28 Rules Group

Commentary on Rule XIV Part I of V

R&I (285-292)

(All Highlighting, Bolding and Underlining—MDR)

Please read this Commentary with your book open or with reference to an electronic copy of the text. This will facilitate an appreciation of continuity.

 

RULE FOURTEEN  

 

In this final rule for disciples and initiates, a great summation is embodied.

 

1.                  The summation for Rule XIV for Disciples and Initiates is extremely brief, just as is the summation for the last of the Rules for Applicants.

2.                  The brevity only adds to the profundity-

 

 I would here point out again (as I have so frequently in the past) that the obvious meaning—no matter how elevated—is not that with which we shall deal.

 

3.                  This is the ongoing challenge to students throughout these more advanced Rules.

 

 It is the significance behind the meaning which is ever the concern of the initiate mind.

 

4.                  DK is writing for the “initiate mind”. These Rules are to be interpreted in the light of the spiritual triad—the realm of “significance”. This task naturally demands a functional antahkarana.

 

 Students would do well to remember the following sequence of words, embodying ideas:  Symbol, Meaning, Significance, Light, regarding light as the emanating creative energy—the organiser of the symbol, the revealer of the meaning, the potency of the significance.

 

5.                  Light is the final term in this sequence of four. It is really an amazing sequence and reminds us of the ancient aphorism that “a word to the wise is sufficient”.

6.                  In this sequence, light is not only the final term, it is also the central term, like the “point within the triangle”.

7.                  Usually one would associate light with the World of Meaning and we would say that the symbol reveals light (which in one sense is true).

8.                  But here it seems that light is associated the Shamballa—with what has been called “unfettered enlightenment”.

9.                  The following planar associations can be made:

    1. Symbol—the World of the Mind
    2. Meaning—the World of the Soul
    3. Significance—the World of the Triad
    4. Light—the World of the Spirit

10.             Light is not only accessed by a symbol. Rather, light becomes an organizing potency. This is a third aspect function. When, along the antahkarana, the higher light is contacted, it out-pictures itself in symbol.

11.             Further, let us think of the antahkarana process. When the creative imagination is brought into play and the bridge is imagined, it is the light of the intuition which organizes the product of the imagination so that can truly be in contact with the reflect the intuition. Imagination has contacted something more than itself and the images produced are mysteriously altered.

12.             When the light of the soul descends (and even more so, the higher light), it reveals meaning, or relationship within context. This is a second aspect function of light—the Light of Love.

13.             When the higher light is contacted (even more the “Highest Light” through the Monad) it empowers the sense of willed-direction revealed within the World of Significance. The direction of the Will of God is revealed and things are shown in relation to that Will and its direction and not only in relation to the context in which they are embraced. This is a expression of the highest aspect of light—the “Light of Life”.

14.             We can see that each of the three divine aspects—light, love and power—contains within itself a threefold expression.

15.             So much, we see, can be contained in a significant series of terms.

 

We have studied the rules and have penetrated deeply into the world of significances.

 

16.             We have thus penetrated could we but realize it.

17.             These advanced Rules are meant to be revelatory of the spiritual triad.

18.             In fact, DK is suggesting that all of the Rules are to be interpreted from the perspective of significance technically understood.

 

 Most of you have not, however, passed beyond the stage of groping in the world of [Page 286] meaning.

 

19.             That we grope means that we do not yet see. And in what manner do we no yet see? We do not yet see with the “wisdom eye”—the ‘eye of synthesis’ which is confirmed in its opening at the third initiation and which admits consciously into the realm of the spiritual triad.

 

  The reason for this is that you have not yet taken the third initiation.

 

20.             True vision of significances would come at this point.

21.             The revelation of significance leads us onward according to the Divine Will.

 

 I would ask you also to bear in mind that the world of symbols is that of the personal life, of the phenomenal world as that phrase covers the three worlds of human evolution; the world of meaning is the world in which the soul lives and moves with intention and understanding; the world of significance is the world of the Spiritual Triad, which only confers its freedom fully after the third initiation.

 

22.             Here DK gives the meaning of the first three terms in a full yet concise manner.

23.             The entire world of the personality is a symbolic outpicturing of higher patterns of meaning and significance.

24.             The soul lives in a world of appreciated relationships. This type of consciousness prevails in the World of the Soul.

25.             In the World of Significance (the world of the “Spiritual Triad”) destined objectives (destined for our planet by our Planetary Logos are revealed.) The potency of intended directionality is added to the revelation of meaning.

26.             We might say that in the World of Significance, the Light of Shamballa lights the way for the higher will of man. The man can intuit and can think in such a way as to be responsive to monadic will which is an aspect of the Will of the Planetary Logos. As this Highest Light pours in, the direction in which the man’s spiritual will should be applied (and it is a direction significant of the Will which directs our planet) is revealed, confirmed and strengthened.

27.             The World of Light is not discussed. The power aspect of light is fully realized on the monadic plane. We know how much the factor of light is to be associated with the second aspect of divinity. The monadic plane is the second of the cosmic physical subplanes.

 

The words dealt with in this Rule XIV are apparently so simple that they can be easily understood.  I will attempt to show you that their real meaning is deep and esoteric to what you call the nth degree.

 

28.             We are shown that the Tibetan intends to lead us ever more deeply into the possibility for esoteric realization.

29.             On a number of occasions, when the Tibetan uses the word “esoteric”, He indicates the Spirit/Monad.

 

Rule XIV.

 

For Applicants:  Listen.  Touch.  See.  Apply.  Know.

 

For Disciples and Initiates:  Know.  Express.  Reveal.  Destroy.  Resurrect.

