Involution, Evolution, Devolution, RevolutionLecture by Gnostic InstructorMore at: gnosticteachings.org

Many spiritual institutions describe the development of the cosmos and the appearance of any given cosmic unit as occurring under the process called involution. Involution as a spiritual term is used in traditions started by Rudolf Steiner, Blavastsky, Aurobindo, among many others. And this word involution, hindi schools refer to how the spirit descends into matter, or in other words, how God becomes involved. So God involves itself in matter.

In the gnostic tradition, we also describe and study this process of involution, or how the Spiirt descends and manifests everything that exists. Involution then is the process by which Spirit, light, Christ condenses itself and creates. That light is the light of the Ain Soph, which appears at the very top of the glyph of the Tree of Life. And the Tree of Life itself is a map or a diagram that illustrates the condensation of that light into deeper and deeper levels of materiality. At the very peak, at the top, beyond the Ain Soph is the Ain. The Ain Soph is that womb from which the light emerges, the Ain Soph Aur. The Ain Soph is the star itself, the Being, intelligence, primordial intelligence which expresses itself and gives rise to existence. The Ain Soph is unmanifest, when it enters manifestation we then see the appearance of the Tree of Life.

The Tree of Life or the Kabbalah, is a series of spheres which represent the multidimensionality of existence. The top most spheres are the most rarefied, the most subtle, the most supreme levels of manifestation. These levels of existence exist far beyond the intellect, far beyond the personality, far beyond the "I". These top three spheres, Kether, Chokmah and Binah in their synthesis are the Cosmic Christ, the light of love and wisdom, intelligence, understanding, the Crown of Life and this primordial light, this Ray extends itself and unfolds all the universes, all the infinites all the galaxies, all the solar systems. So in the heart of every existing thing, is that light. We also call that light consciousness. We can also call it mind. But it is not consciousness, or light or mind in the way we think of it, in the way we experience it, it is far beyond that.

These dimensions unfolded on the Tree of Life can be related or understood when we understand how modern physics presents its understanding of light. When we know that the Tree of Life is a unfolding of light into multidimensionality and then we reflect upon the spectra of light then we can see that there's a relationship. That we as physical organisms perceive only visible light which is incredibly narrow band of vibration of light, a particular wave length which is very narrow in comparison with the extent of light that scientists have measured thus far. This begs the question, if we only perceive a very limited band of visible light but yet within that band we perceive existing things, then would it not also be true that within the other regions of light that there are also manifested existing things that we do not perceive? This is precisely what the Tree of Life illustrates.

Physical light, visible light corresponds to Malkuth, the physical world, which is the lowest sphere of the ten spheres. In other words, it's the most dense, the most material, the third dimension which is this dimension that our physical bodies exist within. Above that world, the physical world, the third dimensional world, are the fourth, fifth, sixth and seventh dimensions which correspond to wavelengths of light that at the moment we don't perceive, but that nonetheless exists. Likewise in an inferior level below this physical dimension, there is a short range of light which we also do not perceive directly and this corresponds to what in Hebrew is called Klipoth, or in other words, hell, the inferior worlds. All of these worlds, all of these levels of existence come into existence because of that Ray. That Ray of Creation that involves down the scale of materiality. And as that Ray descends and the notes of that octave become deeper, the number of laws that enforce themselves also increase. In this physical world, we're ruled by 48 laws. In other words, all the laws that are above us, plus the laws of this realm are enforced here, but in deeper levels there are more laws, so things are more complicated, more dense, heavier.

During the course of any given cosmic day we see that the light emerges, there is a dawn, the sun rises, the light expands and manifestation expands and then the day passes into evening and the light begins to withdraw until night arrives and then the light is gone. When we look at a physical day on this earth we see how the sun rises, reaches its zenith and then descends until it passes from our sight and there's darkness. A cosmic day is exactly the same. But in these spiritual schools that describe the process of involution, they assign this term involution to that unfolding of light to the rising of the sun and the Cosmic Day when all the light of The Christ expresses itself and illuminates all the dimensions, illuminates all the worlds. But there's a point of time when that light begins to recede, when that sun will set and the light begins to extract itself and the twilight arrives.

This cycle of day and night is processed in octaves and scales like a spiral. These scales these processes are reflected in birth and death. They are reflected in the movement of our heart, of our blood. The pumping of the heart and the distribution of the blood is a form of day and night. The movement of our breath, inhaling and exhaling is a process of birth and death. Here we see in every level of nature, this fundamental axiom, this fundamental duality upon which all of nature depends.

Thus when we look at this process of involution, we have to understand that it has two faces. When the light descends and illuminates all the worlds, all the dimensions, there is a process that unfolds, the light from the seventh to the sixth and the sixth to the fifth and the fifth to the fourth and the fourth to the third. That consciousness or that light is bringing life with it. WIthout that life, there is no life. WIthout that essential light there is no existence. Thus in ages past at the beginning of this cosmic day the life was descending, involving through those dimensions until finally penetrating from the fourth to the third and when that penetration occurred life emerged in the third dimension, and all the life forms emerged and were animated, movement began.

This is true of every level of life and existence. That when that light penetrates into that sphere, that light animates energy and movement and matter. Without that light of Christ there is only nothingness. There is no activity, there is no movement. When that light stimulates movement in a given realm, this initiates a process of cause and effect. Any movement produces reaction, produces a consequence, and this initiates the process of life, action and consequence, cause and effect, in other words, karma. The light itself only extends itself into the different worlds because it's driven by karmic impulse, it's driven by previous causes that must be satisfied. Those effects must be dissipated. So when the light emerges into the third dimension, that light which gives rise to life, is pushed by the impulse of cause and effect, of some previous cause which must satisfy itself, which must attain balance.

