The astral force of our planet, distinctive of the planetary astral plane in the three worlds of human enterprise.
The astral force of the solar Logos, the true God of Love.
The astral energy of the cosmic astral plane.
These forces are symbolised to the manipulating Master by a triangle. In the Old Commentary it says:
“The Master throws Himself—under the liberating Law of Sacrifice—into the vortex of the astral life of the One to Whom our Lord relates Himself with humble joy. And as the Master works, there forms before His eyes a triangle of force in shades of varying rose. By His magnetic power, He concentrates the energy required. Then through this triangle of force, as through an open door, He sends the potency of love into our planet, and till His cycle ends He thus must work.”
This is but a rough translation of some very ancient phrases, and is perhaps less symbolic than it may appear. It is in connection with this Path that the work of the Triangles which I initiated is related; the function of these Triangles is in reality to facilitate the work of distributing the pure incoming love energy (expressing itself as light and as goodwill) into the Hierarchy and Humanity. This deeply esoteric purpose of the Triangles will not be understood by the general public, but some of you who read this will appreciate the opportunity to serve in this manner consciously.
The Path of Magnetic Work takes the Master, first of all, to the Heart of the Sun, and from thence to the cosmic [403] mental plane, passing through and pausing temporarily upon the cosmic astral plane. The above statement does not in reality refer to progress from point to point in an ordered sequence. It refers to high states of awareness and to a form of cosmic contact which is registered by the Master from the point at which He stands upon this second Path, for all the planes are interpenetrating. This has been somewhat easy to understand in connection with our seven planes, as the rarer substances could be visualised as interpenetrating the denser. It is not so easy to comprehend, however, when we pass out of the cosmic physical plane (in our imagination, needless to say) and enter those planes of which we know nothing and of whose composition and substance (if they are substantial, as we understand the term) we are totally ignorant; besides that, we are not in a position to ascertain the truth.
The method of the Master's work upon this Path is also not easily understood. It can be summed up in the following words which may bring some light via their united meaning (each phrase contributing an idea), if due reflection is brought to bear upon them:
Isolated Unity the position of the Master
A positive Focus the mental attitude
Sound, under the Law of Attraction the means employed
Precipitation the intention visioned
Passage through the Triangle the projection ensuing
Directive work under the Law of Distribution direction towards the goal
These phrases may give some vague idea of a process, based on “reception, then direction, producing rejection and impact where the rejecting agency ordained.”
Another aspect of the work done by the Master on the second Path is the drawing off of those phases of glamour which no longer have the power to deceive mankind. They are not allowed to accumulate or to remain upon the astral plane. They are therefore, through the magnetic power of the Master, withdrawn from our planetary life and are “occultly [404] absorbed” by the Master; the substance of the glamour, purified and freed from all that conditioned it on the planetary astral plane, and with only the pure essence retained, sets the law in motion which draws this purified remainder into the cosmic astral plane.
Constantly, therefore, this great circulatory process goes on, demonstrating anew the essential synthesis underlying all life—human, planetary, systemic and cosmic; it reveals also that the Law of Attraction, the Law of Magnetic Work, and the cosmic Law of Synthesis are three aspects of one Law for which, as yet, we have no name.
It might be said that the Masters working on the second Path are working in relation to and in contact with certain great Lives Who work on the periphery of the constellation Libra, the Balances. This is due to the fact that Those Masters Who can work with magnetic energies, and with the three above Laws, have achieved a point of balance which makes Their work possible; it involves also a poised attention and directive power, permitting the inflow of energies from Libra which could not otherwise enter our planetary life at all. These Libran energies enter our solar system via the Heart of the Sun and are peculiarly amenable to magnetic attraction and distribution.
All these Paths gradually came into being when our planetary Logos created the Earth and started the involutionary process of creation, leading in due time but much later, to evolution. They are therefore, all of Them, Paths of Return. This second Path was one of the first to be used and (again quoting the Old Commentary) “the door once opening inward now opens outward and permits the exit of those who hold the key because they entered by that door in aeons long gone by.”
