initiate – Traou an Dour

Climate Change, Esoteric, Esoteric Psychology, Musings, New Age, Rāja yoga

2025 and Millions of First-Degree Initiates

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The Tibetan suggests that by the year 2025 there will be millions of first-degree initiates in incarnation. He does not say if they will be adult or freshly born. This means by 2045 there will be millions of adult initiates, just as the planet is getting a lot hotter.

In order to be a first-degree initiate, one has to have been an accepted disciple in the ashram of some Master or other. One would have to have worked at discipleship across many lifetimes. The notion of service will run pure in their blood.

This suggestion by the Tibetan means that the externalisation is well underway and is of a truly massive scale.

We might speculate that there are 100 times fewer initiates of second degree. Which would mean 10,000 initiates of the second degree and perhaps 100 of the third degree and one of the fourth.

The Tibetan said millions plural.

This back of a fag packet speculation suggests quite a lot of initiates.

These are likely to be possessed of a good intellect and to be found therefore in appropriate employ.

You could even be working with an initiate unbeknownst to you.

It is possible even that you are yourself an initiate but that the recollection has not registered in brain consciousness. This is more likely for the first two degrees {according to the text}. If I understand it correctly at the third one knows for sure and beyond doubt.

Elsewhere the Tibetan mentions that the Council will meet at Shamballa in 2025 and decide its next actions.

If there is to be mass initiation that implies a genuine and widespread crisis. For the backdrop of crisis accompanies the initiatory process.

The world is hurtling towards an environmental crisis as Mach 3.

People do not want to let go of acquisitional materialism, air travel and funky silicon-based gadgets. Nor do they want the sea level to rise and the climate to get worse. They desire economic “growth” not spiritual growth.

People want to have their cake and eat it too…

Something will have to budge…

ॐ, Cause & Effect, Esoteric, Karma, New Age, paradigm, Prophecy, Quotations, Rāja yoga

Mode of Approach Toward Externalization

(August 1946)

One of the most important things emerging from the theme of this amazing and imminent event (the reappearance of the Hierarchy on the physical plane) is the factor of the developments and the adjustments going on within the Hierarchy Itself in preparation for this happening. Incidentally, I would here point out that what will take place, and what is already tentatively taking place, is the externalization of the Ashrams. The great official departments, such as the teaching department or that of emerging civilizations, will not at this time reappear. Their activities will still, for a long time, be retained within the Hierarchy upon Its own plane. The first step is the appearance of certain Ashrams, controlled by certain Masters, upon the physical plane, evoking general recognition and guaranteeing to the public the fact of the Hierarchy and the restoration of the Mysteries. Later, if these steps prove successful, other and more important reappearances will be possible, beginning with the return of the Christ.

But in the meantime, great and momentous happenings are taking place within the Hierarchy and in relation to Its Membership. Disciples upon the periphery of any Ashram are apt to be unobservant of the training and attitudes of Those Who are senior to them in an Ashram; they frequently overlook the fact that They too – from the Christ down to the humblest initiate – are in process of steady and increasing hierarchical discipline, training and instruction. Because the senior disciples and initiates have reached a goal which has seemed for long quite unattainable to the average aspirant, it is assumed that they have attained; the fact that they have only passed a milestone upon the endless Way of Bliss is entirely forgotten. But, owing to the impulsion of life itself, progress ever continues; knowledge must ever be transmuted into wisdom; love must ever be accompanied by divine will; planning must ever give way to divine purpose; light must ever be succeeded by life; from the Hierarchy, the initiate must pass to Shamballa, and from Shamballa he will follow one or other of the seven Paths; the Path of Evolution gives place to the Way of the Higher Evolution; planetary recognitions eventually expand into solar contacts; the Christ-consciousness eventually unfolds into something so all-inclusive that we have as yet no word for it or any need of words; recognition of the Father and of monadic being causes all lesser recognitions to fade out, and soul-consciousness and progressive life in form are no longer goals but are left far behind.

In spite of all this, it is necessary to remember that the gain of all experience for ever persists, nothing is ever lost; that which life in form has conferred is still in the possession of the immortal spiritual entity; that which the soul-consciousness has enfolded and included is still the rich endowment of Being, centered now in the Monad; hierarchical experience is merged into the purposes of the Council Chamber at Shamballa, but ability to work in the Hierarchy ever lasts because the hierarchical constitution and institution condition all manifestation – for what reason this is so, no one knows, but so is the divine Will.

In synthesis and in the all-inclusive awareness of the great Life which enfolds all that is, everything (except what we know as evil) is persistent and for ever endures.

You will have noted (if you are true students of what I have given out to the world) that information anent the Hierarchy has fallen into three major categories:

The work of the Hierarchy in relation to man and to the three worlds of human evolution.
The interior constitution of the Hierarchy and its internal activity.
Its superior relation to Shamballa and to extra-planetary livingness.

A great deal that has been conveyed to you in the two final categories has been merged by you into an interested but totally impractical realization that the Hierarchy apparently has a life of its own which proceeds independently of humanity and that it also has its own goals and objectives which are no concern of yours. These deductions are dependent upon your domination by the separative mind, for in reality the work and the activity proceeding in all three centers – Shamballa, the Hierarchy and Humanity – are merged, fused and interdependent; they are all mutually evocative and invocative.

The fact, for instance, that the Hierarchy is approaching closer to humanity and will eventually make an appearance upon the physical plane is due, not only to hierarchical intent, but to the demand of mankind and to the strong vibration and note which humanity has set up. To that extent, humanity controls some of the activities of the Hierarchy and thus precipitates action. At the same time, all that is happening can be traced to Shamballa, is inherent in divine purpose and is impulsed and impelled by Shamballa energy, distributed throughout the planet, via the Hierarchy in the majority of cases. Both the Hierarchy and Humanity are brought under the influence of extra-planetary forces which make their impact upon the planet, via Shamballa. Therefore, a great interdependence emerges, of which the head, heart and solar plexus centers in the individual man’s etheric body are symbols; their unified relation keeps the man functioning and demonstrating as a coherent whole at a particular level of consciousness. It is essential that students endeavor to grasp this, and so develop within themselves at least the rudiments of this synthetic unified grasp of living conditions and of a vital situation.

These instructions can aid all earnest aspirants and disciples to develop this type of understanding with as much speed and accuracy as possible. It is distinctive of the hierarchical type of mind: concerned with itself as a divine group, conscious of the pull and evocative power of the highest center, Shamballa, responsive to the demands of humanity, and sensitive to the “call” of that third major center through which the life of the planetary Logos expresses itself. The consciousness of the Master is therefore preoccupied with three main lines of responsibility, but only one of them is innate within the living organism of which He is a part; that aspect of His life is invocative in two directions: towards Shamballa and towards Humanity; to Him, the other two centers are evocative.

Today, human beings as a whole are so loudly invocative that the entire trend of the life of the Hierarchy and Its plans to date have been subjected to change, to postponement as far as certain interior and purely hierarchical determinations are concerned, and to a hastening of certain plans which were slated (if I may use such a word) to take place several centuries later than this but which – owing to the unexpected preparedness of humanity – can take place, not prematurely really, but securely and in the fullness of time; this fullness of time, as regards the particular planning with which we are dealing, is from now until the year 2025 A.D. – brief period of time indeed in which to see the consummation of the larger purpose of the planetary Logos, working through the three major centers within His body of manifestation. This purpose was threefold in nature:

It involved the ability of Those in the Council Chamber at Shamballa to react to and absorb certain extra-planetary energies and to use them in an intra-planetary sense. It had not been anticipated by the Directing Agents of these forces that our planetary Logos would achieve a certain goal so early in time and space as He has.
It involved a great expansion, numerically and in the consciousness of the Hierarchy. This predicates a great influx of initiates and disciples and a tremendous inflow of what is esoterically called “angelic essence” from the deva kingdom, under the direction of certain great Devas who have affiliated during the past two hundred years with the Hierarchy. This again had not been expected so early. The result of this happening has been that the door of initiation through which mankind passes stands wider open (symbolically speaking) than ever before, and at the same time, the Masters are passing with greater rapidity on to the Way of the Higher Evolution; this is due to the fact that initiates are fitting themselves so rapidly to take Their places, and disciples are moving on into initiate position so fast, that a great pressing forward has become legitimate.
It involved, finally, a great awakening in the human family and a major spiritual reorientation. This again had been believed possible of accomplishment when the sun passed into Capricorn about 2300 years hence. But – it has already taken place and necessarily has brought about a basic adjustment in the plans of the Hierarchy and a renewed emphasis upon the purpose, as registered in Shamballa.

This, being factual, and the time ripe for decision, has caused an intra-planetary ferment and great activity in the three major centers. In the last analysis (and this is the factor of supreme importance) this development – this unexpected right absorption of spiritual energy, and this seizing of spiritual opportunity – is due to humanity itself; above everything else, it is the readiness of mankind for that which is new, and humanity’s determination to create a new and better world, adapted more adequately to their “renewed” spiritual nature, that is responsible for all the activity.

In this section of our training themes (if I may call them so) we shall deal primarily with the response and the subsequent activity of the Hierarchy in relation to humanity. This will take the form of a new Approach and a reappearance exoterically.

It would be wise, therefore, to keep the following ideas constantly in mind; I will enumerate them sequentially and for the sake of clarity:

1. The work of the Hierarchy, throughout the ages, has been fundamentally threefold in nature:

A constant effort to set up a closer and more understanding relation with Shamballa. This involves:
An unfoldment of the will aspect in conjunction with a full use of intelligent love.
A constant adaptation of the developing Plan to the emerging, energizing Purpose.
An increasing ability to transmit energy from Shamballa to the three worlds, from the cosmic etheric levels to the cosmic dense physical planes.
To unfold – within the periphery of the hierarchical center – a life, a plan and a technique which will train all who find their way into an Ashram, which is in itself an aspect of the life of the Hierarchy. This ancient and intelligent effort has created and conditioned what you know as the Hierarchy. However, it is constantly subject to change in response to new situations and developments.
To represent, finally, within the Hierarchy, the qualities of all the seven Rays, through the medium of the seven major Ashrams and their allied and subsidiary Ashrams.

There are many other aspects of the hierarchical constitution and objectives, but these three are the ones with which we are at this time the most concerned.

2. Today, the relation of Shamballa to the Hierarchy is closer than at any previous time, owing to the following factors:

The one-pointed work and plan – pursued by the three great departments in the Hierarchy (the department of the Manu, that of the Christ, and that of the Lord of Civilization) – in which the three Leaders have unitedly acted as a Triangle of transmission between the Council Chamber of the Lord of the World and the Hierarchy. They are, all three, Members of the Council, though none of Them is yet working at the very center of affairs; in order to be of greater service in Their own sphere, They have taken Their stand upon the periphery of the Council’s influence.
The invocative work carried out both consciously and unconsciously by humanity itself, which has been of such a potency that it has penetrated beyond the ring-pass-not (symbolically understood) of the Hierarchy to Shamballa itself, and has evoked response. This invocative work reached a high point of potency as a result of the world war (1914-1945) and its note and appeal are still persistent.
The rapid development of integration among advanced people, which has forced many on to the Path of Discipleship, and therefore into certain of the Ashrams, and has likewise enabled many disciples to take initiation.

3. The recognition by a very much larger number of the general public of the fact of the Hierarchy; this has established a new type of relation between the Hierarchy and humanity. Hitherto the relation was dependent upon recognition, by advanced aspirants, of the nature of their position in relation to the Hierarchy; today, the recognition of thousands who are not in any way advanced aspirants or in any sense prepared for affiliation with the Hierarchy has created a new type of problem; it connotes to the Hierarchy a promising development, though at the same time an embarrassing one, requiring as it does a different mode of adjustment to human demands than that entailed by the admittance of disciples to Their Ashrams; it requires the attention of certain disciples and initiates in all the Ashrams and the ability of the Hierarchy to penetrate and dissipate the thick cloud of inchoate thought-forms which the bewildered, interested and curious public have created anent Them.

4. The use by the Hierarchy of the destroyer aspect of divinity, the first Ray, in such a manner that it is in fact a creative factor and one which, in the last analysis, not only releases the life from its previous limitations, but also calls in – under the Law of Balance – the building activity of the second Ray. The work of destruction is now practically accomplished and over, and the work of the Builders is beginning.

5. The new group of world servers has been created as an intermediate body between the Hierarchy and the general public. This group is divided into two lesser groups:

Those disciples and workers who are already integrated into some one of the Ashrams.
Intelligent and humanitarian aspirants and workers in world affairs and in all departments.

These two groups unitedly form a transmitting agency through which the Hierarchy can reach the mass of men with the new concepts, the techniques of the new civilization and the basic propositions under which humanity will move forward into greater light.

6. The recognition by humanity of its major problems, and the increasing ability of the general public to view these problems in terms of One Humanity, of the whole. This ability indicates to the Hierarchy the position of Humanity upon the Path at this time and the readiness of mankind for the new revelation – to be followed later by the restoration of the Mysteries.

7. The new orientation of the human family within itself to the concept of the One Humanity and the intensely alert spiritual demand which is today distinctive of mankind everywhere, and which has forced the Hierarchy to come to certain basic decisions and to readjust Itself to a much closer cooperation with the human center of life and purpose.

