Commentary on Rule IV for Disciples and Initiates
Synthesis of the Two Rules
Rule IV: Third Sentence
Rule Four for Applicants: Let the disciple tend the evolution of the fire; nourish the lesser lives, and thus keep the wheel revolving.
Rule Four for Disciples and Initiates: Let the group see that all the eighteen fires die down and that the lesser lives return unto the reservoir of life. This they must bring about through the evocation of the Will. The lesser wheels must not for aye revolve in time and space. Only the greater Wheel must onward move and turn.
The Rule for Applicants
A. Rule Four for Applicants: Let the disciple tend the evocation of the fire; nourish the lesser lives, and thus keep the wheel revolving.
1. Fire is life.
2. Fire is like the breath; without it we die.
3. Fire is vibration. Distinct fires are distinct levels of vibration.
4. Fire, as understood in this Rule, keeps us spiritually alive.
5. All is fire, of some kind or nature, but, upon our planet, the right circulation of the fire has been inhibited. Various fires are congealed and wrong fixation or localization has occurred. The divine circulatory flow must be restored.
6. The fire of the higher mental plane, the fire of the Solar Angel, is always available to those who know how to access it. In a way, that fire sustains all we are upon those three subplanes (the causal body) and all we are in the three lower words.
7. The disciple needs conscious access to this fire in order to promote his/her progress and strength in serve.
8. So that fire must be invoked and its intended work within the personality promoted.
9. The greater fire, invoked, will cause the lesser fires to circulate properly; the various triangles which are to be vivified in right succession according to the ray of the soul and monad will evolve correctly.
10. Our task is to see to the evocation of solar fire. This we do by invoking solar fire through correct occult meditation and through an attitude and acts of service. Our personal lives become an ongoing invocation to the source of solar fire, and by means of this invocation, solar fire is evoked.
11. We know that spiritually nourishing solar fire is present in our personal lives when our heart is alive and when we approach living with a true and impersonal wisdom.
12. Then, the consciousness and form nourished by solar fire are no longer under the sway of binding desire. Other and higher ‘gods’ are now served, and release from spiritual bondage is imminent.
13. How actually do we tend to the evocation of the redeeming solar fire (the fire of the increasingly attentive Solar Angel)?
a. We center the consciousness in the head (etherically) or ‘above’ the head.. This is the prerequisite of occult meditation. We never forget that the ‘heart of pure reason’ is found within the head center.
b. We keep the Divine Plan always in mind, remembering that, first and foremost, it must be the Plan we serve, for the right emergence of the Divine Plan will bring the good of all.
c. We remember the nature of our soul ray, its color and its note. Solar fire is sevenfold, and each of us can best promote its evocation by working along the vibratory line which, for us, is the spiritual line of least resistance.
d. We seek to be sensitive to the needs of the environment or context in which our personal lives are immersed. All environments and contexts and sounding their notes and chords. Dissonance exists and must give way to harmony. We remain sensitive to the ‘touch of improvement’ which we may be equipped to offer.
e. When we look towards our brothers and sisters we attempt to sense their real need—the need as seen from the soul perspective. This may not be easy. When, through the open heart, the need is detected, however, solar fire will respond to meet that need.
f. Our orientation, then, is one of helpfulness (whether the help to be given is objective, or, quite often, subjective). We are ready to give the help which only the soul can give and the soul is ready, from its perspective, to flow through us to the ‘sensed place of need’.
g. We keep the instrument fit, and knowingly do no thing which will dampen its vibration and is receptive/radiatory capacity.
h. We learn the mantrams, Words of Power, Rules and Laws which (practiced) will keep us en-rapport with the ‘fires from heaven’—whether solar fire, triadal fire of monadic fire. There are, after all, technical means by which the lower worlds may be connected to the higher, promoting the flow from higher to lower. We should make a number of these techniques our own.
i. We devise our own mantrams which will summon the “fires of heaven”.
j. We learn the secrets of the “Breath”—the Breath as key to the sources of inspiration.
k. We live with positivity and as cheerfully as possible, knowing that depression is ingratitude.
l. Each will have his/her own means of tending the evocation of the fire. Think how you do it and make sure the heavenly fire is burning for you and definitely make your list.
