The Longing That Leads To True Life

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If your astral consciousness is drawn up into the heart, you are, consequently, the subject of interference of two worlds. The old and the new one seize you; it is a situation more difficult to endure because of the tensions it provokes. Therefore, take your cross, your rosycross, and go the Path that leads from Bethlehem to Golgotha, so that you may walk in the New Light.

To this end, it is necessary that the astral consciousness, during the hours of sleep, is not found again in the astral sphere of the nature-of-death. This is the first task. Imagine that you could free yourself for several nights from this astral sphere; you would then experience what an enormous blessing results from it.

Therefore, apply your new possibilities by living out of them, by taking them into account every hour of the day and by drawing the necessary consequences. Do not allow yourself to be dragged along in common behaviour, either as an individual, or with others, but direct yourself to The Great Aim and bring your being in harmony with it. When one is young one strives after maturity and social success. In the promising youth of gnostic pupilship, standing before the gates of the New Life, you likewise need to prepare for this Life and become mature as to the Soul-man and arrive in the Soul-world.

Of course you will still have to carry out your social tasks. We all have our duties and responsibilities which demand fulfilment and which weigh heavily. Do not neglect your duties. However, when you realize the Eternal Importance propelling the Soul-man within you to Life, then everything social, everything dualistic, however necessary to occupy yourself with for some time, will become of secondary importance. We do not mean that it does not matter any longer, only that The Great Aim will predominate in you by day and by night.

All the rest becomes spontaneously subservient. While you are occupied with whatever it may be, the Voice of the Soul will be heard and you will be able to listen to its rejoicing. When the astral self, drawn up into the heart, sends out its Longing for a New Life, all the rest will recede into the background as a matter of course. This Longing needs to resound in you by day and by night as one continuous tone. Then you will go the Way of Self-Surrender, the logical Way of Transfiguration, directly and in practice.

You know what Longing is. What have you not longed for in your life? When you look back on all those multifarious desires you know that a certain desire can be so strong that it becomes completely dominant. Well, when your longing for the Liberating Life, for the Gnosis, has that kind of depth and intensity, the astral self will become devoted, in self-surrender, to 'It', to 'Tao' to the Rose of roses, to the Gnosis. In this way, you will sing your thirteen songs of repentance, oh Pistis Sophia.

If you stand in this Process without any force of (nature-born) will, your astral self will no longer thrive, no longer breathe in the astral sphere of the nature-of-death. Then the natural astral self will die and the astral sphere of the nature-of-death will have to let you go, as a matter-of-course, because it can no longer reach you. Then, with respect to the astral self, you will have died according to nature.

From "The Road To Alienation" The Egyptian Arch-Gnosis, Vol. 1 - Jan van Rijckenborgh

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Purification Of The Heart

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When we awaken in the new, gnostic morning, the purification of the heart must be taken in hand in a very serious way from that moment on. Therefore, it is worthwhile to describe the average pupil of the Spiritual School of the Golden Rosycross. One can say that nearly every pupil is engaged in drawing the astral self up into the heart. In this way, he draws the drape from a window, as it were, where he can see a new light, shining as a rising dawn.

As soon as the pupils are able to look through the window of the heart, they come to know that real inner happiness can be found only on an entirely different spiral of life. The Rose of the Heart begins to speak because a new state is entered, the Gnostic Light has penetrated into their blood and developed entirely different motives in their system, so they stand at the gate of an entirely new process of development. Or, speaking in the language of the gnostic gospel of the Pistis Sophia: they stand before the gates of the Thirteenth Aeon.

If you are in this situation, the old process of development has not yet left you. At least, the old life has left its marks deeply in your heart sanctuary and that is why it must be purified. As long as the heart has not become pure according to the standards of the Gnosis, the new direction you gave to the astral consciousness will be only partially possible. The latent possibilities of the heart sanctuary cannot yet be freed; the old state of life continues to play an important part in your life and the consciousness, during sleep, returns to the astral sphere of the nature-of-death with all the ensuing consequences.

So you are, to a great extent, by virtue of your state-of-being, subjects of interference to the reflection-sphere, even to a higher degree than might be considered normal, because its inhabitants know that they are about to lose you. It is obvious that your life, for the moment, is more difficult, because in this situation both the Gnosis and nature have a role in your life. It is clear that the inner conflict may become more acute. You can read of these things in the Pistis Sophia, which is completely inspired by the experiences of the pupil who wakes up in the heart and seriously considers the consequences of it.

Whoever draws the astral consciousness up into the heart, penetrates into the holy halls of the universal Gnostic Brotherhood. However, the candidate, just as the Pistis Sophia, is sent back to purify the heart from numerous stains in various stages.

Pupils of the Spiritual School seek the Pure Light, the Liberating Life -- and because you have drawn your consciousness up into the heart, you know from within that the Pure Light exists. It is the pure, Original sidereal substance, the Pure Astral Force, just as it exists in the universal Gnostic Chain. The important thing now is that you reform the sidereal body -- the desire, or astral body -- in accordance with the standards of the Gnosis. What each pupil must achieve is the transfiguration of the astral self. It must be made pure, just as the Gnostic Light is pure. According to inner Knowledge you can cherish the hope of achieving this necessary purification, the first aspect of Transfiguration.

Therefore, you must now radically take yourself in hand, yet without forcing yourself, for that only causes extra tensions. Then the grand and glorious process, of which we have spoken in detail, develops. In the purified heart, the Immortal Soul is born, the basis for an entirely new type of man. This soul-basis consists of four principles of consciousness: the new material, the new etheric, the new astral and the new mental consciousness. First the astral consciousness must develop, then the mental and finally the etheric and material consciousness.

In this way the new soul-state will make itself felt in the blood and the nerve-fluid and, further, will manifest itself powerfully in the astral fluids of your being, upon which you new birth depends. Finally, on this basis the renewing principle begins to establish the new mentality with which the new state-of-consciousness has become complete. This entire process is indicated as the new sidereal birth.

From "The Way To Alienation" The Egyptian Arch-Gnosis, Vol. 1 - Jan van Rijckenborgh

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The heart is home to the sleeping Divine Spark. It must be purified, i.e., raised in vibration, in order to provide proper conditions for the Rosebud to bloom. It is from this sleeping Spirit-Spark Atom that the New Man will be re-born. But first, the heart of the candidate and eventually the entire astral body as well, must be purified.

~ g
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