In other words this process of cause and effect, birth and death is related to the law of the balance, the law of karma, evolution and devolution, birth and death, arising and passing. When the light animates matter and energy, matter and energy are stimulated into growth. Birth occurs, that matter and energy combined with consciousness produces light. In the heart of every existing thing we have a triumvirate, we have three aspects, we have consciousness, matter and we have energy and it's these threes three which animate everything.

Now Einstein wisely pointed out that you cannot destroy either matter or energy. You can only manipulate them or modify them. One becomes the other and likewise. If you destroy matter it becomes energy. Energy applied becomes matter, and this is reciprocal relation, but the point of balance between the two is consciousness, will in other words. An atom, a simple atom has will, has consciousness and this is something that quantum physicists have discovered, and have measured and analyzed. Quantum mechanics does not ignore that atoms have a form of intelligence. This is why quantum mechanics is quickly moving into a mystical realm because their former materialistic theories can no longer answer the questions that are being posed by their experiments. Therefore if a simple atom has consciousness then what about that which the atom constitutes? All the organisms that are made up of atoms must likewise have intelligence, consciousness, will. Yet its will, the will of any organism is relative to its level. The will of an atom, a physical atom is limited to its level and thus when we look at this physical world, this sphere of Malkuth, the third dimension, we see a vast array of organisms from the very simple microbes all the way up to galaxies ,to infinites and across that huge scale, there are many organisms and all of them have consciousness, they all have matter, they all have energy they all have consciousness. Thus they all have will but at their level.

When the light initiates movement and birth in any given world, what it initiates is the first impulse for evolution, for development. The light animates the matter and energy and initiates the development of some organism. So when we analyze any given organism, we see that it's born and it begins a process of developing itself. We call this process evolution. When a baby is born when it's conceived, the matter and the energy and the consciousness initiate a process of development, a process of evolution. Birth occurs and that child begins to grow. Eventually that child will reach its zenith and that child will begin to age, will become an older person, wIll begin to decay and then die. That process from the zenith to death is called devolution.

Every existing organism, evolves and devolves. Everything that exists is born, grows and develops and becomes more complex, reaches its pinnacle in its given level and then begins to decay and die. Nothing in this material world escape this law, nothing. Therefore it's important for us to comprehend evolution and devolution in all its many octaves. Our very physical body is a result of evolution and devolution in many octaves. In the context of one lifetime, we will experience our own octave of evolution and devolution according to the span of our life and all the factors that are applied to it. We grow and develop to a certain point and then we begin to decay until we die. This process that I am referring to in this moment is simply applied to the physical, to the physical body, to the mind, not to the consciousness. This is something else.

One thing to understand about these two laws, evolution and devolution, these laws are what you would call in physics, invariants. An invariant law is a law that requires the energy to be returned to its original point of departure and this is closely related to the law of karma. Karma states just like Newton's third law that an action produces a result. When you initiate and action you also initiate the return. When you propel an energy you also instantaneously propel the return of that energy. This is an invariant law, its called the law of conservation and this is how all energy is restored to its original balance. Another way to look at this is in a match, if you take a match, that match contains energy and when you strike the match that spark is birth, the flame emerges and this is evolution, the flame reaches its peak which is its zenith and then it begins to recede which is its devolution, decay and then the flame goes out, death. And what you have in your hand is inert, dead, a used match.

Your physical body is exactly the same. Your physical body when born contains within it a certain potential of energy. It's struck when we're born, the flame that emerges is our life and when that flame goes out that physical body is discarded. And yet have you considered where does the flame come from? How did the flame come out of the match? Because you remember, you cannot create energy, nether can you destroy it. So where did the flame come from and then where did it go This is something worthy of meditation. When you observe the sun where does all that light come from? The sun cannot create light, the sun is merely a vehicle; the light passes through the sun like a light bulb. A light bulb transmits light, it does not create it. All it does is it modifies the electricity. Where does electricity come from? A generator does not create electricity. It is a vehicle through which that energy can emerge. Your physical body is the same. Where does the consciousness come from? This is the question that has eluded philosophers for ages. Where does the consciousness emerge from? This is a question we must answer because all of us without exception according to the law of invariants, will die. This is unavoidable. The physical body that you have will exhaust its given energy and it will die. Where will your consciousness go? Where will that flame recede to at at that moment? The purpose of gnosis is to prepare for that. To prepare your consciousness for that moment.

Every element on the wheel existence is subject to evolution and devolution, to growth and development to decay and death. That wheel is symbolized in the tenth Arcanum of the Tarot which is called Retribution and shows a great wheel; upon one side are rising creatures and on the other side are descending creatures. The same is seen on the Bhavachakra, the Wheel of Samsara of Buddhism. In the centermost wheel we see this law, this invariant law of evolution and devolution. So life is based upon this cycle, but it isn't a simple wheel that just turns, it's much more sophisticated. Really, evolution and devolution is a spiral. A spiral which has the potential to move upwards and downwards. And this spiral effects all levels of matter and energy in different ways. So really this spiral is more like a thread, of interwoven, interdependent tracks of movement.

