The Rays and the Initiations

by Alice A Bailey

  Thus, from a new angle which is practical and not simply theoretical, it begins to dawn on him that he is an inalienable part of a group whole and that this incontrovertible fact involves responsibilities and duties. He discovers that his major responsibility—spiritually speaking—is to permit no hindrance, on the part of the supplementary seven, to the free flow of love from the greater seven, and later the free flow of life (inspired by purpose) from the planetary seven. He knows now that all form a great interlocking directorate through which the will of God is working out. He now knows himself to be a minute part of that great interlocking Whole, a responsible conscious atom within its periphery. Then as he goes on and learns to submit to the Law of the Supplementary Seven, he finds that from the life angle and through his own conscious direction, gradually developed, all the potencies of divinity are his to use, once he can be trusted, as the advanced initiate can ever be trusted. He is then set free for complete cooperation with the purpose lying behind the Plan. He has passed out of the human kingdom into the Hierarchy; later he will pass out of the hierarchical group into Shamballa, or out of our planetary life altogether, and either here or there will begin a greater and more extended service.

  Coming down to the immediate practical issues, the initiate is confronted with the problem of work within the individual framework, for I am not here dealing with the [155] requirements for the initiations above or beyond the third. Here the initiate has reached the point where he grasps the significant fact that the way into the innermost Centre is most securely guarded; no one can pass onward and take those more advanced steps which admit into the higher worlds of being and of unparalleled potency until he has demonstrated within the framework of his own life a definite control of energy (and this the black adept also possesses), purity of motive (which the black adept can likewise have, if by purity of motive you mean single-hearted and one-pointed intent), deep love of humanity (which the black adept never has), selflessness, willingness to follow the light wherever it may lead, ability to begin work within the larger framework the moment such an attempt becomes possible, clear vision and spiritual insight, a developed intuition, and an undeviating intention and strong faith in the future. When these qualities begin to show themselves, it then becomes possible to admit the initiate to further advancement upon the Way.

  It is believed to be safe for him now to move on a few more steps into greater light, and then—having reached his next point of testing—he must there again demonstrate the rightness of his work within the individual framework and his ability to work within the greater framework in group formation. He must appreciate the fact that as he passes upon the upward way he may not safely so do without the safeguards which protect the Way from him until he knows more; he must learn also that the group protects him and that only with the group can he proceed with security; he begins to realise that the group is not only a protection but also his chosen and destined field of service. He begins to learn with his group the meaning of the “united breath” referred to in the rule, and also to work with the group in “unified rhythm.”

  Thus he goes from strength to strength. All the time the Hierarchy is aiding in his development and at the same time protecting the Way from him until such time as glamour cannot reach him. This individual security of his [156] is only reached between the time of taking the second initiation and the third. Prior to that, he is still regarded as a potential hazard and as unstable. After that, he may suffer from illusion, but there is then no fear of his permanently turning back and reaching the left-hand path and so perhaps, in rare cases, finding his way into the Black Lodge. The major liability of the average initiate is sloth or lack of speed. Ponder on that.

  I would have you grasp clearly the highly condensed presentation I have given you. Some of it you know already but it is the synthetic presentation which I would have you appreciate and appropriate. We can then take up the work to be done within the individual framework by the initiate; I will endeavour to help you to understand somewhat more clearly what the initiate-consciousness would read into the Law of the Supplementary Seven.

  Beginning with this eighth rule which we are now studying, we enter upon the consideration of certain major unfoldments, major spiritual happenings and a series of major awakenings in consciousness which are in the nature of events. These involve likewise certain major recognitions and appreciations which will affect the initiate increasingly and bring about his eventual attainment. These are the factors which condition the date of his achievement and not the character undertakings and the soul contacts which are so necessary upon the Path of Probation and upon the Path of Discipleship.

  We are principally concerned at this point with the interpretation of the Law of the Supplementary Seven. It must be remembered that the Laws of Nature are imposed upon the mass of men, and cannot be avoided. If these laws are broken, infringed or evaded, they carry their own penalty within themselves, and this also cannot be avoided. These great protective laws are intended to guard the personalities through which the soul incarnates and eventually to cement and further all the great and possible relationships. The man passes from the stage of antagonism (as an individual) to the control of these natural though divine [157] laws, to a recognition of their inevitability and of their wisdom. They automatically then control him.