It is interesting to note (though it is of no immediate moment) that the work of destruction initiated by the Hierarchy during the past one hundred and seventy-five years (therefore since the year 1775) has in it the seeds – as yet a very long way from any germination – of the final act of destruction which will take place when the Hierarchy will be so completely fused and blended with Humanity that the hierarchical form will no longer be required. The three major centers will then become the two, and the Hierarchy will disappear and only Shamballa and Humanity will remain, only spirit or life, and substance as an expression of intelligent love will be left. This corresponds to the experience of the individual initiate at the fourth initiation, when the causal body, the soul body, disappears and only the monad and its expression, the personality (a fusion of soul and form) are left. This event of final dissolution will take place only at the close of our planetary existence, when the door to individualization is finally closed for a pralayic period and the Way of the Higher Evolution will be more closely trodden than the Path of Initiation.

Therefore, my brothers, the closer relation of the Hierarchy to Shamballa, the stimulation of its own interior life, and the readiness of humanity for revelation and for certain unexpected development, will condition the cycle into which we are now entering. This is, therefore, the most amazing period in the history of humanity. Added to this, it must be borne in mind that we are entering another greater round of the Zodiac, and this coincides with the lesser zodiacal activity because Aquarius governs the greater immediate cycle of 25,000 years and is also the sign into which the sun is now moving for a period of 2300 years – a most amazing happening and full of import in our planetary history; it is a coincidence of which our planetary Logos is well aware and of which He is making full and intelligent use. It is a cycle also wherein, for the first time, the three major planetary centers – Shamballa, Hierarchy and Humanity – are in direct and unimpeded relation, for today the alignment is correct and adjusted for the first time in planetary history. Even if this be only temporarily so, something has been initiated, the effects of which will never be lost. It is a cycle also in which the planetary Logos, having successfully taken initiation and thus affected His entire planetary life, has also established certain extra-planetary relationships which are necessarily incomprehensible to you and of no moment whatsoever to the individual human being, but which will eventually create a situation in which our planet will become a sacred planet. This process, as it unfolds and develops, will have a potent subjective and deeply spiritual effect upon every kingdom in nature and in the realm also of super nature.

Let us now proceed with our consideration of our theme, after our study of these basic premises.

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Excerpted from “The Externalization of the Hierarchy – Section IV – Stages in the Externalization”.

By Alice Bailey and Djwhal Kuhl

ॐ, Esoteric, Esoteric Psychology, Quotations, Rāja yoga

Initiation I – The Birth at Bethlehem

Initiation I – The Birth at Bethlehem – Ray VII

The Energy of Order or Ceremonial Magic.

First of all, let us consider the type of energy which the seventh ray expresses and wherein lies its potency and efficacy, from the angle of the initiation. As we study these initiations and their conditioning rays, we will divide our ideas into three parts:

The type of energy and its quality in relation to the processes of the particular initiation with which it is associated.
Its effect upon humanity, regarding humanity as a world disciple.
The stimulating nature of the energy as it expresses itself:

In the three aspects of the initiate’s nature – mental, astral and physical.

Through the soul-infused personality, the initiate “in good standing” – a phrase of the deepest occult implication.

At this particular time in world history, seventh ray energy is of a growing potency because it is the new and incoming ray, superseding the sixth ray which has for so long held sway. When we speak of ray energy we are in reality considering the quality and the will-purpose aspect of a certain great Life to Whom we give the name “Lord of a Ray.” You will find much about these Ray Lords in the earlier volumes of A Treatise on the Seven Rays. His divine intention, will, purpose, or the determined projection of His mind, creates a radiation or stream of energy which – according to type and quality – plays upon all forms of manifested life within our planetary ring-pass-not. These Lords of the Rays are the creating and sustaining energies which implement the Will of the planetary Logos. They cooperate with Him in the defining and the expression of His supreme purpose. Their radiating emanations are cyclically objectified and are cyclically withdrawn. As they radiate forth into the three worlds, the impacting energies produce changes, disturbances, progress and unfoldment; they create the needed new forms and vitalize and qualify that through which the immediate divine intention is expressing itself; they intensify both the quality and the receptivity of consciousness.

At other times, during the process of being withdrawn “to their own place,” they cause the fading out or the dying of form aspects, of institutions, and the “organizing organisms” (to use a peculiar phrase); they therefore produce cycles of destruction and of cessation and thus make room for those new forms and life expressions which an incoming ray will produce. It has been the gradual withdrawing of the sixth Ray of Idealism and of one-pointed Devotion which has been responsible for the ferment, crystallization, destruction, death and cleavages of the past century; old things are passing away as the Lord of the sixth Ray withdraws His attention, and therefore His energy; His radiation is today no longer centered or focused in the life of the three worlds. Simultaneously, the energy and radiation of the Lord of the seventh Ray are becoming steadily more powerful in the three worlds.

This incoming of a ray always produces an intensified period of initiatory activity, and this is the case today. The major effect, as far as humanity is concerned, is to make possible the presentation of thousands of aspirants and applicants for the first initiation; men on a large scale and in mass formation can today pass through the experience of the Birth Initiation. Thousands of human beings can experience the birth of the Christ within themselves and can realize that the Christ life, the Christ nature and the Christ consciousness are theirs. This “new birth” initiation of the human family will take place in Bethlehem, symbolically understood, for Bethlehem is the “house of bread” – an occult term signifying physical plane experience. These great initiations, implemented by the ray energies, must be registered in the physical brain and recorded by the waking consciousness of the initiate, and this must be the case in this amazing period wherein – for the first time since humanity appeared on Earth – there can take place a mass initiation. The experience need not be expressed in occult terms, and in the majority of cases will not be; the individual initiate who takes this initiation is aware of great changes in his attitude to himself, to his fellowmen, to circumstances and to his interpretation of life events. These are peculiarly the reactions which attend the first initiation; a new orientation to life and a new world of thought are registered by the initiate. This will be equally true on a large scale where modern man, the world initiate of the first degree, is concerned. Men will recognize the evidences in many lives of the emergence of the Christ-consciousness, and the standard of living will increasingly be adjusted to the truth as it exists in the teachings of the Christ.

This developing Christ-consciousness in the masses of men will create necessarily a ferment in the daily life of peoples everywhere; the life of the personality, oriented hitherto to the attaining of material and purely selfish ends, will be at war with the new and inner realization; the “carnal” man (to use the words of Paul, the initiate) will be battling the spiritual man, each seeking to achieve control. In the early stages, after the “birth” and during the “infancy of the Christ-Child” (again speaking in symbols), the material aspect is triumphant. Later, the Christ life triumphs. This you well know. Each initiation indicates a stage in the growth and the development of this new factor in the human consciousness and expression, and this continues until the third initiation, when there emerges the “full-grown man in Christ.” The initiate is then ready, at the fifth initiation, to register, realize and record the long awaited revelation.

In connection with the individual and the first initiation, the seventh ray is always active and the man is enabled consciously to register the fact of initiation because either the brain or the mind (and frequently both) are controlled by the seventh ray. It is this fact which is of importance today in connection with humanity, for it will enable mankind to pass through the door admitting them to the first initiatory process. It will be apparent to you why the present period in which human beings (in large groups) can take the first initiation corresponds to a situation in which bread is the major interest of men everywhere. Humanity will pass through this “birth” initiation and manifest the Christ life on a large scale for the first time during a period of economic adjustment of which the word “bread” is but a symbol. This period started in the year 1825 and will continue until the end of this century. The unfoldment of the Christ life – as a result of the presence and activities of the second divine aspect of love – will result in the ending of economic fear, and the “house of bread” will become the “house of plenty.” Bread – as the symbol of material human need – will eventually be controlled by a vast group of initiates of the first initiation – by those whose lives are beginning to be controlled by the Christ-consciousness, which is the consciousness of responsibility and service. These initiates exist in their thousands today; they will be present in their millions by the time the year 2025 arrives. All this, reorientation and unfoldment will be the result of the activity of the seventh ray and of the impact of its radiation upon humanity.

The seventh ray is, par excellence, the medium of relationship. It brings together the two fundamental aspects of spirit and matter. It relates soul and form and, where humanity is concerned, it relates soul and personality. In the first initiation, it makes the initiate aware of that relation; it enables him to take advantage of this “approaching duality” and – by the perfecting of the contact – to produce upon the physical plane the emergence into manifestation of the “new man.” At the first initiation, through the stimulation brought about by seventh ray energy, the personality of the initiate and the hovering over-shadowing soul are consciously brought together; the initiate then knows that he is – for the first time – a soul-infused personality. His task is now to grow into the likeness of what he essentially is. This development is demonstrated at the third initiation, that of the Transfiguration.

The major function of this seventh ray is to bring together the negative and positive aspects of the natural processes. It consequently governs the sex relationship of all forms; it is the potency underlying the marriage relation, and hence as this ray comes into manifestation in this world cycle, we have the appearance of fundamental sex problems – license, disturbance in the marriage relation, divorce and the setting in motion of those forces which will eventually produce a new attitude to sex and the establishing of those practices, attitudes and moral perceptions which will govern the relation between the sexes during the coming New Age.

The first initiation is therefore closely related to this problem. The seventh ray governs the sacral center and the sublimation of its energy into the throat or into the higher creative center; this ray is therefore setting in motion a period of tremendous creative activity, both on the material plane through the stimulation of the sex life of all peoples and in the three worlds through the stimulation brought about when soul and form are consciously related. The first major proof that humanity (through the medium of the majority of its advanced people) has undergone the first initiation will be the appearance of a cycle of entirely new creative art. This creative urge will take forms which will express the new incoming energies. Just as the period governed by the sixth ray has culminated in a world wherein men work in great workshops and factories to produce the plethora of objects men deem needful for their happiness and well-being, so in the seventh ray cycle we shall see men engaged on an even larger scale in the field of creative art. Devotion to objects will eventually be superseded by the creation of that which will more truly express the Real; ugliness and materiality will give place to beauty and reality. On a large scale, humanity has already been “led from darkness to light” and the light of knowledge fills the land. In the period which lies ahead and under the influencing radiation of the seventh ray, humanity will be “led from the unreal to the Real.” This the first initiation makes possible for the individual and will make possible for the mass of men.

Seventh ray energy is the energy needed to bring order out of chaos and rhythm to replace disorder. It is this energy which will bring in the new world order for which all men wait; it will restore the ancient landmarks, indicate the new institutions and forms of civilization and culture which human progress demands, and nurture the new life and the new states of consciousness which advanced humanity will increasingly register. Nothing can arrest this activity; all that is happening today as men search for the new ways, for organized unity and peaceful security, is being implemented through the incoming Ray of Order or Ceremonial Magic. The white magic of right human relations cannot be stopped; it must inevitably demonstrate effectively, because the energy of this seventh ray is present, and the Lord of the Ray is cooperating with the Lord of the World to bring about the needed “reforming.” Soul-infused personalities, acting under this ray influence, will create the new world, express the new qualities and institute those new regimes and organized modes of creative activity which will demonstrate the new livingness and the new techniques of living. It is the distortion of these seventh ray ideals and the prostitution of this incoming energy to serve the unenlightened and selfish ambitions of greedy men which has produced those totalitarian systems which today so terribly imprison the free spirit of men.

To sum up what I have said:

The energy of the seventh ray is the potent agent of initiation when taken on the physical plane, that is, during the process of the first initiation.

Its effect upon humanity will be:

To bring about the birth of the Christ-consciousness among the masses of intelligently aspiring human beings.

To set in motion certain relatively new evolutionary processes which will transform humanity (the world disciple) into humanity (the world initiate).

To establish in a new and intelligible manner the ever-existent sense of relationship and thus bring about upon the physical plane right human relations. The agent of this is goodwill, a reflection of the will-to-good of the first divine aspect. Of this first Ray of Will or Purpose, goodwill is the reflection.

To readjust negative and positive relationships, and – today – this will be carried forward primarily in connection with the sex relation and marriage.

To intensify human creativity and thus bring in the new art as a basis for the new culture and as a conditioning factor in the new civilization.

To reorganize world affairs and so initiate the new world order. This is definitely in the realm of ceremonial magic.

The stimulation of this seventh ray will, in relation to the individual initiate,

Bring into being upon the mental plane a widespread and recognized relation between the soul and the mind.

Produce a measure of order in the emotional processes of the initiate, thus aiding the preparatory work of the second initiation.

Enable the initiate – upon the physical plane – to establish certain service relationships, to learn the practice of elementary white magic, and to demonstrate the first stage of a truly creative life.

As far as the individual initiate is concerned, the effect of seventh ray energy in his life is potent in the extreme; this is easily realized, owing to the fact that his mind and his brain are conditioned by the seventh ray at the time that the initiatory process is consciously taking place. The effect of this upon the mental plane is similar to that seen – on a much larger scale – in the planet, for it was this ray energy which the planetary Logos utilized when He brought together the major dualities of spirit and matter at the commencement of His creative work. The two aspects of the mind (the lower concrete mind and the soul, the Son of Mind) become more closely related and enter eventually into a conscious, recognized association on the astral plane; it is the seventh ray which restores order within the astral consciousness, and (on the mental plane) it is this influence which produces creativity, the organizing of the life, and the bringing together “within the head” of the lower and higher energies in such a manner that “the Christ is born.” This latter point we shall consider in some detail when we take up the significance of the initiations; we shall then find that the relationship between the pituitary body and the pineal gland is involved.

