Initiation I. The Birth at
Bethlehem. Ray VII.
The Energy of Order or Ceremonial Magic.
First of all, let us consider the type of energy which the seventh ray expresses and wherein lies its potency and efficacy, from the angle of the initiation. As we study these initiations and their conditioning rays, we will divide our ideas into three parts: [Page 568]
1. The type of energy and its quality in relation to
the processes of the particular initiation with which it is associated.
2. Its effect upon humanity, regarding humanity as a
world disciple.
3. The stimulating nature of the energy as it
expresses itself:
a. In the three aspects of the initiate's nature—mental, astral and
physical.
b. Through the soul-infused personality, the initiate "in good
standing" a phrase of the deepest occult implication.
At this particular time in world history,
seventh ray energy is of a growing potency because it is the new and incoming
ray, superseding the sixth ray which has for so long held sway. When we speak of ray energy we are in reality
considering the quality and the will-purpose aspect of a certain great Life to
Whom we give the name "Lord of a Ray." You will find much about these Ray Lords in
the earlier volumes of A Treatise on the Seven Rays. His divine intention, will, purpose, or the
determined projection of His mind, creates a radiation or stream of energy
which—according to type and quality—plays upon all forms of manifested life
within our planetary ring-pass-not.
These Lords of the Rays are the creating and sustaining energies which
implement the Will of the planetary Logos.
They cooperate with Him in the defining and the expression of His
supreme purpose. Their radiating
emanations are cyclically objectified and are cyclically withdrawn. As they radiate forth into the three worlds,
the impacting energies produce changes, disturbances, progress and unfoldment;
they create the needed new forms and vitalise and qualify that through which
the immediate divine intention is expressing itself; they intensify both the
quality and the receptivity of consciousness.
At other times, during the process of
being withdrawn "to their own place," they cause the fading out or
the dying of form aspects, of institutions, and the "organising [Page 569] organisms" (to use a peculiar phrase); they therefore
produce cycles of destruction and of cessation and thus make room for those new
forms and life expressions which an incoming ray will produce. It has been the gradual withdrawing of the
sixth Ray of Idealism and of one-pointed Devotion which has been responsible
for the ferment, crystallisation, destruction, death and cleavages of the past
century; old things are passing away as the Lord of the sixth Ray withdraws His
attention, and therefore His energy; His radiation is today no longer centred
or focussed in the life of the three worlds.
Simultaneously, the energy and radiation of the Lord of the seventh Ray
are becoming steadily more powerful in the three worlds.
This incoming of a ray always produces an
intensified period of initiatory activity, and this is the case today. The major effect, as far as humanity is
concerned, is to make possible the presentation of thousands of aspirants and
applicants for the first initiation; men on a large scale and in mass formation
can today pass through the experience of the Birth Initiation. Thousands of human beings can experience the
birth of the Christ within themselves and can realise that the Christ life, the
Christ nature and the Christ consciousness are theirs. This "new birth" initiation of the
human family will take place in Bethlehem, symbolically understood, for
Bethlehem is the "house of bread"—an occult term signifying physical
plane experience. These great initiations,
implemented by the ray energies, must be registered in the physical brain and
recorded by the waking consciousness of the initiate, and this must be the case
in this amazing period wherein—for the first time since humanity appeared on
Earth—there can take place a mass initiation.
The experience need not be expressed in occult terms, and in the
majority of cases will not be; the individual initiate who takes this
initiation is aware of great changes in his attitude to himself, to his
fellowmen, to circumstances and to his interpretation of life events. These are peculiarly the reactions which
attend the first initiation; a new orientation to life and a new [Page 570] world of thought are registered by the
initiate. This will be equally true on a
large scale where modern man, the world initiate of the first degree, is
concerned. Men will recognise the
evidences in many lives of the emergence of the Christ-consciousness, and the
standard of living will increasingly be adjusted to the truth as it exists in
the teachings of the Christ.
This developing Christ-consciousness in
the masses of men will create necessarily a ferment in the daily life of
peoples everywhere; the life of the personality, oriented hitherto to the
attaining of material and purely selfish ends, will be at war with the new and
inner realisation; the "carnal" man (to use the words of Paul, the
initiate) will be battling the spiritual man, each seeking to achieve
control. In the early stages, after the "birth"
and during the "infancy of the Christ-Child" (again speaking in
symbols), the material aspect is triumphant.
