurophysiological aspects of hypothalamic and posterior pituitary functioning, and one can readily see how two times forty-eight or ninety-six petals or functional aspects could be defined for the outwardly manifested activities of this centre, if not as specific hormonal molecules themselves. The white and black colours ascribed to the two petals of this chakra also reflect its commanding position. For just as white light contains within it the vibrations of all the colours of the full spectrum, so too does the ajna chakra contain within it a reflection of all the varying colours of the five lower chakras. And just as white light is our experience of this admixture of electromagnetic vibration at the physical level, so too is it the way we experience the energetic aspects of this chakra as the vibrational source of all the lower chakras, with their coloured petals. The differentiation of this chakra into white and black presumably reflects the manner in which the inflow and outflow of energy are experienced when consciousness is focused at this point. The total number of petals equals 48, with the ajna chakra containing within each of its two petals or polarities a resonance to each of the other chakras. And this is exactly what happens when the endocrine activity of the lower glands feeds back to the pituitary/hypothalamic centre. There is an energetic response or a resonance, resulting in inhibition (yin) or stimulation (yang), depending upon the direction of molecular activity, to or from the higher centre. "As above, so below." Just as the thousand-petalled lotus, the Sahans-dal-Kanwal or Sahasra at the heart of the astral realm, (sometimes referred to as the crown chakra, though there is no functional relationship to the crown), is the energy powerhouse of all below, yet it has itself come into being as a result of interaction in the more inward energy currents of which it is itself comprised, similarly does every molecule or energy pattern in the body arise due to interactions at a more inward or subtle level. Each molecule arises, moves and has its being because of the structure and relationships within the more subtle energy fields. Each molecule bears a harmonic relationship to inward function and energetic activity. If the specific nature and structure of these energy fields could be modelled, then we would possess a model of body function that would be of inestimable value.