 

30.             These are all words for deep meditation.

31.             One point for meditative focus is the apparent overlap between series, pivoting on the word “Know”.

32.             The series for Applicants ends with knowledge of the World of the Soul. The series for the Initiate begins there.

 

The following relationships should be noted, for the first is the seed of the other.

 

APPLICANTS   INITIATES

Listen....Know

Touch....Express

See......Reveal

Apply....Destroy

Know.....Resurrect

 

33.             We see how the higher terms correlate with the lower.

34.             We also see the relationship of these lower terms to the first three senses, though we could not convincingly go so far as to say that the final two of these terms for applicants correlated with the sense of taste and smell.

35.             Also, we must remember that the true Ego or soul is the spiritual triad.

36.             We can eventually interpret even the five words for applicants in a triadal manner, but this is the not the way in which they must be interpreted initially.

37.             For instance, in elevating the meanings of the five terms for applicants, we could proceed as follows:

38.             Through inner hearing we come to know the soul-as-Triad. This occurs in relation to the buddhic plane, though first we must hear the “Voice of the Soul”.

39.             Through the refined sense of touch we learn to express the soul-as-Triad, though first we must touch and be touched by the soul.

40.             Through the extension of the sense of sight we are able to reveal the soul-as-Triad. A higher type of realization attuned to the atmic plane is ours, though first we must learn to ‘see’ the soul in three forms of expression—as Angel, as lotus, as wheel.

41.             We eventually learn to apply the higher will to destroy the “shroud of the soul” (the causal body). Initially, though, application involves the intelligent application to the three worlds of that which is known by the personality or of that which the personality knows of the soul.

42.             Finally one learns to know the spiritual triad intimately and also becomes intuitively intimate with the post-triadal world of the Monad, though at first, and obviously so, one must know the soul on the higher mental plane.

43.             These are simply a few faltering attempts to convey that which the higher terms could signify when related to the original five terms and understood to include the elevated expressions of these lower five.

44.             DK will undertake the explanation of these terms according to the hierarchical perspective.

 

You will note that the applicant eventually arrives at knowledge and begins to know;

 

45.             This knowing is of that which the World of the Soul (on the higher mental plane) reveals.

46.             The final knowing of the applicant is not a knowing of the spiritual triad.

 

the disciple or the initiate starts with knowing,

 

47.             DK is obviously not speaking of the probationary disciple, but of the disciple who is passing through the probationary initiations. It would seem that such a disciple must have taken at least the second initiation at which time the building and utilization (with effectiveness) of the antahkarana is a confirmed part of the program of spiritual development.

 

and through his ability to express esoterically that which he knows is able to reveal the light,

 

48.             DK has given us an excellent little summary of the manner in which the disciples or initiate is to demonstrate the five higher terms or, really, injunctions or commands.

49.             When DK uses the term “esoteric” or “esoterically”, so often He is speaking in terms of the spiritual triad or even the Monad.

 

 and by that light to destroy all illusion, glamour and maya;

 

50.             It ´will be the light of the intuition (clearly a triadal form of light) which brings illusion, glamor and maya to an end.

 

 he brings about resurrection upon the physical plane—a resurrection from the death which physical plane life inevitably confers.

 

51.             This type of resurrection suggests the taking of the fourth initiation. It is a rising out of physical plane life and a transcendence of the need to return to it through the usual process of incarnation—i.e., physical birth.

52.             There is also a higher type of resurrection associated with the seventh initiation and the logoic plane. Of this type of resurrection we can know practically nothing and what we ‘know’ will be only theoretical.

 

The five words as given to the applicant are indeed relatively simple.

 

53.             Though even here the simplicity can be misleading…

 

 Most aspirants understand their meaning [Page 287] to a certain extent.

 

54.             Here DK will interpret the five words to applicants in terms of the soul.

 

  They know that the listening mentioned has naught to do with the sense of physical hearing, and that the touch to be developed has reference to sensitivity and not the sensory perception of the physical vehicle.

 

55.             The words do not refer to the utilization of the outer senses in the normal manner. The outer senses can, however, assist in the process of “spiritual reading” by means of which the world of phenomena can be interpreted in the light of the soul.

56.             We note that the applicant to initiation must always be sensitive, which suggests a certain refinement of the astral body.

 

  They know likewise that the sight to be cultivated is the power to see the beauty underlying form, to recognise the subjective divinity and to register also the love conveyed through the medium of symbols.

 

57.             This is a wonderful sentence. We are definitely speaking of “spiritual reading”, which suggest the first of the soul siddhis activate on the higher mental plane, “spiritual discernment”. It is a seeing of that which is spiritual in all things.

58.             “Spiritual reading” (“spiritual discernment”)  is a second ray type of vision, for the second ray is the “Ray of Beauty in Relationship”, the “Ray of the Divine Pattern”.

59.             Divinity is a term relating to the Spirit, and students are also to cultivate their sense of inner ‘sight’ in that direction.

60.             How beautiful, as well, to consider that love is “conveyed through the medium of symbols”. Symbols reveal the beauty of the Divine Pattern formulated through pure reason, which is another term for love as expressed through the buddhic plane.

61.             When we look upon the world of symbols (the three lower worlds), we must realize that this world is a presentation of the love existing on the “plane of harmony”, the buddhic plane. Symbols reveal the purely reasonable love (purely reasonable in the occult sense) which underlies the World of Archetypes—found especially upon the monadic plane but reflected on the buddhic plane. In these worlds, all things exist together in loving harmony.

62.             So, in this injunction, we are asked to see with the eyes of the higher consciousness—beginning at first with the consciousness of the veiled soul upon the higher mental plane, and moving gradually into the consciousness of the spiritual triad and then, of the, Monad. The aspirant, per se, is not asked to see with these higher extensions of consciousness, but the initiate is.