Later, the Christ life triumphs.
This you well know. Each initiation
indicates a stage in the growth and the development of this new factor in the
human consciousness and expression, and this continues until the third
initiation, when there emerges the "full-grown man in Christ." The initiate is then ready, at the fifth
initiation, to register, realise and record the long awaited revelation.
In connection with the individual and the
first initiation, the seventh ray is always active and the man is enabled
consciously to register the fact of initiation because either the brain or the
mind (and frequently both) are controlled by the seventh ray. It is this fact which is of importance today
in connection with humanity, for it will enable mankind to pass through the
door admitting them to the first initiatory process. It will be apparent to you why the present
period in which human beings (in large groups) can take the first initiation
corresponds to a situation in which bread is the major interest of men
everywhere. Humanity will pass through
this "birth" initiation and
manifest the Christ life on a large scale for the first time during a period of
economic adjustment of [Page 571] which the word
"bread" is but a symbol. This period started in the year 1825 and will
continue until the end of this century.
The unfoldment of the Christ life—as a result of the presence and
activities of the second divine aspect of love—will result in the ending of
economic fear, and the "house of bread" will become the "house
of plenty." Bread—as the symbol of
material human need—will eventually be controlled by a vast group of initiates
of the first initiation—by those whose lives are beginning to be controlled by
the Christ-consciousness, which is the consciousness of responsibility and
service. These initiates exist in their
thousands today; they will be present in their millions by the time the year
2025 arrives. All this re-orientation
and unfoldment will be the result of the activity of the seventh ray and of the
impact of its radiation upon humanity.
The seventh ray is, par excellence, the
medium of relationship. It brings
together the two fundamental aspects of spirit and matter. It relates soul and form and, where humanity
is concerned, it relates soul and personality.
In the first initiation, it makes the initiate aware of that relation;
it enables him to take advantage of this "approaching duality" and—by the perfecting of the contact—to produce
upon the physical plane the emergence into manifestation of the "new
man." At the first initiation,
through the stimulation brought about by seventh ray energy, the personality of
the initiate and the hovering overshadowing soul are consciously brought
together; the initiate then knows that he is—for the first time—a soul-infused
personality. His task is now to grow
into the likeness of what he essentially is.
This development is demonstrated at the third initiation, that of the
Transfiguration.
The major function of this seventh ray is
to bring together the negative and positive aspects of the natural
processes. It consequently governs the
sex relationship of all forms; it is the potency underlying the marriage
relation, and hence as this ray comes into manifestation in this world cycle,
we have the appearance of fundamental sex [Page 572]
problems—license, disturbance in the marriage relation, divorce and the setting
in motion of those forces which will eventually produce a new attitude to sex and
the establishing of those practices, attitudes and moral perceptions which will
govern the relation between the sexes during the coming New Age.
The first initiation is therefore closely
related to this problem. The seventh ray
governs the sacral centre and the sublimation of its energy into the throat or
into the higher creative centre; this ray is therefore setting in motion a
period of tremendous creative activity, both on the material plane through the
stimulation of the sex life of all peoples and in the three worlds through the
stimulation brought about when soul and form are consciously related. The first major proof that humanity (through
the medium of the majority of its advanced people) has undergone the first
initiation will be the appearance of a cycle of entirely new creative art. This creative urge will take forms which will
express the new incoming energies. Just
as the period governed by the sixth ray has culminated in a world wherein men
work in great workshops and factories to produce the plethora of objects men
deem needful for their happiness and well-being, so in the seventh ray cycle we
shall see men engaged on an even larger scale in the field of creative
art. Devotion to objects will eventually
be superseded by the creation of that which will more truly express the Real;
ugliness and materiality will give place to beauty and reality. On a large scale, humanity has already been
"led from darkness to light" and the light of knowledge fills the
land. In the period which lies ahead and
under the influencing radiation of the seventh ray, humanity will be "led
from the unreal to the Real." This
the first initiation makes possible for the individual and will make possible
for the mass of men.
Seventh ray energy is the energy needed to
bring order out of chaos and rhythm to replace disorder. It is this energy which will bring in the new
world order for which all men wait; it will restore the ancient landmarks,
indicate [Page 573] the new institutions and
forms of civilisation and culture which human progress demands, and nurture the
new life and the new states of consciousness which advanced humanity will
increasingly register. Nothing can
arrest this activity; all that is happening today as men search for the new
ways, for organised unity and peaceful security, is being implemented through
the incoming Ray of Order or Ceremonial Magic.
