Madame Blavatsky on Mahatmas and Their Bodies

Book excerpt: Mahatmas can travel in their inner or astral body, preserve full command of all their intelligence, and condense their “phantom” form into visibility or dissolve it into invisibility. But They are not accident-proof for They are living men in living bodies. Their Mayavi-Rupa is furnished by the Auric Egg. At death, Their apparitional or astral body becomes as solid and tangible as was the late physical body. – When the body of an Adept is entirely at the command of the Inner Man, – When the Spiritual Self is completely reunited with its seventh principle even during the lifetime of the personality, — When the Astral Man or Personal Self has become so purified that he has gradually assimilated all the qualities and attributes of the middle nature (Buddhi and Manas in their terrestrial aspect), Then it can be said that the material lower self substitutes itself for the spiritual Higher Self, and is thenceforth capable of living an independent life on earth. Mahatmas are able to desert their bodies, which live on from that point until the day of death of the body entirely devoid of a soul. But the influence of the Adept on the atoms, and consequently on all new physical atoms coming into the form, is such that no evil influence enters and the life led by that body is harmless and often actively good. There are two types of voluntary and conscious incarnations: those of Nirmanakayas, and those undertaken by the probationary chelas who are on trial.