Regardless of which aspect we observe on this spiral of life each proceeding development or devolution is built upon the one before it. This physical body that we have now is a result of previous causes, it is the effect of previous actions. Each development, each position in this wheel is built upon the one that came before it. In other words, it's karmic. Your physical body is the result of the actions that you took previous to having it. It is also the result of the actions of your parents. This is invariant. This is unavoidable. We inherit a certain set of circumstances in our very atoms, in our very genes, in our organs. The way we move our bodies, the way we related to our bodies, the way our mind functions is built upon the preceding steps. A plant inherits its characteristics from the plant that gave birth to it. That seed is the result of its parents. And that parent is the result of its circumstances and the forces that affected it plus its inheritance. So there is a vast chain of cause and effect that extends through time.

This is what people commonly think of when they think of evolution, that all of the races and creatures and beings and plants and animals are on this constantly ascending movement of evolving life, and that by the process of natural selection every race, every species is gradually getting better. But this is a lie. It's a lie because there is no evidence to support it, in many levels. Samael Aun Weor wrote a book entitled Gnostic Anthropology, which indicates and points out very clearly and precisely many of the problems that exists with this theory of evolution which is posited by modern materialistic scientists. We don't have time in the lecture today to address all of them. What's important for us to address is that just the same as any given entity in any point and time can be in a process of growth, any given entity can also be in a process of decay and the same applies to a species. Natural selection does not necessarily apply to everything. It has its place. But we see species in the world now that are not improving their chances of survival, they are getting worse, they are decaying. Entire species of animals and plants that are decaying, devolving, reaching the end of their cycle of existence. In other words, entire species are born, develop, reach their peak, and then decay and then disappear from the earth and this has happened through countless ages but nowadays somehow we don't seem to understand that, that this is part of nature. In the same way that and organism grows decays and dies, entire species do this.

And how do we find them? By analyzing their characteristics. If we look for example at primitive cultures, most of the time scientists treat primitive cultures as some kind of anomaly, some kind of isolated group that is simply a reflection of our supposed past state. But what scientists fail to realize is that in many cases these so called primitive groups are just devolved. They are human beings that once had a former glory but because of their particular circumstances and their particular karma have entered into a long slow death, until they eventually disappear. The so called cavemen were devolving human beings, degenerated human beings.

We can also see this when we look at the human species in the context of its different civilizations. Everyone's heard of the rise and fall of the Roman empire, and here you see a beautiful example of evolution and devolution, birth and death in one empire, one group. But that same process applies to entire species, to entire races. It's important for us to always seek to expand our own understanding of life and to not expand it just based on ideas and theories but to observe nature. Nature contains within itself all of the evidence we need. But if we observe it with preconceptions we will not see it.

A good way or a good illustration of all the factors that we're describing in the lecture today is to observe the waves hitting a beach. The waves that hit a beach are a beautiful illustration of the cycles and processes of evolution and devolution. If you imagine a wave and you remember observing waves you see that they have enormous characteristics; they can be very calm and mild and they can also be very ferocious and very powerful. But their movements always change, and this is how life is. When we describe this wheel of evolution and devolution we're describing a process of constant change, constant movement, which is initiated by that involution of the light into matter and energy. That's the spark that initiates the emergence of the flame. So these waves rise from the ocean, build in power according to the forces that drive it, according to the forces that influence it like the wind, and then those waves decay and die. But a wave is made up of particles, many particles of water and many other elements that are mixed in. This is what a species is, any species on this earth is like a wave. It is a group of particles, which driven by forces and impulses rises according to the strength of the forces that push it. It's modified by the forces that influence it. In the case of a wave we know that the surge is pulled by the moon and then the wind hits it and shapes the wave. These are karmic forces when we apply it to our analogy. Karmic forces from the past and karmic forces of the circumstances.

All of the pine trees in the world have a process of evolution and devolution. That whole group of pine trees, all the pine trees in the world form a group and inhabiting each of those trees are sparks or particles of consciousness which subside within those trees in order to acquire knowledge at that level of existence, and those trees are transformers of energy, transforming energies that they receive and expelling energies back out. So there are enormous complicated laws that are managing all of the species and life forms that exist in this physical world and every species has its own characteristics, its own capacities, its own limitations. A mineral has energy and matter and consciousness in its level. Minerals form the lowest of the kingdoms of Malkuth but it's minerals that form the basis upon which life can exist here. When the cosmic light of Christ enters into this physical dimension, the minerals receive that light and become active and minerals receive, transform and transmit energy according to their level, and in every mineral is consciousness according to its level.

The same is true of the other kingdoms. Superior to the mineral kingdom would be the plant kingdom, and superior to the plant kingdom would be the animal kingdom and in all of these creatures we see many levels of mind, many levels of sophistication and development. Each one having its own idiosyncrasies, its own capacity. We cannot say that a dolphin has the same kind of mind as an amoeba, or as algae. They have a totally different kind of mind. In other words, the light that inhabits that organism has more experience, do you grasp that? The light develops itself from body to body, from existence to existence, gradually gathering more and more experience.

Stated another way, the light of the Ain Soph which is within us, our own particular inner star sent its ray into manifestation, into the existing dimensions. But that ray when it first entered had no consciousness of itself, consciousness of its own happiness, it had no real development. So it enters into existence as a simple spark without experience. Gradually little by little that spark gathers experience through the inferior kingdoms, receiving energy, transforming energy, and transmitting energy, and it becomes more complex, more sophisticated, more powerful. The pinnacle of the animal kingdom, we see animals who are extraordinarily beautiful and who start to show glimmers of independence.