14. The nourishing (and ordering) of the lesser lives will proceed automatically with the right evocation of the higher fire.
15. The popular idea about nourishment is that is derives from what we eat, but nourishment is a much wider concept.
16. Nourishment deals with the assimilation of that which promotes the sustainment and expression of the pattern of our being.
17. Non-nourishing assimilations weaken the pattern of our being. Just as there is “junk food”, there is ‘junk thought’, ‘junk feelings’ and ‘junk actions’.
18. Every environmental contact can be nourishing or not. Every thought, feeling or action can nourish or promote the expression of that archetypal pattern, or not.
19. At this stage of our development, and spiritually speaking, soul energy (solar fire) brings nourishment and, with it, true health.
20. When we align and attune with the soul/Solar Angel, we place ourselves in the stream of true beneficence, and, overall, stimulate those parts of our nature that should flourish and endure.
21. Yes, there may be such a thing as ‘over-exposure’, and some adjustment may be needed to ensure that the “lesser lives” receive only that which they can assimilate (for they are lives of a lower order than the ‘soul-source’). Over time, however, those lesser lives will adjust to a greater inflow of soul energy, and a greater flow of soul energy will be assimilable. Besides, the Solar Angel is a highly intelligent being, and will not release an excessive ‘flow of its energy’ into an aligning human being, lest damage be done. But the invoking human being must also be watchful.
22. When we think of ‘spiritual nourishment’, the principle is that ‘nourishment descends from above’ or ‘emerges from within’.
23. The “wheel” that must be kept revolving is the symbol for all periodic processes which sustain the energy system of man. Each life (of whatever size and scope) is, in a sense, a “wheel”, and must continue its developmental processes—which means to ‘revolve’.
24. From the microcosmic perspective, the most important wheel is the “wheel of incarnation”. The incarnating monad, assisted by the Solar Angel, has a developmental purpose which is achieved ‘over time’ through the means of cyclic immersion in the worlds of form. That purpose must be continually advanced or the will of the monad, expressing itself as the will of the soul, will be thwarted. We remember that the ‘will of the monad’ is an aspect of God’s Will (God—the Planetary Logos).
25. As evolution proceeds, the closer the rapport between the “overshadowing soul” (the inspiring Solar Angel), the more rapid and effective the turning of the wheel of incarnation. Each life cycle is actuated by a definite purpose known (on causal levels, and fully only there) to the incarnating human soul and incarnation proceeds as it should. Lessons are learned, skills and capacities are developed, and service is rendered.
26. The quality of this cyclic progression depends upon the quality of our contact with the ‘inspiring supervisor’ (the soul/Solar Angel), the nourisher of the lesser lives through solar fire.
27. We are not yet at a sufficiently high point of evolution that the services of the Solar Angel are no longer needed. Our “inner Guide” our “inner Monitor” must be consulted as if it were our very Self. And in a sense, that Solar Angel is our “Higher Self”—the representative of the monad which we essentially are.
28. The Solar Angel embodies the will of the monad as we (the immersed human soul) can appreciate it and assimilate it.
29. First must come the assimilation of solar fire and only then, can we safely approach electric fire—the true “Fire from Heaven” (the fire of the “Heavenly One”, Uranus).
30. As students of occultism there is no way we could or should avoid this fire. If we do not make application for the assimilation of a nourishing fire, our lives will be ruled by the lower fire which has for ages ruled—fire-by-friction.
31. The New Age (as far as esotericists are concerned) is all about an increasing appreciation of and group-access to solar fire. It is the ‘fire of salvation’, of redemption and of solution to the many ills which presently plague the human race (and the planet).
32. Indeed, let us tend the evocation of the fire and thus contribute to the turning of all wheels which will advance the Divine Plan.
33. “Let the disciple tend the evocation of the fire, nourish the lesser lives and thus keep the wheel revolving”.
