The Six Stages of the Building Process

The Six Stages of the Building Process are as follows:

1. Intention

2. Visualisation

3. Projection

4. Invocation and Evocation

5. Stabilisation

6. Resurrection.

From The Rays and the Initiations by Alice A. Bailey, (p. 481-501)

The task with which the human being in all his stages [482] of unfoldment has been occupied might therefore be stated to be the bridging of the gap between:

1. The Mutable Cross and the Fixed Cross.

2. Humanity and the Hierarchy.

3. The lower triplicity, the personality, and the Spiritual Triad.

4. The Monad on its own plane and the outer objective world.

This he does through a process of Intention, Visualisation, Projection, Invocation and Evocation, Stabilisation and Resurrection. With these various stages, we will now deal.

The Construction of the Antahkarana in the Aryan Race… Present
I would like to pause here and make a few remarks anent this relatively new process of building the antahkarana. It has been known and followed by those who were training for affiliation with the Hierarchy, but it has not been given out before to the general public. There are two things which it is essential that the student should note: one is that unless it is borne in mind that we are concerned with energy, and with energy which must be scientifically used, this whole teaching will prove futile. Secondly, it must be remembered that we are dealing with a technique and process which are dependent upon the use of the creative imagination. When these two factors are brought together (consciously and deliberately)—the factor of energy substance and the factor of planned impulse—you have started a creative process which will be productive of major results. The human being lives in a world of varied energies which are sometimes expressing themselves as dynamic, positive energies, as receptive, negative energies, or as magnetic, attractive forces. An understanding of this statement will substantiate that made by H.P.B. that “matter is spirit at its lowest point,” and the reverse is equally true. The whole process is one of establishing constructive relations between negative and positive energies and the subsequent production of magnetic force. This is the creative [483] process. It is true of the activity of a solar Logos, of a planetary Logos and of a human being—the only conscious creators in the universe. It must prove true of the disciple, who is attempting to bring into a constructive relation the Monad and the human expression in the three worlds of human evolution.

There has been much emphasis upon the life of the soul and its expression upon the physical plane; this has been necessary and a part of the evolutionary development of the human consciousness. The kingdom of souls must eventually give place to the rule of the spirit; the energy of the Hierarchy must become a force, receptive to the energy of Shamballa, just as the force of humanity has to become receptive to the energy of the kingdom of souls. Today all three processes are going on simultaneously, though the receptivity of the Hierarchy to the second aspect of the Shamballa energy is only now beginning to be recognisable. The Hierarchy has for long been receptive to the third or creative aspect of the Shamballa energy, and—at some very distant period—it will be responsive to the first aspect of that same energy. The triple nature of the divine manifestation must also express itself as a duality. This can be understood in a faint way when the disciple realises that (after the third initiation) he too must learn to function as a duality—Monad (spirit) and form (matter)—in direct rapport with the consciousness aspect, the mediating soul being absorbed into both of these two aspects of divine expression, but not functioning itself as a middle factor. When this has been achieved, the true nature of Nirvana will be comprehended, the beginning of that endless Way which leads to the One; this is the Way whereon duality is resolved into unity, the Way that Members of the Hierarchy are seeking to tread and for which They are preparing.

The initial step towards bringing about this dualism is the building of the antahkarana, and this is consciously undertaken only when the disciple is preparing for the second initiation. As I have already said, there are literally [484] thousands so preparing, because it can be assumed that all earnest and true aspirants and disciples who work undeviatingly for spiritual advancement (with pure motive), and who are oriented unswervingly towards the soul, have taken the first initiation. This simply connotes the birth of the infant Christ within the heart, speaking symbolically. There should be many who are preparing to begin this task of building the rainbow bridge and who, under the influence of the Ageless Wisdom, are grasping the necessity and the importance of the revelation which this process conveys. What I am here writing has, therefore, a definite and useful purpose. My task has been for a long time the giving out, in book form, information anent the next stage of intelligent and spiritual recognition for humanity. Therefore, again, the understanding of the method of building the antahkarana is essential if humanity is to move forward as planned, and in this moving forward the disciples and aspirants must and do form the vanguard. Humanity will awaken steadily and as a whole to the incoming spiritual urge; an overwhelming impulse towards spiritual light and towards a major orientation will take place. Just as the individual disciple has to reverse himself upon the wheel of life and tread the Way counter-clockwise, so must humanity; and so humanity will. The two-thirds who will make the goal of evolution in this world cycle are already beginning to do so.

