Gnosis knowledge of self

Meaning of gnosis – The Mind thus deluded hastens to unite itself with the evil essence. But thereupon the Christ is fully revealed as the perfect Great Mind, burns down the false tree utterly and unites the Mind with the Tree of Life. Then apparently and not till then does the Mind become identical with the Christ.

MEANING OF GNOSIS

Gnosis is the life of the heart through God , and the turning away of one ‘ s inmost thoughts from all that is not God .

We find that in the first treatise of the Corpus Hernteticum, in the famous Poinzatares or Shepherd of Men document, the demand of the initiand is : ” I would learn about existent things and understand their nature (i.e. the origin and develop-ment of the world], and know God “.

And after the showing of the vision of the world-order and world-process, the Initiator, the Divine Mind, informs the contemplator: ” Thou halt been taught the nature of the universe, yea the grandest vision”.

The world-vision, however, is, as we have already seen, not the end, but the beginning of the path of perfection ; and naturally enough, for it has to do with beginnings and not with ends. This is seen most clearly in the so-called Mithra-liturgy, where the’ perfect body’ has first to be enformed ‘ out of the pure elements before the mystics can ascend to the vision.

But if we talk of beginnings with regard to the universal process, we must not forget that they are only beginnings for us, and not of reality itself, which has no beginning or end. This is admirably brought out in the Trismegistic tradition as follows:

“For to the Good there is no other shore ; it has no bounds ; it is without an end ; and for itself it is without beginning, too, though unto us it seemeth to have one—the gnosis. ” Therefore to it gnosis is no beginning; rather is it that gnosis doth afford to us the first begin-ning of its being known”.

And all things whatsoe’er attend on God, these hath God promised to bestow on thee ; for thou hast been made god, thou haat been born immortal. This is the Know Thyself ‘—knowing the One who bath made god of thee.” As to this immortal or spiritual body, the general belief of all the mystics was that in the human body there was so to say the potentiality of a cosmic body, a body of wholeness.

Thus in one of the Trismegistic mystery-prayers we find the petition : “The all in us-0 Life, make thou it whole ; O Light, enlighten it ; 0 God, inspirit it “). This all ‘ is the new immortal body, the body of the resurrection; Life, Light and the Good are the Divine Soul, Mind and Spirit which are to complete it in gnosis.

The outpouring of the gnosis is to operate a change of being—enlivenment, illumination, inspiration. God, as Spirit, transmutes us into spirit ; as Light, He glorifies us, irradiates us so that we become glorious ; and, as Life, bestows upon us immortality. The con-summation is to be a fulness or teonian being of spiritual immortal lustre.

Though it is true there is something of an absolute nature about this ‘ light of the gnosis,’ for it is essentially spiritual and immediate, the gnosis is also frequently spoken of as a ‘ path,’ a gradual ‘ ascent.’ In the loftiest conceptions of it, however, this path is not a psychic ‘ heaven-journey’ ; it is rather a spiritual immediate way that opens out in every walk of life.

There is no need to ‘ leave the world’ to find it, except in the sense of casting out of ourselves the ‘ supreme vice’ or ‘ chiefest evil,’ which, as set over against the supreme virtue of gnosis, is called ignorance of God, in the sense of a positive force of wilful disregard of the divine. It is a question of ‘ repentance,’ but in the spiritual sense of a turning back of the whole nature, that is of the whole will being set towards the Good.

That the gnosis was essentially religious or spiritual and not intellectual, is already fully established, but it may be authoritatively confirmed by the following categorical statement with reference to the vision of the Beautiful and Good: “There is one way alone that teacloth unto it —devotion joined with gnosis”.

The entrance on the pathway of the gnosis is called a’ going home ‘; it is, as we have seen, a return, a turning back from the world, a repentance of the whole nature : “We must turn ourselves back into the old old way “.

Entering into gnosis is a waking from drunkenness and sleep, and nescience of God, from world-drunkenness to righteous soberness. ” For the evil [deluge] of unknowing is flooding all the land and bringing utter ruin on the soul boxed up within the body, preventing it from sailing for the harbours of salvation “.

The only salvation is gnosis—gnosis of God,for: “God is not ignorant of man ; nay rather is it that He knows him through and through, and that His will is that He (in His turn] should be well-known (by him]. This is the only means of safety for a man—his gnosis of his God. This is the Way up to the Mount (lit. Olympus). By this (ascent] alone is it that man’s soul is made good”. The climbing of the mount is the ascent (anodos, anabasis) of the soul to the height of contemplation, or its plunging into its spiritual nature ; it is the way above, as well as the return.

Looked at from the human standpoint, gnosis is the contest of devotion ‘ (C.H. x. 19), the 6 virtue of the soul’ and also the end of science ‘; he who knows himself ‘ is said to be ” good and pious and still while on the earth divine “. Regarded, however, from the soteriological standpoint, or in regard to the theory of salvation, the path is not self-made, but made by the descent of the Saviour, in pre-Christian as well as in the Christianised forms of the gnosis.

The ascent of the mount is repeatedly men-tioned, as it is throughout nearly the whole of mysticism, and must not be referred to the Moses-legend; it is purely Pagan.

In the Magic Papyri (Pap. Lug. v.) we read : ” I am he whom thou didst meet beneath the sacred mount,” and in the Trismegistic treatise called The Secret Sermon on the Mount, the probationary path is called the wending up the mount ‘, on the top of which the transfiguration and vision take place. In the same initiatory sermons elsewhere the neophyte is exhorted : ” Seek for a guide to lead thee to the gnosis) gates, where shines clear light, pure of all darkness, where not a single soul is drunk, but all are sober, waked from their drunken sleep, with heart’s eyes fixed on Him who willeth to be seen “.

This is brought out still more finely in the passage: ” But on the pious soul the Mind doth mount and guide it to the gnosis’ light. And such a soul cloth never tire in songs of praise to God and pour-ing blessings on all men, and doing good in word and deed to all, in imitation of its sire “. The knowing of God is thus a knowing or seeing ‘ with the eyes of the heart ‘ ; such eyes are called ‘spiritual,’ blessed,” immortal.’ The eyes of the body are not the organs of true vision, as the souls lament when first shut in body: ” Windows are these—not eyes !” The body is the veil of nesoitince,’ the surround of darkness,’ the carapace of selfhood ‘ ; for : ” No ear can hear Him, nor can eye see Him, but only mind and heart “.

Gnostic knowing is the intuition of the true or spiritual mind, immediate apprehension or apperception of the living reality. Though generally referred to metaphorically as seeing, vision or contemplation, because sight is the keenest of the differentiated senses, it is rather immediate insight; indeed it is called the one sense, the simple sense, the unitary sense, the sense of the intelligence.’

“The spiritual man, the man who knows himself, should not make anything succeed through magic, not even if he think the thing is good ; nor should he compel fate, but suffer it to take its natural course. He should move onward by the quest of his true self alone, and thus attaining unto gnosis of divinity, should gain the three ‘ that has no name on earth, and let fate carry out its will on its own clay—that is upon the body.

And if he understand it thus and order thus his life, he shall have vision of the Son of God becom-ing all things for the sake of saintly souls, in order that he may draw every soul out of the region of the fate into the realm where it is free of body.”

The three ‘ or triad ‘ are, presumably, Light, Life and the Good, as we have seen above. The Son of God is the Mind, the Shepherd of Men, the Divine Guide unto the Light, who illuminates the mind of every soul and so bears it aloft, or makes it free of fate.

As the attainment of gnosis con-notes the idea of freedom and salvation, so also it suggests the notion of power, conquest and control. The possession of gnosis thus bestows authority,’ a term interchangeable with ‘ power ‘ in a gnostic sense.

A wealth of additional evidence could be brought forward, but enough has already been given to show that the ground-idea of gnosis is transmutation into spiritual being, and this is fundamentally an Oriental religious idea, the anti-podes of philosophy in its general modern mean-ing of the fabrication of an intellectual system.

Gnosis is thus accompanied with vision and revelation in the sense that the above quotations should have by this time made clear. It would further. be easy to show that these also are the general characteristics of the gnosis in the Christianised systems as well, but that would require a paper in itself. It is enough here to quote a single pro-nouncement from a little known fragment of a Valentinian apocalypse preserved by Epiphanius.

“Greeting from Mind that never weary grows to minds that nothing can make weary Now will I wake in you again the memory of the mysteries above the heavens themselves, the mysteries to which no name can anyhow be given, of which no tongue can tell—the mysteries no rulership and no authority, no subject or mixed nature, have power to comprehend, but which have been made plain unto the understanding of the consciousness that stands above all change.”

THE ‘ BOOK OF THE HIDDEN MYSTERIES’

They who desire to ascend must first purify their garments—both soul and body. For the mind to ascend, the body must be as if dead, and the purified soul absorbed in the mind ; the ascending mind being guided by that good-nature by means of which alone it can attain to union with the Divine.

Such a spiritual struggle arouses the fiercest antagonism of the opposing essences that lie in wait for the soul on the first stages of the ascent, the purgatorial realms of unseen nature, corresponding with the external sub-lunary spaces, where are the demons of the ways of the midst, as they are elsewhere called.

But by the grace of the Divine goodness all these are vanquished and the mind is raised to the firmament, while the angelic hosts above it cry aloud: ” Lift up your heads, 0 ye gates, and the king of glory shall enter.” For they recognise that the victor in this fight is potentially or spiritually higher than themselves; the doctrine being that not even to the intelligence of angels are the wonderful mysteries of pure and holy minds, that is of spiritual men, revealed.

The first stage of the ascent, then, is marked by that degree of purification of the lower nature which enables the aspirant while still alive in an earthly body to win his way through the purgatonal realms of Hades, and their opposing and at the same time chastening hosts.

The next stage is that of spiritual rebirth, which occurs when the mind is made worthy to ascend beyond the firmament, regarded as a wall of separation’ between the purified and the un-purified, between Hades and Heaven ; the mind is become “as a new-born child that passes from darkness into light.” This child has now to grow in stature. It enters the heavenly realms, the celestial states, of which there is a multitude.