The Rule for DisciplesB. Rule Four for Disciples and Initiates: Let the group see that all the eighteen fires die down and that the lesser lives return unto the reservoir of life. This they must bring about through the evocation of the Will. The lesser wheels must not for aye revolve in time and space. Only the greater Wheel must onward move and turn.
1. The eighteen fires have long served us, though during the majority of that lengthy evolutionary period, we have been ignorant of their true nature and significance within our developmental process.
2. The eighteen fires are, as we know, the fires of personality. The number 18 sums to 9 which is the number of the third ray. The personality is (in the human microcosm) the expression of the third aspect of divinity.
3. For ages the human being tends the stimulation of the eighteen fires. This he does through the agency of desire. Again, he is mostly unconscious of what he does, for desire rules him, and stimulates the eighteen fires with or without his conscious consent.
4. But the human spirit will not forever abide limitation, and there comes the day when the eighteen fires are seen, by the detaching human soul, to have served their purpose.
5. From that time forth attitude of the man (now a disciple and growing in wisdom) is that the fires must be instrumental to his higher purposes (inspired by the soul).
6. He then begins to see the eighteen fires (if ‘burning unto themselves’) as obstructive of his higher purposes and he determines that they must be controlled.
7. Of course, he must understand them before he can successfully control them. Thus, he sets himself to discover their nature and their true function within the life of a spiritually advancing individual.
8. He places his attention on ‘higher’ things and the eighteen fires begin to subside through lack of attention. The “feeding power of the attention” has been directed elsewhere.
9. How shall we—disciples in the modern world—contribute to the needed ‘dying-down’ of the eighteen fires?
a. By communing with the soul and thus affirming the existence and nature of that higher ‘Other’ which is the higher of the “pairs of opposites” (personality and soul).
b. By experiencing the nature of the soul/Solar Angel as fully as possible so we come to value it and its fires above that which the eighteen fires can offer.
c. By turning our attention to the cultivation of soul-presence, soul-power, soul-love and soul-intelligence, thereby replacing within out field of consciousness, the lower energies which have typically dominated that field.
d. By so identifying with soul/Solar Angel that it becomes possible to direct its energy into the forces represented by the eighteen fires.
e. It is not that the eighteen fires must be thoroughly repudiated (until the fourth initiation), for they are useful instruments in the worlds of lower form, but they must be transformed by soul-infusion. At this process we must become somewhat adept.
f. We must use the eighteen fires and not be used by them. That use must be purposeful and in accordance with the Divine Plan which the soul/Solar Angel always promotes. Thus the eighteen fires become subordinated to soul-purpose and plan, and we, focussed in our will nature (higher will), administer the application of that higher purpose with which we have come to identify.
g. All depends upon ‘right use’. When the eighteen fires take their proper place in the Hierarchy of Lives, they will be naturally subordinate to the higher aspects of the human energy system. Of that Hierarchy we must be aware, and our actions must support its influence in the microcosmic life as well as the group life.
10. Of course the presence of a spiritually-purposeful group will assist the dying-down of the eighteen fires. The individual microcosm can only do so much. The group will—reflecting the Will of the Ashram, of Hierarchy and eventually, of Shamballa—is much stronger.
11. Personality tendencies within the individual will naturally become subordinate to the group-will. The personality of the group itself will gradually become subordinate to the group will.
12. How does this happen?
a. Group meditative application brings purpose and plan into increasing prominence in the group life. The members of the group know why they are assembled, what they have to do, and why they have to do it. These higher directives begin to dominate the group life, and all lesser things begin to take their proper place.
b. Among the lesser things are the personality forces of the constituent members—whether the members are considered singly or in aggregate. The higher directives become stronger than the individual and group personality tendencies.
c. The group as a whole keeps a watchful eye upon the group personality even as it attends to the higher matters of executing plan according to purpose.
d. The pressure experienced through that ‘group-eye’ both restrains and transforms personality tendencies found within the group. The members find that it is, as it were, ‘against group law’ to allow the eighteen fires too much scope. A hierarchy of functions becomes established and various energies and forces are forced to keep to their proper spheres.