 

 The application of soul energy to the affairs of daily life and the establishing of those conditions which permit of soul knowledge are the elementary lessons of the aspirant.  With these I need not deal, except in so far as they give the clue to the significance of the five words as given to the initiated disciple.

 

63.             This is very straightforward. Through meditation one learns what the soul intends. Will these intentions remain theoretical only? Or will they be applied in practical service? This is the crux of the problem of every aspirant and probationer. In the section of text under consideration, the focus is upon only the “elementary” lessons of the aspirant; more advanced lessons are not considered.

64.             We should note that DK is pointing not so much to the “meaning” of the five words given to the “initiated disciple” but to their “significance”. This again affirms that these five words are to be understood in the light of the spiritual triad.

65.             Note as well that the five terms in the higher series is given to the “initiated disciple”. What is the meaning of that term “initiated disciple”?

66.             Minimally, it suggests the second initiation. At that point one is a true disciple, almost certainly “accepted” in the technical sense of the term, but one is not yet the true initiate—a state of consciousness and of mind which begins a the third initiation.

67.             Yet, from a higher perspective, those who have taken the third initiation are still disciples, as are even the members of the Spiritual Hierarchy. And, we must remember that the last seven of the fourteen higher Rules are only really to be understood by the initiate consciousness.

68.             So, perhaps we must conclude that the real significance of this higher series of five terms will only be understood by the initiate of the third degree and that, in this context, the “initiated disciple” is one who has taken the third degree.

 

Let us take each of these five words and seek to ascertain their significance.

 

69.             Again, He repeats this word “significance” which means that we will be looking at thee words from a very high perspective.

 

  But first of all, I would like to point out that here we are concerned with monadic signatures,

 

70.             This is an interesting and very occult term. It hearkens back to the medieval doctrine of “signatures”—which are often curiously rendered line-diagrams (very much like a person’s signature). They were sometimes called “sigils” and were thought to invoke and embody the energy or presence of a higher or lower E/entity.

71.             We might say we are dealing with concretized expressions revelatory of the identity of the Monad.

72.             DK is trying to reveal the nature of our subject. He is trying to reveal something of that monadic nature and monadic presence which lies behind the use of the five higher injunctions.

 

 with that which synthesises significances,

 

73.             Amazingly occult. Significances are realized within the spiritual triad. Yet it is the Monad, as the "point within the triangle", which synthesizes significances realized within the Triad.

74.             Really, Rule XIV is a very synthetic, monadically inspired Rule.

 

 and with that which contributes vital significance to the initiated life.

 

75.             Vital significance is living significance. The initiate living the initiated life is vitalized by the spiritual triad which is an expression of the Monad.

76.             The initiate experiences a living, vibrant directionality reaching him via the spiritual triad but impulsed, ultimately, by the Spirit or Monad itself.

77.             When significances, as revealed within the triadal sphere, are impressed upon the consciousness of the initiate, he becomes charged with life and with the will to apply those significances to the world of the soul-infused personality and, even more, to the world of the group and to the world of humanity.

78.             The initiate is driven by the living will of the Monad expressed as significance through the Triad.

79.             Suffice it to say that the impress of the Monad substands all we study in this Rule.

 

 I would have you, as you read my words, retreat within yourselves and seek to think, feel and perceive at your highest possible level of consciousness.

 

80.             For us, if we have somewhat built and are using the antahkarana, the place of “retreat” will be the subplanes of the seven systemic planes through which the spiritual triad expresses—presumably the lower subplanes rather than the higher.

 

 The effort to do this will bear much fruit and bring rich reward to you.  You will not grasp the full intention of these words, but your sense of awareness will begin to react to triadal impression.

 

81.             Something higher will begin to dawn upon us even if we cannot register the full significance of what is dawning.

 

  I know not how else to word this, limited as I am by the necessity of language.

 

82.             When we reach the point of realizing that language, as ordinarily used, is a limitation upon esoteric communication, that in itself is an indication of esoteric progress.

 

  You may not register anything consciously, for the brain of the average disciple is as yet insensitive to monadic vibration.

 

83.             The average disciple has not yet taken the third degree when this type of sensitivity is awakened.

84.             Let us be clear—this type of study is intended to facilitate monadic impression of the brain. This higher Rule is synthetic and intends to bring “Heaven to Earth”.

 

  Even if the disciple is capable of some responsiveness, there are not the needed words in which to express the sensed idea or to clothe the concept.

 

85.             A subtle esoterically-‘poetic’ approach is, therefore, needed.

 

 It is therefore impossible to put the divine ideas into their ideal form and them bring them down into the world of meaning, and from thence into the world of symbols.

 

86.             These ideas originate within the World of the Monad (the World of Being) and live within the World of Significance. They do not usually live within the World of the Soul or the World of the Personality—the worlds of meaning and personality respectively.

87.             Remember that idealism exists with the World of the Soul and also with the World of the Triad (the faculty of idealism being found on the third subplane of the buddhic plane). And the Monad too, on the sixth plane counting from below, is the Great Idealist.

 

  What I say will therefore have more significance towards the close of this century,

 

88.             We have been there and beyond. Are we sufficiently aware?

 

when men will have recovered from the chaos and cruelty of war,

 

89.             Yet war within our kingdom has persisted. Has our consciousness recovered?

 

 and when the new and higher spiritual influences are being steadily poured out.

 

90.             This has happened and is happening.

 

  I write, my brothers, for the future.

 

91.             These Rules, I suspect, will have utility throughout the Aquarian Age. If the Gospel Narrative in the Christian Bible (written down by those who still had much to achieve in their spiritual development) endured for two thousand years, there is no reason to think that stanzas taken from the Inner Archives will not similarly endure. Stories from the Old Testament, also not written by high initiates, have lasted even longer.

