Jewels from the Indra Net

By Trevor Leggett

These pieces on Eastern methods of inner training and realisation are not intended as theoretical instruction or entertainment. They all point to actual practice in life and hint at deeper practice.

The title of the book Jewels from the Indra Net refers to the fabled net of the god Indra of which the strands have a jewel of truth at each junction. The jewels reflect each other so that each one has deeper and deeper meanings in it.

The pieces are from a variety of traditions, some of them being based on original translations of little known Sanskrit or Japanese texts. Others come from observation or personal experience and hopefully will reflect to the reader some further gleams from the Indra Net.

The fundamental training is mind control and meditation which in the end have to become one pointed. Allusions to them will be found in several places and will be recognised by those who are approaching that level. Some longer pieces have been put at the beginning to give a survey of some main points.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Trevor Leggett Trust
• Release date: Nov 4, 2025
• ISBN: 9781911467212

Book preview

PREFACE

These pieces on Eastern methods of inner training and realisation are not intended as theoretical instruction or entertainment. They all point to actual practice in life. For instance, even the little piece A Prince Reprimanded contains, beside the two obvious surface points, a hint at deeper practice.

The title of the book Jewels from the Indra Net refers to the fabled net of the god Indra, of which the strands have a jewel of Truth at each junction. The jewels reflect each other so that each one has deeper and deeper meanings in it.

The pieces are from a variety of traditions, some of them being based on original translations of little known Sanskrit or Japanese texts. Others come from observation or personal experience. A few of these have appeared on my Internet sites and I am now hoping the whole book will reflect to its readers some further gleams from the Indra net.

INTRODUCTION

As with all training, the inner training requires a certain minimum of theory. In this book there is an underlying philosophical structure which, however, stands not as ultimate truth but as a working basis. The Absolute, tentatively called Universal Self or Brahman or by many other names, is beyond concepts. It cannot be known by them: it can be known by being, by becoming it so to say. It is tentatively called existence – intelligence – infinity. Brahman projects universes as fundamentally purposeful and beautiful illusions. As latent consciousness Brahman is in every particle of the creation. The purpose is that the consciousness, at first unmanifest then latent in primary elements such as rocks struggles to evolve into semi-consciousness in plants and animals and self-consciousness in man. The programme is that those higher in the scale of evolution should help those in less advantageous circumstances to rise higher. By doing this they also make progress themselves. If they fail to do it they relapse: this is technically called the law of Karma. The awakening spiritual aspirant does good to others only to make it easier for them to strive to reach universal consciousness; there is no other reason. Relief of starvation including mental and cultural starvation but not assistance in gratifying limited personal desires, which have binding effects. Instant pleasures are only for an instant. They correspond to moments of happiness experienced by slaves or prisoners. Silver chains are still chains. As man becomes increasingly self-conscious, the urge to return to infinity becomes strong. Opportunities arise to enter a path of realisation of the true universal nature, first in the individual body-mind complex and then without limits. These opportunities are provided by the higher spirits (perhaps once in human form) who reflect and transmit the glory of the Universal Self. The fundamental training is mind control and meditation which in the end have to become one pointed. It is not useful to say much about the higher stages in meditation as this can rouse a distracting how am I doing? monitoring anxiety. Allusions to them will be found in several places and will be recognised by those who are approaching that level. Some longer pieces have been put at the beginning to give a survey of some main points.

Part One: Inner Practice

1. The Pole Star Within

The inner meaning of the title, The Pole Star Within, is that there is something within us which can give us unfailing guidance for directing ourselves in thought, word and deed. By it we can guide our experience in this world, and our spiritual progress. The Pole Star is in the north. The sun rises in a different place every day. We usually direct ourselves by knowing the marks of the locality where we live. But if we travel abroad, we do not know the locality, so we cannot find a fixed direction. A fixed direction is given to us by the Pole Star, often called the North Star. When we list the directions, we say north, south, east, west; north always comes first. But the Chinese list them quite differently: east, west, south, north. North comes at the end. East (they say) is where the sun rises and wakens the world, and west is where it goes down and the world begins to sleep. South is the direction of warmth and cities and trade and social life. It is full of interest. Only north has no interest: the Chinese say, What is there in the north, after all? The further you go, you find snow and ice and barren wastes. There is nothing useful or interesting in the north. Why do you Europeans put North first? Most of us do not know. A Japanese scholar explained it to me. He said: You people are voyagers, travelling round the world, whereas the Chinese called themselves the Central Flower Kingdom, and did not want to go elsewhere. They thought other people would come to them, to the superior civilization. But you British, for example, were sailing all round the world, exploring, and then converting to Christianity, and then conquering and then colonizing. You plundered nearly all the countries you went to. The British Museum is the biggest robber’s cave in the world – full of things which you have stolen from other countries. I admit (he added) that you did respect what you stole: it is all beautifully preserved and catalogued and studied. No doubt many of those things would have perished if they had been left where they were. But the fact remains that you stole them. So in a way you were a nation of pirates. That was why you respect the North: your Viking brigand ships needed the North Star to guide them. The crest of your hero, Sir Francis Drake, shows a North Star in the sky, then the water, and the star reflected in it. Did you ever wonder what the Spanish thought of your Sir Francis? Just a pirate, just a robber. This is the sort of thing a foreign scholar knows, which we have forgotten, or rather, we never knew it. It was not in our history books. At any rate, it is true that they needed a fixed direction, and the Pole Star gave that. But only at night, and only when it is not clouded over. So they needed something else. There is a nearer Pole Star, which we now call the compass. That tiny magnetic needle points to the north, or to the south, as the Chinese prefer to think. Even here, some special conditions have to be provided. It has to be kept steady, and it has to be protected from the presence of nearby masses of metal, whose influence will bring it off line.

The Inner Compass

There is an inner compass, which will show itself when the mind is calmed and finally brought to complete steadiness, and free from the disturbing influence of illusions and passions (which are themselves forms of illusion). When these conditions are right, the inner compass, like the outer compass, has a life of its own. It directs the mind to the Pole Star of the cosmic purpose. The meditator comes to know what he is to do in life, and when he faces in the right direction, he also gets the energy to do it. In his book The Heart of the Eastern Mystical Teaching, Dr. Shastri gives a secret of meditation: Every man must be