e. As the group communes with its own higher nature, and increasingly with the Master of the Ashram and the Hierarchy itself, the group will is strengthened, and its purifying, regulating and transforming effect upon the eighteen fires of the group personality is intensified.
f. Esoterically, the group becomes a “burning ground”, and those who stay in the group and submit to its pressure, are changed for the better. Their eighteen fires are subordinated, subside and eventually are released to the place from which they came (“the reservoir of life”) at that period when the human soul achieves liberation from form.
g. Is it clear that we are not only members of groups, but are being trained by the group (provided that our group is a spiritually-intended group)?
13. The eighteen fires are really “lesser lives”, and the day of their release is the fourth initiation, just as that initiation is the day of release for the patiently supervising Solar Angels.
14. All lives progress to and through various points of freedom, and the lesser lives which comprise our personality are no exception.
15. Our responsibility to these lesser lives is to bring about their release through the instrumentality of our own release. Really, there is a triple release at the fourth initiation—the lesser lives are liberated to the “reservoir of life”; the Solar Angels are liberated to return, eventually, to the “Heart of the Sun”, and we—that ‘extension’ of the monad immersed in lower form—are released (by ‘translation’) into the higher ‘spaces’ of the Spiritual Triad—i.e., into that vibratory domain which participates in the mind, heart and will of God the Planetary Logos.
16. This great release is prepared in many ways over the millennia, but finally love, will, and dis-identification are the releasing agents. It must be realized that spiritual love and spiritual will promote the disidentification which brings release.
17. For ages we, the human soul, have involved our consciousnesses with the turning of the lesser wheels. We have been preoccupied with ‘lesser turnings’.
18. Wearying of that preoccupation, at last, we have noticed that the lesser revolutions are part of greater revolutions, and they, of still greater revolutions.
19. The vast extent of our world, our cosmos, has begun to dawn upon us and we have noted that the Great Structure can be seen as a Vast Wheel, composed of wheels within wheels within wheels—all turning according to their regulated measures.
20. In the Process of Cosmogenesis, the greatest wheels have become, in emanation, lesser wheels and these lesser wheels, still lesser wheels. Every emanated life going forth functions through cyclicity.
21. Revolving wheels do not turn without reason. They turn until an intended point of accomplishment is reached. When sufficient ‘cyclic exposure’ is achieved, there comes a fulness which indicates that the period of revolution may now come to an end—in fact, should come to an end.
22. This period of fulness, of completeness, is the period of absorption, wherein lesser wheels are absorbed into greater wheels—or, alternatively, lesser wheels are separated from greater wheels (giving them both a temporary respite until the hour of re-amalgamation on a higher turn of the evolutionary spiral).
23. How can we make these thoughts about lesser and greater wheels practical in terms of our discipleship service and progress?
a. We can question: “What are the wheels which ‘turn within me’ and ‘within which I turn’?” Thus we will become aware of the many cyclic motions which are taking place within the microcosmic energy system and in relation to the larger energy systems within which the microcosm holds place.
b. We can take notice of the wheels or cycles which have involved our attention, perhaps preoccupying our attention and preventing its focus upon greater wheels within and around us.
c. Once such a determination is made, we can begin to detach ourselves from the turning of lesser wheels. That is, we can relinquish lower preoccupations and attend to the progression of greater and more meaningful cycles. Practically, we can keep larger purposes and plans in mind though exposed to lesser purposes and plans.
d. Perhaps physical cycles have engrossed our attention, or emotional, or mental cycles. Perhaps we have followed (with excessive attention) the cyclic ups and downs of our personality nature. A certain measure of attention to such cycles can, of course, be constructive and is inevitable in the course of life. But the ‘normal’ becomes ‘excessive’ when it is “time to move on”.
e. Perhaps now, after ages of ‘attending to the lower’, we are ready to attend to the cyclic impulsions which emanate from the soul/Solar Angel. Perhaps we are ready to think of incarnational-purpose and incarnational-plan. Perhaps, we can even become aware of the present incarnational cycle (or wheel) as simply one of a series—originating from semi-detectable causes and moving towards semi-detectable results.