Because you'll notice through all the lower kingdoms, all the minerals and plants and animals move in waves, in groups, they have collective mind. They have organisms that have been provided to them by nature and they are moved in groups in order to learn as a group, as a collection. The same way that a plant releases seeds, it releases hundreds of seeds over the course of its life. But how many of those seeds will actually give birth to a plant? In the same way nature gives birth to hundreds of species and hundreds of individuals in each species, but how many of them will actually develop? This collective mind that develops through these lower kingdoms, reaches its peak in the animal kingdom and we see certain animals that have evolved to a point where they have the flavor or the appearance of individuality. They begin to act on their own, the larger more sophisticated animals. The spark of consciousness that inhabits that organism has gathered experience through all its previous incarnations, then needs to develop something new, it needs to develop individual will. Because even a lion or an eagle can only behave in accordance with the behaviors of a lion or an eagle. In other words, it is modified by its inheritance. It can only do what an eagle can do, it can't go beyond that. So that mind , the vehicle for that sprit has to inhabit a new organism, which has further capacity, and that organism is humanoid like you and me. That organism, the humanoid creature sits at the very top of this great wheel, the human organism the humanoid organism is the most perfect creation that nature,mechanical nature can produce. It is the most sophisticated, it is the most complex, and it is also the most dangerous.

The animal mind that the spark develops through the lower kingdoms enters into a humanoid body and is given something new. While all the lower forms of creatures have consciousness and they have mind in their level, they do not have reasoning. The humanoid receives reasoning, the ability to compare. The ability to compare things and then act from individual will based upon their own analysis. This is unique to the humanoid.

In other words what we're saying is that this wheel is like a ladder, it's a ladder of many level of beings of organisms, that the spark of light of consciousness works through little by little to gather experience, to prepare itself until the moment arrives when nature bestows upon it reasoning. A mind that has that capacity, why? Why would that happen? Here is where you may find a little difference between the teachings that we study in gnosis, and the spiritual teachings that are studied in most other schools. Most of the schools that teach about involution state that humanity is on an eternally ascending slope and is gradually just getting better and better and gradually little by little we'll return to the light. In the same way that the light is returned at the end of a Cosmic Day, that the Spirit will draw back its consciousness and then we will go back as spiritually enlightened beings. This is what many of these schools state, this is a very New Age idea and science believes something comparable, that life in its movement is simple getting better from day to day. And yet there's no evidence anywhere to support these beliefs, none.

When we sincerely look at the state of our world we can see that in fact this entire planet is in a process of decay, but most especially the humanoids, us. We are diseased, we are not spiritually evolving, we are spiritually devolving, stagnant in other words. Because when we reach this humanoid kingdom, in order to advance to enter into a more superior level of life, this cannot be done mechanically. Nature does not automatically create angels and masters and buddhas. If it did, there would be millions of angels and masters and buddhas among us right now, but we don't see that. What we see among us are murderers, rapists, thieves and liars. Where is the supposed golden age of humanity going to come from? From our greed? From our lust? From our anger? From our hate? How can a golden age emerge from this society that values money over a life? That we will kill for paper? How can a golden age emerge from that? How can a spiritual master emerge from someone who is consumed with envy, with jealousy, with pride. It cannot.

The humanoid creature can become an angel, a buddha, but not mechanically. By will. This is the difference. The humanoid creature has to develop will, individual will, not collective will, individual. This is because to become an angel, to become a master, is to become a creature with tremendous power and to wield such power you must have understanding, you must have wisdom. Why would God give this diseased humanity spiritual power? This humanity that only wants to conquer, to crush, to take. Why would God, the angels, the buddhas, bestow upon us the gifts of clairvoyance, of astral travel, of powers over the four elements of nature, the ability to move from dimension to dimension at will, when we are consumed with pride, when we are consumed with desire, when we are influenced from moment to moment by resentment, by envy, by craving? This is an impossibility.

You as a parent would never give your angry child a gun because you know that that angry child would turn on you. God is the same but much more intelligent. Therefore it's required of us that if we want to develop, we have to do it by will. The development of this light, of the Ain Soph comes through knowing itself, comprehending its own self. Knowledge, but conscious knowledge, not book knowledge, experiential knowledge, awakened knowledge. Therefore we begin in these studies to learn how to awaken the consciousness so that we can perceive these things for ourselves. We begin by learning how to see our own mind for what it is. It is an animal mind. It is a mind that nature bestowed upon us because we needed it to develop in those levels of nature, but now to become a real human being we have to discard the animal mind, the mind of desire and instinct and impulse and create a human mind.

The word human is a compound word, man, m - a - n comes from manas which is a Sanskrit word related to mind. We have an inferior mind, manas, animal mind which is capable of behaving as an animal. Hu is related to spirit. a hu-man is someone whose mind is controlled by their spirit, an angel, a master. Someone whose mind is in the service of the Ain Soph, someone whose mind has will that acts in accordance with the laws, does not break the laws of nature. A human being is an angel, a human being is a product of will. The point of life is not simply to emerge as a humanoid, to eat, to drink, to make children and to die, to gather wealth, to try to become famous, only to die. This would be quite useless. This would be very sad and unfortunately many people believe this is all life is about, satisfying all of our desires, gathering as much money and sexual experiences as we possibly can before we die. To acquire as much power, as much pleasure as we can before we die. This is the philosophy of our modern humanity, this is not the philosophy of one culture. This is not the decay and degeneration of one small group, this is the decay of an entire race. Humanity as a whole only believes in desire, in satisfying lust, in building pride, in feeding envy. None of these things have anything to do with God. All of these thing are the ego, the "I". And if you'll recall in the Ain Soph, in the Christ, there is no '"I". There is no ego. If we want to return to that light we cannot have ego, we have to be free of desire, at perfect peace, with absolute equanimity, no craving, no aversion. But awake and clean.

