The Rays and the Initiations

by Alice A Bailey

  2. He must study the five meanings of magnetisation. This refers to the five modes in which the Law of Magnetisation works; this is another name for the Law of Attraction.

  3. He must comprehend what transmutation is and in which consists the secret art (now lost along with the Lost Word) of Alchemy. Esoterically speaking, transmutation is the mode whereby force is transmuted or changed into energy. This means (where a disciple is concerned) the transmutation or changing or stepping up of personality force into egoic energy.

  4. He must know the “hidden name egoic” or the first letter of the imparted Word. Two things should be noted here. The “Word” here does not refer to the Sacred Word but to the name of the planetary Logos, the hidden name of Sanat Kumara Who is the soul of the world in all its phases, the manifesting Ego of the Logos on the cosmic mental plane. Only the first letter of that “ineffable name” is permitted expression to initiates until the fourth initiation. You will see, therefore, how vast a field this instruction on Rule XIII covers.

  The higher correspondences of these four requirements are expressed in the following terms:

  1. Let the group understand the Law of Synthesis. (This is the law which governs the thinking of those great Lives Who form the Council of Sanat Kumara in Shamballa.) [249]

  2. Let the threefold mode of working with that which is dynamic carry the group together towards the Higher Three where the Will of God holds sway.

  3. Let Transfiguration follow Transformation and may Transmutation disappear.

  4. Let the O.M. be heard right at the centre of the group, proclaiming God is All.

  You can gather from the above what a tremendous field of esoteric truth is here covered and how abstruse to the average occult student is the theme. Again I would remind you that the real significance will only be perceived by the trained initiate and that what I say here must necessarily be veiled and even meaningless to the non-initiate, even whilst radiantly clear to those who truly know. Again, I would remind you that I write this particular section of A Treatise on the Seven Rays entirely for initiates, and that aspirants who have not taken initiation cannot understand or duly appreciate the inner meaning of these fourteen rules. In this fact lies no reason for discouragement, nor is there any suggestion that those with initiate consciousness should endeavour to explain, even if—through compassion or from the desire to stimulate approach to the Mysteries—they desired to do so. No true initiate would be so tempted, for he would realise that it would not only be impossible but also that there is a vital necessity for the disciple to work out significances and meanings through the medium of his own life experiment and to arrive at understanding through direct experience. Then no questioning can ever arise and sure knowledge takes its place. There are no questions of any kind in the consciousness of those who form the Hierarchy. The lower analytical concrete mind which questions and separates this from that has been completely controlled and superseded; response to indicated group activity takes place. Students need to realise more concretely that group consciousness, universal awareness, and therefore synthetic effort, synthetic understanding and synthetic activity are possible to a Master or an initiate of the higher degrees. That involves the keynote of this solar [250] system, particularly within this planet, the Earth; it will be succeeded in the next solar system by a type of life activity which is as yet only known in Shamballa.

  Here I should like to pause a moment and interpolate some remarks.

  There are certain phases of teaching and knowledge which I have given to the world which are relatively new—new to the modern esotericist and occult student though not new to disciples and initiates. It might be useful here if I mentioned one or two of these new aspects of the fundamental Truth which have been given by me to the public. If these new phases of the teaching have been later given to the public by other occult groups, it will have been because the information was gained by those who have read the books put out by A.A.B. for me or who are directly and consciously in touch with my Ashram.

  An instance of this is that book by C. W. Leadbeater on “The Masters and the Path” which was published later than my book, Initiation, Human and Solar. If the dates of any given teaching are compared with that given by me, it will appear to be of a later date than mine. I say this with no possible interest in any controversy among occult groups or the interested public, but as a simple statement of fact and as a protection to this particular work of the Hierarchy. I would remind you that the instructions given by me as, for instance, those in A Treatise on White Magic and A Treatise on the Seven Rays were given sequentially over a period of years, antedating the publishing of the books. The same time factor prevailed in the publishing of the earlier books. All my books were written over a long period of years, prior to publishing. All that appears of the same type of information over other signatures harks back to these books. Even if denied by their writers, a comparison of the dates of publishing with the original dates of issuing the instructions (in the form of monthly sets for reading and study in the Arcane School) or with the books published before the formation in 1925 of the Disciples [251] Degree of the Arcane School will prove this conclusively. Bear in mind this factor of timing. A.A.B. takes down to my dictation an average of seven to twelve pages of typing (single-spaced) each time she writes for me; but owing to the exigencies of my work I cannot dictate to her every day, though I have found that she would gladly take my dictation daily if I so desired; weeks sometimes elapse between one dictation and another. I write the above paragraphs for the protection of the hierarchical work in years to come and not for the protection of A.A.B. or myself....

  What are some of these newer truths for which I am responsible as transmitting agent to the world of occult students? Let me briefly state them in the order of their relative importance:

  1. The Teaching on Shamballa. Little has ever been given on this subject. Only the name was known. This teaching includes:

  a. Information as to the nature of the will aspect.

  b. Indications as to the underlying purposes of Sanat Kumara.

  c. Directions as to the building of the antahkarana, which is the first step towards achieving monadic consciousness, and thus the first step towards the Way of the Higher Evolution.