Through these, as it grows in stature and in purity, it continues to ascend. As it rises it becomes the purifier and sanctifier of the essences below it. The mode of its communion in these states is that of the mystical sacrament of the eucharist; it eats and is eaten, to use the graphic symbolism of the most primitive and elemental act of all; it is benefited and benefits in turn. It has communicated to it the mysteries of the orders of the essences through which it passes and communicates to them the perfection of its intelligence.

This may seem, at first sight, a strange doctrine. It explains, however, the first greeting of the celestial essences; the idea is apparently that the purified ascending mind, precisely because it has been incarnated in the lower realms and has fought its way again above, is possessed of a treasure which is lacking to the celestial essences who have not descended. They recognise in it the sign manual of the supreme nature of the Good and assemble to adore it. But Heaven is by no means the end.

As in the doctrine of so many other great schools of the mystic) way, the joys of Heaven are an even greater hindrance to the attainment of perfection than the mingled joys and sorrows of earth-life. The re-generate or spiritual child or youth is allowed to taste the celestial joys; but as the mind grows in stature and reaches spiritual manhood, it has to approve itself by a mighty trial of suffering willingly borne.

When then the ascending mind has passed through the heaven-stages, it draws nigh to the Great Boundary which separates Heaven from the mysteries beyond, that limit apparently which divides the finite from the infinite, or at any rate from the supercelestial spaces. Here for a time it rests from its labours to gain strength for the great trial, in that state which is called Distinction. Beyond this lies the mystery of the Cross.

If It would go further the mind must endure the great passion and suffer crucifixion ; for unless the mind undergoes all that Christ suffered, it cannot be perfected. The purification of the superficial human nature is the preliminary to the stages of perfection which transcend the purely human stage, and connote the perfection of the very depths of that nature.

But how is the mind to be crucified when it has already reached the height of celestial bliss ? When the deep motion to union with Christ arises in the regenerate nature as though it were the sign of true spiritual manhood, then a mighty revolution or transformation occurs in the depths of the lover’s being. They who crucify the mind are those very same celestial essences or angels who previously adored it.

These now, it would appear, desire to keep it with them, and because it would ascend still higher, hate it and oppress it. The crucifixion, however, is not of the mind only, it is of the whole human nature ; for the mind is crucified in the midst and the soul and body cruoi-fled on the right and on the left.

Thus only can the amazing subtlety of sin be vanquished and destroyed. After the great passion, the mind is laid in the ‘ sepulchre ‘ to rest for three days; what state the ‘ sepulchre ‘ symbolises we are not told. But on the third day it rises from the dead, and unites to itself its now perfectly purified soul and body, which in the new life of the perfected human stage are now subjected entirely to it, and are no longer the causes of its subjection. The mind now becomes conscious of its being made like unto Christ—’ our union.’

But though the evil of soul and body has been purged, there are still elemental depths of the nature within that have not yet been vanquished, and which cannot possibly be van-quished till some degree of identification with Christ is reached.

The very root of evil has now to be eradicated. The temptations of normal man are overcome, even the subtle temptations of the celestial joys have been transcended; but there are temptations that assail those greater than men, and roots of evil from which these superhuman deceptions arise. From this root of ignorance there grows up again and again an immense tree, whose branches oast darkness over divine souls and hide them from the perfect light.

These branches are out down time and again, but like the heads of the hydra of fable they spring up ever anew in the depth of man’s nature, until they are finally destroyed by fire—the Baptism of the Spirit.

This is the stage of the dark night of the soul indeed. It is now that the mind sees by the grace of Divine illumination that it must descend again to the very lowest regions to tear up the tree by its roots.

The sorrowful return is begun ; the newly awakened or illuminated mind descends into the depths of Sheol, to combat the subtlest and fiercest essences of evil and opposition in its own nature. It fights and fights on, but finally is slain, for of itself it cannot win the victory ; the debt of death even of the mind itself must be paid, for as yet it is not one with the Divine Mind, the Christ.

The mind then is slain ; it is the final mystic death. But as it was crucified above and raised above ; so now it is slain below and raised in the depth by Christ Himself, the Divine Mind, and so peace-fully and swiftly makes its second ascent through all the regions and states. Then and not till then is it deemed worthy of the divine Baptism of the Spirit.

For now it becomes not only like to, but enters on the first stages of identification with Christ. It now receives the adoration of the heavenly hosts, apparently the supercelestial choir, and has the power of the divine High Priest bestowed upon it.

No longer is it mind, it has entered the sonship consciously, though as yet it is not the Son who doeth all according to his will. One would have imagined that hero the seer would have ceased and not dared to go further.

By no means ; he still continues with ultimate visions of the divine drawn°, now set forth as the mind conceives them as experiences of its own, while still short of identity with Christ, and then again as the triumphant deeds of Christ Himself.

There are still further combats for the sonship itself ; for beyond all personal salvation, there is universal salvation, and a mystery of utter sim-plicity in which all oppositions are finally to be resolved.

After consciously entering or being born into the Christ-state by the Baptism of the Spirit, the Mind, as High Priest, now communicates to the supercelestial host in the holy of holies the supreme eucharist, the spiritual type of every eucharistic feast.

After this farewell banquet as it were, the Mind passes into that state where there is no longer vision, to enter on the stages of mystery of union with the Universal Essence itself. Though there is now no longer any ‘vision; for the conflict is really with principalities and powers and essences, the writer is still constrained to use symbols and personifications.

The Universal Essence is first figured as the Tree of Life. The Mind first becomes a divine catechumen, as it were, and is instructed by the High Priest of the Universal Essence in three mysterious doctrines —namely, the distinction of minds, the coming of the mind into the body, and the final end of the nature of all things. But instruction must be followed by realisation, the hearing of the doctrine is to be followed by the doing of the will.

Though the Mind is now in the supernal Paradise, it is not content but would be one even with the Tree of Life itself, a union which is said to be “the consummation of visions and the perfection of mysteries.”

But this desire, sublime as it is, necessitates still further combat. There now comes on the scene the Aroh-Enemy himself, the adversary of the Christ, and transforms himself into the semblance of the Tree of Life, at the same time proclaiming: ” I am the bread which came down from heaven ; whoso eateth of me shall live for ever.”

The Mind thus deluded hastens to unite itself with the evil essence. But thereupon the Christ is fully revealed as the perfect Great Mind, burns down the false tree utterly and unites the Mind with the Tree of Life. Then apparently and not till then does the Mind become identical with the Christ.

But beyond the Tree of Life of the supernal Paradise is the Arch-Good. Even the unutterable rest and peace of union with the Tree of Life is not the end. Before the universal consummation can be reached the Mind must execute judgment on the adversaries of the Good. That which was effected for it above, it must now effect for itself below. It then receives a mystic sword and takes its downward way once more, but now with joy in full consciousness that none can any longer oppose it.

The Divine Mind enters Sheol, apparently the purgatorial realms, or Hades, overthrows the essences of the demons of those regions, who gather together to oppose it, and the minds imprisoned therein are delivered, enlightened and forgiven; these regions moreover are illuminated and purified and made like to the celestial realms.

The Mind has now cast out of itself the whole adversative nature. But below the purgatorial realms lie the depths of perdition.

The Mind accordingly descends into Hell, and thereon the minds there who’are the slaves of perdition, amaied at its beauty, desire to be united with it and be saved. Just as previously Purgatory was transformed into Heaven, so now Hell is changed into Purgatory ; perdition is transformed into purgatorial chastise-ment of an essential nature. For when it is said previously that the Mind destroys the purgatorial demons, it means that it destroys them as demons, and not in their essence.

When the Mind has executed judgment in Gehenna, it descends still further to the lowest Abyss, the seat of the Prince of Darkness, to destroy the very root of demonic evil, the that which had had the power to appear to it above as the Tree of Life itself. Here is the limit of the sensible universe depth-wards.

When it is said that the Mind destroys these roots, we are told it signifies that it has reached a stage of universal purification, when its sole will is to be united with the Aroh-Good alone. But between it and this supreme consumma-tion lies a mystery called the Insensible Essence. It has long reached a state where there is no vision or symbol of any kind.

There is the simple sense of the Insensible—utter negation. This Essence possesses no name that is named on earth or under the earth ; it possesses nothing of nature. It is immaterial, unconscious, lifeless and insensible.

Although the Mind would vanquish it, it will not submit, for it is the final essence of contumacious-ness. Before this mystery of non-being’ can be revealed, the final resurrection must take place ; that is to say, apparently, the Mind whose purified nature first included as far as the purgatorial realms only, must now extend itself to the whole sensible universe below as well as above.

It therefore once more begins its ascent from the very ground of what it has thought to be non-being. Thereon begins the final ascension and resurrection. As it mounts it sees all those that it had slain lying dead before it.

Together with its supreme yearning to become the Father, there arises in it an overwhelming love to have mercy on the slain and raise them from the dead. It would now extend its goodness to all, including the evil and ‘ make them all like unto itself.’ Thereon a wondrous voice is heard : “Come from the four winds, O Breath, and breathe upon those slain that they may live!”

The resurrection is consummated ; the slain are raised and draw nigh the Divine Mind, who greets them with the words : “Ye are my brethren : for truly are ye bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh.” They are thus united with Him that they may ascend with Him.

Then are all His limbs gathered together and He has united to Himself all minds in the universe. Thus made whole He contemplates the Essence Above, the Light of the Divine. Nay more, He descends again below all essences, and there now sees that what He had before resurrection ‘ sensed’ as the Insensible, is the very same one Essence of the Divine He had seen above, and so he cries aloud : ” If I ascend up into heaven Thou art there, and if I descend to hell there also art Thou.

