The Unveiling Of Gnostic Wisdom

The Unveiling Of Gnostic Wisdom - Part I



The Unveiling Of Gnostic Wisdom - Part II



Happy New Year.

~ g
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The Mystery Of The Grail

Mystery of the Grail - Part I



Mystery of the Grail - Part II



Next: The Unveiling Of Gnostic Wisdom

~ g
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The Rebirth Of The Soul

[QUOTING]

Let us now return to the five aspects of Transfiguration and try to form a clear understanding of them.

What we call the soul is a fivefold revelation of the astral fire in our personality. It fill the seven cerebral cavities and is taken up into the system by means of the magnetic respiration of the brain. This astral fire and its connection with the head-sanctuary form the nucleus, the deepest being of our soul-state, of our entire life. Owing to this animation, we call ourselves "I". As long as this soul is to be explained entirely out of dialectical nature it is mortal.  After the death of the body, the soul, too, undergoes a process of decay. At first it remains for some time in the reflection-sphere, but after that, nothing remains of it: the soul volatilizes to ordinary cosmic fluid.

However, as soon as the new state-of-consciousness becomes a fact, owing to the influx of the new astral fire in the sevenfold system of the head-sanctuary, one can speak of a new soul-being and consequently of the sign of the Son of Man. From that moment on, the Soul is no longer mortal. After the death of the personality this immortal soul no longer needs to occupy itself with the reflection-sphere because it no longer has a reflection in the earthly territory. Therefore, at the parting of the material body, should you possess a soul-state renewed in the Gnosis, then the earthly is swallowed up and the Unearthly exists. This Unearthly Being cannot be found in the reflection-sphere. That is why we have always said that a pupil who dies after having accomplished the task will find himself in the Vacuum of Shamballa.

When your soul-state has become immortal, there will be no further question of the need to return after the death of the personality. Notwithstanding this, there will be several among us who will return, but that will be on a voluntary basis for the sake of those who stay behind to maintain the Spiritual School in the service of the Universal Brotherhood as long as that is useful and necessary.

We emphasized that as soon as the new state-of-consciousness has become a fact our soul becomes immortal. This offers a great consolation, in particular to the older among us, for it will be better to cast off the crystallized and worn-out cellular structure of the earthly personality than to try to renew from below upwards. When the transfiguration of the soul has taken place and death has been conquered due to the possession of the immortal soul-state, the new personality can also be constructed in the Vacuum of Shamballa. The transfiguration of the soul can be realized by you within a comparatively short time.

If you ache for the New Life, if your thoughts are directed to the Spiritual School and your state-of-faith is without criticism, then make room in your head-sanctuary for the Light of the Gnosis, so that the sign of the Son of Man may be stamped on your forehead. Then you are released from the nature-of-death. Then, as regards your soul-state, you have become immortal. Moreover, as soon as the Immortal Soul has become a fact, you are free from the Wheel of Life and Death, unless you would like to return on account of a voluntary load that you would shoulder in servitude to humanity. You need not return any longer for the renovation of your personality.

You will now realize that, when the New Soul has become a fact, it takes over the task of the old soul. And as you know: a state of consciousness is a state of life. The soul, the consciousness, governs, builds and maintains the personality and the body. When a new soul-state has been born in us and the New Soul takes over the function of the old one, wonderful consequences follow. The soul has five fluids: the astral consciousness-fire, the serpent-fire, the hormonal secretions, the nerve fluid and the blood. These five fluids emanate from the nucleus of the soul and together form the soul-state. If they are realized in the body by the reborn Soul, then it will be clear that the effects will be borne out in the body. Therefore, transfiguration is not an obscure wonder but a scientific process.

To summarize: liberate the Path within you for the Light by means of the twofold magic of Faith and Life. Be absorbed by the merciful rebirth of your entire soul-state. Then you no longer need to be anxious about the rebirth of the entire state-of-being, as that will be an automatic result of the rebirth of the soul.

From "The Rebirth Of The Soul" - The Gnosis In Present-Day Manifestation - Jan van Rijckenborgh

[END QUOTING]

That's 'Faith' as in faith in the transfiguristic process and 'Life' as in actively living out of the required New Attitude of Life. Without these two cornerstones, one is only talking about the Path, not walking it.

