The Presence of the Kingdom

The real and eternal you, standing whole and perfect within the Kingdom that is yours now, awaits your recognition in order that s/he may step forth into your daily life and assume full control.

This real ‘self’ holds the key to the use of the ‘link’, whose function is to create and sustain complete poise and balance between the positive and negative ‘forces’ which have formed the background to our every thought and emotion.

Hitherto, most of us have provided the battleground on which these two opposing ‘energies’ have fought for mastery. We have never ceased to see-saw first in one direction and then in another, always in a state of conflict, and without making any progress in a forward and upward direction. Our salvation from this tragic condition can come about here and how; not by our continuing to struggle and to fight, but by ceasing to do so, and instead, by allowing our real selves to enter in and to take command.

The Kingdom which is yours and mine and which Christ tells us is in our possession now, contains within it the real you and me. When once I have learned how to merge myself (my lower self or personality) within the true and perfect self, my troubles will be at an end.

No longer will there by any need to try to ‘save’ myself from pain or evil or fear of the unknown. The ‘I am’ will look after all this for me, and my ‘salvation’ will have been achieved.

This ‘I am’ will provide the neutralising link between the positive and negative forces which hitherto have seemed to be tearing me apart. Poise will have been restored and poise brings with it a complete awareness of health, harmony and understanding.

Wellesley Tudor Pole, The Engima of Good Versus Evil

Praxis

The most fundamental message of the Christian faith is in the life of Christ, his message and his praxis.

He called for complete liberation…he came to develop a new solidarity between men….he spoke of the poor and oppressed and he lived for the poor and oppressed.

As revolutionaries, we affirm that Christ’s importance was that he lived his own message. When he spoke of the liberation of the poor and oppressed he referred to those who were materially oppressed, with whom he lived and to whom he spoke.

When he spoke of revolution, he did so by concretely fighting against the religious and political power that oppressed people; he denounced these powers and he organised until his martrydom.

He was faithful to his beliefs and to the people until death….in this way he established that practice is the ultimate proof of faith.

Fuerzas Armadas Rebeldes, Guatemala

Find this Book

Precisely as the confident sun was crossed by a thick, scudding, cloud, the atmosphere in Mysteries was electrified by morbid anxiety verging on panic. To lose the book would be an unmitigated disaster, of this there could be no doubt. There were only seven known-of copies left on the planet, the other two having been lost in the midst of time while three updated versions were yet to be recalled and translated from the Akashic records[i].

A well-preserved copy was with the Dalai Lama, while the elder Rabbi – who had denied its existence no less than 28 times because of his pathological obsession with total secrecy – kept the most pristine version within a hidden compartment in his personal library.

An Indian sage called Mahavatar Babaji had also received a Pros Theon scroll that he subsequently left with his disciples, while a famously un-heard of Sufi Magician inherited the fifth from his grandfather.

This highly revered leader of a largely forgotten tribe of nomads had escaped persecution by retreating to a hidden network of mountain caves above the plains of ancient Babylon. From this increasingly imperilled retreat, he and his devoted disciples kept alive a love-fuelled tradition that transported them all to a revolutionary state of pure ecstasy on a well-timed basis.

The Catholic Church had the remaining extant copies of Pros Theon. The first was mostly in fragments and frequently misinterpreted due to the high number of puzzling gaps in crucial places, while a second had been retrieved by the Knights Templar from a vault below the Church of the Sepulchre in Jerusalem, shortly before mad caliph al-Hakim came to power in the dark ages.

Sealed in a ruby and amethyst-encrusted casket that was locked with a golden key bearing three perfect emeralds and a set of alchemical sigils that were barely understood by anyone alive, this particular copy of Pros Theon had not been opened for almost 1,000 years and nor would it ever be again.

The Master felt a sudden chill. Was it possible that the only freely available text had been lost or – it hardly bore contemplating – stolen? Oh, the horrors if that were true! The very thought brought about cold sweats and a search that was renewed with marked zelatory.