  2. The Teaching on the New Discipleship. This has been revolutionary where the older schools of occultism are concerned. The teaching includes:

  a. A presentation of the new attitude of the Masters to Their disciples, due to the rapid unfoldment of the mind principle and the growth of the principle of “free will.” This changed technique negates the old attitudes, such as that portrayed in the Theosophical literature, and it was a recognition of the difficulties of correcting the wrong impression given which prompted H.P.B. in one of her communications to the Esoteric Section of her day, to regret ever having mentioned Their names. That earlier presentation was useful but has now served [252] its purpose. Unless the schools based on the old methods change their techniques and their approach to truth, they will disappear.

  b. Information as to the constitution of the Hierarchy and of the various Ashrams of which it is composed. I have presented the Hierarchy as the Ashram of Sanat Kumara in its sevenfold form, thus linking will and love.

  c. A presentation of the newer type of meditations, with its emphasis upon visualisation and the use of the creative imagination; I have presented a system of meditation which has eliminated the attention paid hitherto to personal problems and the intense earlier focus on the relation of the disciple and the Master. The keynote of group fusion and of service underlies the newer form of meditation, and not this powerful emphasis upon the personal relation of the disciple to the Master and the achievement of the individual aspirant. This was degenerating into a form of spiritual selfishness and separateness.

  3. The Teaching on the Seven Rays. The fact of the seven rays was well known to the heads of the Theosophical Society, was mentioned very abstractly and vaguely in The Secret Doctrine, and formed in an
elementary form some of the teaching given in the Esoteric Section; the names of the rays were given, and some information as to their qualities, and the Masters on the rays, was imparted but not much else. I have given out much information upon the subject and have endeavoured to show the importance of this teaching from the psychological angle, because the new psychology is in the making. If esoteric teaching is eventually to be public in its presentation, it will be given out along the lines of psychology because esoteric teaching in its fullest and deepest sense concerns the consciousness aspect of man and God.

  4. The Teaching on the new Astrology. This teaching too has gone out to a few hundred students before its publication in book form. This new astrology has been hitherto [253] ignored by those astrologers who have read it and (with the exception of four astrologers who have deeply appreciated it but who wish I would be more explicit) see little in it. I have given enough, could the open-minded astrologer but realise, to establish the coming astrology on a firm basis; the accuracy of what I have given will in the course of time he ascertained when astrologers who are dealing with the horoscopes of advanced people and disciples will use the esoteric planets as given by me, and not the orthodox planets as usually used. The accuracy of their deductions will necessarily depend upon their own point of development and also upon their ability to recognise an advanced person, a disciple or an initiate when they meet him and undertake to cast his horoscope. If they are themselves advanced disciples, they may have a tendency to set too rigid a standard for those seeking astrological deduction, and thus fail to recognise a disciple; if they are not advanced, they may regard people as advanced who are far from being even true aspirants. In either case then the horoscope may prove inaccurate. It is of no use to use the esoteric planets in relation to the average man.

  5. Information about the New Group of World Servers and their work. This information includes

  a. The recognition of this group as intermediate between the Hierarchy and Humanity.

  b. The nature of their work as it influences the human soul and as it seeks through the instrumentality of the men and women of goodwill to determine the period in which we live.

  c. The Triangle work which embodies two phases of their work, i.e., the forming of the network of light as the channel of communication between the Hierarchy and Humanity, and the forming simultaneously of the network of goodwill, which is the objective expression of the subjective influence of light. Ponder on this statement.

  6. The attempt to form an exoteric branch of the inner Ashrams. This is evidenced in the work I have done with a [254] special group of aspirants and accepted disciples whose instructions, emanating from my Ashram, have been embodied in the book Discipleship in the New Age (Vols. I and II).

  7. Teaching upon the new world religion, with its emphasis upon the three major Full Moon periods (Aries, Taurus, Gemini, falling usually in April, May and June respectively) and the nine (occasionally ten) minor Full Moons each year. This leads to a consequent relation being established between the work of the Christ and of the Buddha in the minds of spiritually inclined people everywhere, with the result of a great broadening of the human aspiration. This work is as yet embryonic, but it should receive increasing attention. Eventually it will demonstrate as the main linking unit between the East and the West, particularly if Shri Krishna is shown to be an earlier incarnation of the Lord of Love, the Christ. Thereby three major world religions—the Christian, the Hindu and the Buddhist—will be intimately related, whilst the Mahommedan faith will be found to be linked to the Christian faith because it embodies the work of the Master Jesus as He overshadowed one of His senior disciples, a very advanced initiate, Mahomet.

  A close study of all the above will indicate to you the lines along which I would like to see the work expand in future years. I would ask for a careful study of these words, for I regard this as an important instruction and one which could be regarded as the skeleton outline of the work I wish to see done. It will involve an intensification of the work of the advanced section in the Arcane School, a greater emphasis upon the Full Moon meetings, a careful organisation of the Triangle work and the Goodwill work as an added effort to aid the work of the New Group of World Servers, plus an attempt to recognise the members of the New Group whenever and wherever contacted. This will not be at all an easy task, my brothers, if you look only for those who think and work your way, or who recognise the Hierarchy as you recognise it, or if you exclude those who labour in relation to religious and other fields in a manner different [255] to yours. Forget not, as an instance of this, that the great Labour Movement in the world was initiated by one of the Masters and is implemented from His Ashram at this time.