Make no mistake, there is an alchemical process that can enable man to return to his former position as an immortal Child of God. The minimum requirement for being able to begin this process is a life of unselfishness and unceasing service-to-others. The focus must be away from the self and what the self wants. Without this minimum foundation of Love and Service, it will be impossible for one to attract the Gnosis, the Divine catalyst that can awaken the Rosebud and herald the Rebirth of the Soul.

~ g
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The Sign of the Son of Man

[QUOTING]

We will now go further into the results and the consequences of the new state of life that originates from the new state of consciousness.

Let us assume that after many thorough preparations the new electromagnetic fluid of the Gnosis becomes part of us. This will be the result of our application of the fivefold Universal Gnosis. Firstly: pure insight. Secondly: true yearning for salvation. Thirdly: complete self-surrender. These three define the quality and the magic of our state-of-faith. This leads to, fourthly: the new attitude of life which, owing to its magic and quality, results in the opening of our personality to the imperishable light of the Gnosis. The result if this is, fifthly: our admission into the New Life Field and the great process of regeneration, Transfiguration, begins.

As soon as the new consciousness fluid pours into the head sanctuary, it becomes visible in a clear, shining light. The Bible speaks of "the sign of the Son of Man" because this consciousness fire is the true, Original Human Fire. It radiates outwardly when the Original astral fire can be inhaled by the brain-system and the seven cerebral cavities are filled with it. The focus of this radiation is formed at the place mentioned, behind the frontal bone. This point is the sign of the Son of Man.

As soon as this sign starts radiating, the total transformation of your entire nature, indicated by the Christ as "the rebirth by water and spirit", takes place. First, there is the transfiguration of the soul. Second, owing to this, a whole series of new consciousness-abilities are going to develop. The nature of the astral fire that touches us defines our entire state-of-being. Body, thinking, etheric vehicle, state-of-desire, blood, nerve-fluid, in short the entire state-of-being is defined by and grows out of the consciousness-fire that glows within you. Therefore, when that fire is renewed, the result must be an entire change of being.

One aspect of such a change is a completely different consciousness faculty which, thirdly, results in a different sensory state. For your sensory faculties also have their basis in the head sanctuary. This new sensory state will lead to a wonderful series of events in your life. Fourthly, a modification develops in the cell structure of all the cell groups of your body, owing to which, as the Bible expresses it, "the old vesture of matter is swallowed up in victory" and replaced by a personality structure which harmonizes with the New Soul-State. Thus, fifthly, death is completely conquered. In fact, this entails disappearance out of the old field of nature.

From "The Rebirth of the Soul" - The Gnosis In Present-Day Manifestation - Jan van Rijckenborgh

[END QUOTING]
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Mortal Soul vs. Immortal Soul

We have been led to believe that we have an immortal soul that will "live forever" after we die.

Not true.

The soul you now have is a mortal soul. This means that just like the physical body, it is subject to decay and death. The mortal soul is created at birth from material borrowed from a child's mother and father. Like everything which has an origin in the material world, it has a temporary existence.

The mortal soul will outlive the death of the physical body (the "first death"), but will eventually dissolve after a somewhat longer existence in the regions of the reflection-sphere. This is the "second death" referred to in Revelations:

"Be faithful even unto death, and I will give you a crown of Life. He who has ears to hear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches: he who overcomes shall not be harmed by the second death" -- Revelations 2:10-11

This passage recognizes that there is an alternative to the death of the mortal soul. That alternative is the rebirth of the Immortal Soul, which can only be accomplished when one begins to walk the Path of Return. Those who embark upon the Path endeavor to overcome the powerful pull of physical matter with the goal of obtaining permanent liberation from the wheel of death-and-rebirth.

Man is a temporary, emergency-order being. Nothing about the personality and its soul-vehicles will survive death. Only the emptied microcosm and its accumulated karma will persist, to eventually provide a home for a new personality. If one wishes to avoid falling victim to this scenario yet again, it will require the birth of a New Soul, generated from astral materials not-of-this-earth. This is what the gnostic Path of Return is all about: the alchemical process that leads to True Immortality.

~ g
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The Birth Of The Christ...Within

 

"Though Christ a thousand times in Bethlehem be born
And not within thyself, Thy soul will be forlorn".