Finally, it is seventh ray energy which – in the initiatory process between the first and the second initiations – enables the initiate (in his physical plane life) to demonstrate a developing sense of order and of organization, to express consciously and increasingly a desire to help his fellowmen, and thereby establish relationship with them, and to make his life creative in many ways.

All these factors are embryonic in his nature, but he now begins to consciously lay the foundation for the future initiatory work; the physical disciplines are at this time of great importance, though their value is frequently over-emphasized and their effect is not always good; the relationships established and fostered are sometimes of small value, owing to the disciple being usually self-centered and thus lacking – from ignorance and lack of discrimination – complete purity of motive. Nevertheless, the changes brought about by the influence of this ray become increasingly effective from life to life; the disciple’s relation to the Hierarchy, the reorganizing of his life on the physical plane, and his growing effort to demonstrate the esoteric sense of white magic will become more and more vital, until he is ready for the second initiation.

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Initiation I – The Birth at Bethlehem

I have preserved the above Christian nomenclature because of its familiarity and because (symbolically speaking) it conveys an aspect of a major truth. Just as the birth of a child is an entrance into light, literally speaking, and the beginning of an entirely new way of life, so each successive initiation is in an exactly similar manner an entrance into light, involving the revelation of a different world to the one hitherto known, and the undergoing of entirely new experiences. If students would keep this symbology and this definition carefully in mind, they would arrive at a keener concept of the processes which lie ahead of them. This is particularly true in connection with this first initiation; the analogy holds good from the very dawn of history, where humanity is considered.

In ancient Lemuria, with the coming in of the mental idea and mechanism, the low grade animal life (which, to a certain extent, looked human but was definitely mindless, unknowing and unseeing) became suddenly aware of that which threw light upon its way. It meant little to the animal men of those days, but it came increasingly to have significance as millennia of years elapsed; civilizations came and went; races developed and disappeared. In Lemurian days, the indwelling light of perception (though it was a perception so remote from ours as to be practically inconceivable) revealed the physical world and that found upon it which the human being of that time would deem desirable. Later, in Atlantean times, that same indwelling light and unfolding light of the mind served to reveal the world of emotions, and in the later half of that period it revealed the more aesthetic values; the arts began to flourish; color and beauty were registered. In our more modern Aryan race, the light has revealed the world of thought and has brought us to a synthesis of the senses; these senses were developed in earlier cycles of human living. Each of these three races, in a mysterious manner, has a correspondence on a racial scale to the first three initiations.

Today, as we enter the new era, the symbology of the fourth initiation, that of the Renunciation, has application; men face the necessity of renouncing the material values and of substituting the spiritual. The ferment of the initiation process goes on all the time, undermining the materialism of the race of men, revealing more and more of the reality underlying the phenomenal world (the only world recognized by the Lemurians) and – at the same time – providing that cultural field of experience in which those sons of men who are ready to do so can undergo the five initiations, technically understood. This is the factor of importance. This, therefore, is our starting point.

The historical process can (and will) reveal the gradual entrance of mankind into ever-expanding “lighted areas” of consciousness; into these areas the way of evolutionary unfoldment has led the race of men right up to the point where there are many, many thousands (and millions if you consider all of humanity – those in incarnation today and those that are out of incarnation upon the inner planes) who have been enabled to step out of the lighted field of the three worlds into another area where the light of the mind can be blended with the still greater light of the soul. They have (in past lives, even though recollection may be lacking) undergone the birth experience and initiation, and as a result of this, that which can reveal what the mind is unable to illumine is now developing and functioning within them. The “light of life” is now available, in a sense far more literally true than you can at this time perceive, and each successive initiation will see this fact more clearly demonstrated. The Birth Initiation lies behind in the experience of many, and this is factually proved by the lives of those who are consciously and willingly oriented towards the light, who see a wider world than that of their own selfish interests, who are sensitive to the Christ life and to the spiritual consciousness in their fellowmen and who see an horizon and vistas of contact unperceived by the average man; they realize a possible spiritual achievement, unknown and undesired by those whose lives are conditioned entirely by either the emotions or the lower concrete mind. At this stage of unfoldment they have a sense of conscious dualism, knowing the fact of the existence of that “something other” than the phenomenal, emotional and mental self.

The first initiation might be regarded as the goal and the reward of the mystical experience; it is fundamentally not an occult experience in the true sense of the term, for it is seldom accurately realized or consciously prepared for, as is the case of the later initiations, and this is why the first two initiations are not considered major initiations. In the mystical realization there is naturally and normally an emphasis upon dualism, but in the new area of unfoldment – visioned and later to be struggled for and attained, initiation by initiation – unity is achieved and dualism disappears. Students should therefore have in mind the following definite occult concept: The mystical Way leads to the first initiation. Having achieved its purpose, it is then renounced, and the “lighted Way” of occultism is then followed, leading to the lighted areas of the higher states of consciousness.

Thus both ways are seen to be essential; the mystical way is for the majority at this time, and an increasingly large number of mystics will emerge out of the modern masses of men; paralleling this, the occult way is attracting more and more of the world intelligentsia. Its experience is not basically religious, as the orthodox churchman understands the word. The way of science is as deeply needed by mankind as is the way of religion, for “God” is found equally on both ways. The scientific way leads the aspirant into the world of energies and forces, which is the true world of occult endeavor, revealing the Universal Mind and the workings of that great Intelligence which created the manifested universe. The “new man” who has come to birth at the first initiation must and will tread the occult or scientific way, which inevitably leads him out of the world of mysticism into the scientific and assured perception of God as life or energy.

The first initiation marks the beginning of a totally new life and mode of living; it marks the commencement of a new manner of thinking and of conscious perception. The life of the personality in the three worlds has for aeons nurtured the germ of this new life and fostered the tiny spark of light within the relative darkness of the lower nature. This process is now being brought to a close, though it is not at this stage entirely discontinued, for the “new man” has to learn to walk, to talk, and to create; the consciousness is now, however, being focused elsewhere. This leads to much pain and suffering until the definite choice is made, a new dedication to service is vouchsafed, and the initiate is ready to undergo the Baptism Initiation.

Members of the New Group of World Servers should watch with care for all those who show signs of having passed through the “birth” experience and should help them toward a greater maturity. They should assume that all those who truly love their fellowmen, who are interested in the esoteric teaching, and who seek to discipline themselves in order to attain greater beauty of life, are initiate and have undergone the first initiation. When they discover those who are seeking mental polarization and who evidence a desire and aspiration to think and to know, coupled with the distinguishing marks of those who have taken the first initiation, they can, in all probability, safely assume that such people have taken the second initiation or are on the verge of so doing. Their duty will then be clear. It is by this close observation on the part of the world servers that the ranks of the New Group are filled. Today, the opportunity and the stimulation are so great that all servers must keep alert, developing in themselves the ability to register the quality for which search must be made, and giving the help and guidance which will weld into one cooperative band those disciples and initiates who should prepare the way for the Christ.

The first initiation should be regarded as instituting a new attitude towards relationships. This is not yet the case. The relationships hitherto recognized, speaking generally, have been those karmically, physically and emotionally instituted; they are largely objective and predominantly concern the phenomenal plane with its contacts, duties, responsibilities and obligations. The new relationships however, to be increasingly recognized, are subjective and may have but little phenomenal indication. They embrace the recognition of those who must be served; they involve the expansion of the individual consciousness into a growing group awareness; they lead eventually to an eager response to hierarchical quality and to the magnetic pull of the Ashram. Such a development in the recognition of relationships leads finally to a recognition of the Presence of the Christ and to relationship with Him. With the recognition of and the relationship to the planetary Logos we need not at this point deal. All these relationships begin, in their truest connotation and with a correctly realized objective, at the birth of the “new man.” To this the Christ referred when He said: “Except a man be born again, he cannot see the Kingdom of God.” I am here using the Christian terminology but prefer to speak of the “new man” rather than the strictly Christian phrase “the birth of the Christ Child in the heart.” It is by means of the touchstone of relationships that world servers can contact the initiates and the accepted disciples in the world, and can discover those aspirants who can be helped and trained.

Let me bring another point to your attention. In the phenomenal world of the average human being who has not yet passed through the initiatory experience of the rebirth, the emphasis has ever been and is today upon the dual relationship of the sexes and to this our novels, plays, movies and affairs of all men bear testimony. Creativity expresses itself mainly through the propagation of the race, brought about through the relation of male and female, or of the positive and negative poles in the human family. This is right and good and part of the divine Plan. Even though men have prostituted their capacities and debased their relationships, the basic plan is divine and ideal. After the first initiation, the entire sex relationship shifts gradually and steadily into its proper place as simply a natural phase of existence in the three worlds and as one of the normal and correct appetites, but the emphasis changes. The higher experience and correspondence, that of which physical sex is only the symbol, becomes apparent. Instead of male and female, there emerges the magnetic relationship between the now negative personality and the positive soul, with consequent creativity upon the higher planes. Of this relationship the head center and the center between the eyebrows (the ajna center) are the agents and eventually – through the medium of the pituitary body and the pineal gland – they condition the personality, rendering it soul-infused.

I have given you so much information anent initiation and the rays and centers in my many books that there is no need for me to repeat it here; there is, however, great need for you to collect and tabulate the scattered information so that you can register it as a whole. Many who read these instructions and who study the books I have written are in process of preparation for one or other of the initiations, and the entire theme should therefore be of major interest to you. You should decide (at least tentatively) which initiation lies ahead of you and then discover all you possibly can about it and its prerequisites, endeavoring to make practical application of the imparted information; either that which I give to you is true or it is not; if true, it is vital to your future progress and you should aim at achieving a measure of real understanding.

You have been taught that the activity or the inactivity of the centers conditions the personality, working through the endocrine system; the energies which the centers channel and the forces which they generate can be controlled and directed by the soul, by the spiritual man. You have likewise been told that the energy of the sacral center (the center most implicated and active at the time of the first initiation) has to be transmuted and raised to the throat center, thereby transforming the physical creative act into the creative process of producing the good, the beautiful and the true. This is the ABC of your fundamental knowledge: the transmutation of sex. In that transmutative process men have greatly erred and have approached the subject from two angles:

They have sought to stamp out natural desire and have endeavored to emphasize an enforced celibacy; they have thus frequently warped the nature and subjected the “natural man” to rules and regulations which were not of divine intent.
They have tried – at the other extreme – to exhaust normal sexual desire by promiscuity, license and perversions, damaging themselves and laying up the basis for trouble for many incarnations ahead.

True transmutation is in reality the achieving of a correct sense of proportion in relation to any phase of human life, and for the race of men today has particular reference to the sacral center and the energies which bring it into activity. When a proper recognition of the place the sex life should play in the daily life is paralleled by the concentration of thought anent the throat center, that center becomes automatically magnetic and attracts the forces of the sacral center upward through the spine into “the place of creative building”; the normal sex life is then regulated and not atrophied, and is relegated to its rightful place as one of the usual faculties or appetites with which man is endowed; it is brought under control through the lack of directed interest and is subordinated to the law of the land as regards its relation to its opposite pole – either negative and feminine or masculine and positive. To the aspirant it becomes mainly the agent for the creation of the vehicles needed for reincarnating souls. Thus by force of example, by the avoiding of all extremes, by the dedication of the bodily energies to the higher uses, and by the acceptance of the law of the land in any given country and at any given time, the present disorder and the current misuse of the sex principle will give way to orderly living and to the right use of this major bodily function.

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Excerpted from “The Rays and the Initiations, Section Two – The Aspirant and the Major Initiations”.

By Alice Bailey and Djwhal Kuhl

ॐ, Esoteric, Esoteric Psychology, New Age, Rāja yoga

How Would You Recognize an Initiate?

If you are a regular reader you will know that I read / have read the blue books opus. From time to time, I quote extensively from them and add emphasis. This is because every time I read a piece I “see” something I have missed and almost never fail to get some additional insight on a re-read.

The number of people who have familiarity with the blue books is high and growing.

They talk about an externalising hierarchy of initiates, disciples and probationers alongside regular humanity.

If the principle excitement for someone is publishing inane selfies on social media their orientation towards life will differ markedly from those who delve with application into the blue books.

There are masonic societies and they have initiates. My ex special forces pathfinder hairdresser was trying for one of these. He thought I was possibly ex-military and therefore at ease to talk with me. There are academic societies who have fellows {jolly good}. I was once a member of two of these. There are shamanic initiations and these can include strong hallucinogens. There are sweat lodge initiations and tribal rites of passage. One can be initiated into gang culture.

What would a first or second degree initiate be like, would they even know that there were, an initiate? One of the American presidents was an initiate if memory serves me right. The Tibetan says that teachings are best given out by disciples and early stage initiates because the presentation will be closer and therefore more palatable and comprehendible to humanity. Inherent in that is the notion that first or second degree initiates would be similar to noninitiates though probably less selfish and with a larger dosage of goodwill.

If I understand it correctly an initiate of the fifth degree has taken the fourth initiation and is awaiting the fifth. At this stage they have no causal body, no self and no personality {occultly understood}. It is likely therefore that they would appear as a strange fish to those who are obsessed with their personality whether integrated or otherwise. Their vehicle may look human, but the contents would differ from Joe public.