Life does have a point. Life is not in existence simply for the satisfaction of desires. As a matter of fact, when you look closely at life, when you look closely at nature, you can see this. If you observe our place in the world you can see that all of the minerals, all of the plants, all of the animals, provide an environment for us, an environment within which we can gather and acquire tremendous amount of self understanding. All the minerals and plants and animals provide to us a theatre within which we can act. In some way it seems as if all of nature exists just so that the human being can appear on the stage, but not the human being as we are now, the human being we are now is diseased and is destroying itself, destroying its own habitat, we're destroying our own food, we're corrupting all the plants, we're making all the animals extinct or we're bending them to our will, we're corrupting the very air we breathe, we're poisoning each other with lust, with pride, with fear.

What animal destroys itself? What animal destroys its own habitat, its own food supply? Only a diseased one, only a sick one. Only a sick and diseased animal bites the hand that feeds it. Only a sick and diseased bites the hand of the doctor, which is what we do, we bite the hand that feeds us, we criticize and attack those who try to help us. This includes our parents, this includes the people who hire us to do a given job and then we turn and criticize them and gossip about them. This is true of our spiritual leaders who give us the teaching and we in turn gossip about them, criticize them, put them down. We're the only creatures who do that, who are so diseased with the "I", with the ego that we destroy the very support that gives us existence. We're eating off our own arms and legs. This is very sad, but it is a fact. And how can a golden age emerge from that? How can a golden age emerge from this society that celebrates violence and lust? That rejects consciousness, that rejects patience, love, charity, compassion. Our society as a whole laughs at these qualities and you can see that if you observe any aspect of our society, in the media or in our relations with each other. We love our anger, we love to stand out, we love to be noticed, we love to get things from others, we love to get something for nothing. But unfortunately, life is not the way we think it is.

This idea that 'live fast and die young', whoeverr dies with the most toys wins, this concept is false. Why? Because energy and matter cannot be destroyed, remember? Every time we feed pride, every time we act on lust, every time we protect our fears and our envy and our jealousy, we instill energy into those psychological elements. Thus when we die, that mind still traps enormous energy, all the energy of all the egotistical actions of our lifetime are still there. What happens is with our physical death all those energies are not in the physical world. We have the same sort of cycle that we see in the rising and passing of the sun, but that sun is consciousness.

When we're born the consciousness enters into our body and we're born, that is our Cosmic Day, that is our little Manvantara. When we die, the light recedes, the physical body is left inert like the match, that light goes to another dimension, it recedes. Yet, that light is trapped, it's trapped in Klipoth, in the inferior dimensions, modified by all those heavy laws. Karma. This is where pride lives, this is where lust lives, this is where fear exists, in hell. Our own psychological hell, our own karma, Therefore when the physical body dies, the light recedes into limbo, until such a moment as the impulse of our karma drives us back into a new physical body, driven by karma, and then we begin to play out all of the residual effects from our previous actions. But what is worse, we add more. Because we continue to be identified with pride, with fear, with envy, and so we add more unto the pile of garage that we've already accumulated. This is the state of humanity. Death is no answer, death is a change of clothes, a movement form one day to another. It is not an end.

The only way to escape this terrible cycle is by will. Because unfortunately as we go from from human lifetime or humanoid lifetime, from one to another and we accumulate more and more garbage, we build more pride, we build more desire, we build more lust, that weight becomes so substantial that it sinks and thus we devolve. But there is a threshold beyond which we can no longer manifest in the physical world because the weight is too much, then we enter into hell, symbolized by Dante in the Divine Comedy, symbolized by the infernos of all the great religions. Hell or the inferno is not a theory, it is natures recycling plant, where those sparks of light which have failed to develop human will are recycled by nature, cleansed of all of their mistakes. Cleansed of pride, cleansed of anger, cleansed of lust, nature provides that as a gift, but it is very painful. Within that pride is trapped light, consciousness. Within that anger is trapped light, consciousness. If we don't extract it, if we don't destroy that "I" that ego, nature will do it for us. This is a form of devolution, when our consciousness trapped in the mind, is cycled through the process of the Second Death, which is mentioned in the Gospels. This is very painful and takes a long long time. It's better to do the dissolution of the "I" now. To destroy all those thoughts of desire emotions of desire, and impulses of desire, now while we have a chance.

This is called revolution, to revolt against our own mind, against ourselves. This is what spirituality is supposed to be. An angel is born by will, by a tremendous revolution, psychological revolution. The Buddha did not become the Buddha mechanically just because nature did that, the Buddha became the Buddha by willpower. He had to work. Jesus did not become Jesus because of nature, he became that because of will. Will driven by compassion, by wisdom, by intelligence. The purpose of our lives is to do the same. To revolt against ourselves. When the "I" is dead, when the "I" is gone, what remains is the consciousness, pure, brilliant, radiant and divine. When the ego is gone, what remains is the light of Christ, according to our own level of development. In other words, a Master must master something. A Master does not receive that title just like getting a diploma. A Master becomes that through works, through mastery. That mastery is mastery of one' s own mind, mastery of one's own self. To conquer one's own self.

We've had millions of years of evolution. Human beings, humankind has been developing for a very long time and if this current civilization is according to peak of evolution according to theories that are given, then it is extremely depressing. If thousands upon thousands of years culminate in this sick and perverse culture, that is a very sad thought. If all the sufferings of all of our ancestors culminate in the rape and betrayal and destruction that's going on now, that would be abominable. Thus we can see that this is not evolution, the result of going along the way we have, has resulted in the ego.