  When this control by the Laws of Nature has become complete, the man becomes an aspirant and begins to come under the Laws of the Soul, which are laws concerned primarily with the establishing of the great Fellowship of the Universe. There has been much confusion among esotericists upon these points. They confuse the discipline to which the personality has to submit when coming under soul influence, with the Laws of the Soul which have naught to do with the petty little affairs of the personality—unimportant and unnoticed by the soul on its own plane—but with the growing recognition of right group relations; these are based upon a growing understanding of the hierarchical mode of work and of inter-hierarchical relationships. The Laws of Nature, therefore, concern the activities of the soul in form and are mandatory and accepted by the form nature. The Laws of the Soul concern the life of the soul upon its own plane, and the relation which the blending soul and personality learn to establish with other souls and with the Hierarchy. These are consciously and voluntarily obeyed, and are not just accepted as mandatory and as forced upon the man by force of circumstances, experience and evolution. They tend to bring about increasing relation between the Hierarchy of Souls and Humanity as a whole, between the great planetary centre which is the custodian of the principle of love and the planetary centre, humanity, which nurtures and distributes the energy of mind.

  The Law of the Supplementary Seven is the great synthetic Law of Life or of Spirit and is the law with which the initiate works; it is this law he wields. From acceptance of the laws of nature and obedience to the laws of the soul, he passes into the positive phase of understanding and wielding the Law of Life. Because this is a governing law for all initiates, and because we know that the nature of life-energy or of spirit cannot be grasped until after the third initiation, it is exceedingly difficult for me to write in explanation of this law. You have not yet the initiate consciousness. [158] I have therefore had to express this law in terms of form, whereas the initiate understands it from its formless angle.

  This law is concerned with the wielding of energy in the world of the Spiritual Triad and not with the distribution or the transmission of this energy to the three worlds in which average humanity habitually dwells. Right wielding of this law (controlling energy in the initiatory world of causes) automatically brings about activity, movement, force expression, and right distribution of these forces in the lower three worlds. These are, under the evolutionary law, direct reflections of the three higher worlds of the triadal light and life. Motivation, the use of the eye of vision (turned this time by the initiate functioning in the world of causes upon the worlds of human living), and the correct direction of force in cooperation with the hie
rarchical Plan condition all the activities of the initiate working with this law. Clearer than this I cannot be.

  This Law of the Supplementary Seven is concerned with the inflow of energy from the seven planetary centres to the seven groups or types of men, via the seven groups within the Hierarchy. In this work of transmission the seven centres of the initiate are used as agencies; their work, therefore, is not the interrelated work of right transmission of energy within the septenary constitution of the etheric body of the individual initiate, implementing his life expression, but is the task of being responsive to the seven types of planetary energy which are received in a pure state. It is then channeled through the seven centres in the initiate’s etheric vehicle and out into the world of men as regenerative and constructive forces. These living spiritual energies—transmitted by the individual initiate from the planetary centres—are handled by him under a great uniform plan and are the means whereby salvation (to use an old familiar word) can come to the aid of humanity. This is the “saving force” in its various aspects, of which the Great Invocation speaks: “The hour of service of the Saving Force has now arrived”. (The Externalisation of the Hierarchy, page 249.) [159] The high Initiates (Those above the rank of Master) work with the energies coming from the seven planets of the solar system at this time active; these feed or implement the seven planetary centres. But the Law of the Supplementary Seven is applied by initiates below the rank of Master, and they are therefore working solely with the seven centres within the Form of the One in Whom we live and move and have our being.

  One of their first tasks is to bring about a free flow and right energy relations between the three major centres in our planet which correspond to the head, heart and throat centres in man. They are occupied with the circulation of energy between Shamballa, the Hierarchy and Humanity. This circulation, which for the first time in planetary history includes the highest centre, Shamballa, is not yet completely established. Shamballa has been in touch with the centre called Humanity by impact several times in the history of the race. But there has been no reciprocal action and no free flow. Humanity has taken the impact of energy and this impact has wrought changes in the activity of the centre, but there has been no “responsive return,” as it is esoterically called, and hence no circulation. The Shamballa force has hitherto been transmitted via the Hierarchy. For the first time, and in this century there has been direct impact. The diagram on page 160 may make this clearer.

  We shall eventually have a free circulation and a veritable vortex of force set up between the three centres; it will be of such an increasing radiatory activity that—moving in both directions around the three centres—it will eventually contact the radiations emanating from the other four centres of the planetary Life, thus completing the interplay and the interrelation between all seven. These four include the three lower kingdoms of nature and a certain basic centre (corresponding to the centre at the base of the spine in man) about which nothing is as yet known nor will be known for ages to come. [160]

  The importance, therefore, of the centre which we call Humanity will be apparent. The Secret Doctrine has ever taught that mankind has a special function in saving and regenerating nature. The “saving force”—a circulatory combination of the three major energies—is radiated by humanity as a group-creative impulse, and this gradually sweeps all forms of life into the field of its magnetic potency, thus relating them (or rather the soul of each kingdom) to the Hierarchy and to Shamballa. This involves a great mystery which is closely tied up—little as you may realise it—with the doctrine of Avatars or of World Saviours.

  It is in this connection that the words I gave you previously are pertinent: [161]

  1. “The group must understand the nature of the Three.” This will be seen to refer to the three major centres and the nature of their relationship, and not specifically to the Trinity.