All the Masters (and not only Those upon the fifth ray) receive careful training in the manipulation of energies, and hence the statement of the Master K.H. to His disciples that the occultist has to learn to master and control the forces and energies within himself; the disciple and the initiate work with hierarchical energies and with the forces [405] of the kingdoms of nature in the three worlds; the Master receives instruction in the handling of the energies which are extra-planetary but within the solar ring-pass-not. Those Masters Whose decision it is to tread the second Path are taught the control and direction of systemic energies and of certain energies emanating from Libra and from one of the stars in the constellation of the Great Bear. In the more advanced stages of Their work, and when the Master is far more advanced than the word indicates, He works consciously upon the cosmic mental plane; His activities will then be concerned with the relation of the energies of the Great Bear to the Pleiades, and their dual relationship (a higher correspondence to atma-buddhi) to the solar system and only incidentally to our Earth. Great is the interlocking, the interdependence and the interpenetration!
3. The Path of Training for Planetary Logoi
It is obviously impossible to say much about this Path. Those Masters Who tread it find Their way to the various schools for the training of planetary Logoi which are found within certain of the major planetary schemes, as stated in Initiation, Human and Solar. They are necessarily few in number, and a small group of Them remains to study in our particular planetary enterprise under Sanat Kumara. This They do after making Their decision and passing through the door on the periphery of our planetary ring-pass-not. Then—out of incarnation and working through the medium of the higher telepathy—They receive instruction of a nature incomprehensible to us, from the Members of the Council Chamber at Shamballa, and primarily from two of the Buddhas of Activity. Having learnt the technique and having passed certain tests, They move into the planetary life of Venus, our Earth's Alter-Ego, and there They complete Their training, as far as our solar system can give it, finding Their way eventually on to the cosmic mental plane.
Two things should be borne in mind in connection with this abstruse subject:
First: These Masters work primarily with the “psyche” [406] or the soul aspect within the solar system. They are occupied with the subtler expressions of consciousness, with occult impressibility and that acute sensitivity which produces instant and accurate registration of all soul reactions within any particular planetary life. These kingdoms are not necessarily identical with those found on the Earth, but they are, in all cases, vast groups of living forms which are manifestations or expressions of the nature of any particular planetary Logos. The Masters taking this training are not occupied with individual states of consciousness within any group. It is the consciousness of the whole, and its responsiveness to cosmic impacts, that engages Their attention. They are not (if I might so express it) interested in any individual unit of any kind or in its individual reactions, responsiveness or susceptibility to im
pression. They are only concerned with those higher processes of identification which indicate an advanced state of evolutionary development. Their work is to further progressive development of identification. They begin with the identification of the Monad within our planetary sphere with the Purpose and the Will of the Lord of the World, and proceed—as Their training produces the desired capabilities—with greater identifications within the solar system. Beyond that we need not proceed.
Their whole training is concerned with the planetary, systemic and cosmic building of the antahkarana, for it is via the antahkarana that spirit works, that life processes are controlled, and the will of all developing aspects of Deity function. Forget not that relating our planet to the planet Venus is a planetary antahkarana, passing from thence to the Heart of the Sun and later to the cosmic mental plane. There are “rainbow bridges” carrying the sevenfold energies of the seven rays from planet to planet, from system to system, and from plane to plane on cosmic levels. It is over these bridges that the will of the related spiritual Identities is projected, producing that synthesis of effort which is distinctive of the cooperative systemic life. The work of the Masters in training from our planet is, among other [407] things, to unfold within Themselves not only sensitivity to systemic purpose, but the ability to transmit that Purpose to the Council Chamber at Shamballa. They have—in an extraplanetary sense—a definite correspondence with and relation to the group of Nirmanakayas within our planet Who work in contemplative activity with the antahkarana which connects the Hierarchy with Shamballa and Humanity with the Hierarchy.