All of the experiences that we've had through life thus far, acting according to the way we've been acting, and following the theories that we've been given has resulted only in suffering. Suffering is not becoming less. The golden age implies that people do not suffer, or suffer very little, but the suffering of humanity in these moments is so intense we have no conception of it because we're all in our own little world, just concerned with our own little petty concerns. Worried about our next paycheck or worried about our little project, or worried about our computer or our car, or worried about our spouse, or thinking about next week and we've got this meeting or a job, we're going to go here or there. So petty, so shallow, so insignificant, like pieces of dust. We have no conception of the pervasive suffering that afflicts humanity. The disease that is ransacking the hearts and minds of everyone, because we are asleep.

The consciousness that we have within us is sleeping. We have not developed it, we have not wakened it. Thus we are in our little cage of thoughts and feelings and sensations. Swept along by the great wave of this humanity which is expiating itself against the rocks of existence. That wave has a great deal of energy but it is at the point of death. The wave of humanity is striking the rocks, the rocks is the end of the line. That wave is subsiding now and what is the result? Humanity is entering into the abyss in waves. The end of this race is happening. No one in Atlantis believed it, no one in the Roman empire believed it, no one in any of the great civilizations like the Aztecs, none of them believed it. But they were warned, and they were told, if you persist in the way you're behaving now, you will enter into hell and you will be recycled by nature. And everybody laughs 'ha ha ha hell is an illusion' they say. 'That's all theories', they say, 'you're just trying to scare us', they say. It's very sad. Humanity being so stubborn, so self destructive and so asleep.

Fortunately we still have a few moments to take advantage of this unique opportunity. The only one who can do it is you. I can't help you. No teacher can save you, no school, no book. The only one who can do it is you, your self. By awakening, by knowing yourself, by changing your bad habits, by learning how to connect directly with your own spark of consciousness and to activate it, to bring it to life, from moment to moment in each experience. Whatever you're doing, to become cognizant and in turn to master your own mind. This is a terrible revolution because we're so conditioned by our habits, by our karma, by laziness, by theories, by all kinds of pressures from collective mind. We all just want to go along with life, to just ride the wave with all our friends and all of our family members, and to just be swept right along. We don't want to go against the current, we don't want to renounce our desires, we don't want to give up fornication, we don't want to give up our addiction to sensations, we don't want to give up our pride. We don't even want to give up our anger, or our resentment or our hurt feelings. We love them too much, thus we condemn ourselves to death. Not just physical death, the Second Death.

All of our experiences and all of our pain are meaningless. This is the saddest part of all, they are meaningless. Remember the law of invariants? It returns energies to its primordial state? When we provoke anger in ourselves, when we project that energy, that energy must return. This is why we suffer. That energy comes back to us. It is our own fault. We blame everybody else, but it is our own fault. If we didn't react, and that energy would return, and that situation would be nulled, satisfied, zero, we'd be done. If that karma came, that suffering came and we did not react and we just accepted it, then we would pay, but we don't do that, we react, we get mad, we get upset, we become emotional, we get sad, we want revenge. So what do we do? We inject more energy, and thus the cycle begins and our suffering grows. In the end when nature takes us, to clear us of all these debts, nature applies all those energies back onto us. All of the things that we did to project all those energies in the wrong way, is returned once more and we suffer the consequences. This is the nature of hell, it takes a long time, because we've been doing this stuff for a long time.

Eventually, when all the debts are paid, all the energy is flat again, everything is made balanced, we start again, exactly where we started before, having gained nothing. Zero. A simple spark, whose just been swinging around the wheel of life for millions of years and has acquired nothing. No development, just lots and lots of pain. Fortunately nature gives us a chance to do it over, to try again, to try to reach a human existence once more and to try to break free of the wheel of samsara, to become perfected. Yet, we must understand how to do that. All of the vehicles that we receive through the process of transmigrating around this wheel, belong to nature. They are lunar in other words, they belong to Mother Nature, the moon. That includes our physical body, it includes our vital body, it includes our so called astral body, and mental bodies, protoplasmic bodies, bodies that are given to us by nature. These are vehicles through which we receive, transform and transmit energy. In the same way that the physical sun receives the light of the sun and transmits it, our physical body receives energy, transforms it and transmits it. The same is true of our mind. The mind is not the consciousness, the mind is a vehicle. But the animal mind is a vehicle that we have infected with desire, it is diseased. To develop individual will, to return to the light we have to abandon the bodies of nature.

We cannot enter into the light unless we become one with that light. In other words we need vehicles that can receive, transform and transmit that solar force. We need vehicles that can go beyond the third dimension, that can go beyond the fourth dimension, that can go beyond the fifth dimension, beyond sixth. In other words, the bodies that nature gives us are limited to their sphere. To go beyond we need solar bodies. These solar bodies in the Bible are called the wedding garment, they're also called the chariot of Ezekiel. This is the To Soma Heliakon in greek, the Merkabah. To accomplish this, we have this Great Work.