Holy Krishna, Moses and Mary, Christ the everlasting Lord, please don’t let Pros Theon fall into the wrong hands. Forgive me for so carelessly misplacing it, I beg of you to let me find The Book…

[i] Derived from the Sanskrit word akasha, which means ‘sky’ or ‘ether’, ‘akashic record’ is a phrase used in theosophy and anthroposophy to define a body of mystical knowledge – a hall of records – accessible only via non-physical planes of existence or dimensions. This is where the ‘books of life’ are thought to be written and stored, along with the secret history of the world. The records are seen as equivalent to the mind of God, although the concept originated with the dualistic and atheistic Hindu Samkhya philosophy that recognizes only that there are two distinct realms of being, the one material, the other of consciousness.

In this Seraphic vision

Know, dearest friar, that when I was on Mount Alverna, all rapt in the contemplation of the Passion of Christ, in this Seraphic vision I was by Christ thus stigmatised in my body; and then Christ said to me:

“Knowest thou what I have done to thee? I have given thee the marks of my Passion in order that thou mayst be My standard-bearer. And even I, on the day of My death, descended into limbo and drew thence all the souls I found therein, by virtue of my stigmatas, and led them up to paradise, so do I grant thee from this hour (that thou mayst be conformed to Me in thy death as thou has been in thy life) that after thou has passed from this life thou shalt go every year, on the day of thy death, to purgatory, and shalt deliver all the souls thou shalt find there of thy three Orders, to with, Minors, Sisters, and Penitents, and likewise the souls of thy devoted followers, and this, in virtue of thy stigmatas that I have given thee; and thou shalt lead them to paradise.”

And those words I told not while I lived in the world.

[This said, St Francis suddenly disappeared]

The Little Flowers of St Francis

The Last Judgement

The last judgement will be the last crisis. The Greek word for judgement is krisis, ie, crisis. Friedrich Schiller said rightly that “the history of the world is the judgement of the world”, ie, it is a continual crisis, the states of which are “historical epochs”.

The last judgement will therefore be the culminating point of history. It will be simultaneously the aim, the meaning and the summary of crises of history. For this reason Jesus Christ, who is the moral and spiritual centre of gravity of history, will be present there. The second coming will be the objective manifestation of the stake of history.

In this sense Jesus Christ will be the “judge” at the last judgement. His presence alone will set in relief all that which is not like him, all that which is incompatible with him for the awakened conscience.

But he will not restrict himself to being present; he will participate in the last judgement and will take an active part, namely that of judge. But he will judge in his own way: he will not accuse, he will not condemn, and he will not impose punishments – rather, he will give forces to souls undergoing the trial that the awakening of conscience and complete memory entail.

Christ’s judgement is the comforting of those who judge themselves and his eternal commandment addressed to those who judge others is: “Let him who is without sin among you be the first to throw a stone…”(John viii, 7). It is thus that Jesus Christ judged during his life, thus that he judges now, and thus that he will judge at the last judgement.

Meditations on the Tarot, Unknown Author, Letter XX, The Judgement

The Second Coming of Christ

To understand the magnitude of a divine incarnation, it is necessary to understand the source and nature of the consciousness that is incarnate in the avatar.

Jesus spoke of this consciousness when he proclaimed: “I and my Father are one.” (John 10:). Those who unite their consciousness to God know both the transcendent and the immanent nature of Spirit – the singularity of the ever-existing, ever-conscious, ever-new Bliss of the Uncreate Absolute, and the myriad manifestations of His Being as the infinitude of forms into which He variegates Himself in the panorama of Creation.

Within the creative Holy Ghost Intelligence are all the governing laws and principles that manifest, sustain, and dissolve every part and particle of the Lord’s universe. The Holy Ghost inherited from Spirit the independence to create and govern within the mandated vast scope of the manifesting powers endowed to it.

This Creative Power, which gives birth and nurture to creation, is referred to in Hindu scripture as Maha-Prakriti, Great Nature, the potentials of all becomings. When this power goes forth from Ishvara (God the Father of Creation) as Intelligent Creative Cosmic Vibration, it takes on a dual nature.