They could walk around in the world “well disguised” and at first look / seem normal. On interaction that similarity might start to cease. They would probably not be interested in posting selfies, nor in what happened in East Enders, or the World Cup.

Many people have attended a correspondence course on the blue books opus. These will have a particular style of writing and responding. Some of these might be initiates. Most would be probationary disciples or disciples. If you recognised the style of writing because you had practised it yourself, you could recognise a fellow traveller.

I’ll speculate that it would only be through interaction that one might to start to recognise an initiate, but you would also have to be sufficiently evolved and ready so to do.

ॐ, Esoteric, Esoteric Psychology, Quotations, Rāja yoga

Initiation VII – The Resurrection

There is no idea more cultivated subjectively by humanity than that of the resurrection; when life seems hard and circumstances carry in them no grounds for happiness, and when nothing calls to one of such a nature that one goes forth happily to the day’s enterprises, and when the nights of sleep are haunted nights, the thought of rising up and out of all these circumstances, of leaving all behind and of entering into a new life, carries with it strength and hope. In the West, the Festival of the year which is regarded as of the most importance is that of Easter Day – the Day of Resurrection. Yet two thousand years ago the Christ did not rise out of a rocky sepulchre and reassume His discarded body. He passed through the great seventh initiation which we will consider today, and knew the secret of life, of which immortality is only one of its many attributes. Humanity lays emphasis so frequently upon attribute, quality and reactions, and not upon that which is the basic underlying reality; men deal with effects and not with causes; for instance, mankind is concerned with war and with horrified preparations for more war, and is not primarily occupied with that which causes war and which, if rightly handled, would prevent war. Let us consider some few aspects of the seventh initiation.

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The word “resurrection” has deep significance latent in its derivation and one that is not often emphasized. The usual interpretation has been that the word comes from “re,” again, and “surgere,” to rise, therefore to rise again. Yet a consultation with the dictionary shows that the prefix means “back to an original state” by rising. This return to an original state is pictured for us in The New Testament under the story of the Prodigal Son, who said “I will arise and go to my Father,” and by the story of the resurrection in which the Master Jesus arose out of the tomb; the chains of death could not hold Him. At that time of His “rising,” a far more important event took place and the Christ passed through the seventh Initiation of Resurrection and returned back to His original state of Being – to remain there throughout all the eternities. This is the true and final resurrection. The Son of God has found His way back to the Father and to His originating Source, that state of Existence to which we have given the name Shamballa. The consciousness of the Universal Life is His; this is far more than simply the consciousness of immortality, because the idea or concept of mortality is not contained within it at all. There have been many deaths within the aeonial life cycle of the initiate:

The familiar and constantly recurring death of the physical body, incarnation after incarnation.
The deaths of the astral and the mental vehicles, as the undying soul discards them life after life – only to create new ones until mastery is attained.
Then – as a result of the incarnating process and its evolutionary effects – there comes the death of desire and its replacing by a growing spiritual aspiration.
Then, through right use of the mind, comes the “death” of the personality or, rather, its repudiation and renouncing of all that is material.
This is followed by the death or destruction of the causal or soul body at the great Initiation of Renunciation.

This process of death and resurrection goes on ceaselessly in all the kingdoms of nature; each death prepares the way for a greater loveliness and livingness, and each death (if you analyze it with care) prefaces resurrection in some form or another until we come to this final resurrection and into the position of final attainment.

I will not here elaborate upon this process of constant death followed by constant resurrection, but it is the evolutionary keynote and the evolutionary technique, and only because men love unduly that which is material and hate to lose contact with the form aspect of nature do they fear death. It is wise to remember that immortality is an aspect of the living spiritual being, and is not an end in itself, as men seek to make it. To the Knowers of Life such a phrase as “I am an immortal Soul” is not even true. To say “I am Life Itself and, therefore, am immortal” approaches closer to the truth, but even that sentence is (from the angle of the initiate) only a part of a larger truth. Symbolically, nature is ever portraying to us the essential facts in the annual progress of the four seasons, in the cycles of light and dark and in the wonder of the emergence of beauty or color or useful function out of a seed which has struggled – because of its inherent life – into the light of the sun.

The fear of death is one of the great abnormalities or distortions of divine truth for which the Lords of Cosmic Evil are responsible. When in early Atlantean times they emerged from the place where they had been confined, and forced temporarily the retirement of the Great White Lodge to subjective levels, their first great act of distortion was to implant in human beings fear, beginning with the fear of death. From that time on, men have laid the emphasis upon death and not life, and have been ridden by fear all their days.

One of the initial acts of the reappearing Christ and of the Hierarchy will be to erase this particular fear and to confirm in peoples’ minds the idea that incarnation and the taking of a form is the true place of darkness to the divine spirit which is man; it is death to the spirit temporarily, and imprisonment. Evolution, men will be taught, is in itself an initiatory process leading from one living experience to another, culminating in the fifth Initiation of Revelation and in the seventh Initiation of Resurrection.

At the fifth initiation it is revealed to the initiate that life in form is indeed death, and he then knows this truth in a manner which my few short words cannot convey. Form dies for him and he knows a new expansion of life and undergoes (if I may so express it) a new understanding of living. The seventh initiation is divorced from all considerations of form, and the initiate becomes a concentrated point of living light; he knows in a manner indescribable that life is all that Is, and that it is this life and its real fullness which makes him a part of That which lies outside of our planetary Life; he may now share in that extra-planetary Existence in which our planetary Logos lives and moves and has His being. This is the “life more abundantly” of which Christ spoke and which only an initiate of the seventh degree can understand or convey.

After the fifth initiation, the initiate has slowly been sensing the nature of this greater Life, the Life of “The Unknown God,” as it has been called, which enfolds all livingness and all forms upon and within our planet and yet remains – greater than our planetary Life, more all-encompassing than is our planetary Logos, and Whose greatness, beauty, goodness and knowledge are to our planetary Logos what His life is to the lowest form of life in the third or animal kingdom. It is only by such inadequate comparisons that one can arrive at some faint comprehension of that great Whole in which our planet and our planetary Logos are but a part. It is this revelation which is accorded to the initiate at this seventh Initiation of Resurrection. He takes this initiation upon what (for lack of a better phrase) we call the “logoic plane,” or on the level of consciousness of the Lord of the World.

At this initiation the Initiator is attended by two groups of Beings; one is a small group of the “Knowers of the Purpose, the Custodians of the Will,” and the other is a much larger group, the personnel of which are known as “The Wise Ones and the Attractive Energies of Shamballa.” I am of course endeavoring to translate certain brief words and intricate symbols into phrases which you can understand and which only dimly convey the true significance of Those Who function on this highest level of the cosmic physical plane. On this level, dynamic electricity is held as in a great reservoir of potency and is directed by these two groups which embody the will and the quality of the will of Deity, called by us the Will-to-Good. They are the directing Agents and are a correspondence to the ajna center of mankind, only here it is the ajna center of the planetary Logos, in the same sense as Shamballa is His head center, the Hierarchy His heart center and Humanity His creative throat center. Motion, planned activity and the seven great creative ray energies are directed into action by Them under the influence of the seven Ray Lords; the Ray Lords are embodied livingness qualified by the seven aspects of Love, but Who are Themselves of so high an order that They cannot function as directing creative Agents but work through Their trained and developed Representatives.

Just as there is a group of Contemplative Initiates, called in the Eastern phraseology “Nirmanakayas,” Who function in deep meditation at a point midway between the Hierarchy and Shamballa, so this much higher group of Ray Lords function in the deepest cosmic meditation between our planet, the Earth, and our sister planet, Venus. You would find it useful to read with care The Secret Doctrine and A Treatise on Cosmic Fire and refresh your minds as to this relationship. A lower correspondence to these two important groups has been forming midway between the Hierarchy and Humanity, and to it we give the name of the New Group of World Servers. All these three groups are fundamentally “transmitters of energy”; the two highest are exceedingly susceptible to cosmic impression and to the vibratory quality of the extra-planetary body of Avatars Who hold Themselves in readiness to function as destroying or building Energies in any part of our solar system and are under the direction of the Solar Logos.

The Avatar of Synthesis, Who is working in cooperation with the Christ, is one of Them. Bear in mind that these extra-planetary Avatars have not arrived at Their high state of spiritual unfoldment on our planet or even in our solar system. Their origin, source and spiritual relationships are a great mystery even to the planetary Logoi – to Whose help They go when the invocative appeal of any planet is adequate. Think not that They come to put wrong right or to arrest evil. A few, a very few, may do so, but They work along the line of the seven ray energies in the solar system and produce certain energy effects desired at any particular time; the constructive work of the Avatar of Synthesis will be apparent to you in the name He is known by; He is coming to the Earth in order to further the manifestation of unity, of oneness and of interrelation, and He comes, therefore, to wield and apply first ray energy. He will charge or galvanize the three groups – the directing Agents in Shamballa, the Nirmanakayas and the New Group of World Servers – with dynamic energy and, in a mysterious way, relate them to each other so that a new synthesis and alignment will be present upon the Earth. All these Avatars embody energy to the extent that any particular planet is capable of receiving it.

These are interesting items of information but are only of value in so far as they convey to you a sense of planetary integrity and of solar synthesis, and present to you a closer spiritual interrelation in which you, as individuals, can share if you are linking your fate and service to that of the New Group of World Servers. Then you will be in the direct line of spiritual descent, of divine energy; in this thought you have the clue to the doctrine (so travestied and misused) of the Apostolic Succession. The details, the personnel and the techniques of the two higher groups lie beyond your ken; They work in cooperation with the planetary Logos Himself, and Those Who compose these groups are all initiates of degrees higher than the fifth. Most of the Nirmanakayas have taken the sixth and the seventh initiations, whilst the group which functions midway between the Earth and Venus have all taken the eighth and ninth initiations. Some of Them, as I mentioned earlier, aid the initiate of the seventh degree; a still larger group of them participate in the activities of the two final initiations.

This seventh initiation gives the initiate the right to “come and go in the courts of Shamballa” as Their work may dictate and Their service may require. It is there also that he goes for the needed periodic or cyclic rechargings which enable him to work.

There is one aspect of initiation which is apt to be overlooked. Every initiation is a process of energy transmission from a higher center of energy to a lower; every initiation charges the initiate with electrical force, and this charging and recharging is related to what H.P.B. calls “the mystery of electricity.” These transmissions of energy enhance the magnetic-attractive force of the initiate, and at the same time are eliminative in their effects. In this fact lies a great planetary truth and the key to the science of planetary redemption. When the spiritual and the electrical charging of the three major centers on the planet – Shamballa, the Hierarchy and Humanity – has reached a high stage of receptive efficiency, a certain cosmic Avatar will “become conscious of the vibratory quality of the little point of light within the solar sphere” and will then “turn His gaze and send His force unto that point of light, and cosmic evil will be driven out and find no more a place on Earth.”

Two more initiations remain to be considered, but so high is their potency and so mysterious their working that I find myself unable to deal with them in any way.

Decision Making, Esoteric, Esoteric Psychology, Quotations, Rāja yoga

The Sixth Initiation of Decision.

I would like to enlarge somewhat upon an earlier remark. I stated that the “seven Ashrams are ‘proving grounds’ for all the Masters confronted with the sixth Initiation of Decision.”

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This constitutes part of the problem facing the Masters Who are thus to move forward; it is particularly crucial for Those Who have chosen the first Path, the Path of Earth Service, and for all in preparation for the sixth initiation. This process of changing for a final, conditioning decision – in line, consciously realized, with divine Purpose and entailing responsiveness to Shamballa – is a major undertaking; it is related to the development of understanding the Will, and concerns the spirit or life aspect; it involves an increasing revelation of the purpose and the “fixed intention” of the planetary Logos but (even more than that) it has relation to extra-planetary sources and energies and to those cosmic conditions which are responsible for the Presence of Sanat Kumara upon the Earth. It is will which has brought Him here, and the unfoldment of the will nature of the Masters and still higher Initiates admits Them into His inner deliberations by means of the highest form of telepathic rapport or impression to be found upon our planet. This impression is, however, made possible by the development of the intuition, and has no relation to the mind nature.

This training in decision is given by forcing the Master to make basic decisions within His Ashram affecting world work and involving all within the Ashram. It is given by His admission to the conclave of the Masters, meeting every seven years. At that conclave They make decisions which concern all forms of life in all the kingdoms in the three worlds and their evolutionary progress; it is put to the test in group form when the entire Hierarchy meets at Its centennial conference and – at that time – decides what form of crisis, on what level of consciousness, and involving what group of lives, must be implemented and presented to humanity, though the other kingdoms of nature will be necessarily implicated. The reason for this is that the meeting of such a planned crisis will hasten certain realizations. Forget not that humanity grows through the presentation of moments of crisis. These moments of crisis, based on past karma, conditioned by the point in evolution already achieved, and on the presence in the three worlds of certain appropriate ray forces, are brought to the point of precipitation by united decision in the conclave of the Masters.

These decisions do not affect man’s free will, for the Hierarchy does nothing to condition man’s approach to the crisis and, occultly speaking, Their “attitude is deliberately turned to other things” during the period of man’s decision; thus the potency of Their thinking does not affect the human mind. Once the precipitation of the crisis is complete, and humanity has begun to take action of some kind, then the full attention of the Masters, working through Their Ashrams, is committed to the giving of full assistance to all those who are seeking to guide humanity along correct lines – a relative few among the countless millions of the ignorant.