 

- Angelus Silesius -

 

The above quote has meaning to those with eyes to see and ears to hear. Silesius was referring to the awakening of the Divine Spark that sleeps within the heart of man. It is the Immortal Seed that must be touched by the Gnosis so that the Original True Man can be re-born.

This is the true symbolical meaning of Christmas. It represents the moment of the awakening of the Rose of the Heart. It represents the birth of the Christ within us. The Child (the Christ-Ray) is born in a stable, His mother resting on a bed of straw, surrounded by assorted beasts and humans. Here, the four kingdoms of the earth are represented: mineral, plant, animal and man.

The event symbolizes that which must occur within each of us, not after we die, but here and now, while incarnate on earth. We must prepare a place in our hearts to receive the Gnosis, the Christ-Ray. Once our Spirit-Spark atom has been touched by the  Gnosis, we are instantly re-linked with the Divine Kingdom from which we estranged ourselves. The Path of Return has begun, upon which we must continue to persevere until the Good End.

May you begin to recognize the true gnostic meaning of the Birth of the Christ, and understand that it is an invitation extended to you to do that which is necessary to provide a home for the Christ that literally sleeps within your heart.

In unity,

~ g

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Not-So-Random Thoughts

“Great men are they who see that spiritual is stronger than any material force, that thoughts rule the world.” - Emerson

“Most people live, whether physically, intellectually or morally, in a very restricted circle of their potential being. They make use of a very small portion of their possible consciousness, and of their soul’s resources in general, much like a man who, out of his whole bodily organism, should get into a habit of using and moving only his little finger." -  William James

“All that we are is the result of what we have thought.” - Buddha

“We are shaped by our thoughts; we become what we think. When the mind is pure, joy follows like a show that never leaves.” - Buddha

“Whatever your mind can conceive and can believe, it can achieve.” - Napoleon Hill

“A man is but the product of his thoughts; what he thinks, he becomes.” - Gandhi
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Yearning For Salvation

 

[QUOTING]

Man has four vehicles: the material body, its etheric double, the desire body and the thinking faculty. The etheric body builds and maintains the material body; the desire body defines the inclinations, the type, the character, the ability of man -- in short, his essential nature.

The desire body, or sidereal figure as Paracelsus called it, surrounds and penetrates us from every angle and the sidereal fluids enter our material system by means of the liver. There is a continuous circulation of these forces that enter and leave the liver. So the liver is more especially the focus of the desire body. The quality of the head and heart sanctuaries is in accordance with the nature of the desire body, as it has developed since birth. The head and heart of natural man are the slaves of he desire body; the functions of the heart and the mentality are directed by the desire body. Your feelings and your thinking as persons of this nature are regulated by your pelvic sanctuary. Consequently, you live out of your pelvic sanctuary, through your spleen-liver system, bound to matter, desiring and focused upon everything that is of ordinary nature. All sidereal radiations enter the liver in accordance with the activities of your desire nature.

When, after endless roaming on the dreary Road of Experience, a human being reaches a dead-end in nature-bound life, it can happen that he begins to desire renewal, to yearn for a liberating solution; that in such a man something like a yearning for salvation develops, an urge to seize one or another approach to Salvation -- to realize it within himself, that he might climb up out of the pit of mortification. This state of searching for renewal, this increasingly conscious yearning for salvation is he highest form of desire of which nature-born man is capable. You cannot reach higher. What in your heart churns and boils is completely desire and its qualitative pinnacle is yearning for salvation. This is the highest state, the limit of dialectical, astral radiation. When we stand at this border, the Gnosis touches us; not in the liver, but in the heart.

The First Touch of the Gnosis always takes place in the heart sanctuary; however, that occurs only in answer to man's yearning for salvation. Therefore, it is out of the question that anyone who would approach the Temples of the gnostic Spiritual School simply experimentally or out of curiosity would benefit in any way. It is beneficial to be in a gnostic focus only when the heart has opened up somewhat for the Gnosis, yet only as a result of that highest state of desire, the yearning for salvation.

From "Pymander and Hermes" - The Egyptian Arch-Gnosis, Vol. 1 - Jan van Rijckenborgh

[END QUOTING]

Everything about us is attracted and attuned to this nature. We are surrounded and interpenetrated by the energies of the Gnosis, but because our thoughts and feelings are tuned in another direction, towards the natural world, we cannot form a link with the Gnosis.

