Talk:Astral body

message: 1. As I understand it, the Astral body refers to the irrational soul. This takes us back to Plato's parable of the irrational and rational souls struggling with each other. This article should therefore start earlier than the Neoplatonists.
2. The astral body disappears in the West at the time of the eighth ecumenical council http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/basis/const4.html Canon 12, where it was declared anathematous. A Renaissance perspective on this can be found in D.P. Walker's article 'The Astral body and renaissance medicine', Journal of the Warburg Institute, 1959 
3. Maimonides, in his introduction to Ethics of the Fathers, quotes the philosophers on the soul, as do other Mediaeval jewish scholars. Jewish tradition therefore, in general shares the Greek understanding of the soul as having three levels; vegetal (dealing with basic body growth and functions), emotional or irrational - the astral body, and the rational soul.
4. The astral body is well known in cultures around the world, though of course with many different names. In China it is known as the yin body, and it contains the acupuncture meridians.
5. Science rejects the astral body a priori and the scientific method is designed to exclude effects caused by the astral body. The goal of science is to explain all things purely in physical terms. 
6. Conventional medicine rests on the scientific foundation that there is only the physical body, and attempts to explain all symptoms in terms of physical disorders, although in practice much ill health is the result of disturbances of the astral body. In clinical practice this generates masses of tests that are negative despite the presence of symptoms. It also produces many diagnoses that are simply descriptions of symptoms (e.g. irritable bowel syndrome, eczema) as the system fails to identify any physical disorder to attribute the symptoms to Aniksker (talk) 07:34, 31 October 2018 (UTC)
thread_title:  Astral Body 

message: This article reads like a mess of different people adding sentences here and there, which is probably how it has formed. As a result, it reads rather badly.
*Firstly, I feel the method of citation for this article is inadequate. I can't tell what information comes from where. Some things are obvious, but others, such as the introduction, are too ambiguous to tell exactly where the information is coming from. We really need to implement an inline citation system. What I want to do is create a Notes section that will have inline citations, new citations can use the inline, and hopefully we can convert the rest over.
*Second, I think the headings are not worded or organized well. I'd like to see something like the following:
:Introduction
:1 Interpretations
::1.1 Neoplatonism
::1.2 Theosophy
::1.3 Max Heindel
::1.4 The Mother
::1.5 Anthroposophy
::1.6 New Age
:2 Artistic depictions
:3 Photographing
:4 See also
:5 References
:6 Notes
:7 External links
I say something like this because we may find that we can do away with some of it. --T. Baphomet 18:40, 18 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Heindel was influenced by Steiner, so his section should come after the one on Anthroposophy M Alan Kazlev 07:31, 1 May 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Or at least I thought he was; their cosmology and teachings are very similar; but maybe they were both equally influenced by Besant/Leadbeater post-Blavatsky Theosophy M Alan Kazlev 07:35, 1 May 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Reorganization 

message: Let's say a hypothetical Wiki reader with no understanding of New Age and its (rather dubious) scientific foundations were to stumble upon this entry.  He/she may very well be tricked into thinking the astral body is a real, observable phenomenon.  Can we please get a scientific (read SKEPTICAL) perspective, or at the very least a sentence about how astral bodies may be make-believe?  Just a thought. MosKillinest 06:59, 1 May 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: The trouble with this suggestion of course is that it represents a bias towards a particular viewpoint, i.e., scientism or skepticism, in violation of NPOV policy (assuming there even can be such a thing, but we can at least try!).  The goal should instead be as much as possible to write an article that doesn't pander to any one philosophy, neither to skepticism, religionism, or any particular ideology or belief-system.  Instead we simply report and summarise what others have written or taught about the astral body, regardless of whether we as editors agree or disagree with what they have said.  So the Theosophists say this.  Rudolf Steiner says that.  Some say it can be photgraphed. Otehrs say it can't.  And so on, neither condeming nor approving.  I agree with you that the sceptical position should be included, but this means starting a new section, not rewriting the entire article.  James Randi (or whoever else) says this.  Some-one else says that.  Include citations.  That way all relevant povs, including scientism and scepticism, can be covered, but the tone of the article itself is not compromised M Alan Kazlev 07:29, 1 May 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I think that you both have a point.... Can we say add a point that reads something like most people (at least in north america) and the scientific community as a whole doubt the existence of such a body. I am not sure where most people in the world hold opinions, I know many other places of the world can be more religious. I don't know... something to let people know that this is not something that is commonly agreed upon. But it should be factual and at the same time no sceptic heaven. Knightt (talk) 23:23, 10 April 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Skepticism is not a POV - the word is often misused. Scientism is a POV until there's a scientific consensus on the nature of mind. At present the article explains that these are Theosophical terms and so they can only really be explained from the Theosophist POV - in terms of science now widely considered superseded, classical, Asian, mediaeval and vitalist thought, as well as the mind-view of Freud and his followers. It ends by pointing out that there is still a place for such thought wherever science ponders the a possible dynamic and organising field or force of mind. If some prominent person has made a statement to the effect that most scientists do not accept such theories, by all means bring it on. Redheylin (talk) 00:04, 10 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Healthy Skepticism 

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thread_title:  Copyright problem removed 

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thread_title:  External links modified 

message: Neither one mentioned, much less cited, that the material was about the "astral body." Please provide citations of the equivalence before returning. Skyerise (talk) 02:08, 6 January 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  Two sections have been removed 

message: Nearly all these articles use the term "body of light", which is a specific lineage of teaching which runs through Hermeticism, Neoplatonism, Renaissance magic, Rosicrucianism, Ceremonial magic, and Thelema. Its derivation is not at all related to the Theosophical traditions which were based on the Indic yoga traditions - but Theosophy might also have intermixed some of this separate thread. That's for the writers of this article to establish. Some of these sources also use the term 'astral body' and have information relevant to Theosophical syncretism. Most should be accessible through WP:LIBRARY. Skyerise (talk) 17:06, 6 January 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  Potential sources