And if I raise the wings of my understanding like those of the eagle, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there shall Thy hand lead me, and Thy right hand shall hold me.” With this Universal Essence then at last is the Divine Mind united and embraces all in itself. It now no longer ascends or descends, for it is all-containing.

Time has also now ceased for it. The Mind has even left the name of Christ, for it has transcended distinction, name and word. It can no longer be said : ” Father, glorify Thy Son, that Thy Son also may glorify Thee,” for all distinction of glorifier and glorified has passed away. Nay, more, Love the Spirit even, in any sense of dis-tinction between lover and beloved, is transcended by perfect Minds.”

For whom should they glorify, as the Good is in them and they in it ? granting it correct to use the expressions in it and in them, for one is the nature and one the person of them and of it; granting it correct to use the terms of them and of it.

Neither will they any longer be named heirs, for distinction is blotted out from them, and when there is no distinction, who can inherit from another? Come now therefore, and let us glorify with unutterable glory the Mind which no longer glorifies but is glorified.” This consummation, however, is by no means a monotonous sameness of sheer unity.

It is the prelude to the creation of a new and better universe. For now is the Mind united to the creative power of Divinity. ” It will thus begin, by a new and holy brood-ing, to create a new world, and will create a new man in its image, imageless, and according to its likeness likenessless. It will mete out heaven with its span, and will measure the dust of the earth with its measure ; it will number the drops of the sea, and weigh the mountains in a scale.

And who will speak of it, that cannot be spoken ? or name it, that cannot be named ? Let us, with the apostle, marvel at a mystery and say : Oh the depth and the riches, the wisdom and understanding, above the name of Divinity, of the Perfect Mind when perfected. For man cannot comprehend its judgments, and its ways are inscrutable. For who hath known its mind? or who hath been its counsellor? “

Gnosis is the life of the heart through God , and the turning away of one ‘ s inmost thoughts from all that is not God .

Gnosis secret information, Secret teachings, Knowledge of this treasure, and its owners, has been lost, Supermind lends itself to the action of the inferior instruments: it is always there indeed at the core as a secret support of their operations, Gnostic Visions: Uncovering the Greatest Secret of the Ancient World

Gnostic Visions: Uncovering the Greatest Secret of the Ancient World

The basic tenet of Gnosticism (the name derives from the Greek gnosis, knowledge) is that the divine is present within every individual, and that the way to achieve union with the divine is through personal gnosis or self-exploration.

The Gnostics thought that Evil was not so much a negative quality – an absence – as a positive one. They believed that the world that resulted from the emanations of God (which they called aeons) was a purely spiritual world, which they called the Pleroma. The material world – which included the human body – was the creation of a Demiurge, a rival of God. Some of the radiance from God, sparks of the divine, had become trapped in parts of this material world; in a human being the Soul was one of these sparks. If it were to be freed from the trap or prison of the material world and to rejoin the purely spiritual world, it needed a special and esoteric knowledge or gnosis – hence the word given to this philosophy.

“The meaning of the term Gnosis or Knowledge, as applied to a system of philosophy, may be illustrated by the language of Plato towards the end of the fifth book of the Republic, in which he distinguishes between knowledge (gnosis) and opinion (darn) as being concerned respectively with the real (to on) and the apparent (to pltainomenon).”

This knowledge differs in name only from that `wisdom’ (sophia) which Aristotle tells us is by common consent admitted to consist in a knowledge of First Causes or Principles.”

Secret teachings

Jesus was indeed able to create many miracles that were meant to be shared. We would note at this point that the ability to heal and transmute matter with energy from his hands is only just now being rediscovered on this planet. This is unfortunate since it was a legacy that he left for you all. These skills originally were meant to be included in a book of his teachings that was later manipulated, edited, and amended until they were almost unrecognisable.

The men in power after Jesus’ death were upset by the possibility that everyone might have access to this information and believed that allowing the ‘common man’ to have such powerful knowledge would lessen their grip on the populations. The information mysteriously disappeared and is known in full to only a handful of people on this planet.

There has been much of this kind of knowledge given through each of these divine ones—these beings with what you call c/iris! energy. Yet in every case, those who followed have disregarded the wishes of the divine messenger-teachers and have instead jealously guarded this information for their small and elite inner groups that reside within the larger religious group. What kind of world would this have been right now had you been able to access this ability to heal without potentially harmful chemicals or unnecessary surgical intrusion? What if the passionate displays of weather on this planet could be soothed into a calmer and less destructive version? All these things would have been possible with the teachings that were left behind.

The ancient knowledge, which was your rightful legacy, has been lost to you both through sup-pression by those who longed to keep the power in their hands and by the annihilation of civilisa-tions with a more highly developed technology and social order than you can imagine.

“Knowledge of this treasure, and its owners, has been lost”.

There have been many teachers—male and female—who had the Christ energy and even now there are the remnants of ancient sects and orders throughout the world who have carefully kept these scrolls, tablets, or other written records in secret places known only to a handful of their followers in each century.

This was meant to be a legacy for all of you that would have radically altered your understanding of love, wholeness, and the interconnectedness of all life forms on this planet. But we must ask you in truth—if you had all of this knowledge available to you, would it be used correctly and for the good of all life-forms?

The true gnostic is one who knows the inner or hidden unveiled revelation and who also understands the outer or published veiled revelation. He is not one who has discovered the truth of himself by his own unaided reflection, but one to whom the disclosures of the inner world are known and become understandable.

Finally, this invisible world is inaccessible to us of our natural normal selves, and can be disclosed to us only by revelation, then spiritual knowledge or gnosis has for its object nothing else but revelation. It thus follows that the possession of gnosis means the ability to receive and understand revelation.

“In a general way there was a persistent conviction that redemption and salvation depend on the revelation of certain truths, knowledge of the gods, of the world and of our own personality, and piety became gnosis.” But to discover what gnosis meant for the best of its adherents in the non-Christian world, we must turn to the writings of the ancient mystze and let them speak for themselves. Gnosis is necessarily gnosis of something—but of what? The answer given both by the lofty Trismegistic literature and by the popular Magic Papyri, as indeed by the majority of our sources, is identical: it is finally gnosis of God. Gnosis is not intellectual knowledge; it is conceived of rather as power or virtue.

It is here quite evident that gnosis is a gift, a grace of the spirit; so, though the gift itself is from God, the light of it could be handed on, for spirit lives by giving. ” Fill me with Thy power and with this grace of Thine, that I may give the light to those in ignorance”; thus prays the suppliant for gnosis. It is also evident that mind is spiritual intuitive mind, the human counterpart of that Mind or Divine Monad in which wo are to be dowsed or baptised, according to the doctrine of the treatise called The Cup, and that the whole conception of gnosis is due to religion, and not to philosophy. Salvation by gnosis is the making whole, a spiritual completion or fulfilment, of the nature of apotheosis or theitais, that is of transfiguration from the life of separation into the self-sufficient divine life.

The kingdom is like a man who had a [hidden] treasure in his field without knowing it.

This, however, ‘is not the case. The gospel is not the kingdom ; it is only a part of the property belonging to the kingdom. It is emphatically ” the gospel of the kingdom.” The whole phraseology of the other parables in the chapter confirms this opinion. That saying of Jesus, also, ” The kingdom of heaven is within you, explains this, though it is often badly interpreted. It ought to be, “The kingdom of heaven is among you ; ” that is, Christ and his disciples were among them ; yet they did not recognize them as the true kingdom of God. Christ’s kingdom is not of this world. Where he appeared as their King, they did not know him as such ; and, therefore, they did not know his disciples either. The kingdom of God did not come with observation—with worldly pomp and splendour. Christ was not known by the world as the King of saints, and neither were his disciples known as the true subjects of his kingdom. Therefore, this kingdom was among them ; for as it consists of Christ the King and his people, the subjects, it could not be said to be within them. The parable of the seed, recorded in verse 24, is an illustration. The seed is not the kingdom ; it is the gospel of the kingdom; preached for the setting up of the kingdom and its progress. The seed is not the kingdom, nor is the kingdom like seed. There is something in the kingdom like a man sowing sad. The seed is the word—the sower is the Son of Man ; and, like as a man sows seed in order to increase his produce, so the Son of Man sowed the seed of the word, the gospel of his kingdom, in order to increase that kingdom with the fruit it was to produce, which is believers, the subjects of the kingdom of heaven;

“Again” (verse 44), “the kingdom of heaven is like unto treasure hid in a field,” &c. Now the treasure here mentioned is not the kingdom ; nor is the kingdom like treasure. But there is something in this kingdom like a man finding treasure in a field in which he was digging, without looking for the treasure.

The man is labouring in the field of another, in the ordinary way, not expecting any hidden treasure to rise up as he is digging or tilling the field; but, as soon as be turns up the hidden, unexpected treasure, his joy is so great, he conceals it ; and, though he has not immediately at band as much money as will buy the field, and as there is no other way he can get at the treasure, be goes his way, sells all he has, and buys the field, and then he has secured the treasure.

So the good news about Christ is treasure; and many a man finds it when he is neither looking for it, nor desires it. He may be a man of the world, minding earthly things; seeking what he shall eat and what he shall drink, and wherewithal he shall be clothed; and of the one thing needful entirely careless ; but, in a wonderfully providential way, the Lord brings him to see the Saviour.

In his pursuit after earth, the treasure of the gospel turns up ; he finds Jesus, and, such riches being so unexpected, his joy is great. Ile sells all; that is, he throws away all his own righteousness, which he now counts filthy rags, dross, and dung, and he rejoices in Christ, the greatest treasure. Verse 45.—” Again, the kingdom of heaven is like unto a merchantman seeking goodly pearls.

In this parable, also, there is something in the kingdom of heaven like a man seeking goodly pearls, although the kingdom itself is not the goodly pearls. And here we ask, Where is the difference between this and the last parable? In the one, the man finds the treasure when he is not seeking it. His heart was entirely bent on this world ; and the Lord, in a providential and unexpected way, brings him to Christ. But in the other, we have a man concerned about salvation, earnestly seeking the way to heaven. He knows that the soul is valuable, and he knows the danger of being lost; and he is endeavouring, by the keeping of the law, to buy the pearl to earn salvation.