 

[Page 288]

1. Know.

 

What is the difference between the knowing of the aspirant and the knowledge of the initiated disciple?  It is the difference which exists between two differing fields and areas of perception.

 

92.             We are really only somewhat familiar with one of these fields of perception—the field of the true psyche (or soul) as it interpenetrates the world of the person.

93.             Of course we are even more familiar with the human psyche within the personality. This is not the true psyche.

94.             With the world of the spiritual triad as it interpenetrates the World of the Ego on the higher mental plane, we have far less familiarity.

 

 The aspirant is told first of all to "know thyself"; he is then told to know the relation of form and soul, and the area covered by his knowledge is that of the three worlds, plus the level upon the mental plane on which his soul is focussed.

 

95.             DK says this succinctly. As aspirants, we are to know the lunar vehicles (four of them, which includes the personality) and then to understand the relationship between these vehicles and the soul or Ego on the higher mental plane.

96.             Knowledge is contact and the apprehension of that which contact revealed.

97.             To acquire knowledge one must be capable of actually contacting the sphere of vibration or field to be known. One must also be capable of registering that which the field of knowledge reveals.

98.             We note that DK reasserts that there is more than one level of the mental plane on which our soul may be focussed. As far as we know, it will be either the third or the second subplane. For an individual who is focussed primarily in the personality, it will be the third subplane.

 

  The initiated disciple knows the relation of the periphery to the centre, of the One to the many, and of unity to diversity.

 

99.             The initiated disciple dwells in unitive consciousness. It is the consciousness revealed by the true Ego, both on its own plane, and also as it works through the causal body during the later stages of evolution.

100.         The stage of consciousness here described reaches a kind of culmination at Mastership at which time one becomes in consciousness both the point at the center and the ring-pass-not which defines the circle or, better, the sphere of consciousness.

101.         If we think of the meanings of the signs Leo and Aquarius, we shall see that these meanings are descriptive of the state of consciousness of the high initiate.

 

  The applicant is concerned with triplicity:  himself as the knower, his field of knowledge, and that which is the agent of knowing, the mind.

 

102.         “Learn that the Thinker and his thought and that which is the means of thought are diverse in their nature, yet one in ultimate reality”. (TWM 473)

 

 The initiated disciple is beyond registering triplicity and is occupied with the duality of manifestation,

 

103.         Thus he works with the “Technique of Duality” as hinted in EP II.

 

3. The Technique of Duality is applied upon the Path of Initiation. (EP II 379)

 

 with life-energy as it affects or is related to matter-force, with spirit and substance.

 

104.         The initiated disciple is involved with the process of eliminating the soul on the higher mental plane as a central factor. He is gradually moving towards that state of identification which will transcend the state of unitive harmonious consciousness realized on the higher mental plane.

 

 The knowledge of the initiate has naught to do with consciousness as the mind recognises that factor in the evolutionary process;

 

105.         It is inferred that there is a way to recognize consciousness in a manner other than the manner in which the mind recognizes it. Consciousness in its purest form substands the entire Universal Process.

 

 his knowledge is related to the faculty of the intuition and to that divine perception which sees all things as within itself. 

 

106.         Here is another marvelous definition of intuition and, perhaps, to a state of inclusive perception which transcends what is usually understood by the term “intuition”.  It reveals the deeply ‘inclusive interiority’ of intuitive perception and of post-intuitive states—perhaps monadic states.

107.         Long pondering on this sentence will reveal much and will stimulate the intuition as here described.

 

Perhaps the simplest way to express the knowledge of the initiate is to say that it is direct awareness of God,

 

108.         Let us call this ‘straight knowledge of Divinity”.

 

thus putting it into mystical terms;

 

109.         Within the true initiate of the occult mysteries, the mystic is alive and well.

 

 the knowledge of the aspirant is related to that aspect of divinity which we call the soul in form.

 

110.         Not even the soul on its own plane—the higher mental plane.

111.         Of course the causal body is also a form and the true soul is the Ego released from the causal body and functioning as the spiritual triad.

112.         The aspirant cannot be expected to have full knowledge of the soul or Ego within the causal body.

 

  Putting this in still another way,

 

113.         And notice, one must do this to attempt to reach the many types of minds…

 

 I might point out that the aspirant is concerned with the knowledge of soul and matter, whilst the initiate is concerned with soul and spirit.

 

114.         The soul is the shared factor in both types of knowledge. The soul is Janus looking in two directions—towards personality-matter and towards spirit and spiritual soul.

 

If I say to you, my brothers, that the knowledge of the initiate is concerned with that which is produced by SOUND and not by the A.U.M. or the O.M., I shall have linked up these comments with much else given previously in the analysis of these fourteen rules.

 

115.         Perhaps we recognize this. The SOUND is of the Spirit; the O.M is of the soul. The A.U.M., as understood within these pages, is of the personality.

116.         The initiate and his group “onward move within the Sound”. (Rule X for Dis and Initiates.)

117.         Yet, what really, do these assertions mean to us?

 

  The "listening" of the aspirant has now been transformed into the effectual recognition of that which the Sound has created.

 

118.         Each of the seven monadic sphere is a creative center with its own geometrizing sound, creatively impulsive in relation to the five lower worlds.

 

 I refer not here to the creation of the phenomenal world, or to the world of meaning which is essentially the Plan or the pattern underlying that phenomenal world,

 

119.         The Monad’s influence upon these three lower worlds and upon the higher mental plane is mediated by the spiritual triad.