f. Perhaps the ‘ashramic wheel’ (and its cycles over decades and centuries) can become the object of our attention, and we can see how our lesser cycles have fit into that greater cycle.
g. This process can be extended to the cycles of Hierarchy. Shamballa too, has its cycles—almost completely unknown to us (except from what Master DK has imparted). Into those greatest of planetary cycles, our little cycles fit in ways unknown to us, but as our intimacy with Hierarchy increases, even those ‘turnings’ will be revealed (when they can be usefully revealed). That which is revealed must, of course, be used.
24. Our greatest concern at the moment is the turning of the ‘Wheel of Humanity’. With that turning all lesser turnings must find their place. All our lesser wheels are to contribute to the progress of that greater wheel.
25. Where is humanity in its cyclic-spiralling progression? Probably we have no immediate way of knowing. Our knowledge of humanity’s history is scanty and our intimations of its destiny vague. But, perhaps we know enough to sense that which is to be accomplished as the wheel of humanity turns, and perhaps we can so identify with that turning that we learn to subordinate our lesser turnings to the immediate purpose of the greater turning.
26. We can approach this approximation by asking, “What does humanity need”? “And how can I, given my capacities and responsibilities, contribute to the fulfillment of that need?”
27. But only if we have succeeded in dis-identifying from preoccupation with the lesser wheels will we find ourselves ready and willing to ask such questions.
28. Not only is there a ‘will of the group’ which forces the eighteen fires of its members to die down, but there is a ‘Will of Humanity’ (of that great Entity Who ensouls the human race). What does that Will require of us? What fires will die-down when that Will becomes our will? The fires of the causal body?
29. We might come to a general principle: ‘Adherence to Purpose hierarchicalizes the fires’.
30. This entire Rule demands that we learn to abstract and participate identificatorily in processes much greater than our own microcosmic processes—participate in the processes of Those “in whom we live and move and have our being”.
31. If we can think with sufficient expansiveness (not only vaguely but in detail), we may begin to see our place within our groups, and the place of our groups within the Ashrams and the Great Ashram (the Ashram of the Lord of the World—Shamballa) as a whole, and the place of the Great Ashram within the Fourth Creative Hierarchy, and its place within the Kingdoms of Nature—and so forth.
32. This venture into even-more encompassing thinking is a venture into abstraction. It is a perspectivizing method which also will contribute to the dying down of the eighteen fires of any lesser whole—for each of these greater wholes has its eighteen fires which must die-down during the process of identification with the greater whole which includes it.
33. Disidentification is the cousin of Death, and both are cousins to Release.
34. This Rule is about death, abstraction and release. It is about prioritization through the processes of death and abstraction. Our attachments to lesser things can last only so long. The hour will strike when the turning of the “greater wheel” calls to us. By that time may we be, somewhat, the master of our lesser cycles, so that we can answer the greater call by disidentifying with the turning of lesser wheels and re-identifying with turning of greater.
“Let the group see that all the eighteen fires die down and that the lesser lives return unto the reservoir of life. This they must bring about through the evocation of the Will. The lesser wheels must not for aye revolve in time and space. Only the greater Wheel must onward move and turn.”
If we have given careful thought to what may be required of us, we have probably noticed that the ‘actions’ required are internal, subjective, subtle. It is ‘movements in consciousness’ which are necessitated, changes of attitude and perspective. We must realize the truth of these new perspectives. To do this we must pass through the ‘disciplines of realization’. Much of value conveyed to us is simply not realized—we do not appreciate its reality. Our task is to make these Rules among the most real factors in our life. They cannot remain remote, strange or unassimilable. They must be woven into the fabric of daily living.
But how shall this be done? One can only count on human resourcefulness. Everyone will find his/her own way to do this. Suggestions may be offered, but only the disciple himself/herself will find the way, just as each must find the unique way to build the bridge (the antahkarana) to the realms of realization (the realm of the Spiritual Triad).