Is there some connection between siddhis and Gnosis?

The Khecarividyā mentions liberation-in-life twice. In both instances (2.7 and 2.14), the yogin becomes a Siva, liberated-in-life by drinking the supreme nectar (paramrta) at the aperture of Brahma. The drinking of nectar, which results from the practice of khecarimudrci, brings about a large number of supernatural effects (siddhi). This indicates that the attainment of siddhis was of primary importance to the author. Furthermore, the notion of samadhi (unmani and Jaya) is men-tioned several times, but only in passing.” Within the broader context of the visualization practices and the emphasis on drinking nectar, samadhi is presented more like a supernatural effect (siddhi) than an auxiliary in a system of yoga. The absence of descriptions of the liberated yogin in a hypometabolic state further suggests that samadhi is incidental to the main transformative processes of rais-ing kundalini and drinking nectar. Like earlier Saivasiddhanta traditions, the Khecarividya (3.48-54ab) also teaches yogic suicide so that the yogin may cast off his body and become like Siva.

The overmind gnosis is in contact and communication with the supermind above . … in its higher and lower functions , acting in the one case as a passage leading into or in communication with the Supermind beyond , and in the other as a veil …

Gnosis emerges in the material nature . It is by the continuous working of the Supermind in the principles of Inconscience and Ignorance that there can be a total conversion of the realities of the universe . It is the supreme Supramental Gnosis …

Supermind and Spirit Supermind or gnosis is the characteristic , illumined , significant action of SPIRIT in its own native reality.

Mind is not in possession of truth . It is only its ignorant seeker . Beyond Mind is the Supermind , the gnostic power of consciousness , which is in eternal possession of the Truth . This Supermind is the Superman , according to Sri Aurobindo .

This overmind leads to the emergence of the Supermind . The evolving mind thus passing through these strata reaches the Supermind . Such a mind is the most perfect attainable , which Aurobindo calls ‘ the gnostic state ‘.

The life of the gnostic being is the spiritual life that embodies the consciousness of the supreme Reality, Sachchidananda. The Supermind takes us to the threshold of the Supreme Being and makes us aware of the higher Reality in its magnificent light and illumination. Thus the gnostic being is established in the consciousness of the Supreme Being thereby making the spiritual being the highest being possible on earth.

Sri Aurobindo ‘ s Integral Yoga aims at a spiritual life of man and collectivity but this also includes mental and physical life in a transformed state . Integral Yoga aims not at an ethics of religion but a spiritualization of the whole race , the birth of a race of gnostic beings.

Thus the real purpose of integral Yoga is to find and establish a new power of action. It is concerned with the salvation of the whole world. It is for the harmony of all external as well as internal.

The aim of integral yoga is different from that of other yogas. Hatha Yoga aims at the conquest of the life and the body. The ideal of Raja Yoga is the liberatior and perfection of the mental being by the mastery of the whole range of thought and consciousness and control of the emotional and sensational life.

Ascent and Descent

Thus integral Yoga is not achieved by ascent alone. It is not concerned simply with individual liberation. It is not only a way of individual evolution but also a method of social development. It aims at defmite change in the entire earth-consciousness through a descent of the higher powers upon earth. Hence the descent is most important in integral Yoga. It is the key to spiritual and supramental transfor-mation. Thus integral Yoga proceeds by a double method of ascent and descent. The sacrifice of love, of knowledge and of works is the way of this triple ascent. The descent follows the absolute consecration. This descent, Sri Aurobindo points out, is not realization, since, according to him, “Realization by itself does not necessarily transform the being as a whole; it may bring only an opening or heightening or widening of consciousness at the top.’

A Universal Method

The method of Yoga is universal. It is accessible everywhere and to every one who is prepared to bear the ordeal. What fundamentally matters in Yoga is not the Hindu or the Western outlook, but the psychic turn, the spiritual urge, and these are the same everywhere. The doubts of the Western psychologists like Sigmund Freud and Prof. Leuba, among many others, are based on misunderstanding of the nature and method of Yoga. The followers of this path should have the best that is found in the East or the West. To quote Sri Aurobindo again, -They will adopt in its heart of meaning the inward view of the East which bids man seek the secret of his destiny and salvation within; but also they will accept, though with a different turn given to it, the importance which the West rightly attaches to life and to the making the best we know and can attain the general rule of all life.’ Thus it is quite clear that the aim of integral Yoga is the ascent of humanity into a spiritual age.

However, the question arises, why does the Supermind descend into the mind and how? This question can be answered by showing that the Supermind or the supra-mental Consciousness-Force descends into the mental consciousness for making the latter change. That is, the mental consciousness cannot change unless the Supermind makes changes in it. This is the essence of the idea of the descent of the Supermind.

The Supermind is the higher mind above the Overmind, which is the power of the Spirit such that it has the capacity to change the consciousness at the mental level. The idea of descent involves the following ideas: first, the Supermind has the power to transform the mind and secondly, it is the creative power of the Spirit because of which it can bring the Spirit into the level of the mind, life and matter. The Super-mind is the Consciousness-Force and so it can make the mind transform itself into the superior consciousness. Unless there is pressure from the above there can be no change in the mind and consciousness. Sri Aurobindo writes:

For a real transformation there must be a direct and unveiled intervention from above; there would be necessary too a total submission and surrender of the lower consciousness, a cessation of its insistence, a will in it for its separate law of action to be completely annulled by transformation and lose all rights over our being (Sri Aumbimndo 1973: 922).

The power from above demands a total surrender of the lower consciousness and the cessation of its own power over our being. This is the total surrender of the mind to the Supermind or the Divine Will and Power.

The total transformation to be achieved by the Supermind involves taking the mind to the highest level in consciousness and also conquering the lower consciousness with its limitations and ignorance. The mental consciousness is also called the earth-consciousness (Misra 1957: 317), which is transformed by the Supermind. “As a result of the supramental transformation of the human personality, there will be a radical change in the working of mind, life and body” (Misra 1957: 317). Since this is a total transformation of the lower nature of man, it will lead to the emergence of a new personality called the gnostic personality. The kind of change that can take place is beyond the capacity of the ordinary mind to visualize. It can be taken to be a total change which the Supermind can alone achieve. Sri Aurobindo writes:

Out total being can rise out of subjection to fact of present Nature only by an identification with a greater Truth and greater Nature (Sri Aurobindo 1973: 926).

This identification with the “greater Truth and greater Nature” makes the radical transformation possible. In the changed condition, the individual being will be totally identified with the highest being, the Divine Purusha. The individual will be free from the subjection of Nature and will be in attunement with the highest Being, the Spirit. As Sri Aurobindo writes:

In place of the Nature of Ignorance with the individual as its closed field and unconscious or half-conscious instrument, there would be a Supernature of the divine Gnosis and the individual soul would be its conscious, open and free field and instrument.. (Sri Aurobindo 1973: 927).

Aurobindo writes: As we reach in our thought the line at which the evolution of Mind into Overmind passes over into an evolution of Overmind into Supermind, we are faced with a difficulty which amounts to an impossibility. For we are moved to seek for some precise idea, some clear mental description of the supramental or gnostic existence of which evolutionary Nature in the Ignorance is in travail… (Sri Aurobindo 1973: 964).

Such is the effect of the supramental transformation, which will make the individual man a spiritual or gnostic being.

The Transformation of the Mind

The very idea of transformation of the mind is due to Sri Aurobindo’s theory of the evolution of the mind into the Supermind. The main reason for this transformation is that the mind operates at a very low level so that it is incapable of knowing the Reality. Mind and reason is incapable of going beyond the limits within which they operate. They operate within the boundary fixed by Nature.

Mind and the mental being functioning within this boundary so that they fall shoe of the knowledge of the Absolute Reality. Mind and the mental being do not have the capacity to know the Absolute. The Absolute itself remains hidden behind the veil of Ignorance. The mind and reason which are the main features of the mental being fail to penetrate the veil and so are condemned to the domain of the limited knowledge with regard to the Absolute Reality. Mind in a sense is the domain of ignorance. according to Sri Aurobindo. He writes:

Mind k not only capable of ignorance. but. because it acts always partially and by limitation. it worts characteristically as a power of ignorance: it may even and it does forget itself in a complete inconscience. ar nescience… (Sri Aurobindo 2000:625).

Thus mind is a limited force and since it acts within limits it is also the power of ignorance. It cannot make any headway beyond the veil of ignorance. The Supennind in comparison is the power of light and divine power. It is the domain of the divine knowledge and consciousness. It is the supreme Truth-Consciousness, which acts on the mind from above as the source of the mental consciousness.

The supramental consciousness is the fountain head of the conscious-ness at the mental and physical level. It is because the Supermind descends into the lower planes to function within them and make them the instruments of the supramental power. As Sri Aurobindo writes:

Supernind lends itself to the action of the inferior instruments: it is always that indeed at the core as a secret support of their operations (Sri Aurobindo 2000: 625).

This is to suggest that the Supermind works secretly within the lower planes of existence such as the mental, vital and physical. It works below the supramental level because of its involution in the mind, life and matter in the descending order. The Supermind is the transforming power because it has the capacity to rule over the mind and life. Its power comes from the Divine. which is above and beyond the working of the mind and the supermind.

The workings of the Supermind are “merely irradiations of the supermind which accommodate themselves to the limited functioning of the obscure instruments: its own characteristic nature is a gnosis superconscient to mind, life and body. Supermind or gnosis is the characteristic. illumined, significant action of spirit in its native reality” (Sri Aurobindo 2000: 625). Thus. it is the Supermind which ultimately rules over the mind, life and body and transforms them into the instruments of the supramental consciousness.