As Para-Prakriti (Pure Nature) it creates and expresses all good and beauty in harmony with the God-tuned immanent Kutastha Chaitanya (Christ Consciousness). Its divine nature is magnificently expressed in the causal and astral heavenly realms.

But as the Vibratory Power descends into material manifestation, it becomes conjointly a deviant Apara-Prakriti (Impure Nature), creating through the circumscriptive laws of gross matter and the uttermost density of delusion. These two aspects of Prakriti correspond to the Christian designations of Holy Ghost and Satan.

The Holy Ghost in tune with Christ Consciousness creates goodness and beauty and draws all manifestation towards a symbiotic harmony and an ultimate oneness with God.

Satan (from the Hebrew, literally “the adversary”) pulls outward from God into entanglement with the delusive world of matter, employing the mayic cosmic delusion to diffuse, confuse, blind, and bind.

The Second Coming of Christ, Paramahansa Yogananda, Discourse 1 (John 1:1-4) & 7 (Luke 4:1-2, 8)

Cosmic Christ of faith; Omega Point of science

Under the combined influence of men’s thoughts and aspirations, the universe around us is seen to be knit together and convulsed by a vast movement of convergence.

Not only theoretically, but experientially, our modern cosmogony is taking the form of a cosmogenesis…at the term of which we can distinguish a supreme focus of personalising personality…Just suppose that we identify (at least in his ‘natural’ aspect) the cosmic Christ of faith with the Omega Point of science: then everything in our outlook is clarified and broadened, and falls into harmony.

Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, Christianity and Evolution

Prayer

His thoughts and actions continually surprise her, so that, increasingly, she “does not understand” his meaning, as for instance when, in the Temple, he leaves her without warning; when he fails to receive her when she visits him; when he refuses to manifest his power in the public ministry, squandering his life and ultimately slipping from her on the cross, substituting the stranger, John, for himself.

With all the strength she can muster she listens to this Word as it grows more and more vast, divine and seemingly alien; its dimensions almost tear her asunder, yet it is for this, for everything, that she gave her consent right at the start. She lets herself be led where she “does not wish to go” – so far is the Word she follows from being her own wisdom. But she consents to this leading; it is a measure of the fact that the Word, which she loves has been “implanted” in her heart (Jas 1.21).

The Christian who tries to be a hearer of the Word can only experience these hard, ineluctable and ever-increasing demands in his life if he unreservedly exposes himself to the Word. On the one hand, certainly, he must genuinely listen to the voice within, to God’s voice in his conscience, to the exhortation of the “interior teacher” (as Augustine calls Christ’s indwelling in us as Word), in an attitude of docility vis-a-vis the inspirations of the Holy Spirit.

Such an inner listening would correspond in some way to Mary’s inwardly directed contemplation. But it would not be of the same order as her beholding of the Son, bodily present with her, living, acting, challenging her. Without this second element our communion with the Word – hard of hearing and fond of comfort as we are – would be in danger of being stifled.

Hans Urs von Balthasar, Prayer

The Nathan Jesus

How was Jesus of Nazareth able so to experience the destiny of humankind and how did this experience bring with it the descent of the Healer? He carried within himself both a comprehensive knowledge of the Zoroaster “I” and, united in his physical nature, the conscience of humankind and the third hierarchy. The fact that this conscience lived in his physical nature indicates its highest development.

Within itself, his astral body continued the inner impulse effected in it by the hierarchical being Jesus in his former union with the Christ. This astral body was made up of the condensed inspirations of the Archangel Jesus, who, while functioning as an angel, had in the past been interpenetrated by the Christ three times. The active aftereffects of this earlier interpenetration made the astral body of Jesus of Nazareth a body of “longing after Christ.”

On the other hand, the whole organization of this body (likewise the result of its participation in the earlier healing influence of Christ on humankind) participated fully in all human destiny. We could even say: In its upward flow, the astral body of Jesus was human longing: in its downward flow, human suffering.

