Agartha: THE SUBTERRANEAN WORLD
The following contents and research material is from Dr. Raymond Bernard.
Professor Henrique J. de Souza, President of the Brazilian Theosophical Society and a leading authority on the Subterranean World, published an article in his magazine, entitled,
“Does Shangri-la Exists?”
We quote:
“Among all races of mankind, back to the dawn of time, there existed a tradition concerning the existence of a Sacred Land or Terrestrial Paradise, where the highest ideals of humanity were living realities. This concept is found in the most ancient writings and traditions of the people of Europe, Asia Minor, China, India, Egypt and the Americas. This Sacred Land, it is said, can be known only to persons who are worthy, pure and innocent, for which reason it constitutes the central theme of the dreams of childhood.
The road that leads to this Blessed Land, this Invisible World, this Esoteric and Occult Domain, constitutes the central quest and master key of all mystery teachers and systems of initiation in the past, present and future. This magic key is the ‘Open Sesame’ that unlocks the door to a new and marvelous world."
The old Rosicrucian’s designated it by the French word VITRIOL, which is a combination of the first letters of the sentence;, ‘VISTA INTERIORA TERRAE RECTIFICANDO INVENES OMNIA LAPIDEM’, to indicate that,
‘In the interior of the earth is hidden the true mystery.’ The path that leads to this Hidden World is the Way of Initiation.”
In ancient Greece, in the mysteries of Delphos and Eleusis, this Heavenly Land was referred to as Mount Olympus and the Elysian Fields. Also in the earliest Vedic times, it was called by various names, such as Ratnasanu (peak of the precious stone), Hermadri (mountain of gold) and Mount Meru (home of the gods and Olympus of the Hindus). Symbolically, the peak of this sacred mountain is the sky, its middle portion on the earth and its base in the Subterranean World.
The Scandinavian Eddas also mention this celestial city, which was in the subterranean land of Asar of the peoples of Mesopotasmia. It was the Land of Amenti of the Sacred Book of the Dead of the ancient Egyptians. It was the city of Seven Petals of Vishnu, and the City of Seven Kings of Edom or Eden of Judiac tradition. In other words, it was the Terrestrial Paradise.
In all Asia Minor, not only in the past but also today, there exists a belief in the existence of a City of Mystery full of marvels, which is known as Shamballah (Shamb-Allah), where is the Temple of the Gods. It is also the Erdami of the Tibetans and Mongols.
The Persians call it Alberdi or Aryana, land of their ancestors. The Hebrews called it Canaan and the Mexicans Tula or Tolan, while the Aztecs called Maya-Pan. The Spanish Conquerors who came to America believed in the existence of such a city and organized many expeditions to find it, calling it El Dorado, or City of Gold. They probably learned about it from the aborigines who called it by name of Manoa or City Whose King Wears Clothing of Gold.
By the Celts, this holy land was known as “Land of the Mysteries” – Duat or Dananda. A Chinese tradition speaks of Land of Chivin or the City of a Dozen Serpents. It is the Subterranean World, which lies at the roots of heaven. It is the Land of Calcas, Calcis or Kalki, the famous Colchida for which the Argonauts sought when they set out in search of the Golden Fleece.
In the Middle Ages, it was referred to as the isle of Avalon, where the Knights of the Round Table, under the leadership of King Arthur and under the Guidance of the magician Merlin, went in search of the Holy Grail, symbol of obedience, justice and immortality. When King Arthur was seriously wounded in a battle he requested his companion Belvedere to depart on a boat to the confines of the earth, with the following words:
‘Farewell, my friend and companion Belvedere, and to the land where it never rains, where there is no sickness and where nobody dies.’
This is the Land of Immortality or Agarths, the Subterranean World. This land is the Walhalla of the Germans, the Monte Salvat of the Knights of the Holy Grail, the Utopia of Thomas More, the City of the Sun of Campanella, the Shangri-la of Tibet and the Agartha of the Buddhist World.
We have indicated previously that the subterranean cities of Agartha were constructed by Atlanteans as refuges from the radioactive fallout produced by the nuclear war they fought, and also referred to Hugenin’s theory that flying saucers were Atlantean aircraft which were brought to the Subterranean World prior to the occurrence of the catastrophe that sank Atlantis. The abandonment of their former home on top of the four-sided sacred mountain in the center of Atlantis (Mount Olympus or Meru, later memorialized by the four-sided, truncated pyramids of Egypt and Mexico) and their skyward journey over the Rainbow Bridge of the Aurora Borealis, through the polar opening, to the new home Walhalla, the Golden Palaces of the City of Shamballah, capital of Agartha, the Subterranean World. This migration of the Atlantean god-rulers to the Subterranean World, prior to the destruction of Atlantis, was referred to in Teutonic mythology as the “Gotterdamerung” or Twilight of the Gods. They made the journey in flying saucers, which were Atlantean aircraft.