The white magic of right human relations cannot be stopped; it must
inevitably demonstrate effectively, because the energy of this seventh ray is
present, and the Lord of the Ray is cooperating with the Lord of the World to
bring about the needed "reforming."
Soul-infused personalities, acting under this ray influence, will create
the new world, express the new qualities and institute those new regimes and
organised modes of creative activity which will demonstrate the new livingness
and the new techniques of living. It is
the distortion of these seventh ray ideals and the prostitution of this
incoming energy to serve the unenlightened and selfish ambitions of greedy men
which has produced those totalitarian systems which today so terribly imprison
the free spirit of men.
To sum up what I have said:
1. The energy of the seventh ray is the potent agent
of initiation when taken on the physical plane, that is, during the process of
the first initiation.
2. Its effect upon humanity will be:
a. To bring about the birth of the Christ-consciousness among the masses
of intelligently aspiring human beings.
b. To set in motion certain relatively new evolutionary processes which
will transform humanity (the world disciple) into humanity (the world
initiate).
c. To establish in a new and intelligible manner the ever-existent sense
of relationship and thus bring about upon the physical plane right human
relations. The agent of this is
goodwill, a reflection [Page 574] of the
will-to-good of the first divine aspect.
Of this first Ray of Will or Purpose, goodwill is the reflection.
d. To readjust negative and positive relationships, and—today—this will
be carried forward primarily in connection with the sex relation and marriage.
e. To intensify human creativity and thus bring in the new art as a
basis for the new culture and as a conditioning factor in the new
civilisation.
f. To reorganise world affairs and so initiate the new world order. This is definitely in the realm of ceremonial
magic.
3. The stimulation of this seventh ray will, in
relation to the individual initiate,
a. Bring into being upon the mental plane a widespread and recognised
relation between the soul and the mind.
b. Produce a measure of order in the emotional processes of the
initiate, thus aiding the preparatory work of the second initiation.
c. Enable the initiate—upon the physical plane—to establish certain
service relationships, to learn the practice of elementary white magic, and to
demonstrate the first stage of a truly creative life.
As far as the individual initiate is
concerned, the effect of seventh ray energy in his life is potent in the
extreme; this is easily realised, owing to the fact that his mind and his brain
are conditioned by the seventh ray at the time that the initiatory process is
consciously taking place. The effect of
this upon the mental plane is similar to that seen—on a much larger scale—in
the planet, for it was this ray energy which the planetary Logos utilised when
He brought together the major dualities of spirit and matter at the
commencement of His creative work. The
two aspects of the mind (the lower concrete mind and the soul, the Son of Mind)
become more closely related and enter eventually into a conscious, recognised
association on the [Page 575] astral plane; it
is the seventh ray which restores order within the astral consciousness, and
(on the mental plane), it is this influence which produces creativity, the
organising of the life, and the bringing together "within the head"
of the lower and higher energies in such a manner that "the Christ is
born." This latter point we shall
consider in some detail when we take up the significance of the initiations; we
shall then find that the relationship between the pituitary body and the pineal
gland is involved.
Finally, it is seventh ray energy which—in
the initiatory process between the first and the second initiations—enables the
initiate (in his physical plane life) to demonstrate a developing sense of
order and of organisation, to express consciously and increasingly a desire to
help his fellowmen, and thereby establish relationship with them, and to make
his life creative in many ways.
All these factors are embryonic in his
nature, but he now begins to consciously lay the foundation for the future
initiatory work; the physical disciplines are at this time of great importance,
though their value is frequently over-emphasised and their effect is not always
good; the relationships established and fostered are sometimes of small value,
owing to the disciple being usually self-centered and thus lacking—from
ignorance and lack of discrimination—complete purity of motive. Nevertheless, the changes brought about by
the influence of this ray become increasingly effective from life to life; the
disciple's relation to the Hierarchy, the reorganising of his life on the
physical plane, and his growing effort to demonstrate the esoteric sense of
white magic will become more and more vital until he is ready for the second
initiation.
(Αlice Bailey,
The Rays and the Initiations, pp. 567-575)
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