In the process, however, the third divine aspect—that of the Creative Actor—comes into activity. It was so in the creative process where the tangible universe was concerned. It must also be when the individual disciple becomes the creating agent. For aeons, he has built and has used his vehicles of manifestation in the three worlds. Then came a time when advanced people began to create upon the mental plane; they dreamed dreams; they saw a vision; they contacted intangible beauty; they touched the Mind of God and returned to earth with an idea. To this idea they gave form and became creators upon the mental planet they became artists in some form of creative effort. In the task [485] of building the antahkarana the disciple has to work also on mental levels, and that which he there constructs will be of so fine a substance that it may not and cannot appear on physical levels. Because of his fixed orientation, that which he builds will “move upwards toward the centre of life,” and not “downwards toward the centre of consciousness or toward light appearance.”

Herein lies the difficulty for the beginner. He has, so to speak, to work in the dark, and is not in a position to verify the existence of that which he is attempting to construct. His physical brain is unable to register his creation as an accomplished fact. He has to depend entirely upon the proved technique of the work outlined, and to proceed by faith. The only evidence of success may be slow in coming, for the sensitivity of the brain is involved, and frequently where there is very real success the brain cells are not of the calibre which can register it. The possible evidences at this stage may be a flash of the spiritual intuition or the sudden realisation of the will-to-good in a dynamic and group form; it may also be simply an ability to understand and to make others understand certain spiritual and occult fundamentals; it may be a “facility of revelation,” both receptive and conditioning or distributing, and so world effective.

I am attempting to make a very abstruse subject clear, and words prove inadequate. I can but outline to you process and method and a consequent hope for the future; on your side, you can only experiment, obey, have confidence in the experience of those who teach, and then wait patiently for results.

The Six Stages of the Building Process
I have employed six words to express this process and its resultant condition. It might prove useful to study them from the angle of their occult significance—a significance which is not usually apparent except to the trained disciple who has been taught to penetrate into the world of meaning and to see interpretations not apparent to the neophyte. [486] Perhaps by the time we have investigated these words, the method of construction and the means whereby the antahkarana is built will appear with greater clarity.

These words cover a building technique or a process of energy manipulation which brings into being a rapport between the Monad and a human being who is aspiring towards full liberation and is treading the Path of Discipleship and Initiation; it can create a channel of light and life between the higher and the lower divine aspects and can produce a bridge between the world of spiritual life and the world of daily physical plane living. It is a technique for producing the highest form of dualism and of eliminating the threefold expression of divinity, thereby intensifying the divine expression and bringing man nearer to his ultimate goal. Disciples must always remember that soul consciousness is an intermediate stage. It is also a process whereby—from the angle of the subhuman kingdoms in nature—humanity itself becomes the divine intermediary and the transmitter of spiritual energy to those lives whose stages of consciousness are below that of self-consciousness. Humanity becomes to these lives—in their totality—what the Hierarchy is to humanity. This service only becomes possible when a sufficient number of the human race are distinguished by the knowledge of the higher duality and are increasingly soul-conscious and not just self-conscious. They can then make this transmission possible, and it is done by means of the antahkarana.

Let us, therefore, take these six aspects of a basic building technique and endeavour to arrive at their occult and creative significance.