As long as we are content with the world of duality (dialectics, as JVR calls it) we will never be able to form that sacred link. For the Gnosis does not vibrate with the natural world. It is a vibration that is not of this world. The only part of us that can connect with It is our Spirit-Spark atom. Our Divine Spark shares a vibrational affinity with the Gnosis. Once awakened, it will send out a homing beacon, as it were, to the Gnosis. But first, a true desire to be done with this world must exist within the Caller. There must be a yearning born out of total weariness with this world, all of it. Only then, will the Gnosis respond to the Call of the Heart.

May it be so, that you develop this yearning and ignite the Flame of Renewal within.

"Renounce the whole world, and the whole matter therein." The Christ

~ g
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About Truth, Illusion, Delusion and Dissolution

[QUOTING]

1 Hermes: It is impossible, O Tat, for a human being, an imperfect creature, to presume to speak about the Truth, since he is composed of imperfect members and, with regard to his sheath is constituted of an assemblage of foreign bodies. But what is possible and correct to say I will say: namely that Truth only exists in eternal bodies, the elements of which are also True: in fire, which is once and forever fire and nothing else; in earth, which is once and forever earth and nothing else; in air, which is once and forever air and nothing else; in water, which is once and forever water, and nothing else.

2 Our bodies, on the other hand, are composed from all these elements together; they contain Fire, and also Earth, and further more Water and Air; yet they are neither fire, nor earth, nor water, nor air, nor anything whatsoever that is True.

3 If then, from the beginning Truth is foreign to the physical constitution, how shall it hold or express Truth? It will only be able to understand Truth if God wills.

4 The things of this earth, O Tat, are not the Truth, but the imitations of Truth; and not all are even that, but only a few of them. The rest are lies and error, O Tat; illusion which only consists of phantoms. When, however, such an illusion receives an influx from Above, it becomes a replica of the Truth. Without this superior influence it remains a lie, an untruth. It is the same with a portrait that is an image of a body; the painting is not the body it represents. It has eyes, but they see nothing, ears, but they hear nothing. The painting also shows all the other parts, but it is all illusion that deceives the sight of the observers. They think they see the Truth whereas reality is a mere lie.

5 But when one observes something that is not a lie, then one beholds the Truth. So if we see or understand all those things as they actually are, we see and understand True things. If they are different from what they seem, we will neither understand nor know anything that is True.

6 Tat: There is then, Father, Truth even upon earth?

7 Hermes: You are mistaken, my son. There is certainly no Truth on earth, and neither can Truth be brought into being on earth. But it could happen that a few people could form an inkling with regard to the Truth. They are those to whom God has granted the ability to see it.

8 Tat: So there is nothing True on earth?

9 Hermes: I think and I proclaim that everything is illusion and delusion. The things I think and proclaim are True things.

10 Tat: But should one not indicate as Truth those things one thinks and proclaims as being True?

11 Hermes: How would that be possible? One must think and proclaim things as they are: on earth there is nothing True. This is True: that here, Below, there is no Truth. And how would that be possible, my son? Truth is the supreme Magnificence, the absolute Good which is not obscured by matter, nor encompassed by a body. Truth is the naked, luminous, unassailable, exalted, immutable Good.

12 But behold, my son, how the things which are here Below are unable to receive this Good. For they are perishable, subject to suffering, soluble, mutable, forever changing, passing from form to form. How could these things be the Truth, since they in themselves are not True? Everything that changes is illusion, because it does not remain in its Essence, but passes from form to form and thus presents a new appearance all the time.

13 Tat: Is not even man himself true, Father?

14 Hermes: As a man he is not, my son. Truth consists solely in itself and remains what it is. But a human being is composed of manifold elements and does not continue to be identical with himself. On the contrary, he changes and transforms from one age to another, and from one form to another, as long as he inhabits a body. Often, after but a short interval of time, parents no longer recognize their children, nor children their parents.

15 Can a creature which changes to such an extent as to be no longer recognizable be True, Tat? Should we not rather think that, on the contrary, this succession of diverse appearances is an illusion? Therefore, understand that only what is lasting and eternal is true. The human being is transient - therefore, he is not True. He is but appearance, and as such, the supreme illusion.