While these centennial conclaves are being held at the close of the first twenty-five years of every century, the Lord of the World with the Members of His Council watch the process of decision in order to see how far the will of the Hierarchy conforms to that aspect of the divine will which should be expressed in the three worlds as the result of Their decision. They watch also Those particular Masters Who should in a short time be ready for the sixth initiation, in order to see how much of that divine will They register and what is the nature and quality of Their use of it. By recording that quality, the Council at Shamballa is able to determine with great accuracy which of the seven Paths a certain Initiate will choose. In this manner They become aware of how many senior disciples will be needed to take over the headship of an Ashram, with a consequent admittance of many disciples to the initiation next in order for them. At the same time, aspirants on the periphery of an Ashram are enabled to move forward into full ashramic participation.

All this should give you some idea of the synthesis which expresses itself through the three planetary centers: Shamballa, the Hierarchy and Humanity. These are responsible for the conditioning of the other planetary centers and the consequent demonstration of divine intention. The basic purpose of Sanat Kumara is to bring about right relations in every field of His manifested life. {our world, our planet} The encouraging factor is today that the activity of humanity itself is, for the first time, concerned with the entire subject of right human relations and how to bring it about. I would have you reflect on this, for it means that, again for the first time, humanity is consciously responding to the will and intention of Shamballa, even though without realizing the esoteric implications. This is of far greater importance than you can imagine, for it signifies a new relationship of a spiritual nature and deeply spiritual results.

The preparation of the Masters for this sixth initiation is exceedingly strenuous. They find it as difficult to achieve Their goal as does the average disciple as he looks ahead at the initiation which immediately confronts him. They have to master the technique of handling the most potent energy and influence in the world, that of the intelligence. They have to penetrate into the mystery of electricity and implement its expression in the creative process under the directive of Shamballa; They have to learn to work with electric fire in the same way as – much earlier – They worked with fire by friction as personalities, and with solar fire as disciples and lesser initiates. In this way, They become familiarized with what is meant by the words the “Central Spiritual Sun,” just as They were familiar with the appearance of the physical Sun when members of the human family, and with the “Heart of the Sun” as Members of the Hierarchy. Again you can see the same unfolding synthesis – a synthesis which originates in that focal point of attractive dynamic energy, known to us as the Sun and its planets.

Thus within His Ashram the Master learns “occultly to decide” and to condition the creative center for which He is responsible. He has to do this with the Ashram, surrounded by all those who are in training and who are the agents of His will. Through them He must act, and they thereby limit necessarily the vision to which He reacts, and step down the rate and quality of the energy of which He is the focal point. This energy constitutes the animating life of the Ashram as well as the force which the disciples and initiates must use in their work in the world, this of course in cooperation with the energy which each disciple within himself “occultly generates” and for which he – in his lesser degree – is responsible.

More anent this subject will be given when we study specifically the nine initiations wherein another synthesis, interlocking with the synthesis of the Will, will appear.

The Seven Paths confronting the Master

It will be apparent to you now that the Master confronts two crises:

The crisis of the will, as it demonstrates in unalterable decision.
The crisis of the new step which will probably “cast Him adrift upon the shore of some distant sphere wherein His will must be expressed in love.” These ambiguous words of the Old Commentary mean that His decision will (with one exception) take Him away from all that He has hitherto known.

The majority of the Masters then enter into realms wherein They are needed “to impart, strengthen and enlighten that which is already fused, already strong and already full of light, but which needs that which He brings in order to express the all-encompassing whole.”

I have to leave you with these words as food for reflection as there is little further that I may say upon this point. In any case and for all deciding groups of Masters, the work with the Hierarchy is over, except for the few Who choose Path I. Part of the mistake which the Buddha made was connected with this subject of decision. He loved humanity so much that He felt He could not and did not choose the Path which He was in reality ordained to follow; He chose instead the Path of Earth Service – which was not His Path at all. This He knows and will in due time pass on to His rightful Path. This little incident will demonstrate the complete freedom of choice which distinguishes the sixth initiation.

The seven Paths are, as you know from your study of Initiation, Human and Solar the following:

The Path of Earth Service.
The Path of Magnetic Work.
The Path of Training for Planetary Logoi.
The Path to Sirius.
The Ray Path.
The Path on which our Logos is found.
The Path of Absolute Sonship.

In that first book which I wrote for the world, I gave a simple definition of the exoteric significance of these Paths – so simple as to convey but little. I wrote then for the general public. I will now endeavor to convey some of the deeper meanings, writing as I do for advanced disciples and for initiates who – reading between the lines and understanding the symbolism involved – will comprehend according to their point in evolution.

As we approach the subject of the seven Paths, I would point out that the only basic point which can be presented to you is that of relationship. All these seven Paths lead to some objective which is thereby put in touch with our planetary life; these objectives – with the life and conditions they represent – present to the Master a vision of possibility. This vision is adequate to the task of drawing Him forth from the hierarchical Ashram, except in one case where vacancies in Shamballa need to be filled. The progressive experience of the greater Lives Who work in the Council Chamber of Sanat Kumara form no part of our studies. Many of these supreme Workers, as you have read in A Treatise on Cosmic Fire, found Their way to our planet from our sister planet, Venus, thereby in Their turn establishing relationship. Remember also that all the seven rays are the subrays of the great cosmic Ray of Love-Wisdom, which is ever expressive of relationship, implemented under the Law of Attraction; it is this form of esoteric attraction which draws the Master forth from His Ashram, conditions His decision and eventually leads to His passing through the door which opens on to other spheres and planes of activity.

Let us now consider – very briefly and necessarily inadequately – these seven Paths, taking them one by one:

1. The Path of Earth Service

This is the only Path which the Lord of the World regards as within the field of His spiritual interference. He reserves the right to retain in the service of the Hierarchy, and consequently of Humanity and the subsidiary evolutions, Those Masters Whom He regards at any one time as essential to the work to be done. This He does by asking Them to record Their decision when taking the sixth initiation, but to postpone moving on to one or other of the Paths until He gives the word. This word He has lately given in the case of the Buddha, Who has expiated His most understandable mistake and will now move forward – in His own good time – on to the Path which will lead Him to His rightful field of expression. In due time also, though not for some time, the Christ will move forward “to the place which calls Him,” and the Master K.H. will assume the role of World Teacher. All these moves present their unique problems; they produce vacancies in the ranks of the Hierarchy which must be filled; they lead constantly to the inflow of new and powerful energies, for it must be recognized that these energies reach us along Paths leading to our planet as well as away from it. The invocative note of our united evolution at stated times and cycles sounds out and reaches Those Who are waiting for spiritual opportunity and service. They then follow the Path to our planet. From other spheres and planes They emerge along the lines of Their destiny and intention; we then call Them Avatars or Great Enlighteners or Planetary Saviors or Spiritual Regents; They act at the request of Sanat Kumara, given on higher cosmic levels.

It is nevertheless a statement of fact that in due time even Those Who choose the Path of Earth Service and remain in hierarchical work are eventually given the right to follow Their decision and pass to extra-planetary service. The Hierarchy, as we have seen, gives the needed training for that wider service, and the theme of what I might call the educational process to which the Masters submit is the unfoldment of the consciousness of the relationships which lie beyond the aura of our planet; this is, in reality, a higher and most abstruse branch of the Science of Impression, which disciples upon their lower level have to master. This aspect of impression is, however, concerned with the formless worlds, whereas all the impressions to which the disciple has to learn to react emanate from and within the cosmic physical plane, of which all our seven planes are an integral part; our highest spiritual world is a part of the substantial world. The Masters, therefore, are working at a conscious receptivity or sensitivity to the cosmic astral plane, the source of the spirit or energy of love. There is a fundamental connection between the Hierarchy (the source of expression of love on Earth) and the cosmic astral plane, and it is towards this objective that the Masters work Who choose the Path of Earth Service. The major ray of our solar system is that of love-wisdom, and there is no better field on which to master the preliminary stages of that divine unfoldment and receive the needed development and education than on the Earth.

On the Earth, the Masters have overcome glamor and illusion, and for Them no astral plane exists. Now ahead of Them, and owing to Their freedom from these “bewilderments,” will come the opportunity to enter into the Heart of God, the center of pure love, and from that center to tread the way of love. All these seven Paths lead either to the cosmic astral plane or to the cosmic mental plane, according to the decision made at the sixth initiation. Upon the cosmic astral plane there is no glamor, but instead a great vortex of energy – the energy of pure love – under the domination of the Law of Attraction. It might be stated that:

Path 1. The Path of Earth Service leads to the cosmic astral plane.
Path 2. The Path of Magnetic Work leads to the cosmic astral plane.
Path 3. The Path for Training for Planetary Logoi leads to the higher levels of the cosmic mental plane.
Path 4. The Path to Sirius leads to the cosmic astral plane.
Path 5. The Ray Path leads to the cosmic mental plane.
Path 6. The Path the Logos Himself is on leads to the cosmic buddhic plane.
Path 7. The Path of Absolute Sonship leads to the cosmic mental plane.

Three Paths, therefore, lead to the realm of loving attractive energy; one Path leads to its higher correspondence, the cosmic level of pure reason; three lead to the realm of divine Mind. Four of the Paths relate the advancing Master to the Heart of the Great Life Who functions through this solar system, and three to His Mind nature. All of them lead the initiate eventually to the Central Spiritual Sun. All Who work in Shamballa find Their way to this supreme center by the three most arduous ways, whilst the remainder reach the same goal via the way of love.

The unfoldment of the will has much to do with Their decision. It must not be thought that Those Masters Who are on the first, third and fifth rays, for instance, follow the Path numerically the same; such is not the case; nor that Those Who are predominantly on the second line of energy find the cosmic astral plane Their goal. Such again is not the case. Their response and decision is based on a realization of cosmic need – a need of which you can know nothing, any more than it is possible for you to comprehend the nature of cosmic evil.

As to the detail of the work of Those Who choose – until released – to stay on Earth and work in or with the Hierarchy, is there more that I can tell you? You know much anent this subject for I have given much – far more than has ever been given before. I have not dealt with the work of the Hierarchy in relation to evolutions other than the human, for two reasons:

Your unfoldment is still such that you do not and cannot yet include or register the consciousness or nature of the subhuman kingdoms.
The work done by the Hierarchy in those kingdoms is largely carried forward via humanity and modern scientific development.

There are many Masters Who do not work with the human kingdom at all, but are fully occupied with carrying out the divine Will in other kingdoms. With this work we have, at present, no concern. When any one takes the sixth initiation and makes his decision to follow the Path of Earth Service (either temporarily at the request of Sanat Kumara, or until the end – of the world cycle), he will find himself faced with a secondary decision as to which of the four kingdoms will profitably provide the field of his sacrifice and service. We will now consider:

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Excerpted from

The Rays and the Initiations – Part Two – Section One – The Aspirant and the Mysteries of Initiation

By Alice Bailey and Djwhal Kuhl

ॐ, Esoteric, Esoteric Psychology, Quotations, Rāja yoga, Yoga

Initiation III – The Transfiguration and the Fifth Ray

There is no need for me to enter into the symbolic details anent this initiation. The whole theme is adequately dealt with in a book written by A.A.B. entitled From Bethlehem to Calvary – a book to which I gave my approval and endorsement as presenting the subject of the five initiations in a form suitable for the Christian West. I would like to recall to you the fact that this third initiation is in reality the first of the major initiations and is so regarded by the emanating Source of our planetary Logos, Sanat Kumara, and in the two great planetary centers, Shamballa and the Hierarchy. I refer to that stupendous Source of our entire planetary life, the sun Sirius, and to the Lodge of Divine Beings Who work from this heavenly Center.

The first two initiations – regarded simply as initiations of the threshold – are experiences which have prepared the body of the initiate for the reception of the terrific voltage of this third initiation. This voltage is passed through the body of the initiate under the direction of the planetary Logos, before Whom the initiate stands for the first time. The Rod of Initiation is used as the transferring agent. The second initiation freed the initiate from the astral level of consciousness, the astral plane – the plane of glamor, of illusion and of distortion. This was an essential experience because the initiate (standing before the One Initiator for the first time at the third initiation) must be freed from any magnetic or attractive “pull” emanating from the personality.

The mechanism of the personality must be so purified and so insensitive to the material attractions of the three worlds that there is henceforth nothing in the initiate which could offset the divine initiatory activity. The physical appetites are subdued and relegated to their rightful place; the desire nature is controlled and purified; the mind is responsive primarily to ideas, intuitions and impulses coming from the soul, and begins its true task as an interpreter of divine truth and a transmitter of ashramic intention.

You will note, therefore, how this third initiation is a climaxing point and also inaugurates a new cycle of activity leading to the seventh Initiation of Resurrection. I would call your attention to the fact that the third, fifth and seventh initiations are under the control of the fifth, first and second rays. These, as you might expect, will constitute the emanating energies transmitted through the application of the Rod of Initiation.