1. Intention. By this is not meant a mental decision, wish or determination. The idea is more literally the focussing of energy upon the mental plane at the point of greatest possible tension. It signifies the bringing about of a condition in the disciple’s consciousness which is analogous to that of the Logos when—on His much vaster scale—He concentrated within a ring-pass-not (defining His desired [487] sphere of influence) the energy-substance needed to carry out His purpose in manifesting. This the disciple must also do, gathering his forces (to use a common expression) into the highest point of his mental consciousness and holding them there in a state of absolute tension. You can now see the purpose lying behind some of the meditation processes and techniques as embodied in the words so often used in the meditation outlines: “raise the consciousness to the head centre”; “hold the consciousness at the highest possible point”; “endeavour to hold the mind steady in the light”; and many similar phrases. They are all concerned with the task of bringing the disciple to the point where he can achieve the desired point of tension and of energy-focussing. This will enable him to begin the conscious task of constructing the antahkarana. It is this thought which really lies unrecognised behind the word “intention,” used so often by Roman Catholics and Anglo-Catholics when preparing candidates for communion. They indicate a different direction, however, for the orientation they desire is not that towards the Monad or spirit, but towards the soul, in an effort to bring about better character equipment in the personality and an intensification of the mystical approach.

In the “intention” of the disciple who is consciously occupied with the rainbow bridge, the first necessary steps are:

a. The achievement of right orientation; and this must take place in two stages: first, towards the soul as one aspect of the building energy, and second, towards the Triad.

b. A mental understanding of the task to be carried out. This involves the use of the mind in two ways: responsiveness to buddhic or intuitional impression and an act of the creative imagination.

c. A process of energy gathering or of force absorption. in order that the needed energies are confined within a mental ring-pass-not, prior to the later process of visualisation and projection. [488]

d. A period of clear thinking anent process and intention. so that the dedicated bridge-builder may clearly perceive what is being done.

e. The steady preservation of tension without undue physical strain upon the brain cells.

When this has been accomplished there will be found to be present a focal point of mental energy which previously had been nonexistent; the mind will be held steady in the light, and there will also be the alignment of a receptive attentive personality and a soul oriented towards the personality and in a state of constant, directed perception. I would remind you that the soul (as it lives its own life on its own level of awareness) is not always constantly aware of its shadow, the personality, in the three worlds. When the antahkarana is being built, this awareness must be present alongside the intention of the personality.

2. Visualisation. Up to this point the activity has been of a mental nature. The creative imagination has been relatively quiescent; the disciple has been occupied within the mind and upon mental levels, and has “looked neither up nor down.” But now the right point of tension has been reached; the reservoir or pool of needed energy has been restrained within the carefully delimited ring-pass-not, and the bridge-builder is ready for the next step. He therefore proceeds at this point to construct the blue print of the work to be done, by drawing upon the imagination and its faculties as they are to be found upon the highest level of his astral or sensitive vehicle. This does not relate to the emotions. Imagination is, as you know, the lowest aspect of the intuition, and this fact must be remembered at all times. Sensitivity, as an expression of the astral body, is the opposite pole to buddhic sensitivity. The disciple has purified and refined his imaginative faculties so that they are now responsive to the impression of the buddhic principle or of the intuitive perception—perception, apart from sight or any recorded possible vision. According to the responsiveness of the astral vehicle to the [489] buddhic impression, so will be the accuracy of the “plans” laid for the building of the antahkarana and the visualising of the bridge of light in all its beauty and completeness.

The creative imagination has to be stepped up in its vibratory nature so that it can affect the “pool of energy” or the energy-substance which has been gathered for the building of the bridge. The creative activity of the imagination is the first organising influence which works upon and within the ring-pass-not of accumulated energies, held in a state of tension by the “intention” of the disciple. Ponder upon this occult and significant statement.

The creative imagination is in the nature of an active energy, drawn up into relationship with the point of tension; it there and then produces effects in mental substance. The tension is thereby increased, and the more potent and the clearer the visualisation process, the more beautiful and strong will be the bridge. Visualisation is the process whereby the creative imagination is rendered active and becomes responsive to and attracted by the point of tension upon the mental plane.