16 Tat: But Father, are the eternal bodies then not True either, since they also vary?

17 Hermes: Nothing that is brought forth and subject to change is True, but as those bodies were created by the First Father, it could be that their substance is True. Nevertheless, there is in those bodies, too, a certain falsity, because they are variable, because nothing is True save what remains identical with itself.

18 Tat: What may we then call True, Father?

19 Hermes: The Sun alone can be called True. While everything else changes, the Sun does not. That is the reason why only the Sun is entrusted to give form to everything in the world, to reign over and create everything. I venerate him and bow before his Truth; after the Only and First One I recognize in him the Demi-Ourgos, the constructor of the world.

20 Tat: And what, then, is the primordial Truth, Father?

21 Hermes:  The One and  Only, O Tat -- He who is not made of matter, nor exists in a body; who has neither color, nor form, who changes not, nor is changed, but who always Is.

However, what is illusion is perishable. The providence of what is True keeps all that is on earth encompassed in dissolution, and will always do so, for dissolution is the condition of all genesis. Everything that is brought forth dissolves so that creatures can again come to birth. It is necessary that out of dissolution life must come into existence, and what is born must, in turn, necessarily decay, in order that the generation of creatures will never cease. Behold the first active cause of the propagation of creatures who, born out of dissolution, are but illusion; at one time they are born like this, and at another like that. It is impossible for them to be born exactly the same. How could then what is reborn and not identical with itself, be True?

If one wanted to define this simulacrum in an accurate way , one ought to regard a human being as a sham person, a child as a pretence of childhood, a young person a sham one, an adult as a pretence of manhood, a greybeard not truly old. As soon as things change, they deceive, both to what they were and as to what they have become.

Yet, my son,  you must understand well that even the illusory activities here Below depend on that which is Above, that is, on the Truth itself. And indeed, since this is the case, I define Illusion as the expression of Truth.

Seventeenth Book of the Corpus Hermeticum - Hermes to Tat: About the Truth - The Egyptian Arch-Gnosis, Vol. 4 - Jan van Rijckenborgh

[END QUOTING]

In short: that which is Changeable cannot be True. That which is True remains so always. Therefore, anything subject to change or dissolution can never be True.

So what does that say about Man and this World? It says that we are but transient illusions. We come and we go. We are composed and then we break apart, again and again and again.

However, an atom of Truth does lie entombed within our microcosm. It is the Rose of the Heart, the Divine Spirit-Spark atom. It is this Truth which we are tasked with freeing from the bonds of illusion. It is this Truth that will liberate us from the Sleep of Ages, if we manage to find and triumphantly walk the Path of the True Way, the Path of Liberation.

You may have to read the above passage from the Seventeenth Book of the Corpus Hermeticum several times before gleaning its True import, but its meaning will most surely dawn on you eventually, pulling aside yet another veil.

~ g
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Fishbowl (Re-post)

Originally posted on 30 July 2013

Imagine that your microcosm is a globe-shaped fishbowl with you, the personality, in the center. You are surrounded and inter-penetrated by astral fluid, just as a fish is surrounded and inter-penetrated by water. As the quality of the fish is determined by the quality of the water that surrounds it, so the quality of the human personality is determined and conditioned by the quality of the astral fluid that surrounds him or her.

Our thoughts are living creations. When we think a thought, a particular vibration is sent into the surrounding astral field. If our thoughts are impure, evil, selfish, fearful, critical, judgmental, vengeful etc., the thought-vibration we send forth will color our astral field accordingly. The emotional body is conditioned by those mental emanations and the ethers that compose the etheric body are also extracted from those astral vibrations. The etheric body, as we know, vitalizes and conditions the physical body.

From the foregoing, one should be able to see that what we think dictates our desires and eventually manifests itself in the health or disease of the physical body. Man lives in a fishbowl. Our astral creations - our thoughts - surround and inter-penetrate all four vehicles of our human personality. If, via wrong-thinking we pollute our respiration-field, the astral field that surrounds us, we have to understand that there will be consequences to deal with and a bill that must be paid.

We are what we think. When we look in a mirror, or examine our desires, or take note of our physical condition, we are seeing our thoughts being reflected back to us.  If we do not like the reflection there is but one thing we can do:

Purify our thoughts. Clean up the fishbowl.