The Great Work consists of three fundamental aspects: birth and death are two of them. It's part of nature, to enter into a given place there has to be a birth, but that birth in the context of this work is the birth of the soul, the birth of the solar bodies. That's one aspect. Another one is death. In order to pass to a new life, the old life must die. In order to enter into the worlds of light, to enter into that ladder to heaven all of our desires must die, our self must die. This is the mystical death symbolized by the beheading of John the Baptist, by the martyrs of all the great traditions, by the crucifixion. That is a mystical death within which our own ego must die. Why? The ego belongs to hell, we cannot enter into heaven and take our ego with us, the ego does not belong there. There is no place in the superior worlds for pride, no place in the superior worlds for vanity, for envy, for jealousy. All of those things must die. And the third factor is sacrifice. The light itself descends and manifests as an act of sacrifice, an act of love. To become one with that light we have to become a vehicle of that sacrifice and this is exemplified in the lives of al the great teachers, Jesus who sacrificed himself, Buddha who sacrificed himself for others, Krishna, all these great masters came to teach this path. Let us not be the way collective mind drives us to be which is to betray all of those teachers. The collective mind of humanity hates the truth. The collective mind of humanity crucifies the Christ and betrays him. To go against that is to against our own mind. Not just going against the people that are around us or outside of us, the betrayer is our own "I" who betrays the Lord in our hearts, in our minds and outside as well.

Do you have any questions?

Q: Can you talk about revolting against the mind, many students have the mind set of initiating and condemning themselves. Now is this helpful or is this harmful?

A: The revolution against the mind is not a condemnation of oneself. It's a very easy thing to condemn ourselves or to praise ourselves. Neither of these accomplishes anything. In order to walk properly with these three factors for the revolution, it's necessary for us to be in balance. Neither condemning nor praising our own self. When we work for our mystical death, to analyze the "I", and destroy the "I", we have to do this dispassionately, disinterestedly, do you understand that? Without craving or aversion. Condemnation and praise are two sides of a pendulum. To comprehend the "I" requires equanimity, to be in the Tao, to be in the middle.

Q: How dangerous is it to transmute, kill enough of the ego and sacrifice for humanity and receive said virtues such as clairvoyance. How dangerous is it for the ego to use that clairvoyance?

A: Okay. That's a good question. The question is about the dangers of powers when the ego is still alive. There's a tremendous danger. As long as the "I" is alive, there is very real threat that exists inside of us. The best approach that we can take is to always doubt everything we see and everything we experience. Not doubt in the sense of aversion. Again, we have this pendulum, craving and aversion. But to doubt in the way of being indifferent, to see something, to analyze it but to neither accept it or reject it. To just see it. This takes a lot of balance, it takes a lot of meditation. The problem that we have is that our mind is very reactive. When impressions enter into our mind they produce impressions, they produce reactions in the mind. So whatever we see, whether it's something from a physical event like seeing someone who's criticizing us physically or seeing something in a dream or seeing something in meditation, the mind reacts. In other words, the ego. We have to always be on guard, to not react.

Q: So can I say that whenever we see something should we conjure?

A: Not necessarily because that may be a reaction as well. The best thing to do is to just see things as they are. To meditate, to be at peace. What happens with students often times is that, say for example, you're just walking on the street and you see something that would stimulate lust in you. A common person would drink that impression in, would gulp it down with great ferocity. Hungry for that, staring at that person or that image, that lustful quality, to consume it. Most people react that way. But when people hear about these studies and the need to transform impressions, often they react with the opposite, they totally will close their eyes, reject and run away. In some cases this is necessary especially if the impression is very strong. For example, students shouldn't go looking at pornography. This is harmful. But if you're walking down the street and you're seeing something lustful or if you're talking with someone and they're doing something lustful, you can't necessarily close your eyes and walk away. You have to learn to transform the impression. So another more subtle reaction is that students will learn prayers and conjurations and try to reject that impression mentally. But again, it's a rejection it's not comprehension.

When you learn to really comprehend an impression, that element, say for example with the lake, if you throw a rock its produces a wave, but when you transform an impression, there's no wave. The rock strikes the water and passes through, no reaction. And you can't fake that, you can't fake it with conjurations and prayers, you can't fake it with attitudes or by turning away. The only way you can do that is to receive that impression but understand it, controlling the mind but not reacting. This is something you have to teach yourself and the best way to learn it is to meditate. Because we have the opportunity to learn this right now in every instant, impressions are striking the mind, constant, on going, always, we're always being bombarded with impressions. So learn to receive them all now, without condemning them or praising them. WIthout grasping them or avoiding them. Neither, just being.

This is the great value of forms of meditation like Mahamudra, like Pratyahara. The practices in which there is no method. Zen is a beautiful example. You just sit. In the teachings of Mahamudra or Dzogchen,the student learns how to meditate without meditating. It's called the methodless method, and it's a very beautiful teaching but it requires a great deal of understanding because it can be misused. That's why it's the highest of the tantric vehicles in TIbetan Buddhism and in Zen they only teach it to qualified practitioners who already have some experience working with the mind. The method basically teaches you to observe the mind as it is. To control the reaction, to not react, to learn to see things as they are and to go into the depths. This is a powerful technique, but again in the traditional school it's only taught to very experienced practitioners because it's so subtle. But I'm describing it so that you can grasp the flavor of how to transform impressions. If you're reacting either for or against, you're not transforming.

