The Tibetan Book of the Dead — ed. W. Y. Evans-Wentz

The Bardo legend as recorded in the Republic concerns Er the son of Armenius,a Pamphylian by birth, who, as Plato tells us, ‘was slain in battle, and ten days afterwards, when the bodies of the dead were taken up already in a state of corruption, his body was found unaffected by decay, and carried home to be buried. And on the twelfth day, as he was lying on the funeral pile, he returned to life and told them what he had seen in the other world. He said that when his soul left the body he went on a journey with a great company, and they came to a mysterious place at which there were two openings in the earth; they were near together, and over against them were two other openings in the heaven above. In the intermediate space there were judges seated, who commanded the just, after they had given judgement on them and had bound their sentences in front of them, to ascend by the heavenly way on the right hand; and in like manner the unjust were bidden by them to descend by the lower way on the left hand; these also bore the symbols of their deeds, but fastened to their backs.’

Having thus described the otherworld Judgement—which closely resembles the Judgement described in our text—Plato goes on to describe the souls of the Greek Heroes in their Sidpa Bardo preparing for reincarnation: ‘Most curious, he said, was the spectacle—sad and laughable and strange; for the choice of the souls was in most cases based on their own experience of a previous life. There he saw the soul which had once been Orpheus choosing the life of a swan out of enmity to the race of women, hating to be born of a woman

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There he saw the soul which had once been Orpheus choosing the life of a swan out of enmity to the race of women, hating to be born of a woman

3069 Hp. 50 because they had been his murderers; he beheld also the soul of Thamyras choosing the life of a nightingale; birds, on the other hand, like the swan and other musicians, wanting to be men. The soul which obtained the twentieth lot chose the life of a lion, and this was the soul of Ajax the son of Telamon, who would not be a man, remembering the injustice which was done him in the judgement about the arms. The next was Agamemnon, who took the life of an eagle, because, like Ajax, he hated human nature by reason of his sufferings. About the middle came the lot of Atalanta; she, seeing the great fame of an athlete, was unable to resist the temptation : and after her there followed the soul of Epeius the son of Panopeus passing into the nature of a woman cunning in the arts; and far away among the last who chose, the soul of the jester Thersites was putting on the form of a monkey. There came also the soul of Odysseus having yet to make a choice, and his lot happened to be the last of them all. Mow the recollection of former toils had disenchanted him of ambition, and he went about for a considerable time in search of the life of a private man who had no cares; he had some difficulty in jinding this, which was lying about and had been neglected by everybody else; and when he saw it he said that he would have done the same had his lot been first instead of last, and that he was delighted to have it. And not only did men pass into animals, but I must also mention that there were animals tame and wild which changed into one another and into corresponding human natures—the good into the gentle and the evil into the savage, in all sorts of combinations,’

If read superficially, this Platonic account of the rebirth process may be understood literally—even as the Bardo Thidol may be; and it is not impossible to imagine that Plato, as an initiate into the Greek Mysteries, who, like Herodotus, never refers to their esoteric teachings openly, but only in figurative and very often intentionally misleading phraseology, intended that it should be understood so by the uninitiated. Nevertheless, when the passage is examined closely, the exoteric doctrine of transmigration of the human into the sub-human, or vice versa, is evidently not the meaning underlying it.

p. 51

The reference to the choice made by Odysseus, as italicized by us, gives the clue to the real meaning intended. Odysseus’ choice was last ; each of the heroes preceding him in choosing their lot had neglected the lot of ‘the life of a private man who had no cares’, and Odysseus chooses this lot as the best ~ of all.

Odysseus’ choice was last ; each of the heroes preceding him in choosing their lot had neglected the lot of ‘the life of a private man who had no cares’, and Odysseus chooses this lot as the best ~ of all.

If we consider the sort of life chosen by each of the Greeks who preceded Odysseus, we find it to be definitely symbolical of the character of the chooser :

Thus, Orpheus, the founder of the Orphic Mysteries, a divine teacher sent to instruct mankind by the god of song and music, Apollo, and held by the Greeks to have been the greatest of harp-players and the most enlightened of poets and singers, very appropriately chooses ‘the life of a swan’, for since immemorial time the swan has symbolized—as it still does—song and music; and Plato’s figurative language, correctly interpreted, implies that Orpheus was to reincarnate as a great poet and musician, as was but natural. To assume— as the exotericist may—that such a being as Orpheus could be born as a swan in reality thus appears to the esotericist to be untenable.

Likewise, Thamyras, an ancient Thracian bard, renowned as a harp-player and singer, symbolically chooses the life of the sweet-singing nightingale.

Ajax, the Homeric hero, who, next to Achilles, was the bravest of the Greeks, most fittingly chooses the life of a lion ; for the king of beasts is, and has been for unknown ages, the symbol denoting bravery or fearlessness, which almost all nations and races of men have recognized.

Agamemnon, the next to choose, selects the life of an eagle ; for among Greek heroes he was the chief, as Zeus was among the gods of Olympus; and, he having been regarded as an incarnation of Zeus and worshipped as one of the divinities, there is assigned to him the symbol of Zeus, which is the eagle.

Atalanta, the most swift-footed of mortals and famous for her foot-races with her many suitors, very naturally is reborn as a great athlete; and, in her case, Plato uses no symbol.

p. 52

Nor is a symbol used in connexion with Epeius, who, noted for his cunning in constructing the wooden horse at the siege of Troy, and whose cowardice afterwards became proverbial, is seen ‘passing into the nature of a woman cunning in the ants”.

As to the jester Thersites, who puts on the form of a monkey, comment is unnecessary.

Accordingly, the expressions concerning the heroes’ hatred of being born of woman seem to be purely metaphorical and employed to carry out logically the literary use of the animalsymbols, just as the passages are concerning ‘animals tame and wild which changed into one another and into corresponding human natures—the good into the gentle and the evil into the savage, in all sorts of combinations’, and of ‘birds, on the other hand, like the swan and other musicians, wanting to be men’,