Still, the Overmind itself, despite containing the first dualisms (or more accurately, not the first dualisms in involution, but the last dualisms to be overcome in evolution’s Refluxing to the supramental Spirit, since the Supermind is not produced by involution but by evolution), is the next-to-highest level that Spirit’s own evolution has produced to date, and is thus a structure of almost infinite grandeur.

Says Aurobindo, “But the Overmind is still a power of llgosmic consciousness, a principle of global knowledge, a delegated light from the supramental Gnosis. When the Overmind descends, the predominance of the centralizing ego-sense is entirely subordinated, lost in largeness of being; a wide cosmic [again, Cosmic perception and feeling of a boundless universal Self and movement replaces it. The source of revelation is not in one’s separate self but in the universal knowledge.” Aurobindo mentions the word “Gnosis.”

As we’ve pointed out, the “gno” in “gnosis” is the same as “kno,” as in “knowledge”; and in Sanskrit, it is jna,” which shows up in the extremely important terms “jnana” and “prajna,” both terms taken by various Buddhist traditions to mean “ultimate nondual knowledge,” “knowledge that is unto Liberation.”

Notice that Aurobindo says that this Overmind Truth knowledge is “delegated”—meaning that it is one step down from Supermind. “Gnosis” or “jnana” is traditionally sourced from the state of turiyatita, or “beyond the fourth” (beyond the Empty Witness—namely, nondual Suchness, or Thusness).

This gnosis, when present in Supermind, is due to the conjoined nondual state. There is another type of nondual awareness—more profound than gnosis, although, as it were, “containing” gnosis as an aspect of itself. But this “higher gnosis” is not merely a state gnosis, but a structure and state gnosis—the nondual gnosis of the Suchness state (the unity of Emptiness and Form) added to a structure comprehension that is literally the fullest of the fullest of all Form possible (because the Supermind has “transcended and included” every structure since the Big Bang).

Typically, when gnosis descends, it is through the filter of what-ever structure, whatever “hidden map,” is present as a lens at what-ever level the individual happens to be when the gnosis is activated—it could be mythic, it could be rational, it could be integral, and so forth—and the person enters a “headless, thoughtless, unity’ state of consciousness, but always as interpreted through its particular hidden map.

But at Supermind, the ‘hidden map” is. for the first time, the absolute leading edge evolution itself—the fullest of the fullest Form anywhere in existence—and thus is, moment to moment, the most complete knowledge available to consciousness in general. This ‘all-structure gnosis” reverberates throughout the known world with a thunderous and electric inclusivity, sweeping up every single thing and event in the known Kosmos into its all-permeating embrace.

This is a gnosis unlike any that have ever appeared before (although, in-deed, there have been various types of “leading-edge gnosis” in the past, which occurred whenever thew-war-level experiencing gnosis, or jnana, was also the highest structure-level that evolution had achieved at that time—whether it was mythic or rational or pluralistic, and so forth). But Supermind is today’s ultimate leading edge, and thus the level that holds this honor in today’s world.

And—to return to the specific point at hand—the Overmind, as one mere step away from Supermind, shines via a “delegated’ (or one-step-down) version of such. This means that certain fundamental dualisms are in place, in particular, as noted, the dualisms of the 4 quadrants (subject versus object and singular versus plural), which, when seen as Spirit’s own ornaments, become the abundantly creative forms through which a Kosmos is manifested, but when viewed apart from Spirit, are the root sources of maya, illusion, and delusory finite awareness.

Overall, the difference between “ignorance” and “Enlightenment” at the Over level is relatively small indeed; especially when conjoined with the Empty Witness state, the resulting “jnana samadhi” (True-Self awareness) is but a small step from “sahaja samadhi” (nominal spontaneous Suchness awareness).

With the Overmind, the big blue pancake has already collapsed and is in the process of falling straight for your headless condition at a very accelerated rate. One of the most notable features of Overmind is its almost constant “awareness of awareness” (which becomes a 24/7 given at Supermind: and again, not necessarily as a highly self-reflexive, constant self-staring. but as an ever-present background Consciousness embracing All).

The Transformation of the Mind

The very idea of transformation of the mind is due to Sri Aurobindo’s theory of the evolution of the mind into the Supermind. The main reason for this transformation is that the mind operates at a very low level so that it is incapable of knowing the Reality. Mind and reason is incapable of going beyond the limits within which they operate. They operate within the boundary fixed by Nature.

Mind and the mental being functioning within this boundary so that they fall short of the knowledge of the Absolute Reality. Mind and the mental being do not have the capacity to know the Absolute. The Absolute itself remains hidden behind the veil of Ignorance. The mind and reason which are the main features of the mental being fail to penetrate the veil and so are condemned to the domain of the limited knowledge with regard to the Absolute Reality. Mind in a sense is the domain of ignorance. according to Sri Aurobindo. He writes:

Mind is not only capabk of ignorance. but. because it acts always partially and by limitation. it works characteristically as a power of ignorance: it may nen and it does forget itself in a complete inconscience. or nrscience… (Sri Aurobindo 2000 625). Thus mind is a limited force and since it acts within limits it is also the power of ignorance. It cannot make any headway beyond the veil of ignorance. The Supermind in comparison is the power of light and divine power. It is the domain of the divine knowledge and consciousness. It is the supreme Truth-Consciousness. which acts on the mind from above as the source of the mental consciousness. The supramental consciousness is the fountain head of the conscious-ness at the mental and physical kvel. It is because the Supermind descent into the lower planes to function within them and make them the instruments of the supramental power. As Sri Aurobindo writes:

Supermind lends itself to the action of the inferior instruments: it is always there indeed at the core as a secret support of their operations (Sri Aurobindo 2000:6251.

This is to suggest that the Supermind works secretly within the lower planes of existence such as the mental, vital and physical. It works below the supramental level because of its involution in the mind. life and matter in the descending order. The Supermind is the transforming power because it has the capacity to rule over the mind and life. Its power comes from the Divine. which is above and beyond the working of the mind and the supermind. The workings of the Supermind are “merely irradiations of the supermind which accommodate themselves to the limited functioning of the obscure instruments: its own characteristic nature is a gnosis superconscient to mind. life and body. Supermind or gnosis is the characteristic. illumined, significant action of spirit in its native reality” (Sri Aurobindo 2000: 625). Thus, it is the Supermind which ultimately rules over the mind, life and body and transforms them into the instruments of the supramental consciousness.

Introduction Gnosis, The Divine Redeemer, “What liberates is the knowledge of who we were, what we became; where we were, where into we have been thrown; whereto we speed, where from we are redeemed; what birth is and what rebirth.”‘

Deliverance from this material world , in other word , can come only by liberating knowledge (gnosis).

Humans are imprisoned in the material universe of fate that the archons control, though we carry within ourselves the leftover sparks of the divine and precosmic Pleroma (Fullness) that existed before the demiurgic construction com-pany took over. Human beings are thus, in essence, absolutely superior to the ecosystem—not stewards or even masters, but strangers in a strange land.

“What liberates is the knowledge of who we were, what we became; where we were, where into we have been thrown; whereto we speed, where from we are redeemed; what birth is and what rebirth.”‘ The primary polarity of Gnostic psychology is not sin and redemption, but ignorance and }gnosis, forgetting and memory, sleep and the awaken-ing of knowledge. The Gnostic sought the pure signal that overrides the noise and corrosive babel of the world—an ineffable rush tinged with the Platonic exaltation of mind, a first-person encounter with the Logos etched into the heart of the divine self within.

“Having conceived that nothing is impossible to you, consider yourself immortal and able to understand everything, all an, all learning, the temper of every living thing…. Collect in your-self all the sensations of what has been made, of fire and water, dry and wet; and be everywhere at once, on land, in the sea. in heaven; be not yet born, be in the womb, be young, old, dead, beyond death. And when you have understood all these at once—times, places, things, qualities, quantities—then you can understand god.”

On one level, this illumination penetrates to the subtlest spheres of consciousness—the call to “be not yet born” recalls the Zen koan that asks the practitioner to recall her original face, the face “before you were born.” But unlike the Zen quest, which proceeds largely by emptying the mind of its obsession with mental bric-a-brac, the budding Promethean Gnostic is here encouraged just to keep loading it up. Hermes is not told to merge with the great ineffable Oneness, but to expand the conceptual and empirical mind, the mind that knows and understands the things of this world, quantities as well as qualities, information as well as wisdom. Gnosis enables die mystic not only to know God, but to know what God knows. Even more important, this cognitive ecstasy is not characterized as something that happens to the aspirant through God’s infinite grace. but as a feat that the aspirant pro-duces through his own mystical, magical, and intellectual labor—in a word, self-divinization.

“Through [the Demiurge’s] unknowing agency the spiritual seed was implanted in the human soul and body, to be carried there as if in a womb until it had grown sufficiently to receive the Logos. The pneuma sojourns in the world in order to be pre-formed there for the final “information” through the gnosis.”

Theories of Change With God being utterly transcendent and unknowable, all the lower realms basically being corrupted (of which the human body is constructed), and the goal being a complete liberation from it all, the fundamental gnostic theory of change and way to this salvation is centered on the acquisition of “knowledge,” or gnosis. The idea here is that God sends Divine Light down to humans thereby enabling them to share in God’s existence.

Such knowledge from and of God not only liberates one from the body’s corrupting passions, but is itself the “ultimate perfection” that transforms the sou1.

In speaking about the relation between the knower and the known, Jonas writes, “There, the mind is “informed” with the forms it beholds and while it beholds (thinks) them: here, the subject is “transformed” (from “soul” to “spirit”) by the union with a reality that in truth is itself the supreme subject in the situation and strictly speaking never an object at all.”

It is, therefore, by one’s reception of Divine knowledge, that one is called, awakened, and finally liberated from all the lower realms. There are also two additional purposes of this gnosis: it gives a magical quality to make the soul impenetrable and invisible to lower gods; and to give knowledge of how one can force their passage to the higher realms.