~ g
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Born To Rule, Now A Slave

'Slaves lose everything in their chains,

even the desire of escaping from them'

 

– Jean Jacques Rousseau

[QUOTING]

"Now", said I, understanding is mine, but what of man, what of myself?  How was man created?" The voice of the Good and Great Being which I knew to be a personalized manifestation of the Holy Spirit, answered me".

"The image and nature of the Supreme Spirit resides in the soulseed of man, just as the image and nature of an oak tree resides in an acorn. The pattern for the mortal body of man was formed in the Sphere of the Holy Spirit and projected to the Sphere of Matter and Mortality where Nature built upon it. When the time was ripe, the body prepared by Nature was implanted with the soulseed of Divinity and the creature of Earth became a man. From that day, man, unlike all other living things on Earth, became a two-fold being in his own right, mortal in body but immortal in Soulspirit. He is immortal only because he has been made the heir of Divinity, and as such all things are within his grasp. He is mortal because he lives within a mortal shell and is subject to a destiny in mortality".

I said to the Being who seemed so near, "Whatever man was when given Divine Life, it is said that he suffered a downfall or disinheritance". I heard the Voice say in reply, "Man will not be disinherited, but he can make what he will of his birthright. The downfall of man was a fall from the sunlit Heights of Spirituality into the dark valley of agnosia. It was also a fall from a position of responsibility and trust, and man has yet to regain that position".

'Man fell because he declined to undergo the necessary preparation and discipline needed by one who aspires to climb the Heights. Also, he possessed the powers of creation, and being free could express them as he pleased. Man used them to satisfy his lower desires and so brought about his own downfall. Since then he has no longer enjoyed them to the full. Given freewill and the ability, it was intended that man should direct his own evolution, but he proved unequal to the task".

"Man was intended to be the redeemer of reasonless Matter and the controller of Nature, for that reason he was first called Lord of Creation. But it was Nature herself who dominated the will of man and tempted him to betray his trust. She lured him into entanglement with the senses, so that instead of being free, he became the slave of desire. The sweetness of the bait disguised the poison it contained and the Spirit of man was dragged into forgetfulness and mindlessness".

"Instead of being the master of a noble steed galloping along the Road to Immortality, man was now a blind creature bound upon a runaway horse. Notwithstanding this, he found the sensation enjoyable, believing that in being freed from the responsibility of control, he had found true freedom. Man made little effort to assume control, for this meant struggle, effort and responsibility, and so he remained in the state of spiritual inertia called the Mire of Matter. The Soulspirit had entered the body, only to be caught in the toils of the of the flesh. Man was heading in the wrong direction  and the way was all uphill".

"So now you see", the Voice continued, "that man was made a two-fold being. Within, though this is a misleading description, is the Soulspirit, but to all outward appearances, man is a mortal shell subject to decay. Though born to a heritage of Divinity, man himself has chosen to suffer as the slave of his desires and the vassal of his weakness. He has bartered his Spiritual birthright for a handful of fragile material baubles. Man, becoming enamored of the glitter from the first bauble offered, has lost his sense of values and has closed his eyes to things of real value. He has drunk the material waters of spiritual oblivion and now lies asleep beside the stagnant pool. He slumbers, awaiting the Day of the Awakened".

The Kolbrin: Book of Lucius - Chapter 3 - The Making of Man

[END QUOTING]

No matter how glorious or tragic the life, man is like a drunk lying half-conscious in the gutter, not caring about the puke drooling from his mouth or the foul smell of his own waste. As long as we do not Seek the Kingdom that sleeps in the Rose of the Heart (referenced in the Book of Lucius as 'the soulseed') we may as well be dead while "alive", which is, in fact, the true case.

Awaken.

~ g
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Lifeforce, Soulspirit, Duty and Purpose

[QUOTING]

When the child grows up, becoming a youth or maiden, it enters into a struggle with existence, with worldliness. It becomes like a swimmer setting out to cross a turbulent river. Individuals try to mold the world to their own way of thinking, but the world fights back and in so doing shapes each one into an image differing from his own conception. To each person Earth takes on a different aspect, according to individual thoughts and inclinations.