120.         Note the excellent definition of the World of Meaning. Through spiritual discernment we detect or discern this pattern and Plan. The “blueprints” which the Great Architect ‘has in Mind’ are revealed to us.

 

 but to the intention or [Page 289] the Purpose Which motivated the creative Sound;

 

121.         The true Sound reveals Divine Purpose.

122.         The true Sound creates the Worlds of the Triad, but it is Divine Purpose which impels and guides the sounding of the Sound.

 

 I am dealing with the impulsive energy which gives significance to activity and to the life-force which the Sound centralises at Shamballa.

 

123.         The “impulsive energy” is centralized in Shamballa. Activity has no significance unless it is directed by Shamballic Will working through the spiritual triad.

124.         These are amazing words. The Sound centralizes the life-force at or in Shamballa.

125.         Apparently the life-force is also in need of the impartation of significance. From the structure of the sentence, we are to understand that it is the “impulsive energy” which imparts this significance also to the life-force which the Sound has centralized at Shamballa.

126.         Shamballic purpose, intention, impulsive energy lie behind the Sound. These three are as one, and impart significance to activity and to the life force which the Sound centralizes at Shamballa.

127.         Long and deep pondering are needed. We can see how the use of the abstract mind is necessitated and also the application of the intuition where possible.

 

It is not the fault of humanity that it is only now possible for the significance of the divine purpose to emerge more clearly in the consciousness of the initiated disciple.

 

128.         It is only now that we are coming to the period in the history of humanity and the planet when divine purpose may be somewhat appreciated by the initiated disciple.

129.         The Shamballa Impacts of the last two centuries have made this possible.

 

 It is a question of timing and of movement in space; it concerns the relation of the Hierarchy, working with the Plan, to Shamballa,

 

130.         This possible revelation at this time of Divine Purpose is controlled by much greater movements and cycles.

 

 the recipient (by means of the Sound) of the creative energy which it is the divine intention to expend in producing a perfect expression of the divine Idea.

 

131.         Here we have some of the profoundest statements describing the esoteric relationship between Shamballa and Hierarchy.

132.         Only now is the relationship between Shamballa and Hierarchy sufficiently adjusted for this registration of purpose to occur.

133.         Notice the function of Shamballa expressed in terms of Sound, creative energy and divine intention. Note the tremendous idealism (or ‘idea-in-substance ) which Shamballa is meant to express.

134.         There is operative in this process something higher than Shamballa for Shamballa is a “recipient” via the Sound of a certain “creative energy” which it is the divine intention (presumably of the Planetary Logos) to expend through Shamballa.

135.         There is a Sound produced in Shamballa and there are even greater SOUNDS produced by the Planetary Logos and Solar Logos. If Shamballa receives “by means of the Sound” that which is to be expressed, it is obvious that this “Sound” originates within points of tension higher and greater than those within Shamballa.

136.         This “divine Idea” must emanate from the Planetary Logos or even from the Solar Logos, and Shamballa (a center directly representative of the Planetary Logos and in contact with the Solar Logos) is meant to express this Idea.

137.         No wonder DK told us to retreat deeply within ourselves to seek deeper understanding of what He was about to say.

138.         It seems that the Tibetan has never approached more abstractly than He is in this chapter.

 

  It is to the knowledge of this relationship and of its effects that the first word of Rule XIV refers.

 

139.         When the initiated disciple seeks to understand the meaning of the term “Know”, he is reaching towards Shamballa and attempting to understand Shamballic-Hierarchical interaction.

140.         He is also reaching towards the Divine Purpose which is known by the Planetary Logos and even more deeply by the Solar Logos.

 

It was the dawning of this significance upon the consciousness of the Christ—a consciousness enlightened, purified and divinely focussed—that forced Him to cry out:  "Father, not my will but Thine be done."

 

141.         The Christ had realized Shamballic Purpose as it was meant to impress the Hierarchy of which He was the Head.

142.         The Christ as a Master of the Wisdom surely had achieved high levels of triadal consciousness but as He was not yet an Initiate of the sixth degree (which He rapidly became), He had not the complete monadic consciousness (presumably of His monadic Ray—the second).

143.         It was this dawning monadic consciousness which revealed to Him the Divine Purpose which He had to take on as His own.

 

 He received a vision of the emerging divine intention for humanity

 

144.         Even though the word “intention” is used, that what is meant is an aspect of the greater Divine Purpose.

 

 and (through humanity) for the planet as a whole.

 

145.         The Christ registered not only the destiny of humanity but the destiny of our planet (perhaps, the entire planetary scheme but perhaps only the “divine intention” for our planetary chain and especially its fourth globe).

 

 In the hierarchical stage of development which Christ had attained and which made Him the Head of the Hierarchy and the Master of all the Masters,

 

146.         For He was a fifth degree initiate and the Great Teacher then even as He is now…

 

 His consciousness was entirely at one with the Plan;

 

147.         The Plan, we remember, expresses the pattern underlying the phenomenal worlds.

148.         There is also a sense in which the Plan has a triadal origin from the plane of atma. A Master of the Wisdom focusses within atma.

 

 its application to life in the three worlds, and its goal of establishing the Kingdom of God on earth and the emergence of the fifth kingdom in nature,

 

149.         DK is speaking of very practical aspects of the Plan—the Plan as it is meant to transform the three lower worlds.

150.         He is calling attention to the Plan as it affected the expression of humanity in those worlds, and not so much to the destiny of Humanity as a whole and of the planet as a whole. These latter two belong more to the domain of Divine Purpose and of “divine intention” (as DK mentions above).

 

 were now for Him simply the fulfilling of the law, and to that fulfillment His entire life was and had been geared.