At this stage the disciple is occupied with two energies: one, quiescent and held within a ring-pass-not, but at a point of extreme tension, and the other active, picture-forming, outgoing and responsive to the mind of the bridge-builder. In this connection it should be remembered that the second aspect of the divine Trinity is the form-building aspect, and thus, under the Law of Analogy, it is the second aspect of the personality and the second aspect of the Spiritual Triad which are becoming creatively active. The disciple is now proceeding with the second stage of his building work, and so the numerical significance will become apparent to you. He must work slowly at this point, picturing what he wants to do, why he has to do it, what are the stages of his work, what will be the resultant effects of his planned activity, and what are the materials with which he has to work. He endeavours to visualise the entire process, and by this means sets up a definite rapport (if successful) between the buddhic intuition and the creative imagination [490] of the astral body. Consequently, you will have at this point:

The buddhic activity of impression.

The tension of the mental vehicle, as it holds the needed energy-substance at the point of projection.

The imaginative processes of the astral body.

When the disciple has trained himself to be consciously aware of the simultaneity of this threefold work, then it goes forward successfully and almost automatically. This he does through the power of visualisation. A current of force is set up between these pairs of opposites (astral-buddhic) and—as it passes through the reservoir of force upon the mental plane—it produces an interior activity and an organisation of the substance present. There then supervenes a steadily mounting potency, until the third stage is reached and the work passes out of the phase of subjectivity into that of objective reality—objective from the standpoint of the spiritual man.

3. Projection. The task of the disciple has now reached a most critical point. Many aspirants reach this particular stage and—having developed a real capacity to visualise, and having therefore constructed by its means the desired form, and organised the substance which is to be employed in this later phase of the building process—find themselves unable to proceed any further. What then is the matter? Primarily, an inability to use the Will in the process of projection. This process is a combination of will, further and continued visualisation, and the use of the ray Word of Power. Up to the present stage in the process, the method for all the seven rays is identical; but at this point there comes a change. Each disciple, having successfully organised the bridge substance, having brought into activity the will aspect, and being consciously aware of process and performance, proceeds now to move the organised substance forward, so that from the centre of force which he has succeeded in accumulating there appears a line of light-substance or projection. This is sent forward upon a [491] Word of Power, as in the logoic creative process. This is in reality a reversal of the process of the Monad when It sent forth the thread of life which finally anchored itself in the soul. The soul, in reality, came into being through the means of this anchoring; then came the later process, when the soul in its turn sent forth a dual thread which finally found anchorage in the head and the heart of the lower threefold man, the personality. The disciple is focussed in the centre which he has constructed upon the mental plane, and is drawing all his resources (those of the threefold personality and the soul combined) into activity; he now projects a line towards the Monad.

It is along this line that the final withdrawal of the forces takes place, the forces which—upon the downward way or the involutionary path—focussed themselves in the personality and the soul. The antahkarana per se, completed by the bridge built by the disciple, is the final medium of abstraction or of the great withdrawal. It is with the antahkarana that the initiate is concerned in the fourth initiation, called sometimes the Great Renunciation—the renunciation or the withdrawal from form life, both personal and egoic. After this initiation neither of these aspects can hold the Monad any more. The “veil of the Temple” is rent in twain from the top to the bottom—that veil which separated the Outer Court (the personality life) from the Holy Place (the soul) and from the Holy of Holies (the Monad) in the Temple at Jerusalem. The implications and the analogies will necessarily be clear to you.

In order, therefore, to bring about the needed projection of the accumulated energies, organised by the creative imagination and brought to a point of excessive tension by the focussing of the mental impulse (an aspect of the will), the disciple then calls upon the resources of his soul, stored up in what is technically called “the jewel in the lotus.” This is the anchorage of the Monad—a point which must not be forgotten. The aspects of the soul which we call knowledge, love and sacrifice, and which are expressions of the causal body, are only effects of this monadic radiation. [492]

Therefore, before the bridge can be truly built and “projected on the upward way, providing safe travelling for the pilgrim’s weary feet” (as the Old Commentary puts it), the disciple must begin to react in response to the closed lotus bud or jewel at the centre of the opened lotus. This he does when the sacrifice petals of the egoic lotus are assuming control in his life, when his knowledge is being transmuted into wisdom, and his love for the whole is growing; to these is being added the “power to renounce”. These three egoic qualities—when functioning with a measure of potency—produce an increased activity at the very centre of soul life, the heart of the lotus. It should be remembered that the correspondences in the egoic lotus to the three planetary centres are as follows:

Shamballa….The jewel in the lotus.