Gnostic transformation, which is “long and endless” and often confining but also joyous is therefore rooted in one’s communion with this knowledge. This journey, however, is not considered to be made alone, especially in Christian versions of Gnosticism. A “transcendent savior” is believed to bring this “saving knowledge” from beyond these realms in which humans are imprisoned.

This savior comes to bring liberation and He must descend and “assimilate himself to the forms of cosmic existence and thereby subject himself to its conditions.

Gnostics pretty much have a singular focus when it comes to the aims of their religion. On this, Jonas asserts, “The goal of gnostic striving is the release of the “inner [person]” from the bonds of the world and [her or his] return to [her or his] native realm of light.”

It is to be “reunited with the divine substance’ ;” a breaking through and awakening from the spirit’s slumbering.309 He continues, “It is no exaggeration to say that the discovery of this transcendent inner principle in [humanity] and the supreme concern about its destiny is the very center of gnostic religion.”

Given the realm of prisons that the spirit is enclosed within, both cosmically and anthropologically, the goal is the gnostic ascent is through the concentric circles and one’s self to the beyond where God dwells.

Being a thoroughly dualistic perspective, it is through this ascent, via a series of stages, that the immanence of the spirit attains to the transcendence of God.

This attainment therefore “involves a process of gathering in, of re-collection of what has been so dispersed, and salvation aims at the restoration of the original unity.”

In short, the central spiritual formation goal of gnostic Christianity is a liberation of this imprisoned spirit into the realm of God that is utterly transcendent to and beyond all of creation.

We know that gnostic practices were important since the acquisition of unknowable knowledge of God was considered to come via “sacred and secret lore or through inner illumination,” either directly, or through a savior. Such knowledge, Jonas asserts, was not just related to gnosis, but also to the way of life that gnostics should live. On this, he writes, “On the practical side, however, it is more particularly “knowledge of the way,” namely, of the soul’s way out of the world, comprising the sacramental and magical preparations for its future ascent and the secret names and formulas that force the passage through each sphere.”

The Savior must be born in us as He was born in the world; must put off in us, (by fighting for us against our spiritual enemies,) those evils which He put oft with the maternal human; must be crucified in us to the death, or quiescence of our former life; must resuscitate in divine truth in us, and establish His kingdom of love in us, before we can be fitted for His heavenly kingdom, and before the incarnation of the Divine Human can produce in us its triumphant and eternally saving effects.

Thus shall we recover the image and likeness of God, in Jesus Christ, which can never more be effaced; the external, though distinct in degree, will be united with the internal in cone-sponding harmony, and the church immortal, which now descends from heaven, will establish its dominion with us forever.

Many whom curiosity may incite to contemplate the wonders of the new dispensation, which is gradually diffusing its light through the world, may, for a while, gladly receive the testimony in the imaginative delights of the natural mind, but none can have any part or lot in the benefits of the second advent, who do not undergo the process of the first.

We must die to self, before we can have life in the Lord; we must have genuine truth before we can have heavenly love. The Lord is the way, the truth, and the life, and every one who would participate the life, must, with heartfelt humiliation, apply to the manifested Jeho-vah as the only way which can introduce the sincere penitent to that divine truth which alone can enlighten, and to that divine love, which, in its bosom. contains eternal felicity.

By the external senses, we know this world ; but if they are disordered, they are not the mediums of correct knowledge. Through the mind only can we know a spiritual world, and only as the mind is qualified by spiritual love and thought, can we thus know it.

Thus only can we know the things of that world, as by the bodily senses only do we perceive things of this. To learn the properties of each, we must have the qualifications for each. Spirit is known only through spirit, love through love, and wisdom through wisdom ; as matter and its properties are known through material organs.

The former process is imaged and illustrated in the latter, as the spiritual world is imbodied and represented in the forms and objects of this. Because this world corresponds to that within and above it, and man possesses in his spiritual body, and in the material body which covers the spiritual body, the rudiments of both worlds, therefore he is capa-ble of knowing both worlds, of living in both, and of ascending by an orderly process from one to the other ; from a natural life to a spiritual, and from earth to heaven.

In the spiritual world there is good and there is evil, light and dark-ness; and the more perfectly man follows the light of the spiritual world, by obeying it in the love of it, the more fully are the rudiments of that world within him developed into form and energy ; and the more do they take the ordering and government of the world without.

Each, thus, becomes a more perfect medium of knowing the other. The spiritual descends more and more deeply into the nat-ural man, to arrange, purify, and regenerate it ; the natural, thus transformed and conformed, rises up and calls the spiritual blessed in ascribing the salvation to the Lord. The world without, be-comes, as it were, a mirror in which arc reflected the images of the world within. The forms and qualities of the spiritual world are thus manifested through the natural.

The content of the Gnostic teaching consists of the belief that God is radically transcendent. The God who created the world, the Demiurge, is seen as a lower deity. The highest God has nothing to do with this world, except with human beings. They are bound to him in their deepest selves, but they have forgotten this. It is the task of the Saviour to remind the human beings of their bond with God and thus of their true identity. Moreover he has to overcome the demonic powers which keep human beings imprisoned in this cosmos. For a Gnostic believer, the com-plete realization of redemption consists in the return to God after death (the journey of the soul). Already in this life believers must strive to be free of matter and its passions by following an ascetic lifestyle.

Knowledge in this manner knows where he comes from and where he is going. He knows as one who having been drunk has turned away from his drunkenness, (and) having returned to himself, has set right what are his own’ . Clement of Alexandria provides a summation of Gnostic self-understanding: ‘It is not the bath (washing) alone which makes us free, but also the knowledge: who were we? what have we become? where were we? into what place have we been cast? whither are we hastening? from what are we delivered? what is birth? what is rebirth?’ (Exc. Theod. 78.2; Foerster, Gnosis 1.230). Williams notes that most of the Sethian sources reflect a preoccupation with the question of human nature and human origins. . . . Recovery of an awareness of one's membership in this divine family belongs to the essence of salvation in Sethian traditions' (Sethianism’).

In Gnosticism, to begin with, the soul has to escape from the Archons who at every stage try to block its way upward.Salvation is a developmental process. Those eligible to aspire to gnosis , or intuitive awareness of the structures of reality, can only escape the hard world through an arduous change of consciousness. Tavistock Institute. Part 149

Every life begins when a small spark of the Eternal Flame of cosmic consciousness splits off like a glowing ember of a universal bonfire. This unique spark ignites as the Organizing Intelligence that creates your organs, divides your cells, and develops you perfectly into a precious being decorated with thoughts, preferences, gifts, talents, emotions, and eccen-tricities.

Your Inner Pilot Light begins in every baby as the untainted, radi-ant, buoyant light of God/Goddess but often gets filmed over by trauma, conditioning, and the illusion of separation from the Eternal Flame from which this unique spark arises.

Although your Inner Pilot Light may grow dim as life’s inevitable challenges threaten to snuff out the full brilliance of this luminous fire, rest assured that your Inner Pilot Light never burns out. Even when you die, the spark returns to the Eternal Flame, adding the brilliance of this unique fractal of light to that which creates all life. In mystical moments, you may be graced with a glimpse through the film that veils your Inner Pilot Light, experiencing moments of enlivening ecstasy, bliss, and unity as your unique flame merges with the bonfire of all life.

Yet, this veil usually creeps back in like fog pouncing into a volley between coastal mountains off a cool ocean, cooling the luminous flames and quieting the burn back to an ember. When the fog retreats back to sea and your Inner Pilot Light flares up, you may have moments of clear vision, deep knowing, and a true remembering of the Oneness that links us all.

Then the fog rolls back in, and you may forget once again that your singular flame is also part of the One bonfire. Over time, the fog may roll in less, and the fire within you may gain fuel from the practices that connect you to the Eternal Flame, stoking your inner fire with your devotion, your discipline, your prayers, your humility, and your longing to reconnect with that which once burst you into life.

As you peel away all that is not love to allow more oxygen to fan the flames of consciousness in your original spark, as the inevitable trauma of human life heals, and as the center of your love is unveiled, this flame within you grows to fill your cells. This original spark fills your whole body until it bleeds through your skin as an invisible field of love that touches the spaces around you, lending this warmth to all who come near.

Error is created : “ Baneful , it [ self consciousness ] exempts man from entering the path of specialism truth is eternal .

Enlightenment and the Alchemy of Light Ancient alchemists worked to turn lead into gold, which was to turn heavy and base metal into metallic light. The great psychologist Carl Jung explained this alchemical process as a metaphor for transforming the dark matter of the unconscious into the pure gold of the integrated self — for turning our own internal darkness into light?’

The universe reflects an alchemical process of transform-ing matter into consciousness, which we could call the ‘al-chemy of light’. From mineral to plant, to animal, human and then to enlightened sage is a progressive evolution of the light of consciousness. This ability to extract con-sciousness from matter is the internal alchemy of light. Our lives are part of this churning process, to bring the light out of darkness, to bring our soul out of our bodily density and inertia.

Through the inner light of awareness we can discover light, truth and beauty in all things, which is to return the world to Cod without any loss of diversity. All life is mov-ing towards this alchemical transformation of conscious-ness. The process of evolution does not end with the human mind as we know it.

The mind too must evolve further to its source — which is pure consciousness or pure light transcending all material forms. We must move beyond our current dualistic thought-based intellect, trapped as it is in likes and dislikes, attractions and repulsions, opinions and prejudices to a greater unitary awareness.

This pure light of universal consciousness is what great yogis and mystics have always sought to realize through their meditation practices. The universe is evolving toward enlightenment as its true goal. Our role as a species is to bring the evolutionary process to its decisive phase in which we consciously seek enlightenment, so that the plenary light of pure conscious-ness can come forth out of the half-light of the mind. This search for enlightenment is our real contribution to the evolutionary movement.

Building upon Plato’s famous Allegory of the Cave, the Gnostics generally viewed the cosmos as a vast prison house; the earth or “sublunar realm” is located at the uttermost dregs of the dungeon where prisoners are held in chains as Plato described in his Allegory, deep in a cave, where their vision is obscured, and their field of reference and knowledge of true reality radically curtailed.