 

151.         DK is telling us how the Christ had lived His life until that fateful moment in the Garden of Gethsemene. He certainly fulfilled atmic law—the law lying behind the Plan. The Plan itself is related to the third ray/first ray nature of the atmic plane-

 

  The Plan, its goal, its techniques and methods, its laws and their application, its phenomenal effects, the hindrances to be met, the energy (that of love) to be employed, and the close and growing relation and interplay between the Hierarchy and Humanity, between the heart centre of the planetary Logos and the creative centre, were known to Him and fully understood.

 

152.         This is an amazing section of text. It embodies all that Christ understood until the experience in the Garden.

153.         In executing the Plan it is principally the energy of love which is to be utilized. Intelligent application is assumed.

154.         The Christ was overseeing the increasingly closer relationship between Hierarchy and Humanity, but the logoically-intended relationship of the central Center both to Hierarchy and humanity was not yet fully understood.

 

 At the highest point of this consummated knowledge, and at the moment of His complete surrender to the necessary sacrifice of His life to the fulfilling of the Plan, suddenly a great expansion of consciousness took place.

 

155.         Master DK is not speaking in a manner easily understood.

156.         One could think He was speaking of the Master Jesus, for He speaks in terms of “the necessary sacrifice of His life”.

157.         Yes, the life in the body was deliberately sacrificed by the Master Jesus, but what was the “life” which the Christ was called upon to sacrifice, when He had long before outgrown the need for incarnation as a human being, and when the body He was using to express His teachings (i.e., the body of the Master Jesus) was not even His own?

158.         May we suggest that the “life” to be sacrificed represented the full commitment of His spiritual life-energies for a five thousand year period of Piscean and Aquarian redemption and salvation?

159.         What the Christ had to surrender were His own ideas and plans for the redemption of the human race (excellent though they were) and instead, adopt the vision and intention of One Greater than Himself.

 

 [Page 290] The significance, the intention, the purpose of it all, and the extent of the divine Idea as it existed in the mind of the "Father," dawned on His soul (not on His mind, but on His soul).

 

160.         Christ was given a clear sense of the intended direction for humanity and the planet.

161.         The “Father” certainly has a “mind”—something which it is so easy for students of spirituality to forget when they are striving after the development of the intuition.

162.         The Christ was given a Shamballic realization of that which the “Father” intended. The realization dawned upon His triadal consciousness, upon his higher soul—the Ego focussed on triadal levels. Thus, it was a completely impersonal realization.

163.         With regard to this dawning, is could not have been the soul within the causal body, because the Christ as the Head of the Spiritual Hierarchy had no causal body.

 

 He saw still further into the significance of divinity

 

164.         Note how two words, “significance” and “divinity” are put together in such a way that the triadal and monadic worlds are fused, for “significance” is of the World of the Triad and “divinity” of the World of the Monad.

 

 than had ever seemed possible;

 

165.         Possible to Him, is the inference…

 

 the world of meaning and the world of phenomena faded out and—esoterically speaking—He lost His All.

 

166.         The World of the Soul and the world of the personality, were blotted out.

167.         This experience recalls the process indicated in Rule IX for Disciples and Initiates:

 

Let the group know there are no other selves.  Let the group know there is no colour, only light; and then let darkness take the place of light, hiding all difference, blotting out all form.  Then—at the place of tension, and at that darkest point—let the group see a point of clear cold fire, and in the fire (right at its very heart) let the One Initiator appear Whose star shone forth when the Door first was passed. (R&I22)

 

168.         The “All” which the Christ “lost” may be considered all that with which He had previously identified Himself.

169.         The terms “esoterically speaking” are important. Words are given which have deeply esoteric meanings. If interpreted in the normal sense, they will mislead.

 

  These are words necessarily meaningless to you.

 

170.         We can assume that DK really means this. We have no experience in these higher worlds and thus, no way of relating occurrences within them to occurrences within our own worlds.

 

  For the time being, neither the energy of the creative mind nor the energy of love was left to Him.

 

171.         Of course, they were to be later retrieved, but He was so impressed by the Divine Will and Purpose, that these two lower aspects momentarily faded into insignificance.

 

 A new type of energy became available—the energy of life itself, imbued with purpose and actuated by intention.

 

172.         “Life”, “purpose”, “intention”—in that order. Life underlies even purpose.

173.         We could question whether the term “life” should be related to the first aspect of divinity, as it is really something substanding all aspects of divinity. Yet, it often it.

174.         Note the word “actuated” in relation to “intention”. Intention is purpose (implemented by will) on the way to becoming actual. Intention deals with specificities in worlds lower than those from which the intention originates.

175.         This was surely an Initiation. Initiation is ever that process or event in which a new realm of divine experience is penetrated and new energies from such a realm are made available.

176.         Of the actually “ceremony” or “inner event” of the sixth initiation we can know nothing.

 

 For the first time, the relation of the Will, which had hitherto expressed itself in His life through love and the creative work of inaugurating the new dispensation and the launching for all time of the Kingdom of God, became clear to Him.

 

177.         The Will of God (Sanat Kumara as expressive of the Planetary Logos) became clear to Him.

178.         This was not to be Will-through-Creative Intelligence or Will-through-Love, but God’s living Will—a Will fitting within the context of God’s vast Purpose—a living Will expressive of Divine Purpose which it was God’s intention (the Planetary Logos’ intention) to see expressed within the phenomenal worlds.

 

  At that point He passed through the Gethsemane of renunciation.

 

179.         This renunciation is not the renunciation as experienced at the fourth initiation. It is higher. It is a renunciation of the Brahmic aspect, from the perspective of the planetary Life. It is the renunciation of the conditioning of the five lower planes.

180.         Meanwhile, Master Jesus was passing through a renunciation of His own—the deliberate renunciation attachment to incarnated life and of further need for such incarnated life.