Whereas, in the days of Atlantis, flying saucers flew in the earth’s outer atmosphere, after they entered the Subterranean World they continued to fly in its internal atmosphere in its hollow interior. After the Hiroshima atomic explosion in 1945 they rose again to surface in numbers, seeking to avert a nuclear catastrophe.
The tragedy that befell Atlantis was due to its scientific development running ahead of its moral development, resulting in a nuclear war, which heated the atmosphere, melted polar ice-caps and brought on a terrific deluge that submerged the continent. A group of survivors, Led by Noah, found refuge in the highlands of Brazil (then an Atlantean colony), where they constructed subterranean cities, connected by tunnels to the surface, to prevent destruction by radioactive fallout and flood.
According to Plato’s account, Atlantis was submerged by a series of inundations which came to a climax about 11,500 years ago. Some four million inhabitants lost their lives. Those who were more spiritual and were forewarned escaped in time to Brazil, where, it is claimed, they or their descendants still live in subterranean cities.
In this connection it is interesting to refer to Jules Vern’s book, “A JOURNEY TO THE CENTER OF THE EARTH,” which presents a similar conception of the earth’s formation as did Gardner’s book by a similar name. Verne describes a party of explorers who entered a volcanic shaft, and after traveling for months finally came to the hollow center of the earth, a new world with its own sun to illuminate it, oceans, land and even cities of Altantean origin. Verne believed that prior to the destruction of Atlantis, some of the Atlanteans escaped and established subterranean cities in the earth’s hollow center. Since most of Vern’s predictions were later verified, it is possible that this one also will be but not by entering a volcanic shaft, but by an aerial expedition through the polar openings into the hollow interior of the earth.
One of the early German settlers in Santa Catarina, Brazil, wrote and published a book in old German, dealing with the Subterranean World, deriving his information from the Indians. The book described the Earth as being hollow, with a sun in the center. The interior of the earth was said to be inhabited by a disease-free, long lived race of fruitarians. This Subterranean World, the book claimed, was connected by tunnels with the surface, and these tunnels, it was claimed, open mostly in Santa Catarina and surrounding parts of South Brazil.
The Author has devoted nearly six years to investigations to study the mysterious tunnels which honeycomb Santa Catarina, obviously built by an ancient race to reach subterranean cities. Research is still in progress. On a mountain near Joinville the choral singing of Atlantean men and women has been repeatedly heard – also the “Canta Gallo” (cock crowing), which is the standard indication of the existence of a tunnel opening leading to a subterranean city. The crowing is not produced by a living animal, probably by some machine.
The Russian explorer, Ferdinand Ossendowski, author of “Beasts, Men and Gods,” claims that the tunnels which encircle the earth and which pass under the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans, were built by men of a pre-glacial Hyperborean civilization which flourished in the Polar region at time when its climate was still tropical, a race of supermen possessing scientific powers of a superior order, and marvelous inventions, including tunnel boring machines we know nothing about, by means of which they honeycombed the earth with tunnels. We shall now quote from Ossendowski’s remarkable book relating to his own experience in Mongolia, where belief in the existence of a Subterranean World of Agartha, ruled by the King of the World, who resides in his holy city of Shamballah, is universal.
Ossendowski writes: “Stop!’ said my Mongol guide, when we crossed the plateau of Tzagan Luk, ‘Stop!”
His camel bowed down without him ordering it. The Mongol raised his hands in a gesture of adoration and repeated the sacred phrase:
“’OM MANI PADME HUM!’
The other Mongols immediately stopped their camels and began to pray.
“ ‘What Happened?’, I wondered, bringing my camel to a halt.
“The Mongols prayed for some moments, then mounted their camels and rode on.
“ ‘Look,’ said the Mongol to me,
‘How the camels move their ears with terror, how the manes of the horses remain immobile and alert and how the camels and cattle bow down to the ground. Note how the birds stop flying or the dogs barking. The air vibrates sweetly and one hears a song that penetrates to the hearts of all men, animals and birds. All living beings, seized with fear, prostrate themselves. For the King of the World, in his subterranean palace, is prophesying the future of the peoples of all the earth.’
“Thus spoke the old Mongol.”
“In Mongolia, with its terrible mountains and limitless plateaus was born a mystery which was preserved by the red and yellow lamas. The rulers of Lhasa and Ourga guarded their science and possessed these mysteries. It was during my trip to Central Asia that I heard for the first time this Mystery of Mysteries, to which I formally paid no attention, but only did later, when I was able to analyze it and compare certain testimonies frequently subjected to controversy. The old men on the border of Amyil told me an old legend, according to which a Mongolian tribe, seeking to escape from Genghis Khan, hid in a subterranean land. Later, near Nogan Lake, I was shown by Soyota a door that a hunter entered into this region and, after he returned told of his visit. The lamas cut off his tongue to prevent him from speaking about the Mystery of Mysteries. In his old age, he returned to the entrance of the cavern and disappeared into the Subterranean World, which memory always brought emotion to the nomad.