Gnostic systems imagined various intermediate realms stacked up through the heavens, ruled over by “archons,” Cosmocrators, “powers and principalities” at each level, all of them serving to further separate our earth and we lowly humans from the true, untouchable, highest God.

They made a distinction between this highest, absolutely quiescent, unmoved and unmov-able true God or Godhead, and the “creator God” who had unleashed honor into the cosmos by creating an imperfect physical world subject to decay wherein subjects are enslaved. This creator God the Gnostics painted as a real tyrant, who enslaved humanity on purpose, then lied to them, proclaim-ing himself to be the only God demanding total obedience and sole adulation from his prisoners.

“Yaldabaoth in a string of Gnostic texts, a fusion of two Hebrew terms, Yahweh and Sabbaoth”. (From a chakra perspective this represent chakra one and five)

Other Gnostic writings equate the creator God with Plato’s original pre-sentation of the Artificer or Demiurge of the Timeus who, in Plato’s vision, only shaped and ordered the preexistent physical universe, following the model of the eternal forms in the Realm of perfection. But Plato’s Demiurge suffers quite the distortion at the hands of the Gnostics, who cast him as the primary player in a grand cosmic plot to torture a captive humanity. He rules over an array of archons at every intervening level, whose task it is to bar our upward passage toward Godhead.

To this end, the sinister agents of the creator God, termed Yaldabaoth in a string of Gnostic texts, a fusion of two Hebrew terms, Yahweh and Sabbaoth, Lord of Hosts, have buried our spark of divinity in the thick, viscous globs of matter that make up our bodies and the physical universe.

Our spark of divinity is drugged therein, buried, asleep, unconscious, benumbed, drunk on the poison of the world. It is imprisoned in an alien world to which it emphatically does not belong and from which it is in desperate need of escape.

This can only be effected by an outside party not, as in Plato’s original view, by one of the prisoners himself who manages to break his bonds and turn toward the light, make his way out of the cave, and lift himself up toward salvation through Gnosis, knowledge of the truth.

In Gnosticism it is only a radical outsider not a creature of this earth but a heavenly being of pure light who descends into the morass of the prison for the very purpose of liberation of the prisoners. This divine light being gener-ally termed the “Gnostic Redeemer Figure,” appears as a constant throughout Gnostic literature.

In Gnosticism this salvific knowledge entailed a knowledge of the truth, the truth about who we really are (divine) and where our true home lies (in the Pleroma, the perfect mind of Godhead), the truth about what we have become (drunk and weighed down by the physical body), where we have been thrown (prison = the earth), and where to speed back to (the Pleroma = heaven, our we home).

The true high-est Godhead is not present in the physical world, did not create it, and did not reveal his will or anything else in the Bible or any other document available to the filthy masses of the world, according to the Gnostic texts.”‘ Only his messenger has been sent, the Redeemer, to outwit the archons, awaken our sleeping divine spirit and lead us home.

Through [the Demiurge’s] unknowing agency the spiritual seed was implanted in the human soul and body, to be car-ried there as if in a womb until it had grown sufficiently to receive the Logos. The pneuma sojourns in the world in order to be pre-formed there for the final “information” through the gnosis.”

In Christian Gnosis also Cross and Resurrection belong closely together, but in such a way that the latter already takes place before or at the same time as the crucifixion ; it is the liber-ation of the spirit and the destruction of the flesh in onc. For this reason the gnostic can say in an inverted sense that Jesus came “to crucify the world”. * “Blessed is he who has crucified the world, and not allowed the world to crucify him” is the proc-lamation of the “living Jesus” to his disciples in the First Book of Jeu, and this crucifixion consists in the hearing and carrying out of what he has to impart to them as secret knowledge.

The ascent of the soul and the end of the world

The redemption guaranteed by means of “knowledge”, in the sense of an escape from the entanglements of earthly existence, is first realized by the gnostic at the time of his death, for at this moment he encounters the everlasting, rewakening fact of re-lease from the fetters of the body, and is able to set out on the way to his true home.

This process, familiar also in other reli-gions, is called the “ascent of the soul” or the “heavenly journey of the soul”. For Gnosis death is thus very definitely an act of liberation. The Mandeans used an expression of their own: “the day of escape” (or: “release”), and placed their main sote-riological emphasis in the sphere which was entered after death. With this object in mind Gnosis is primarily concerned with a man’s personal destiny; expressed somewhat differently: the eschatology of the individual, i.e. the doctrine of the fate of individuals after death, is of primary importance.

In no way does this exclude a “universal eschatology” which under-stands the end of the world in a collective sense, as is sometimes supposed. On the contrary, Gnosis is interested not only in the final end of mankind but also in that of the cosmos, for both are ordered in accordance with its cosmology. The coming into be-ing of the world, which is regarded as calamitous, has its goal in an end which restores the beginning. Our first concern however is with the “eschatology of indi-viduals”.

The path of the soul to the kingdom of light or to “rest”, as this objective is often desaibed, is the same as that which the soul traversed at the beginning. Taking up the words of the ancient Greek philosopher Heraclitus it is recorded in one section of the Three Stelae of Seth: “The way of ascent is (like) the way of descent”, which refers here to the elevation to the pleroma achieved by prayer.

The redeemer must also tra-verse this path, and so both are frequently likened to each oth-er: the redeemer prepares or shows the soul the way; he has, as the Mandeans say, “established the path”. However, gnostic theology here faces an initial problem of conflicting interests.

Only rarely is the ascent of the soul accomplished automatical-ly, but requires help and support.

The reason for this lies in the existence of the powers which rule the world, the Archons, who try to impede the soul’s return in order to prevent the perfect-ing of the world of light and thus protract the world process.

The description of the menace to be encountered on the jour-ney is a central theme in numerous gnostic traditions, as is also I that of the overcoming of these obstacles. At this point magic and cult intrude for a number of gnostic schools, media which really run counter to gnostic self-understanding, but which do show that such practices also have their own decisive impor-tance in Gnosis.

One must not rely only on the saving nature of “knowledge” and the “natural” redemption process, but on palpable elements, like protective and distinguishing signs and symbols (“seals”), magical sayings and death ceremonies. – ‘

The ascending soul, after it has crossed the “barrier of evil”, i. e. the firmament, by traversing the “eternally chained gates of the Archons” has to acquire the favour of each of the guardians of the planetary stations by prayers of entreaty. The address to Astaphaeus (= Venus) is an example: “Astaphaeus, lord of the third gate, overseer of the primeval source of water

In Gnosticism, to begin with, the soul has to escape from the Archons who at every stage try to block its way upward.

Salvation is a developmental process. Those eligible to aspire to gnosis , or intuitive awareness of the structures of reality, can only escape the hard world through an arduous change of consciousness.

Each was under the sway of its own ruler or “ archon. ” These rulers were originally the heavenly bodies themselves , upon whose supposed sway over mortal destinies the whole trade of the astrologer was founded, but they resembled … In any case the only way of escape lay in the possession of Gnosis or knowledge.

In the Gnostic system of belief, history was conceived of as a permanent conflict between the Gnostics and the forces of evil. The latter, ruled by the demiurge and his acolytes, the archons, all of whom keep the rest of mankind under their sway, unceasingly sought either to destroy the Gnostics, who were born from the pure “other seed” of Seth.

Through the body and soul man is subjected to the power of the Archons; only the spirit can be awakened by knowledge.

Humans are unfortunately caught in the middle of this cosmic drama with the light attempting to reclaim its lost sparks and the darkness trying to enslave the sparks. What all of this entails for free will is that only two groups: the offspring of Seth or of the true light, and the “psychical,” have any free will. If you feel that you are not of this world and you come to gain acquaintance or gnosis with your inner or higher self and with its heavenly origin, then you have some free will and at that point it is your sole objective to escape the terrestrial hell that you find yourself currently enslaved in. It is unclear how one knows whether or not they are a “pneumatic” who automatically ascends back to the pleroma or a “psychic” who must choose the correct ethical path.

At each sphere there waited its ruling Archon (playing the role of the old Babylonian planetary gods ) , ready to turn back any escaping soul.

Christ has restored to the different regions of the world the elements which were in it ; to the inferior region, his body, which remained in the tomb; to the sublunar region, the psychical element ; to that of the great archon, the element which he had taken; to the Holy Spirit, the divine truth which animated it ; finally, what he had of the third essence, has ascended the firmament to consummate itself in the absolute. Jesus is the type of the true Gnostic ; be enlightens men in order to lead them to salvation. Faith is born of a sudden illumination. The gospel is the knowledge (gnosis) of what is above our world.

Like the body , the soul too is a creation of the Archons, who endowed it with their own evil natures. Only the pneuma, the divine spark consisting of Lightsubstance, is pure. In the vast upheaval which preceded the creation of the world, particles of this Light – substance became entrapped in the material universe.

The human body was formed specifically to hold these particles and prevent their escape. Salvation thus … Ignorance is thus the Gnostic equivalent of sin . The escape … Archons and make possible the passage of the pneuma through the seven spheres ; he himself leads the way

The escape from ignorance is knowledge, which leads to salvation. Enlightment (or gnosis lead to liberation and salvation). Therefore, “Enlightenment is ego’s ultimate disappointment”, and is the the archons disappointment. The archons controls the three lower physical chakras. When humans overcome these the first chakras theyt overcome the abyss (the ego-mind prison). “The mind creates the abyss, the heart crosses it.” When people open their fourth chakra or their spiritual heart, then it will crosses the abyss.

Salvation thus consists of liberating the pneuma from its bodily prison so that it may ascend to God.

How to Think Like a Gnostic. Introduction Knowledge. Although human beings have a divine origin, they live as “strangers” in this world and are absolutely separated from the divine world. Tavistock Institute, Part 140

Although human beings have a divine origin, they live as “strangers” in this world and are absolutely separated from the divine world.