 

A hint lies here.  This high point of attainment of the Christ—as related in the Gospel story—was reached in Gethsemane, and for a brief moment we are given an insight into an aspect or happening of the Sixth Initiation.

 

181.         The experience in the Garden of Gethsemane was not the entirety of the aspects and happenings associated with the sixth initiation, but was an event more representative of that initiation than we have ever been given.

182.         There was a great moment of choice. The sixth initiation is closely associated with Libra (as the determining of the cosmic Paths to be trodden by the Master indicates). One can ‘see’ the Christ choosing, according to the Will of God, five thousand years of “Earth service”.

183.         One can see how the deepest possible of attunement with-and-as the Monad is required if one is to make this choice.

184.         As a precedent and Great Example for all humanity, the Christ correctly made the choice of all choices with the inner surrender expressed in the words, “Not my will, Father, but thine be done”.

 

 It was this event and spiritual crisis in the life of the Christ (taking place as He overshadowed His disciple, Jesus) which enabled Jesus on His own level of spiritual development to take the fourth initiation, that of the Crucifixion or the Great Renunciation.

 

185.         Both the Christ and Jesus were in the Garden of Gethsemene—each attuning with a higher level of divinity than had hitherto been possible, and each in the process of making a specific type of great renunciation.

186.         How this overshadowing process worked we cannot know in detail, but the interplay of the two related consciousnesses must have been considerable.

 

 The numbers four and six are closely connected,

 

187.         When one numbers the third ray as the first Brahmic aspect and continues counting downward, one finds the four and the six aligned.

 

 and the lesser renunciation (great only from the human point of view)

 

188.         This puts things in proportion, does it not?

 

makes the higher renunciation possible eventually, and vice versa.

 

189.         Only He who has passed through the renunciation necessitated at the fourth initiation can find Himself prepared to make the greater renunciation at the sixth initiation.

190.         Conversely, the events transpiring during the sixth initiation, make the taking of the fourth initiation a possibility for the third degree initiate associated with his exalted Guru Who is passing through the sixth initiation.

 

  Running through many parts of the Gospel story are two paralleling histories;

 

191.         These are the history of the Christ and history of the Master Jesus.

 

the lesser world of discipleship profits by the achievements of those who take the higher initiations,

 

192.         If we rise, we cannot help but lift those associated with us. The reverse is also true.

 

 and thus is demonstrated the close unity which forever exists within the Hierarchy and—focussing through the Christ—the synthesis which is beginning to be formed between the Hierarchy and Shamballa.

 

193.         DK is speaking more of the synthesis existing between Hierarchy and Shamballa than of the growing fusion between Hierarchy and Humanity.

194.         In His individualized nature, the Christ demonstrated the union of Shamballa (the Will of the “Father”) and Hierarchy (Christ’s intimate knowledge of the Plan and its best modes of implementation).

 

 This is taking place in this era for the first time in human history.

 

195.         The experience of the Christ was the forerunner of this possibility, only now emerging in humanity.

 

 The recognition of this emerging synthesis between Will and Love produced a definite effect in [Page 291] the consciousness of the Christ and led Him to know much that had hitherto been concealed from Him.

 

196.         What do we learn? That fusion brings revelation. That the union of the highest principles opens doors hitherto closed. Thus we are encouraged to achieve the necessary alignments between the higher aspects of our nature, knowing that doors of perception and realization will open as a result.

 

These are deep mysteries.  Their value to the disciple in training lies in the recognised and considered relationships.

 

197.         The Tibetan has pointed towards so much that He cannot fully disclose, but the hints given are sufficient to help us (alone and more particularly in group formation) to penetrate into spiritual realms awaiting and inviting penetration

 

These rules are—as you know—the rules controlling group life;

 

198.         Why wonder how esoteric groups in the New Age will function. The outline has been clearly given. There is no need to piece together possibilities from the substance of vague impression. A Master of the Wisdom has spoken and has given us what we need to consider. Why not recognize the gift and accept it, and do what is required in relation to it?

 

 they constitute the key to the laws under which all planetary groups work.

 

199.         Thus is confirmed the amazing value of that which has been imparted.

 

  The hierarchical life, through its major aspect of Love, was a familiar area of consciousness and well-known to the Masters and to the Master of Them all, the Christ.

 

200.         For there were Masters in those days even as there are now.

201.         The Members of the Hierarchy with which we are now most familiar may not have been Masters then, but surely there were Masters of the Wisdom directed by the Christ.

 

  But a further "knowing" lay ahead of even this "perfected Son of God";

 

202.         The Christ was perfected according to human standards. The Master of the Wisdom is still a human being. A Chohan (which the Christ was about to become) is no longer a human being. “They are no longer men as are the Masters.”

 

 the nature and the mind of that great Being, embodied in the Lord of the World at Shamballa, was now revealed to Him.

 

203.         Whose mind was revealed to the Christ? The mind of Sanat Kumara or the mind of Him of Whom Sanat Kumara is an embodiment (i.e., the Planetary Logos)?

204.         In a way, the Christ (the most rapidly developing of all the Sons of Men) was on the verge of taking the seventh initiation, at which time the Will of the Planetary Logos would also make its impression.

205.         Yet, to know something of the mind of Sanat Kumara was to know some small portion of the mind of the Planetary Logos, Himself.

 

It is this living realisation of Being and of identification with the planetary Logos upon the cosmic mental plane which constituted the unfolding awareness of the Christ upon the Way of the Higher Evolution.

 

206.         Here it is, stated exactly. It was the Planetary Logos with which the Christ was coming into identification.