Initiation III. The fifth Ray of Science. This inflowing energy produces its major effects upon the mind, or upon manas, the fifth principle; it enables the initiate to use the mind as its major instrument in the work to be done, prior to passing through the fourth and fifth initiations.
Initiation V. The first Ray of Will or Power. At this initiation the disciple appreciates for the first time the significance of the will and uses it to relate the head center and the center at the base of the spine, thus completing the integration started at the third initiation.
Initiation VII. The second Ray of Love-Wisdom is here active, as the major planetary ray. The application of the Rod of Initiation by the Initiator (working this time from the highest plane, the logoic plane) produces in a mysterious way an effect on the totality of humanity and – to a lesser extent – upon the allied kingdoms. The effect is similar to that produced in the individual at the fifth initiation, wherein the head center and the center at the base of the spine became closely en rapport – through the use of the will.

Aspirants and disciples should remember that after the third initiation, the effects of the initiation which they may be undergoing are not confined simply to the individual initiate, but that henceforth at all the later initiations he becomes the transmitter of the energy which will pour through him with increasing potency at each application of the Rod. He acts primarily as an agent for the transmission, for the stepping down and for the consequent safe distribution of energy to the masses. Each time a disciple achieves an initiation and stands before the Initiator, he becomes simply an instrument whereby the planetary Logos can reach humanity and bring to men fresh life and energy. The work done prior to and at the third initiation is purely preparatory to this type of service required from an “energy transmitter.” That is why, at the seventh initiation, the dominating ray of our planet – the second Ray of Love-Wisdom – is employed. There is no energy upon our planet of equal potency, and no expression of it has so pure and constructive a quality as that to which the initiate is subjected at the seventh initiation. This seventh initiatory climax marks another culminating point in the career of the initiate, and indicates his entrance into an entirely different cycle of experience.

You will have noted, if you are comparing these instructions with the outline given by me on page 340, that in this third initiation it is the ajna center (the center between the eyebrows) which is stimulated. This is a fact of great interest, because it is at this initiation that the disciple begins consciously and creatively to direct the energies being made available to him, doing so via the ajna center and directed towards humanity as a whole. These energies are:

The energy of his own soul. This has a purely group effect and though working through his personality, is consciously directed outward into the world – after the transforming process brought about as the energy received permeates his threefold mechanism.
The energy of the Ashram to which he belongs. Both this energy and the one above mentioned are necessarily the energy of his soul ray and of the Ashram which is representative of that ray. The effect produced – according to his capacity of absorption and direction – will further the working out of the divine Plan.
The energy of the Hierarchy Itself. The Hierarchy is primarily controlled by the energy of the second Ray of Love-Wisdom, though this dominant ray is modified and enriched through blending with the other six rays. His use of this energy will at first be largely an unconscious use and he will register at this point no definite intention. This is due to the magnitude of the great reservoir of energies; he is a recipient of the incoming energy largely because he is an initiated member of the Hierarchy and is also a pure channel for transmission.
The peculiar energy which is transmitted to him by Sanat Kumara at the time of his initiation. This is a totally different energy to that transmitted to him at the earlier initiations. It comes from Shamballa and is uniquely (in a sense undefinable and hence incomprehensible to you) the energy of the planetary Logos Himself. He directs extra-planetary energy (in the initiations which follow the third initiation) from the ajna center of which He is possessed, to the head center of the initiate and from thence immediately to the ajna center of the initiate. Then this energy is directed outward into its destined field of service. This energy is of so high a quality that there is nothing of a registering mechanism in the initiate’s equipment capable of registering its admission and circulation through his three head centers. Nevertheless, this energy does pour through him and out into the world, in spite of the fact that he remains unconscious of its presence.

The ajna center is the “center of direction”; it is placed symbolically between the two eyes, signifying the twofold direction of the life energy of the initiate – outward into the world of men and upward towards the divine Life and Source of all Being. Where the direction of the energy is consciously undertaken (and there are certain energies of which the initiate is constantly aware), the ajna center is controlled and dominated by the indwelling spirit of man; this spiritual man bases all action in relation to these entering energies on the ancient premise that “energy follows thought.” His thought life becomes, therefore, the field of his major effort, for he knows that the mind is the agent of direction; he endeavors to concentrate within himself so that eventually he may consciously control and direct all the incoming divine energies. This is, in reality, the major hierarchical endeavor and the work to which the Masters are pledged and for which They are in constant training. As the evolutionary process proceeds, new and higher energies become available. This is particularly the case now, as They prepare for the reappearance of the Christ.

There are three words which are directive words for the disciple as he handles his life, his environment and his circumstances. They are: Integration, Direction, Science. His task – as he faces it after the third initiation – is to produce a greater personal integration so that he becomes increasingly a soul-infused personality, and also to integrate himself with his environment for service purposes. To this must be added the subtler task of integrating himself into the Ashram so that he becomes an integral part of the Master’s band of workers.

As the work of integration proceeds, he is striving all the time to learn the uses of the ajna center and consciously and with right understanding to work with, absorb, transmute and distribute energy as his major ashramic service. His keynote is right direction as the result of right reaction to hierarchical intention and the injunctions of his own soul. Both integration and direction, he discovers, require understanding of occult, scientific knowledge. He works then as a scientist, and for this reason all the three keynotes of his life as an initiate – before and immediately after the third initiation – are conditioned by and directed by the mind; the mental plane becomes the field of his major endeavor as a server.

Again you see that I am presenting you with no glamorous picture of the initiatory process but only one of hard work, constant effort and strenuous mental and spiritual living. There is much here for you to consider, and what I have here given warrants sound reflection and much thought. It is my earnest hope and wish that you may realize that the teaching here given can be appropriated by you and that the initiatory process is one that eventually you will understand and in which you will participate.

Ray Five

It posits an ability to function with clarity upon the mental plane, to collate information, rightly to interpret and relate that information, and to create the needed thought-forms or concepts for those interpretations.

These thought-forms fall into three major fields of thought or thought-form areas of consciousness:

Science. Under this word I include all that which the educational processes cover or are supposed to cover, and such a useful science as medicine.
Philosophy, with its presentation of great conditioning ideas.
Psychology, with its effort to account for humanity and to discover what man is essentially and how he functions.

You will note that I have not included religion in this analysis. The reason for this is that If the world religions were really controlled by concrete knowledge or science, they would not be the vague, speculative, mystical and glamor-controlled systems which they are at present. Some day the minds of men – illumined by the light of the soul – will formulate the one universal religion, recognizable by all. Then the Kingdom of God will be known for what it is, another kingdom in nature. Speculation, wishful thinking and hopeful aspiration will disappear. The science of occultism is the first step upon the way of true religion, and the scientific investigation of human psychology will greatly help toward this end.

Today we find this ray energy expressing itself mainly through science – a science sadly debased and corrupted by materialism and human greed, but a science which (when animated entirely by goodwill) will lift humanity on to higher levels of consciousness, thus laying the foundation for that time when humanity on a large scale can pass through the Transfiguration Initiation. Steps in this direction are already being laid and the existence of the press, the radio and the rapid means of transportation have done much to further the revelation of that unity and that Oneness which is the major characteristic of the Universal Mind.

These developments can be regarded as the initial steps of the initiatory process for the third initiation – far ahead as that initiation may lie for the mass of men. It is unification and a growing sense of oneness which is required in order to take this initiation, and it is the integrated personality which takes it. The major sin of Russia, and that which has prostituted and warped the initial divine impulse underlying the ideology of that country, is the determination she demonstrates at this time to be separate and to shut the Russian people away from world contact, using the implements of deception and the withholding of information. It is not the totalitarian nature of the Russian government which is the prime disaster; it is the refusal to develop the universal consciousness. Many governments today are totalitarian in nature, either openly or subtly, but – at the same time – their peoples have free access to press and radio and are not kept in ignorance of world events. Russia is drifting into a pronounced expression of the great heresy of separateness. There lies her problem – a problem which is refused recognition by her rulers.

The existence of a closed mind on a national scale is dangerous in the extreme, just as the individual is in a dangerous “state of mind” when he closes it to world contact, world news and world understanding, and when he refuses to admit new ideas and new modes of behavior. Fortunately, the influence of this fifth ray energy – which is always present, whether the ray is in incarnation or not – is steadily leading humanity towards illumination.

This ray energy operates always in connection with the Law of Cleavages. Today, tremendous cleavages between the past and the present are in order. The importance of this statement is to be found in the fact that – for the first time in human history – humanity is aware of cleavage at the time it is being brought about. Hitherto cleavages have been noted during an historical retrospect. Today, all men everywhere are conscious of the fact that the old order, the old cultures and civilizations are rapidly passing away, and they are universally clamoring for the new. Everywhere men are laying the foundation for the new order, the coming of which is threatened only by one country, Russia, owing to its separativeness (and not because of its ideology), and by one world group in every country, those guilty of financial greed and consequent aggressiveness.

Before humanity can pass through the Transfiguration Initiation the new world order must be functioning and the coming civilization must be at its height. It is useless for me to consider with you this third initiation in connection with humanity as a whole, or its preparatory or subsequent initiatory process. All this lies too far ahead for even advanced humanity to consider; there are, however, senior disciples who are preparing for this initiation, just as there are a few who are passing through the initiatory process, prior to taking the fourth initiation.

The outstanding expression of this fifth ray energy can be seen in the rapid formulating of the many ideologies which have taken place since the year 1900. Such words as Fascism, Communism, National Socialism, Socialism as the British accept it, and the names of many schools of psychology and philosophy, were unknown one hundred years ago; today they are the common talk and phrases of the man in the street. The inflow of this mental energy into the world of men, the attainment in consciousness of mental ability by many thousands, and the achievement of mental polarization by aspirants all the world over, are all due to the activity of this fifth ray energy; this may be regarded as preparatory work for the first and the second initiations. Some of this success is due also to a little-realized function of this fifth ray energy – that of telepathic interplay. Few people realize in the slightest degree how naturally telepathic every human being is or how impressionable are their minds; this again is an effect of fifth ray influence.

The creation (and, I should add, the over-creation) of the millions of material things which men everywhere regard as essential to their well-being is also the result of the creative activity of the fifth ray consciousness. This is, of course, as it demonstrates upon the physical plane. When it demonstrates upon the mental plane, we then talk of ideas, concepts, philosophies and ideologies. When it demonstrates upon the astral plane, we are aware of the religious impulse, of mysticism and of the emotional and conditioning desires. All these aspects are present in the consciousness of men everywhere today. Everything is crystallizing in human consciousness, and this takes place in order to make man aware of where he stands upon the ladder of evolution, and of what is wrong and what is right. All this again is due to the influence of fifth ray energy. This will begin to transform human living and human desires and also human affairs and attitudes, and will lead eventually (in the middle of the sixth root race) to the great Transfiguration Initiation in which the reality that lies behind all human phenomena will stand revealed.

Let us now consider the effect of this ray energy upon the life of the individual, as he faces the third initiation. This third initiation is, as earlier said, the first initiation, from the angle of the Hierarchy; it is the one in which the spiritual man demonstrates his complete control of the personality. The physical body has been controlled through the medium of the physical disciplines; the emotional nature has been reorganized and made receptive to spiritual impression coming from the plane of pure reason (the buddhic plane) through the transforming processes of the mind or the fifth principle. In this connection, the mind has acted as an organizer of astral reaction and as a dispeller of glamor. The disciple is now focused in his everyday consciousness upon the mental plane, and the triangular relation of the three aspects of the mind upon this plane is now dominant. In the next initiation, the Renunciation, this relationship becomes a dual one instead of a triangular one, through the destruction of the soul vehicle which is no longer needed. Soul fusion with the personality is now completed.

During the initiatory process preceding the third initiation, the mind works in a new manner. Its transmuting work with the physical body has been accomplished; its transforming work with the emotional nature has been successful, and now its transfiguring work with the personality as a whole is carried forward, making the initiation of the Transfiguration possible. It is of value to the student to consider these three activities of the mind. The transmuting agent in the first case is the lower or concrete mind; the transforming agent is the soul, whilst the transfiguring agent is the Spiritual Triad, working through the higher or abstract mind. You will here note the wonderful synthesis of the spiritual work. When this work is concluded, you have the initiation of the third degree made possible. This produces impelling and new contacts. It should here be remembered that when I use the word “new” I mean that which is new in consciousness, for the basic synthesis and fundamental relationship always exists in factual recognition, but is only progressively realized by the evolving spiritual man.

It is well nigh impossible to differentiate the results of fifth ray energy in the various aspects of the personality, for the reason that the initiate is now functioning as a soul-infused personality, and therefore the three aspects of that personality are nothing more or less than agents of the soul, and thus are progressively responsive to the inflow of triadal energy. It might therefore be said that, as a result of the Transfiguration Initiation – the culminating point of strictly human unfoldment – the three types of energy which are expressed through the Spiritual Triad can begin – only begin – to flow through the reflection of itself in the three worlds. Let me state this as follows:

The directing energy of the higher mind is – as a result of the Transfiguration Initiation and via the antahkarana – thrown into the brain; therefore the man upon the physical plane is guided, directed and controlled by group purpose and by the hierarchical plan.
The illuminating energy of pure reason, emanating from the buddhic plane, pours down into the clarified and organized body of sensitive response which is all that remains of what has been called the astral body. This produces complete freedom from glamor and the creation of “a limpid pool of such reasonable response to the love of divine relationship” that the initiate becomes a sensitive revealer of that love.
The dynamic energy from the atmic plane (the highest aspect of the Spiritual Triad) pours into the mind and begins slowly to reveal the will-to-good, which is essentially the will of God.