  We come now to a detailed analysis of Rule XIII. In the foregoing pages I gave you certain broad principles and outlined a new aspect of the work which I had undertaken to do for humanity—under instruction from the Hierarchy. The teaching I gave there is very abstruse; little of it can as yet be of real service to the majority of aspirants but a wide and general idea can take form and provide the immovable background for later teaching. I would have you remember that the teaching which I have given out has been intermediate in nature, just as that given by H.P.B., under my instruction, was preparatory. The teaching planned by the Hierarchy to precede and condition the New Age, the Aquarian Age, falls into three categories:

  1. Preparatory, given 1875-1890 . . . written down by H.P.B.

  2. Intermediate, given 1919-1949 . . . written down by A.A.B.

  3. Revelatory, emerging after 1975 . . . to be given on a worldwide scale via the radio.

  In the next century and early in the century an initiate will appear and will carry on this teaching. It will be under the same “impression,” for my task is not yet completed and this series of bridging treatises between the material knowledge of man and the science of the initiates has still another phase to run. The remainder of this century, as I told you elsewhere (Destiny of the Nations, page 106), must be dedicated to rebuilding the shrine of man’s living, to reconstructing the form of humanity’s life, to reconstituting the new civilisation upon the foundations of the old, and to the reorganising of the structures of world thought, world politics, plus the redistribution of the world’s resources in conformity to divine purpose. Then and only then will it be possible to carry the revelation further.

  It is with the above indicated sequence in mind that I [256] come to the analysis of the sentences in Rule XIII, beginning with the first:

  1. Let the group get ready to reveal the hidden mystery.

  The readiness here referred to has nothing to do with personal preparedness or with the group unity which I have so often emphasised. It does not refer to individual purity or consecration or to mental development or to group relationships, as they work out in harmony and understanding. I am considering something far different to all these factors which are regarded as automatic and necessarily present. I refer to that which is the result of all of them, just as they in their turn are the result of soul contact. I refer to effects wrought out in the group owing to the present and factual nature of the monadic control which is taking place increasingly.

  What does this mean? It signifies the fact that the members of the group are each and all of them upon the Path of Initiation at some one or other of its stages and that the group, as a group, is in process of taking initiation, for initiation is a process at this stage, and not an event. It signifies that the group antahkarana is built and is being consciously used, and that therefore divine purpose is being sensed (even if only faintly so) and that the Plan is being obeyed and carried out. It signifies also that the three strands of the “rainbow bridge” are now so strong and so firmly anchored that they not only connect the two aspects of the mental equipment (higher and lower mind), but that they have been carried also through the three levels of the triadal consciousness; it means also that these three strands are firmly anchored in what I have symbolically called the Council Chamber at Shambal
la.

  This Council Chamber is not a location or a place, but a state of consciousness within the all-enveloping Life. These three points of anchorage within the sphere of the planetary Consciousness, or (if you like it better, though remembering ever that we are speaking and thinking in terms of symbols) in the planetary brain, find their feeble correspondence in [257] the three points of sensitivity in the head of a disciple or initiate, that is, in the region of the pineal gland, the pituitary body and the carotid gland. These, as you know, are to be found within the areas to which we give the names the head centre, the ajna centre and the alta major centre. These correspondences are very real, even though functioning upon a minute scale; the initiate achieves his desired “perfecting” when the triad within his head is related, and love, will and intelligence are functioning in synthesis. Here we find a relation to the spiritual Triad and the three points in the Council Chamber which are presided over by the three Buddhas of Activity, and within Whose exalted consciousness the three strands of the antahkarana meet and become active in a way incomprehensible to you. Necessarily, this great antahkarana is not constructed correctly except by those whose individual antahkaranas are likewise in process of construction.

  See you, therefore, the necessity of eventually organising a group in the world which will be so constituted and so carefully chosen and interiorly related that all its members are initiates, all have created their own “rainbow bridges” with understanding and accuracy, and all can now work in such complete unity that the group antahkarana becomes a channel of unimpeded communication direct from Shamballa to the group because every member of the group is a member of the Hierarchy. In this manner the three planetary centres arrive at the needed relationship, and another great triangle reaches true functioning activity. When this takes place, a revelation undreamt of will be manifested upon the Earth; a new divine quality, of which no knowledge at present exists, will make its presence felt, and the work of the Buddha and of the Christ, and the work of the coming Avatar, will be superseded by One for Whom both Shamballa and the Hierarchy have unitedly waited and of Whom the doctrine of the Messiah and the doctrine of Avatars have been and are today only the dim distant symbols. They preserve this concept of the Great Revelation in the consciousness of men, in the expectancy which the Hierarchy evidences, [258] and through the “preparatory work” now being undertaken at Shamballa.