“I obtained more detailed information from Houtouktou jelyl Djamsrap de Narabanch Kure. He told me the history of the arrival of the all-powerful King of the World to the door exit of the Subterranean World, his appearance, his miracles and prophecies. I then commenced to understand this legend, this hypothesis, this collective vision, which no matter how we interpret it, conceals not only a mystery but a real force which governs and influences the course of the political life of Asia. From that moment, I commenced my investigations. The Lama Gelong, favorite of Prince Choulton Beyil, gave me a description of the subterranean World.”
“More than six thousand years ago, he said, a holy man disappeared into the earth accompanied by a tribe of people and never returned to its surface. This inner world was also visited by various other men, as Cakya-Muni, Undur-Chengen Paspa, Baber and others. No one knows where they found the entrance. Some say it was Afghanistan, others say it was India.”
“All inhabitants of this region are protected against evil, and no crime exists within its boundaries. Science developed tranquility, uninterrupted by war and free from the spirit of destruction. Consequently the subterranean people were able to achieve a much higher degree of wisdom. They have composed a vast empire with millions of inhabitants governed by the King of the World. He masters all the forces of nature, can read what’s within the souls of all, and in the great book of destiny. Invisible he rules over eight hundred million human beings, all willing to execute his orders.”
All the subterranean passages in the entire world lead to the World of Agartha. The lamas say that all the subterranean cavities in America are inhabited by these people. The inhabitants of submerged prehistoric continents (Lemuria and Atlantis) found refuge and continued to live in the Subterranean World.”
The lama Turgut, who made the trip from Ourga to Pekin with me, gave me further details:
"The capital of Agartha (Shamballah) is surrounded by villas where live the Holy Sages. It reminds one of Lhasa, where the temple of the Dalai Lama rises on top of a mountain surrounded by temples and monasteries. His palace is surrounded by the palaces of the Gurus, who control the invisible and visible forces of the earth, from its interior to the sky, and are lords of life and death. If our crazy humanity will continue its wars, they may come to the surface and transform it into a desert. They can dry the oceans, transform continents into seas and cause the disappearance of mountains. In strange vehicles, unknown above, they travel at unbelievable speed through tunnels inside the earth. The lamas found vestiges of these men in all parts and in inscriptions on rocks; and saw remains of the wheels of their vehicles. “
When I asked him to tell me how many persons visited Agartha, the lama answered:
‘A great number, but most of those who are there maintain the secret as long as they live. When the Olets destroyed Lhasa, one of their regiments, in the mountains of the southwest, reached the limits ofAgartha and were then instructed in mysterious sciences, for which reason the Olets and Talmuts continued to live there for centuries. Later they were expelled from the Subterranean World and returned to live on the surface of the earth, bringing with them knowledge of the mystery of prophecy by means of cards and reading the lines of the hands. (they were the ancestors of the gypsies). In a certain region in the north of Asia there exists a tribe which is on the verge of disappearing and which frequents the caverns of Agartha. Its members can invoke the spirits of the dead which live in space.”
The lama then remained silent for some time and then responding to my thoughts continued:
‘InAgartha, the sages write on stone tablets all the sciences of our planet and of other worlds. The Chinese Buddhist sages know that well. Their science is the most advanced and purest. In each century the sages of China unite in a secret place near the sea and on the backs of a hundred large turtles that come out of the ocean they write the conclusions of the divine science of their century.”
“This brings to my mind a story that was related to me by an old Chinese attendant in the Temple of heaven in Pekin. He told me that turtles live for three thousand years without air or food and for this reason all the columns of the blue temple of heaven rest on the backs of the living turtles, so that wooden supports would not rot.”
Many times did the rulers of Ourga and Lhasa send ambassadors to the King of the World, said the lama librarian, but they could not reach him. However, a Tibetan chief, after a battle with the Olets, came to a cavern whose opening bore the following inscription:
‘THIS DOOR LEADS TO AGARTHA.’
From the cavern loft a man of beautiful appearance, who presented to him an ancient tablet bearing strange inscriptions, saying:
“The King of the World will appear to all men when comes the time of the war of the good against the evil; but this time has not yet come. The worst members of the human race have yet to be born.’
Chang Chum Ungem sent young prince Pounzig as an ambassador to the King of the World. The ambassador returned with a letter for the Dalai Lama of Ohasa. He wished to send him a second time but the young ambassador never returned.”
Agartha or the interior world has been featured in myths and legends for thousands of years. Perhaps there are mysteries still that man’s science has yet to discover.