Let me give you an example. Impressions of lust are probably the hardest for us to transform when we start out. But if you're a student and you observe a baby, that baby can see a naked woman and not react, it just sees the woman, or naked man, no reaction. No lust. Because the ego has not infected that baby yet. The ego has not corrupted that baby yet. They're still in that phase of development in which it's just consciousness. So you see we have the ability to see impressions and not react with ego, it is in us. But we have to be using the consciousness, free of ego to do that. This actually provides a very illuminating example for us. When we look at the progress of a persons life from birth to death, nature recapitulates , nature always recapitulates. Because if you remember we're a product of former movements of matter and energy. So in the course of our own lives there are elements through our own development that are mere echoes of our past existences. Places we go, people we meet, things that we do, experiences that happen, these are all echoes of past existences and the same is true of thoughts and feelings and sensations. When we analyze the course of our own life, we can receive a great deal of information about the nature of our ego and the nature of our karma. But specifically, if we reflect back to our childhood, we can remember and recall states of consciousness free of ego and this is invaluable. It's that taste that tells us how to self remember, how to meditate. Because every one of us when we were babies had moments and experiences, egoless, no "I", no ego, pure. The consciousness in us is very simple, it is not sophisticated and developed but nonetheless free and that memory of that flavor, that taste can give you the direct understanding of how to use it now. This is a great value that you can find by meditating and reflecting on your own childhood.

Q: When reading Tarot cards, does that same danger apply? Isn't it dangerous to do Tarot card readings because the ego manipulates? [inaudible/ paraphrased]

A: Of course, you have to meditate. When you get any kind of symbol whether from Tarot or from a dream or meditation, you have to meditate further because our own ego is always there trying to filter and corrupt, to interpret. Remember the Master says the "I" is an interpreter, we don't need that. What we need is intuition which spontaneously comprehends the real meaning, but the "I" has to be removed. So we need samadhi, we need to meditate. Then you can grasp the real meaning, that's the only place when the "I is not there, that you can definitively discover the true meaning of something. While we're physical we don't know. While we're here as we are with the ego very much with us, we cannot have that confidence.

Q: You said that we enter into hell when we can no longer manifest in the physical world but I'm under the impression that during the time you're devolving there are manifested physically as evolving animals. Is this also true?

A: Well, what I said was in synthesis. The question is about the process of devolution and how we enter into the inferior worlds. The process of entering into the inferior worlds is gradual and immediate at the same time. When our ego is very heavy, that ego belongs to hell and there are cases, probably more than we would like to hear about of knowing that certain Masters and teachers have reported encountering parts of their own ego in animals that they encountered physically. So our mind is so heavy with ego and karma that the Masters and the Law out of compassion, will take certain parts of that mind and place it into the organisms of animals in order to start the process of devolution. To lighten our load temporarily, to give us a chance to work. This is a compassionate act. But there is a threshold at which we have exhausted our opportunities.

If we demonstrate no serious endeavor or effort to revolt against our own mind, our own Being is the one who puts us in hell. our own Being is the one who says ''it's useless. My child is not listening to me, only wants to feed his desires and i've tried to help him as long as I can, but he's not returning to me.' So our own Being will cut that tie and we descend, like that. Now what happens here is quite sophisticated. The consciousness is in the abyss, trapped in the ego, but that ego is made up of a multiplicity of elements. Some of those elements belong to lower spheres, some to higher sphere of klipoth. Some of those elements will also have physical bodies as animals.

You have to remember that everything in nature works according to laws, there are multidimensional aspects to everything. The way we explain in these lectures is hugely simplified because the true function of the wheel is so complex. Remember the example of the wave I was giving you? If you watch a wave at the beach can you really understand all the laws and forces that are moving that wave? No, and that's just one wave. now try to put into your mind all of the species that exist on the planet. Not only existing physically but they exist in the fourth and fifth dimensions as well. So how is that? Can your mind conceive of that huge interdependent, interconnected process? Just keep that in mind when we explain these things.

Q: Are most people alive now at the same stage, the same part in the way of devolution or are some of them only recently starting with the humanoid body. If so what happens to them?

A: The human beings, the humanoids move in waves, in the same way that the animals and plants and minerals do. Our current humanity which is this fifth race in this planet, the Aryan race is a great wave. That great wave has many components. Again, if you go to the ocean and you see a huge wave, it has a lot of parts, a lot of different sections, a lot of different components, and our race is similar to that. When that wave strikes the rocks, there are some right in the front and there are some towards the back. The wave strikes with a movement of time, and the same is true of humanity. Many of our brothers and sisters of this humanity have already entered into devolution in the inferior worlds, many. Many more are behind us, some of us may be on our last existence, some of us may have one or two more. But in general, the entire human race on this planet, our human race, our brothers and sisters and mothers and fathers and children are moving as a group, as a herd. There are a few who are exceptions to that. But so rare that there's almost no point in discussing it.

Q: The people start to dye their hair in a certain way, start to wear certain colors, lipstick, nail polish, wear their clothes a certain way, listen to certain types of music, begin to go against nature by cutting off their [inaudible] and get a vasectomy. Is there any hope for them still? Because we're here and we have the opportunity to die within ourselves but do they have the same opportunity even though they're at a different level?

A: Every human organism has an opportunity. No matter your state, no matter your karma. If you're in a human body you can work. Even if you're a paraplegic, blind and deaf and dumb, you can meditate, because you have consciousness. It doesn't make any real difference in the big picture, as long as you're making effort. Now it's true, that if you have physical limitations or if you have physical damages or if you have problems or circumstances in life that limit your capacities, it will be difficult. But Samael Aun Weor stated very clearly, if you hear of these teachings when you're an old woman or an old man and you no longer have the sexual power you did when you were a youth, don't lose heart. Prepare yourself for your next existence. Learn about yourself, meditate, change. All of us can do that, no matter what our conditions, every one of us can change, and that's the great power that's in our hands. That power of will, we can change, no matter our circumstances.