Four States of Consciousness
A basic structure that outlines four key states of consciousness. There are two well known version of this structure: Hindu and Greek, and they correspond quite closely to one another.
- Deep sleep
- Dreaming
- Waking
- Superconscious
In yoga, these are: deep sleep (sushupti), dreaming (svapna), waking (jagrat), and superconscious (turiya). There is also a higher state called turiyaeeta, or merger with the Absolute.
"The first state of consciousness is called Eikasia.
"The second state of consciousness is Pistis.
"The third state of consciousness is Dianoia.
"The fourth state of consciousness is Nous.
"Eikasia is Ignorance, human cruelty, barbarism, exceedingly profound sleep, a brutal and instinctive world, an infra-human state.
"Pistis is the world of opinions and beliefs. Pistis is belief, prejudices, sectarianism, fanaticism, theories in which there does not exist any type of direct perception of the Truth. Pistis is that consciousness of the common level of humanity.
"Dianoia is the intellectual revision of beliefs, analysis, conceptual synthesis, cultural-intellectual consciousness, scientific thought etc. Dianoetic thought studies phenomena and establishes laws. Dianoetic thought studies the inductive and deductive systems with the purpose of using them in a profound and clear way.
"Nous is perfect awakened consciousness. Nous is the state of Turiya, profound perfect interior illumination. Nous is legitimate objective Clairvoyance. Nous is intuition. Nous is the world of the divine archetypes. Noetic thought is synthetic, Clear, objective, illuminated. Whosoever reaches the heights of Noetic thought totally awakens consciousness and becomes a Turiya.
"The lowest part of man is irrational and subjective and is related with the five ordinary senses. The highest part of man is the world of intuition and objective spiritual consciousness. In the world of intuition, the archetypes of all things in nature develop. Only those who have penetrated into the world of objective intuition, only those who have reached the solemn heights of Noetic thought are truly awakened and illuminated." - Samael Aun Weor, The Perfect Matrimony