Behind these three differentiations which are all of them expressions or aspects of the divine or the universal mind, the initiate dimly senses or becomes consciously aware of what has been called the Monad or Spirit or Life. This is subtly revealed in the Transfiguration Initiation of the Master Jesus Who re-enacted all the five human initiations for the benefit of humanity. In this dramatic picturing of the third initiation, the three disciples (or the three vehicles of the personality) prostrate themselves upon the ground and the Master Himself (the glorified personality) is transfigured before them. At this climaxing point they hear that which is called “the voice of the Father” speaking to the transfigured Jesus.

The personality is now possessed of knowledge, for fifth ray energy has done its needed work; the disciple is also aware that he is in possession of the wisdom which enables him to use knowledge in the furtherance of the Plan, and therefore to work as an illuminating factor in the world of men. He knows clearly what has been accomplished and senses something of what lies ahead. The great principle of cleavage (which the fifth ray governs) is the dominating factor in his time sense; he now differentiates sharply between past and present and that which has to be ascertained in the future. Cleavage, in the sense of separateness, is finished for him and he now feels and knows something of the essential unity of all manifested life; therefore, from the angle of space, he has dominated and overcome cleavage and division; in the sense of time he has not. The great heresy of separateness no longer exists in his consciousness; the consciousness of the initiatory process is not yet over, however for that involves the recognition of time.

During the initiatory process between the second and the third initiations, the initiate has to battle with illusion in exactly the same sense as he earlier had to battle with glamor. Illusion is, in the last analysis, the control of the mental processes by great and massive thought-forms; this conflict persists from the moment that the disciple has achieved mental polarization (at a midway point between the second and the third initiations) until he stands before the Initiator at the sixth Initiation of Decision, when the last illusion disappears. You will feel and comment that the Masters are therefore subject to illusion. This They definitely are, and there are great and basic illusions governing life within the Hierarchy. Nevertheless, they are illusions of such a high order that – for advanced humanity – they would signify achievement. I may not give you more than one instance of such illusion, but that should prove clear and sufficient. It is not until the sixth Initiation of Decision that the illusion of the planetary ring-pass-not finally disappears. The Master then knows that such a limitation is non-existent. For Him, the choice between the seven Paths becomes possible. This basic illusion constitutes for mankind a great hierarchical mystery and is based upon the Principle of Privation, by means of which the planetary Logos chooses to circumscribe His freedom and to limit His activities.

This curious freedom from successive limitations is experienced at the third, the sixth and the ninth initiations; these are, all three of them, related in a mysterious manner to each other. Transfiguration leads eventually to Decision, which culminates in due time with a final refusal to accept any planetary limitations whatsoever.

It will be obvious to you that the higher the initiation, the less will any involved energy have a personality control or connection. Progressive and recognized fusions have taken place as one initiation after another is undergone; the effect of the energy involved will be noted in relation to humanity as a whole, to the work of the Ashram within the Hierarchy and to the planetary life. This must ever be borne in mind and must necessarily limit the scope of the teaching which I am able to give you.

———————-

Excerpted from

The Rays and the Initiations – Part Two – Section Two – The Aspirant and the Major Initiations

By Alice Bailey and Djwhal Kuhl

Esoteric, Esoteric Psychology, Quotations

Knowledge Wisdom Understanding

The question anent initiation is one that is coming more and more before the public. Before many centuries pass the old mysteries will be restored, and an inner body will exist in the Church – the Church of the period, of which the nucleus is already forming – wherein the first initiation will become esoteric, in this sense only, that the taking of the first initiation will, before so very long, be the most sacred ceremony of the Church, performed esoterically as one of the mysteries given at stated periods, attended by those concerned. It will also hold a similar place in the ritual of the Masons. At this ceremony those ready for the first initiation will be publicly admitted to the Lodge by one of its members, authorized to do so by the great Hierophant Himself.

Four Words Defined

When we speak of Initiation, of wisdom, of knowledge, or of the probationary Path, what do we mean? We use the words so glibly, without due consideration of the meaning involved. Take, for instance, the word first mentioned. Many are the definitions, and many are the explanations to be found as to its scope, the preparatory steps, the work to be done between initiations, and its result and effects. One thing before all else is apparent to the most superficial student, and that is, that the magnitude of the subject is such that in order to deal with it adequately one should be able to write from the viewpoint of an initiate; when this is not the case, anything that is said may be reasonable, logical, interesting, or suggestive, but not conclusive.

The word Initiation comes from two Latin words, in, into; and ire, to go; therefore, the making of a beginning, or the entrance into something. It posits, in its widest sense, in the case we are studying, an entrance into the spiritual life, or into a fresh stage in that life. It is the first step, and the succeeding steps, upon the Path of Holiness. Literally, therefore, a man who has taken the first initiation is one who has taken the first step into the spiritual kingdom, having passed out of the definitely human kingdom into the superhuman. Just as he passed out of the animal kingdom into the human at individualization, so he has entered upon the life of the spirit, and for the first time has the right to be called a “spiritual man” in the technical significance of the word. He is entering upon the fifth or final stage in our present fivefold evolution. Having groped his way through the Hall of Ignorance during many ages, and having gone to school in the Hall of Learning, he is now entering into the university, or the Hall of Wisdom. When he has passed through that school he will graduate with his degree as a Master of Compassion.

It might be of benefit to us also if we studied first the difference or the connection between Knowledge, Understanding, and Wisdom. Though in ordinary parlance they are frequently interchanged, as used technically they are dissimilar.

Knowledge is the product of the Hall of Learning. It might be termed the sumtotal of human discovery and experience, that which can be recognized by the five senses, and be correlated, diagnosed, and defined by the use of the human intellect. It is that about which we feel mental certitude, or that which we can ascertain by the use of experiment. It is the compendium of the arts and sciences. It concerns all that deals with the building and developing of the form side of things. Therefore it concerns the material side of evolution, matter in the solar systems, in the planet, in the three worlds of human evolution, and in the bodies of men.

Wisdom is the product of the Hall of Wisdom. It has to do with the development of the life within the form, with the progress of the spirit through those ever-changing vehicles, and with the expansions of consciousness that succeed each other from life to life. It deals with the life side of evolution. Since it deals with the essence of things and not with the things themselves, it is the intuitive apprehension of truth apart from the reasoning faculty, and the innate perception that can distinguish between the false and the true, between the real and the unreal. It is more than that, for it is also the growing capacity of the Thinker to enter increasingly into the mind of the Logos, to realize the true inwardness of the great pageant of the universe, to vision the objective, and to harmonize more and more with the higher measure. For our present purpose (which is to study somewhat the Path of Holiness and its various stages) it may be described as the realization of the “Kingdom of God within,” and the apprehension of the “Kingdom of God without” in the solar system. Perhaps it might be expressed as the gradual blending of the paths of the mystic and the occultist, – the rearing of the temple of wisdom upon the foundation of knowledge.

Wisdom is the science of the spirit, just as knowledge is the science of matter. Knowledge is separate and objective, whilst wisdom is synthetic and subjective. Knowledge divides; wisdom unites. Knowledge differentiates whilst wisdom blends. What, then, is meant by the understanding?

The understanding may be defined as the faculty of the Thinker in Time to appropriate knowledge as the foundation for wisdom, that which enables him to adapt the things of form to the life of the spirit, and to take the flashes of inspiration that come to him from the Hall of Wisdom and link them to the facts of the Hall of Learning. Perhaps the whole idea might be expressed in this way:

Wisdom concerns the one Self, knowledge deals with the not-self, whilst the understanding is the point of view of the Ego, or Thinker, or his relation between them.

In the Hall of Ignorance the form controls, and the material side of things has the predominance. Man is there polarized in the personality or lower self. In the Hall of Learning the higher self, or Ego, strives to dominate that form until gradually a point of equilibrium is reached where the man is controlled entirely by neither. Later the Ego controls more and more, until in the Hall of Wisdom it dominates in the three lower worlds, and in increasing degree the inherent divinity assumes the mastery.

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Excerpted from:

Initiation, Human and Solar – Chapter II – Initiation Defined

Alice Bailey & Djwhal Khul

ॐ, Cause & Effect, Esoteric, Esoteric Psychology, Quotations, Rāja yoga

Rule Seven – Three Doors into Shamballa

Rule VII

For Applicants: Let the disciple turn his attention to the enunciating of those sounds which echo in the hall where walks the Master. Let him not sound the lesser notes which awaken vibration within the halls of Maya.

For Disciples and Initiates: Let the group life emit the Word of invocation and thus evoke response within those distant Ashrams where move the Chohans of the race of men. They are no longer men as are the Masters, but, having passed beyond that lesser stage, have linked Themselves with the Great Council in the highest Secret Place. Let the group sound a dual chord, reverberating in the halls where move the Masters but finding pause and prolongation within those radiant halls where move the “Lights which carry out the Will of God.”

Of real importance, though relatively small, are two contrasts. These emerge with clarity if you compare the instructions given to applicants for discipleship and those given to initiates. The applicant (or young disciple) is addressed as an individual and is told to give forth “those sounds” which will be heard by the Master in His Ashram – for that is the true significance of the words. The initiate functions in a group (always in a group) and has developed or is rapidly developing group consciousness; in unison with his group and as an integral conscious part of it, the Word must be enunciated; this is not a medley of sounds, but is one clear Word of invocation. You need to remember that the disciple is occupied in resolving the many sounds into the Word; when he has done this, his individual approach to reality terminates, and he begins to act with his group where all activity is concerned. This is a point of major importance for the newer type of disciple to grasp. In the past, the emphasis has been on what the individual initiate had to do in order to fit himself to take initiation, and so become a Master of the Wisdom and a member of the planetary Hierarchy. In the coming new cycle the emphasis will be upon group work and activity, upon group initiation and group approach to the Center of Life. The required mode of life and the needed individual eliminations and adjustments are now so well known (theoretically, at least) that they should have dropped below the threshold of consciousness and should consequently be automatic in their effects. This should also provide a steady inducement to thought which will make the initiate what he ought to be, because his conscious mind is free for group functioning. This is a concept which must be increasingly cultivated; “As a man thinketh in his heart, so he is.” The lower mind should be the organ of heart expression and be as unconscious in its functioning as is the rhythm of the heart itself – the physical heart. The higher mind is intended to become increasingly the field of the initiate’s effort, and hence the constant need for him to build the antahkarana.

In this Rule we are therefore dealing with the work to be done by a group of pledged disciples and initiates; they are learning together to make an approach to Shamballa (involving the Will element); this is as much a goal of the Hierarchy as approach to the Hierarchy is the goal of advanced humanity. It concerns the interrelation of great centers of force. This is a point which esoteric students should attempt to grasp for it completes the planetary chain of Hierarchy and throws a light upon the Way of the Higher Evolution.

Great movements and progressions have always taken place upon the subjective side of life; it is these subjective activities which have made it hard for disciples to grasp the truth and arrive at some true realization of the subjective situation which ever exists between the Hierarchy and Shamballa. The energies concerned are so subtle, and the Beings involved are so advanced and so highly developed (even from the angle of the initiate of the third degree), that it is well-nigh impossible for the teachings (which I seek to give) to be worded in such a manner that they become comprehensible. All that I can do is to make certain statements which (from the standpoint of those I teach) are not verifiable; they have to be accepted on trust and with the reservation that time and the point of view of the individual disciple will later prove their truth – or their non-truth.

The objective of all training given to the disciple is to shift his conscious awareness from the point where he is to levels which are higher than those in the three worlds of definitely human evolution; the intention is to teach him to function on those planes of conscious contact which are as yet so subjective that he only accepts them as existent in theory. The trained initiate knows that they have to become his natural habitat, and that eventually he has to relegate the ordinary and normal human experience to the three worlds of daily expression. These become eventually the worlds that exist below the threshold of consciousness; they are relegated to the realm of the subconscious – recoverable consciously, if necessary for right service of humanity, but as much below the threshold of consciousness as are the ordinary emotional reactions of the average man. These are always recoverable (as modern psychoanalysis has demonstrated) and can become capable of expression and of formulation into conditioning concepts – thus actuating mental perception if deemed of adequate importance. However, it should be borne in mind that the greater part of the emotional life of the disciple must become increasingly subconscious, just as the physical plane life of the normal, healthy human being is entirely automatic and thus subconscious. When the disciple has striven to expand his consciousness, when he has learnt to stabilize his consciousness in the Spiritual Triad, then he becomes part of a great and constant hierarchical effort which strives upwards towards the “Place of Clear Electric Light,” to which the clear cold light of the reason is the first key to the first door.

There are three doors into Shamballa, speaking figuratively:

1. There is the door of the reason, of pure perception of truth. Christ gave the clue to this teaching when He said “I am the Way, the Truth and the Life.” Of that Way we know much, because upon the Way a vast body of teaching has been given, and that teaching, if followed, brings a man into the Hierarchy. He then becomes a factual part of the hierarchical membership. Of that Truth, we know (as aspirants) relatively very little. Truth – as we understand it during the early treading of the Path of Discipleship – is concerned with great verities which are (from the insight of the Enlightened Ones) only the ABC of life. These truths are:

The manifestation of divinity on the physical plane.
The doctrine of Avatars. This religious history reveals.
The nature of consciousness, through the development of psychology.
The doctrine of the Trinity, as it expresses itself through the aspects and the attributes.