When the divine is reduced to such universal principles, God is wrongfully immanentized and humanized.

The relation between the divine and the human is essentially one of crisis, as the idea of transcendence questions by its very nature the legitimacy of immanent being and mere human life. But precisely by being human, one always fails to reach the divine transcendence from which one is separated by a deep “abyss.”

The aim of Gnosticism is to liberate the pneuma from its material, delusional prison and to reunite it with the Deity. The Archons seek to obstruct this liberation and to maintain their dominion. The tyrannical rule of the Archons is called heimarmene, which manifests itself through natural law, through human governments, institutions, laws, and conventions.

The spiritual interpretation is front and center : the goal of alchemy is the liberation of the spiritual Adam from the bonds of carnality imposed upon Him by the rulers of the sublunary world, the archons.

This ignorance is fostered in human nature by the influence of the false creator and his Archons , who together are intent upon keeping men and women ignorant of their true nature and destiny. Anything that causes us to remain attached to earthly things serves to keep us in enslavement to these lower cosmic rulers.

Humans are generally ignorant of the divine spark resident within them. This ignorance is t, fostered in by the influence of the false creator and his, who together are intent upon keeping men and women ignorant of their true nature and destiny. Anything that causes us to remain attached to earthly things serves to keep us in enslavement to these lower cosmic rulers. Death releases the divine spark from its lowly prison, but if there has not been a substantial work of Gnosis undertaken by the soul prior to death, it becomes likely that the divine spark will be hurled back into the pangs and slavery of the physical world.

Ecstatic Spirituality

The third type of spirituality that surfaces widely in the ancient Mediterranean is ecstatic spirituality. It points to an ecstatic or mystical relationship with God. So we should consider both the words ekstasis, which signals in Greek disassociation or out-of-body experience, and mystis, which indicates someone who has been initiated into the divine secret mysteria (mysteries).

Behind this is the Greek word ma, which means to “close” or “shut” the lips or eyes. It points to an understanding of the divine as something hidden that must be revealed to the ignorant human. This form of spirituality is built on the premise that the god and the human are vastly different and separate in two ways. First, the human is mortal, whereas the gods are immortal.

This means that humans are unlike the gods in their essential being. Second, the dwelling place of the gods is far removed from the human, or is cloistered in a separate space, so that a chasm exists between the two worlds. It is an abyss that is intended to keep the god and the human separate, in multiworlds of their own. The gods are hidden in a shrouded, divine world, beyond the human locale, in a place where humans cannot go. The gods are utterly Other in the otherworld, according to this spiritual perspective.

This difference means that the gods cannot be comprehended by the human being. The natural human mind, being utterly different from the mind of the gods, cannot conceive of the gods, who are ultimately Other.

They are a mystery beyond what the mortal human mind is capable of comprehending. There are no words in human language that even begin to circumscribe the gods. To the mystic, the gods are Incomprehensible and ineffable. what we can know about the gods is that they are hidden, a mystery that remains unsolved.

One might think, then, that type of spirituality is an agnostic orientation. We cannot know anything about the gods; so, end of story. But that is not the case. In fact, the opposite is true: ecstatic spirituality encourages humans to seek knowledge of the gods through two avenues.

The first avenue is human discernment, when we try to read the signs that the gods leave for us in the natural world; for example, by studying the skies or the entrails of sacrificed animals. We might learn the plans or secrets of the gods from a divine figure who crosses over into our world from the othenvorld to tell us what the gods desire.

This figure might be an angel like Michael, with a revelation In hand, or a god like Hermes, with some divine wisdom to share. It might come from a human prophet like Jeremiah, who is inspired by God’s spirit to speak on behalf of God, to set the community straight about exactly what kind of fidelity God requires. Or It might come from a seer like the priest Ezekiel, who is ravished by an apparition of God in a visible shape and is roused to tell about it. It might come in the form of dreams, such as Daniel describes, which require proper interpretation by religious experts to unravel God’s messages.

The second avenue is more traumatic because it involves trying to transmute the human being into a creature divine enough to enter the otherworld and communicate directly with the gods. This transmutation process relies on peculiar rituals that ecstatics develop to raze the human body and make it into a new creature capable of seeking the gods and venturing across the chasm into the otherworld to discover their will. Ultimately, the ecstatics hoped to learn the will of the gods beyond any doubt.

Short sunnerize: Gnosticism say humans need knowledge to separate, escape or liberate themselves from the abyss, liberate the spark of life trapped within matter. Other say therfore they know to understand “Alchemy” to be able to transform their Being to a new Spiritual Being of Light, and they need to raise their inner vibrations through raising their Kundalini, and in the end they will recieve the hidden white stone, or may even find the Philosopher´s Stone.

⦁ Learn Gnosticicm
⦁ Learn Alchemy
⦁ Release the Kundalini Energy in the spine
⦁ Seek total enlightment
⦁ in the end they will find or develop the Philosopher´s Stone

According to the Gnostics, the creation of the world was the result of a cosmic catastrophe. In overreaching herself, she fell from the world of the divine, becoming separated from the other divinities and her own consort.

The Philosopher´s Stone may be created by a process, and the stone may actually be hidden within the thousend petal lotus at the crown chakra. When this flower explode the Philosopher´s Stone is both created and found.

The prima materia (root chakra and start of Kundalini) is the beginning of the opus. At the end of it stands the lapis, which is Latin for “stone:” Once again, we are not really sure just what this stone was which alchemy put such great store by. Sometimes the lapis is called gold, but alchemical texts are forever stating that their gold is not ordinary gold. The mysterious lapis, which the alchemist attempted to release from the confusing matrix of the prima materia, is equated with all sorts of extraordinary things. It is sometimes called the Philosophers’ Stone, sometimes the Garden of the Philosophers, sometimes a rose or a lotus flower, sometimes a diamond. It is equated with Christ.

The alchemists believed the lapis to be immortal and imperishable; and they also believed that it had a catalytic effect on the world around it. In other words, if the alchemist could produce the lapis, the lapis would transform other base substances simply by being what it was. This is the same as the Chinese idea of being in Tao. The lapis reproduces itself, and has a permanent and ever-extending effect on life. So there is something about this inner authority on a psychological level which gives an individual a profound effect on the environment, not because he or she is struggling to achieve power or has arrived at a state of spiritual perfection, but because somehow that core of self acts as a trigger on the psyches of other people. Then we say a person has “mana,” some quality of inner authenticity and wholeness which affects others very powerfully.

The fourth step is a jump. You remain silent, just like a rock. In that moment of silence and stoppage, energy will be there—so much you cannot hold it; it will have to explode. And it will move from the sex center upwards. You will feel as it moves upwards you will fell a transformation, a change. You are not the same; moment to moment something else is coming into being. When this energy touches the head center, the last center, sahasrar, Hindus have said it is as if a lotus of one thousand petals has opened suddenly. You are filled with benediction, bliss, beatitude.

The chakra at the top of the head is known as the thousand-petalled lotus because of the thousand chambers or petals it contains, which resemble a water lily or lotus when it opens. Each of these is connected to an aspect of God.

Try to realize that you are no more ordinary human beings. You have crossed the bondage and now you are not even in the Sahasrara. You are beyond it. Sahasrara is the limbic area and this limbic area is closed like a lotus. When you get your Kundalini entering into it, then this lotus opens…. These petals are nothing but nerves which are en-lightened and they look like flames. But these flames are not with any heat…. They are extremely cooling, soothing, beautifully burning.

So when this Sahasrara lotus opens, then the Kundalini pierces through your fontanel and you get your Realization. This is what has happened to you. Now the only thing is to keep this lotus open and there where we fail sometimes because still there are some lingering human feelings within us.

Your conscious mind feels that integration within you. The rationality which is separated from the heart becomes one with the heart. It becomes one with your attention. Wherever your attention goes, you act in a collective way. All the activities of your attention are blessed. The attention itself is effective.

This is the door or gate.

Padma is a Sanskrit term meaning lotus (flower) . The lotus symbolizes what all humans can ultimately achieve , enlightenment . Enlightenment then is the lotus flower that raises itself above an ordinary world

The jewel in the lotus and the Philosopher ‘ s Stone both represent spiritual perfection.

In Gnosticism, to begin with, the soul has to escape from the Archons who at every stage try to block its way upward.

Salvation is a developmental process. Those eligible to aspire to gnosis , or intuitive awareness of the structures of reality, can only escape the hard world through an arduous change of consciousness.

Each was under the sway of its own ruler or “ archon. ” These rulers were originally the heavenly bodies themselves , upon whose supposed sway over mortal destinies the whole trade of the astrologer was founded, but they resembled … In any case the only way of escape lay in the possession of Gnosis or knowledge.

Humans are unfortunately caught in the middle of this cosmic drama with the light attempting to reclaim its lost sparks and the darkness trying to enslave the sparks. What all of this entails for free will is that only two groups: the offspring of Seth or of the true light, and the “psychical,” have any free will.

The Primal Man was freed from the hellish substance by the Living Spirit who descended and extended his right hand

The final goal of redemption is the liberation of the Gnostic from his entanglement in earthly appetites

The Gnostic systems is a dualistic manner of thought: the quali-tative distinction between God and the world, the great chasm between the divine world and matter. This is what made it necessary to develop a doctrine of how the world came into being. Some elements of the divine world became separated from the

nktipavitc. They sink like sparks of light through the world of the aeons, until they come to the material world in which they are held prisoner. The world came into being by the uniting of ail and the divine substance. In this way “Adam” was not only the first human being but he represents humanity as such as a part of the cosmos, captured within the world of matter, subject to mor-tality, enslaved by the powers of death, oriented toward a freedom that could only come from beyond. The redemptive drama corresponds to this cosmology: the heavenly redeemer descends from the divine pleroma into the cosmos, brings gnosis to fallen humanity, thereby liberating the light sparks held captive in matter, and leads them through the hostile aeons {archon) back to the heavenly world.