207.         The Christ had entered the Way of Higher Evolution. He was in process of realizing the Being of our Planetary Logos (achieved via His “Father in Heaven”, Sanat Kumara). He was in process of identifying with the “One in Whom we live and move and have our being”.

208.         We might say that the Christ was having not only a monadic revelation but a logoic inspiration—that His realization was impulsed from the logoic plane as well. This makes sense as He was soon to take the initial stages of the seventh initiation, which centers the high initiate on the logoic plane.

 

  Therefore, experience, perception and Being are the keynotes of:

 

209.         DK reveals keywords for various stages of development for members of the Fourth Creative Hierarchy

 

1. The Path of Evolution.

 

210.         The keynote here is “experience”.

 

2. The mode of unfoldment upon the Path.

 

211.         The keynote here is “perception”.

 

3. The state of divine focus upon the Way.

 

212.         The keynote here is “Being”.

 

In other words, you have the states of Individualisation, of Initiation, and of Identification.

 

213.         We are given a mnemonic—Individualization, Initiation and Identification.

214.         The signs of the zodiac involved are Leo—Capricorn—Pisces.

215.         Or if we choose to be more complete: Cancer/Leo; Capricorn/Aquarius; Pisces.

 

The relation between the listening of the aspirant and the knowledge of the initiated disciple has been expressed for us in a certain ancient writing as follows:

 

216.         This, after all, is that upon which DK’s foregoing interpretation has been focussed.

 

"Dimly the one who seeks hears the faint whisper of the life of God;

 

217.         This represents the initial influence of the Voice of the Silence which is the Voice of the Soul.

 

he sees the breathing of that whisper which disturbs the waters of his Spatial life.

 

218.         It is still a faint voice, a whisper.

219.         He notices a new rhythm, a new rhythmic breath which is a cyclic impulsion and withdrawal of energy conducted by the soul.

220.         He lives in the world of time and space and he has previously established certain conditioning rhythms. Now these are to be reconditioned by new rhythms.

 

  The whisper penetrates.

 

221.         He not only detects the voice but allows it ‘in’ and attends to it. The whisper can now become spiritually influential.

 

  It then becomes the Sound of many waters

 

222.         Many astral desires and their sounds coalesce into one Sound emanating from the soul.

223.         The listener must not become confused by the lesser sound of many waters, but must hearken to the Synthetic Sound which unites into one those many lesser sounds.

 

and the Word of many voices.

 

224.         It takes a while for the sound of many waters to become the ‘soul Sound’ and for the ‘words spoken by many inner and outer voices’ to become the “Word of may voices”, the Word which synthesizes the many voices.

225.         The Voice of the Soul is not easily detected, understood and obeyed.

 

 Great is the confusion but still the listening must go on.

 

226.         One cannot allow oneself become distracted or preoccupied by diversity. One has heard the whisper of the soul and seen the rhythm of the spiritual breath. One must persist until that whisper becomes a clear spiritual voice which is immediately obeyed, and the breath the new and spiritual rhythm of all life processes.

 

Listening is the seed of obedience, O Chela on the Path.

 

227.         To listen, to hearken, is to obey Saturn, the ‘God of Obedience’.

228.         To listen properly invites the application of spiritual will in one’s life.

 

More loudly comes the voice;

 

229.         The Voice of the Silence asserts itself more strongly. It was and remains the “still, small Voice” but now it is taking control.

 

 then suddenly the voices dim and listening now gives place to knowing

 

230.         It is the inner clamor which prevents us from known as the soul knows.

231.         Noise prevents the registration of soul knowledge.

 

—the [Page 292] knowledge of that which lies behind the outer form, the perception of that which must be done.  Order is seen.  The pattern clear emerges.

 

232.         One knows the soul and with that knowledge come soul directives impelling the personality life in certain spiritual directions.

233.         The world of the soul is a world of ordered beauty.

234.         The second ray is archetypally the ray of all souls and that ray is the “Ray of the Divine Pattern”. Yes, the “pattern clear emerged”.

 

Knowing is the seed of conscious doing, O Chela on the Path.

 

235.         This is a somewhat Socratic statement: “To know the good is to do the good”:

236.         Doing ever occurs. We always do, and that doing is often mayavic because there is no focussed consciousness attending the doing.

237.         So the quality of our action in the three worlds changes when we are soul-conscious. Our doing reflects the soul-consciousness we have achieved.

 

Listening and knowledge also fade away and that which they produce can then be seen.

 

238.         This is to say that the worlds of the soul and personality fade away. Listening, touching, seeing and applying, even knowing in the lower sense—all these fade away.

 

  Being emerges and union with the One.

 

239.         The third initiation is taken. Unity emerges. Oneness is no longer theorized but appreciated in actuality.

 

 Identity is known—

 

240.         There are many levels of identity. The level here indicated is that which lies above and beyond what we usually call the soul.

 

not on this plane but on that higher sphere where move and speak the greater Sons of Life.

 

241.         We are speaking of life in the triadal worlds. It is within these worlds that the Arhat and Masters move and speak—the Chohans as well.

242.         Notice that these planes together are called a “higher sphere”. All planes are spherical and the relationship of planes to each other are as spheres within spheres.

 

 Being alone is left.  The work is done."

 

243.         “God IS. The Lord for aye stands firm. Being exists alone. Naught else is.” (DINA II 284)

244.         The Tibetan has taken us through a wide range of possible knowing—from the knowing of the aspirant, to the knowing of the disciple, to the knowing of the initiate focussed in the soul, to the knowing of the high initiate and even Master in the triad and to the knowing of the Master and Chohan within the Monad.

245.         Do we see how deeply we must probe the meaning of these five higher injunctions if we are to find the meaning which initiated-disciples are meant to find?