These four expressions of truth will be found to convey all the knowledge with which the initiate must stand equipped when he climbs the Mount of Transfiguration at the time of the third initiation. They have given him a spiritual perception of the Plan.

Of that Life, we know nothing whatsoever. The contemplation of its significance belongs to Those Who can move at will within the “precincts of the Lord of Life” – in Shamballa itself. All we can know about it is its lowest step. This enables us to study the impulse or instinct which enables all forms of life to function, which embodies the principles of responsiveness to contacts and to environment, and which embodies itself in the breath of life; this is also related to the air in some mysterious manner, and also to fire. More anent this subject it would be useless for me to say.

2. There is also the door of the will. This is a penetrating power which relates Plan to Purpose and which has in it the faculty of coherent persistence. The reason for this persistence is that it is not dependent upon the content of the form – whether it is the form of an atom, of a man or of a planet – but upon a vital dynamic and immutable purpose, latent in the consciousness of the planetary Being Who, “having pervaded this entire universe with a fragment” of Himself, Remains – greater, more inscrutable and “firmer in intent” than any of His creations, even the most advanced and the closest to Him. Only those have clear perception of His divine purpose who do not belong to our earth humanity at all; these are the Lives who came with Him to this planet when He came, and Who remain with Him as “the prisoners of loving intention” until the last weary pilgrim has found his way home.”

This spiritual will is something of which humanity knows nothing; it is hidden and veiled by the self-will of the individual and the group will of the soul. Through both of these experiences the human being moves until his individual will is developed and grounded, focused and reoriented, and his group will is unfolded so that it includes and swallows up the dedicated, conscious, individual will. When this fusion has taken place (at the third initiation) a great revelation unfolds itself, and for the first time the initiate senses and then contacts the universal will; from that moment the initiate says, “Father, not my will but Thine be done.” Just a little of what that will includes may emerge as we study this seventh rule and some of the succeeding rules.

3. I can find no words to express the nature of the third door. Let us, in default of a better term, call it the door of the monadic sense of essential duality. Body and life, soul and personality, the Spiritual Triad and its expression, the Christ in incarnation – all these dualities have played their part. Man has passed from one expansion of consciousness to another. Now he comes to the final duality of spirit and matter, prior to their resolution into something to which the terms “isolated unity” and “universal synthesis” give only faint and inadequate clues. To the development of this system of identification the initiate of the degree of Master of the Wisdom, and also (on a higher turn of the spiral) of the degree of the Christ, are focusing all Their efforts. Up to the fourth initiation, the term “system of expansions” would seem illuminating; after that great initiation, the term “system of identification” would appear more appropriate.

When the initiate has passed through the three doors, symbolically speaking, he then faces all life, all events, all predeterminations, all wisdom, all activity and all that the future may hold of service and progress from the angle of the pure reason (infallible and immutable), of true spiritual will (completely identified with the purpose of the planetary Logos), and of the highest possible focused relation. The mystery of relationship becomes revealed to him. Then the entire scheme of evolution and of the intention of the One in Whom he lives and moves and has his being becomes clear to him; he has no more to learn within this planetary scheme; he has become universal in his attitude to all forms of life, and is also identified with the “isolated unity” of Sanat Kumara. Few of the great Lives Who form the inner group of the Council Chamber at Shamballa are now of greater advancement than he; the “Supernal Three,” the “Radiant Seven,” the “Lives embodying the forty-nine Fires,” the “Buddhas of Activity,” and certain “Eternal Spirits” from such centers of dynamic spiritual life as Sirius, or from the constellation which at any one time forms a triangle with our Sun and Sirius, and a Representative from Venus are of greater – far greater – advancement. Otherwise, all initiates of the sixth degree, and a few of the Masters Who have undergone specialized training because They are upon the first Ray of Will or Power (the ray conditioning Shamballa itself), form part of the Great Council. Many Masters and Chohans, however, after serving upon the planet in various capacities, working with the Law of Evolution, pass out of our planetary life altogether.

All the above information concerning the Lives which are far in advance of the disciples of the world contains little of moment for you, except in so far as it falls into a diagrammatic pattern of our planetary life and purpose, and enabling you, therefore, to get a faint glimpse of a synthetic theme and purpose to which all evolving lives must and will eventually conform.

It must ever be borne in mind that the great theme of Light underlies our entire planetary purpose. The full expression of perfect Light, occultly understood, is the engrossing life-purpose of our planetary Logos. Light is the great and obsessing enterprise in the three worlds of human evolution; everywhere men rate the light of the sun as essential to healthy living; some idea of the human urge to light can be grasped if you consider the brilliance of the physically engendered light in which we live when night arrives, and compare it with the mode of lighting the streets and homes of the world prior to the discovery of gas, and later of electricity. The light of knowledge, as the reward of educational processes, is the incentive behind all our great schools of learning in every country in the world and is the goal of much of our world organization; the terminology of light controls even our computation of time. {Atomic clocks?, my addition} The mystery of electricity is unfolding gradually before our rapt eyes and the electrical nature of man is being slowly proven and will later demonstrate that, throughout the human structure and form, man is composed primarily of light atoms, and that the light in the head (so familiar to esotericist) is no fiction or figment of wishful thinking or of a hallucinated imagination, but is definitely brought about by the junction or fusion of the light inherent in substance itself and the light of the soul.

It will be found that this will be capable of scientific proof. It will also be shown that the soul itself is light, and that the entire Hierarchy is a great center of light, causing the symbology of light to govern our thinking, our approach to God, and enabling us to understand somewhat the meaning of the words of Christ “I am the Light of the world.” These words carry meaning to all true disciples and present them with an analogous goal which they define to themselves as that of finding the light, appropriating the light, and themselves becoming light-bearers. The theme of light runs through all the world Scriptures; the idea of enlightenment conditions all the training given to the youth of the world (limited though the application of this idea may be), and the thought of more light governs all the inchoate yearnings of the human spirit.

We have not yet carried the concept up to the Center of Life where dwells the Ancient of Days, the Eternal Youth, the Lord of the World, Sanat Kumara, Melchizedek – God. Yet from that Center streams what has been called the Light of Life, the Light Supernal. These are empty words as yet until we know, as trained initiates, that light is a symptom and an expression of Life, and that essentially, occultly and in a most mysterious way the terms, Light and Life, are interchangeable within the limits of the planetary ring-pass-not. Beyond those limits – who knows? Light can be regarded as a symptom, a reaction to the meeting and consequent fusion of spirit and matter.

Therefore, where that great point of fusion and of solar crisis (for that is what it is, even when producing a planetary crisis) appears in time and space, light also immediately appears and of such intensity that only those who know the light of the soul, and who can bear the hierarchical light can be trained to enter into and form part of the light of Shamballa and walk in those “radiant halls where move the Lights which carry out the Will of God.

To carry the concept a little nearer home: only when the will of the personality and the will of the soul come together – evoked by love – does the light of the soul dominate the material light of the personality. This is a statement of importance. Only when the will of the Monad and the will of the Hierarchy of souls meet and blend in the “upper brackets” (if I may use such a modern business phrase) can the radiant light of Life dominate the blended lights of Humanity and of the Hierarchy. Faintly this group fusion and junction can be seen to be taking place.

It is also the first touch of the radiance of Shamballa which is bringing the universal revelation of evil, a radiance which is now producing the world unrest and which has brought about the lining up of good and evil; this touch of radiance is the conditioning factor behind what is called postwar planning and the ideas of reconstruction and of world rebuilding which are dominating the best human thinking at this time.

It should be carefully borne in mind that evil (cosmic evil or the source of planetary evil) is much closer to Shamballa than it is to Humanity. The Great Lives there move entirely free from glamor; Their vision is one of extreme simplicity; They are concerned only with the great and simple duality of spirit and matter, and not with the many forms which the fusion of these two brings into being. The domination of spirit (and its reflection, soul) by matter is what constitutes evil and this is true whether the statement is applied to the development of the individual or of the group. The “Lights which carry out the will of God” move free from the spell of evil. The Light in which They move safeguards Them, and Their Own innate and inherent radiance repels evil. But They “move alongside the evil to which all lesser forms are prone”; They are part of a great observing Group which “moves forward in time and space”; its members watch the great war and conflict proceed on Earth between the Forces of Light and the Forces of Evil. They have let loose upon Earth the Forces of Light, whilst the Forces of Evil are inherent in substance itself – of which all the many forms of life are constructed.

At this time, the work of the Great Council at Shamballa, ‘Working until now through the Hierarchy, is with the life within the form; They have to proceed with the utmost caution as They thus work, because these Lights know that the danger of premature direct contact with humanity, and of consequent over-stimulation, is great. One of the causes of the present cataclysm is the fact that humanity was deemed capable of taking and receiving a “touch from Shamballa,” without stepping it down via the Hierarchy, as has hitherto been the custom. The determination to apply this touch (which is in the nature of a great experiment) was made in 1825, when the Great Council had its usual centennial meeting. The results you know; they are working out before your eyes. The industrial movement began to take shape one hundred years ago and received a great impetus from this touch. The evil in nations – aggression, greed, intolerance and hate – was aroused as never before, and two world wars occurred, one of which is still raging (written October 1943). Paralleling this was an uprising of good, again in response to the divine “touch,” resulting in the growth of understanding, the spread of idealism, the purification of our educational systems and the inauguration of reforms in every department of human life. All has been speeded up and little such growth was seen on a worldwide scale prior to 1825. The knowledge of the Hierarchy is also spreading over the earth; the facts anent discipleship and initiation are becoming common property; humanity has consequently moved onward into a greater measure of light. Good and evil stand out in clearer focus; light and dark are in a more brilliant juxtaposition; issues of right and wrong are appearing with cleared definition, and humanity as a whole sees the great problems of righteousness and love, of sin and separateness upon a worldwide scale.

The old age and the coming new age, old rhythms of thought and new approaches to truth and consequent new and better ways of life are presented with clarity to the minds of men. The guarantee of the success of the experiment started more than a century ago is the fact that (in spite of much that is undesirable) so many nations have ranged themselves upon the side of right, and only two definitely and altogether upon the side of evil. The evil is more concentrated, and therefore more powerful temporarily upon the physical plane; the good is more diffused and not so pure in its concentrated essence being colored by many undesirable aspects; the good, however, is concentrating rapidly and will triumph. The “Lights that carry out the will of God” now wait to give another touch which will enable the reconstruction work to move forward along right lines, but They wait for the invocative cry of humanity and for the dust of battle and of conflict to die down.

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Excerpted from: The Rays and the Initiations – Part One – Fourteen Rules For Group Initiation

By Alice Bailey and Djwhal Khul

Musings, Satire, Toltec Teachings

The Four Natural Enemies Simplified

The four natural enemies are fear, sobriety, power, and old age.

I think it fair to say that most people have fears, some of these are crippling. In our times we have a new fear, the fear of missing out.

In the context of evolution fear of the unknown and fear of changing from the way you were socially programmed by family and peers are big, as is fear of getting rid of your internal dialogue. If you have no inner critic, what are you going to do without all those circling thoughts? Fear of silence and being alone in one’s own company is also common.

Sobriety as an enemy means that you think you know more than you do and are sufficiently detached to have no pangs of conscience if you are mean to someone. If you are sufficiently detached and uncaring you can then exert power over other beings. This kind of power is addictive to some.

You could say we have, insecure scaredy cat, clever Trevor or Jeremy and Donald the bequiffed prince of orange, the very stable genius, as archetypes of people who have succumbed to these enemies.

The fourth natural enemy is old age, it means that you are exhausted and worn out by struggle, so you just want to pack it all in, get your slippers and a mug of cocoa, nanna and gramps.

One encounters stories of a lot of people who have succumbed to power in alternative circles. It often involves copious shagging by the “guru” of people who have handed their power and wealth over to said guru, so that he can have orgies and Rolls Royces. How many people in Westminster sexually interfere with their junior staff? Power is an aphrodisiac to those who are power hungry. It is a vicious circle.

If you work in higher education, you will have encountered the young smart Alec type, who thinks that they get all the material you have been torturing them with. Thinking they know a lot, they are fond of showing off, whilst still an undergraduate. They are usually a tad more circumspect when it comes to Ph.D. viva having been disabused of their illusion.

The Toltec teachings are the only ones, that I know of, which tackle power as a subject. It is, to my eyes, implicit in Vajrayana tantra. To my opinion a discussion on temptation and on evil in a sane way, is absent in much “spiritual” material. Treating evil as a taboo subject, enables it. In the darkness strange things fester. If you can’t talk about evil in an adult rational way, you are handing your power over to evil by means of fear. Taboos are primitive and superstitious.

I’ll speculate that it is transcending the natural enemy power which is the gateway to the third initiation and thereby inevitable ultimate liberation or if you succumb becoming ever more deeply embroiled with the dark adepts and thereby not achieving liberation, not in this kalpa. Overcome the natural enemy power and in the fullness of time there is no hasta la vista baby, no au revoir.

To overcome power is tiring. If you do this, you feel knackered. Then you have to start all over and with a newfound sense of trying hard not to be a complete arrogant dickhead, rather a harmless and humble being trying their best, and with little or no drama.