The lifeforce centered in man is not something unique in nature, and the vast Ocean of Life seeks to draw it back into Itself. Therefore, if the lifeforce is to remain separate within the individual, the individual must be prepared to face conflict and opposition. The struggle to retain life cannot be renounced, no one can cut himself off from the difficulties of worldly existence, or discard the burden of manhood or womanhood.

While strength and vitality throb within the mortal container, worldly problems and difficulties must be steadfastly faced and overcome. But at the onset of middle age each one should prepare for the downhill run, and by this time the soulspirit should be aroused to consciousness and be well and harmoniously formed. Each person should, by this time, be strong enough to face the inevitability of old age, decay and death, with equanimity. At this, the turning point of life, there should be an inward turning, a greater effort expended in seeking to understand the purpose and meaning of life. There should be a seeking after spirituality, after fulfillment.

The sole purpose of earthly existence is to realize and develop the latent powers in man. All the problems and struggles, all the spiritual difficulties and obscurities, all the paradoxes, the experiences of joy and sorrow, pleasure and pain, simply serve to awaken the soulspirit. Life is all-embracing, it includes both birth and death, growth and decline, the contrasts, the opposites, the active and the passive, the male and female.

It is the knowledge of his individuality, his separateness, his consciousness of self that raises man above the level of the dumb creatures, but this position cannot be maintained without effort; it will always be easier to fall than to rise, to go back instead of forward. The child knows little of the burdens imposed by life, but as it grows older, its light-heartedness becomes over-shadowed by the knowledge of duties and obligations which must be assumed. The hearts of our weaker brethren are so often filled with a longing to return to the state of protected childhood, that they are easily beguiled by parental faiths which treat them as children. They find it easy to cast their spiritual burdens at the feet of comforting priests, but such action is not only childishly irresponsible, it is also morally cowardly.

The spiritually irresponsible, who seek a comforting creed, are generally apathetic or selfish persons careless of their spiritual life and needs. My friends, the ultimate, the final thing we must depend upon is the soulspirit. Only that accompanies the individual into life eternal, but it is too late to come to this realization upon the deathbed. Those who have confidence in their future existence are the only true contented ones on Earth.

Man should never forget that his most important aspect is the soulspirit and he should not be neglectful of its needs and demands. He should not confuse it with the frail mortal body whose needs and demands, if given full rein, will override those of his greater self. Man must understand Life, he must understand its forces, which play about him. To understand it fully is to know one's own destiny, one's own heritage of struggle and one's own trials. Man must resolve on the inner search and follow its trail diligently.

When a man's life becomes a pattern of perfection reflecting the Perfection above, he is a container for the lifeforce and a channel for the down pouring Power which serves to uplift the whole of mankind. Becoming this is in fact the only real service man can render The Supreme Spirit.

Man's prime duty is to himself and even when he serves others he is serving his own ends, therefore he should not be hypocritical about his goodness. The good deeds of men are the molders of the soulspirit, as are also spirituality, freedom from agnosia, forbearance, love of Truth and justice, tranquility of the heart, simplicity, austerity, generosity and integrity.

Only in a well-balanced being can the lifeforce manifest harmoniously. Therefore, all excesses of joy and sadness, pleasure and melancholy, despair and exhilaration, are to be avoided. The rule must be oft-repeated: Moderation in all things and complete control over the self.

My friends, I have revealed to you the nature of the Inner Being who controls all things from within. Now it is up to you to use this knowledge to good effect. I have shown you the chords by which the spheres are held together and the same chords bind all things.

You ask me, "What is a good man?". He is one in whom goodness triumphs over evil, whose good qualities grow stronger daily, while his evil qualities weaken. In him, conceit, avarice, selfishness, anger, rashness and agnosia are diminishing each day, and he governs his life in accordance with the Good Books.

From The Kolbrin - Book of Lucious - Chapter 13

[END QUOTING]
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Withstanding The Trials Of Life

"Hear my voice, those who miserably bewail their misfortunes. When troubles beset you and new trials confront you every day, know you are being tested. Life itself is a necklace of tests. Accept with fortitude whatever test life presents, saying in your heart when meeting each one, "However this may appear now, it is for my ultimate good".

Face up to every trial, for only the tests successfully undergone and the good deeds done have lasting value. To merely wile away the time, to take the easy path through life, turning aside at every obstacle, has no value whatsoever".

The Kolbrin: Book of the Silver Bough - The Teachings of Elidor
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