As planetary Logoi when Their Own time comes, these Masters will be concerned with the registration of the Purpose and expressed Will of some solar Logos. They will then, through the planetary and systemic antahkarana, supervise the gradual evolutionary impartation of that Will (which is now Theirs) to all the forms through which They function in any particular planet for which They have assumed responsibility. This definitely involves working with the soul aspect and with the unfoldment of conscious responsiveness and sensitive reaction to all the higher impressions.
Second: These Masters are the directing builders and Creators eventually of all forms of planetary life—forms embodying qualities and intentions as yet undreamed of by us. They have developed in Themselves a perfected synthesis of the two energies of atma-buddhi, or of spiritual will and spiritual love, completely unified and energetically active in a comprehensive condition seldom attained by any other group of Masters in training.
It must be realised that the Buddhas of Activity, of Whom there are only three on our planet, are similarly active. They are active love-wisdom or a complete synthesis of active intelligence, active love and active will. The Masters on this third Path will, therefore, some day complete Their training for planetary Logoi by attaining the status of Buddhas of Activity, and will for a period serve in that capacity in some planetary scheme, before taking the control and guidance of Their Own body of manifestation.
The training of these Masters on the third Path might be described as an intensive study of a most exalted form of the Science of Impression. The supreme task of a planetary [408] Logos is to impress His sevenfold body of manifestation, via its seven states of consciousness and the seven centres, with His will and intention; these are progressively imparted as the etheric body is brought into an increasing state of receptivity through the awakening of the seven planetary centres, primarily the three major centres. The Masters thus in training gain experience of the methods used by the planetary Logoi of all the seven sacred planets, and the training is therefore an exceedingly lengthy one. It must be remembered however that—except in dense physical incarnation and, therefore, conditioned by the brain and its special limitations—the spiritual man is not conscious of time, once He is separated from the physical body. Time is the sequential registration by the brain of states of awareness and of progressive contacts with phenomena. There is no such thing as time on the inner planes, as humanity understands it. There are only cycles of activity or of non-activity; this non-activity for Masters on the third Path takes the form of cyclic periods of contemplation and mental activity, followed by active periods of energy direction to impress the will of certain planetary Logoi and Their agents upon the Council Chamber of our planet in particular, and upon other planets, as Their training is perfected.
It is the impulsive incentive of these Masters which bridges and links between the Monad on the monadic plane and the three worlds of dense expression on the cosmic physical plane; in this process the antahkarana between the spiritual man in incarnation and the spiritual Triad is aided and finally constructed, but this is only incidental to the far greater work of relating Shamballa to all kingdoms in nature and to other planets.
The number of Masters deciding on this Path is, as I said, not large; the training is peculiarly arduous and is followed, when opportunity is offered to function as a planetary Logos, by an act of sacrifice which confines Them indefinitely to the limitations of the ring-pass-not of Their body of manifestation, a planet. It is for this reason that Sanat Kumara has ever been called “The Great Sacrifice.” [409]
Certain Hierarchical Changes
Before proceeding with our consideration of the seven cosmic Paths, I would like to pause here and clarify your mind, A.A.B., and answer certain questions which you are formulating.
Some years ago (in 1925) I gave out to the world through your instrumentality A Treatise on Cosmic Fire. In that volume I elaborated upon the very elementary information given upon this subject in Initiation, Human and Solar—a book published earlier (in 1922). In both these volumes I touched upon the cosmic Paths. I gave (in very abstruse terms) some information; the terms were so abstruse that few can understand their meaning. The true significance is only for advanced initiates, of which I am not one, from Their point of view, though from yours I may be. In Initiation, Human and Solar very little was said, because the book was written for the general public and thus only a few ideas were indicated to point direction. Now, in A Treatise on the Seven Rays I have added to that already given; this book is, however, intended for a much larger number than those who read (and claim, erroneously, to understand) A Treatise on Cosmic Fire. In what I have to say, the teaching is carefully guarded. Two things should, however, be pointed out here in order to save confusion:
1. It had not been the intention of the Hierarchy to give any further information anent these Paths; it was felt that enough had been said about this naturally incomprehensible subject. Owing, however, to the fundamental changes in the hierarchical plans, this decision was altered. I was permitted to add to that already given. This was due to two causes:
a. The tremendous unfoldment of the human consciousness during the last twenty-five years warrants more information; so many aspirants were being admitted to the Path of Discipleship and were finding their way into the Ashrams, thus forcing the passage of many initiates on to the Way of the Higher Evolution. [410] This in itself is a most joyous happening, but necessitated many ashramic adjustments.