  2. “The nature of the One must be grasped and comprehended.” This has reference to the fact that our planetary Life is Itself a centre within a still greater Life, and is today one of the three planetary centres (even if not yet one of the seven sacred planets) which are the custodians of the force, in process of transmission, which will be to the greater Life what Shamballa, the Hierarchy and Humanity are to Our planetary Logos.

  3. “The group must work through the medium of the united breath.” This deals with the processes of circulation, for the breath is the life and pours through all the centres.

  4. “The group must attain a unified rhythm.” This has no reference in reality to the work of a group of disciples, but to a group of centres of life, such as the three major centres or the entire group of seven centres.

  A study of these ideas may carry illumination, but I would again remind you that I write for initiates, living at a later period in this century and in the next.

  In considering this Law of the Supplementary Seven, I would like to point out that the word “supplementary” is of real significance. It brings in a factor of great interest, from the angle of initiation. You must bear in mind that when the antahkarana is constructed and in use, there is consequently a free play of energy in a direct line between the Spiritual Triad and the personality; i.e., between the Monad and its “earthly anchor.” You will also remember that the soul body, the form on the higher levels of the mental plane which has “shrouded” the soul, eventually disappears. This, as you know, takes place at the fourth initiation and is one of the best recognised facts in the occult teaching. In the three worlds, the correspondence to this disappearance of the form of the second divine aspect, the soul, is the dissolution of the astral body—the second aspect [162] of the personality. Then the personality stands free from its control. Sensitivity and reaction to contact in the three worlds has been perfectly developed, but it no longer holds the disciple a prisoner.

  Then, at a later stage upon the Path of Initiation, the causal body also disappears and the initiate stands free in the three worlds. The astral body and the causal or soul body are—in the language of esotericism—supplementary to reality. They have had a temporary reality during the evolutionary process, but (having served their purpose and having endowed man with certain required assets—consciousness, feeling, sensitivity, the ability to establish and register contact) they pass away and the initiate remains, possessed of power over form and a fully awakened consciousness. He is a soul and the fusion is complete.

  What is true of the individual is true too of the Heavenly Man, the planetary Logos. In the long period of a world cycle there comes a time when the Hierarchy itself, as a body organised and functioning in order to implement certain evolutionary ends, is no longer needed. It is then regarded as “supplementary,” and under the Law its life, its potency and its entire consciousness are absorbed into the planetary head centre, Shamballa. A great process of abstraction or of withdrawal takes place, covering necessarily a long period of time, and which is consummated only when evolution—as we know it—comes to an end and the planetary Life (again as we know it) also comes to an end. This process of abstraction is always going on. Men become disciples and then initiates. Some stay as hierarchical workers, choosing to work with the planetary forces of evolution. Others pass on into the great Council Chamber of the Lord of the World, and still others pass out of our planetary ring-pass-not altogether.

  Thus the Law of the Supplementary Seven is ever in force. It functions in the processes going on in the seven centres of the individual man, gathering energy from one centre into another until all are centred, controlled and directed in the head. In the stage of what the Hindus call [163] “samadhi” the vital energies from all the centres are concentrated in the highest head centre in the etheric body, in the area just above the physical head. Thus the analogy is complete. The processes of abstraction are (as you may thus see) connected with the life aspect, are set in motion by an act of the spiritual will, and constitute the “resurrection principle which lies hidden in the work of the Destroyer,” as an old esoteric sayin
g expresses it. The lowest manifestation of this principle is to be seen in the process of what we call Death—which is in reality a means of abstracting the life principle, informed by consciousness, from the form or the bodies in the three worlds.

  Thus, the great synthesis emerges, and destruction, death, and dissolution are in reality naught but life processes. Abstraction is indicative of process, progress and development.

  It is this aspect of the Law of Life (or the Law of Synthesis as it is called in certain larger connotations) with which the initiate specifically deals when wielding the Law of the Supplementary Seven. The group angle of the matter can be seen if you remember that the individual initiate, when wielding this law, draws upon the united energy of the Will as the group is expressing it in “unified rhythm.” It is by the use of the “united breath” of the entire group (as much of it as his individual will can assimilate, focus, use and direct) that he augments his own will and its directed force. The breath, as we well know, is the life; this Law is the one wielded by the living or risen Christ, in perfect harmony with the will of Shamballa. Herein lies one of the mysteries of the resurrection initiation about which so little has been told, and it is the very heart of the mystery of the ascension initiation. In this latter initiation the living risen Christ withdraws or abstracts Himself and enters consciously and permanently into the great centre, Shamballa. The resurrection and the ascension are the results of the death or destruction of the causal body. It can be seen, therefore, how true the Gospel story is to the purposes of Shamballa.

  Let us now briefly interpret or rather paraphrase the [164] four sentences by means of which I have sought to embody this law, or as much of it as it is possible to put into words, for the enlightenment of the initiates of the future.