No physical body could have borne such an astral body had the “I” living within it not possessed an unusual power of cohesion, and had its superhuman sensibility to shock not been balanced by a force able to return it to equilibrium. Because the Zoroaster “I” could give a wisdom-filled direction to the immense forces of the longings of the Nathan Jesus, the physical organisation was empowered to bear those longings; because the being of Buddha radiated into the astral body of the Nathan Jesus, the tranquil calm of Buddha flowed into the intensely agitated life of the soul.

This current of calm preserved the physical organism from destruction by a fiery excess of pain; the centralising Zoroaster force preserved it from congealing in an excess of longing. Thus the astral nature of the Nathan Jesus united within itself the greatest possible capacity for ecstasy – for expanding in purest self-surrender – with the greatest possible capacity for enstasy, or concentrated repose in the self. The first faculty made it possible to sustain the ordeal of the baptism in Jordan, that is to say, the absorption of the cosmic being of the Christ; the other gave proof of its power soon after, during the temptation in the wilderness.

The ether body of Jesus of Nazareth bore the innocent life spirit of the sister soul of Adam, and hence the forces of human youth bestowed the freshness of the first day of creation on every impulse in the soul of Jesus. When he spoke, he did so as only the most childlike child would be able to speak if it also possessed the most mature wisdom of the ages. The wisdom of the great Zoroaster shone in him with all the freshness of youth, without weariness, without the wounds of innumerable disappointments, and without the heaviness of soul that must be experienced and endured on the paths leading to such wisdom.

Experience leads to wisdom, but it wearies even souls. Therefore, from very early ages, the soul of Zoroaster had carried within itself the experience of the terrestrial history, but it surrendered that earthly experience to a soul that was without it. Thence the wonderful combination of the most mature wisdom arose along with the most childlike mind. Here was a man who could speak in such a way that not only did he speak the truth, but in speaking, restored the life that animated it on the first day of creation. Cosmic dawn lived in the great Western concepts of human destiny when he spoke during the time before the baptism in Jordan.

The Nathan Jesus possessed an organism we could call an organism of love, as distinct from an organism of force that reverts to the centaur. The nature of the Nathan Jesus, however, is not exhausted by a study of his astral, ether and physical bodies. Something more belongs to the organism of every incarnate human being, something that envelops that being just as the bodies do. Every incarnate human being brings another kind of “body” that may be called a “karmic sheath”. This sheath is made up of the forces of good and evil, which are not rooted in the three human bodies but are drawn by past karma into one’s environment as a circle of influence, so to speak.

Nathan Jesus was an exception. He had no individual human karma from the past; thus his “karmic sheath” was very different from that of other people. Because he was without past individual karma, he was not surrounded by an individual karmic sheath, but by the karmic sheath of humanity as a whole. This meant, however, that a vast range of human impulses were active in his environment, born by spirit beings who represented them quite accurately.

These particular impulses were active around him, “making smooth the way” for the Christ within him. These impulses revealed themselves in the simple forms of “insight”, “the spirit of sacrifice”, and “penitence.” Later, st Paul – after being transformed by the presence of Christ – understood the scope of these impulses and described them as “faith,” “love” and “hope”.

Christ and Sophia, Jesus of Nazareth

Prayer for a Revelation of the Supreme Mystery

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost. An-Soph, Yah, Soph Yah.

Thou, the most Holy Divine Sophia, the substantial image of beauty and the delight of the transcendentally extant God, the bright body of Eternity, the soul of the worlds and the queen-soul of all souls, by the fathomless blessedness of Thy first Son and beloved Jesus Christ, I implore Thee to descend into the prison of [the] soul, fill this darkness of ours with Thy radiancy, melt away the fetters on our spirit with the fire of love, grant us freedom and light, appear to us in a visible and substantial manner, become Thyself incarnate in us and in the world, restoring the fullness of the aeons, so that the deep may be covered with a limit and God may become all in all.

Vladimir Solovyev, Prayer for a Revelation of the Supreme Mystery