b. Owing to this advancement, owing to the increased sensitivity of the human mechanism, and owing to the decisions humanity is in process of making (as a result of the frightful testing period of the war, 1914-1945), the Hierarchy—far earlier than had been hoped or anticipated—has prepared Itself for physical plane manifestation, or for what is called by Them “the process of externalisation.”
This has necessarily produced problems, and among them the strictly hierarchical problem of the passage of the initiate of the sixth degree on to the cosmic Paths. You will find, if you study closely the three presentations of the teaching (in Initiation, Human and Solar, A Treatise on Cosmic Fire, and A Treatise on the Seven Rays) what may appear to you as contradictions or differences. This is not truly so, but the casual reader may feel them to be present even though the differences are apparent more than real. Two causes account for this:
a. The decision to throw open initiations higher tha
n the fifth to the ready Master, and to familiarise the world of aspirants with their existence. Little has ever been given beyond the fifth initiation. Many initiates are becoming Masters, and many disciples are achieving the first initiation, and this fact confronts the three Great Lords Who rule the Hierarchy with a definite problem.
b. To make the sixth initiation and not the fifth initiation the Initiation of Decision. Here I must state the existence of a hierarchical problem: the use of the will aspect in the unfoldment of the initiate. It must be remembered that this first ray aspect is:
A definite and most potent energy. It is the most potent energy in the planetary life and is carefully held in leash by Those Who are in a position to wield it.[411]
The medium whereby the purpose of creation is finally revealed.
The force which enables the Hierarchy to present the Plan in the three worlds.
The needed dynamic whereby the “deciding” Master sets His foot upon the Path of the Higher Evolution.
Owing to the success of the influence of this Shamballa energy upon humanity when the experiment was made to test its impact without stepping it down through the medium of the Hierarchy, the entire course of man's spiritual history was most peculiarly altered. This had not been anticipated, for—as oft I have told you—the Masters know not which way mankind will go, nor may They interfere by action or thinking in humanity's decision. It was therefore necessary to control more definitely the passage of initiates on to the seven Paths; only a certain number are required to fulfill cosmic intention; it was therefore decided to make the rules of entrance more difficult and more rigid.
Forget not, brother of mine, that this is not the first time that this has happened. Changes were made in Atlantean times; the door of entrance for the animal kingdom or for animal man into the human kingdom was stopped. No more units have since then been admitted from third kingdom into the fourth, except in a few cases and for specific reasons. Here, however, you have a reverse situation. The Hierarchy, owing to its constitution at that time and to the fact that very few, relatively, of our Earth humanity were members of the Hierarchy, could not influence directly the more developed human beings or train more aspirants. They therefore closed the door. That particular condition does not now exist, and the supreme Directors of the seven cosmic Paths are today in the same position as was the Hierarchy then; the word has gone forth to our three Great Lords—the Manu, the Christ and the Mahachohan—via the three Buddhas of Activity, to act in order to tighten up on requirements, to make the sixth initiation and not the fifth, the decisive one, and to present those on the seven rays with [412] a wider range of choices and a greater diversity of choice. Thus the Masters will have nine choices to face when They face Their decision; there will then be no need for Those on certain rays to pass to certain already determined Paths, but They can move forward under Their Own inspiration and with greater freedom. The cosmic mental plane is not barred to Them, as has hitherto been the case.
The Rays and the Initiations Page 44