Hierarchy….The three groups of petals.

Humanity….The three permanent atoms within the aura of the lotus.

Students should also bear in mind that they need to rid themselves of the usual idea of sacrifice as a process of giving-up, or renunciation of all that makes life worth living. Sacrifice is, technically speaking, the achievement of a state of bliss and of ecstasy because it is the realisation of another divine aspect, hidden hitherto by both the soul and the personality. It is understanding and recognition of the will-to-good which made creation possible and inevitable, and which was the true cause of manifestation. Ponder on this, for it is very different in its significance to the usual concepts anent sacrifice.

When the disciple has gained the fruit of experience which is knowledge and is learning to transmute it into wisdom, when his objective is to live truly and in reality, and when the will-to-good is the crowning goal of his daily life, then he can begin to evoke the Will. This will make the link between the lower and the higher minds, between spirit and matter and between Monad and personality a definite and existent fact. Duality then supervenes upon [493] triplicity, and the potency of the central nucleus in the egoic vehicle destroys—at the fourth initiation—the three surrounding expressions. They disappear, and then the so-called destruction of the causal body has taken place. This is the true “second death”—death to form altogether.

This is practically all that I can tell you anent the process of projection. It is a living process, growing out of the conscious daily experience and dependent upon the expression of the divine aspects in the life upon the physical plane, as far as is possible. Where there is an attempt to approximate the personality life to the demands of the soul and to use the intellect on behalf of humanity, love is beginning to control; and then the significance of the “divine sacrifice” is increasingly understood and becomes a natural, spontaneous expression of individual intention. Then it becomes possible to project the bridge. The vibration is then set up on lower levels of divine manifestation and becomes strong enough to produce response from the higher. Then, when the Word of Power is known and rightly used, the bridge is rapidly built.

Students need feel in no way discouraged by this picture. Much can happen on the inner planes where there is right intention, as well as occult intention (purpose and tension combined), and the bridge reaches stages of definite outline and structure long before the disciple is aware of it.

4. Invocation and Evocation. The three preceding stages mark, in reality, the three stages of personality work. The remaining three are expressions of response from higher levels of the spiritual life; beyond briefly indicating them, there is very little that I can put into words. The task of Invocation, based on Intention, Visualisation and Projection, has been carefully undertaken by the disciple and he has at least some measure of clear perception as to the work he has done by the dual means of spiritual living and scientific, technical, occult work. He is therefore himself invocative. His life effect is registered upon the higher levels of consciousness and he is recognised as “a point of invocative tension.” This tension and this [494] reservoir of living energy, which is the disciple himself, is set in motion by projected thought, the use of the will and a sounded Word or Phrase of Power.

The result is that his developed potency and its radius of influence are now sufficiently strong to call out a response from the Spiritual Triad. There is then a going forth towards the aspect of the antahkarana, constructed by the disciple, along which the life of soul and body can travel. The Father (Monad), working through the thread, now goes forth to meet the Son (the soul, enriched by the experience of personality life in the three worlds), and from the higher levels a line of responsive projection of energy is sent forth which will eventually make contact with the lower projection. Thus the antahkarana is built. The tension of the lower evokes the attention of the higher.

This is the technical process of invocation and evocation. There is a gradual approach from both the divine aspects. Little by little, the vibration of both becomes stronger reciprocally. There comes then a moment when contact between the two projections is made in meditation. This is not a contact between soul and personality (the goal of the average aspirant), but a contact between the fused soul and personality energy and the energy of the Monad, working through the Spiritual Triad. This does not constitute a moment of crisis, but is in the nature of a Flame of Light, a realisation of liberation, and a recognition of the esoteric fact that a man is himself the Way. There is no longer the sense of personality and soul or of ego and form, but simply the One, functioning on all planes as a point of spiritual energy and arriving at the one sphere of planned activity by means of the path of Light. In considering this process, words prove completely inadequate. At this stage, when very advanced, there is no form attracting the Monad outwards into manifestation. There is no way in which the call of matter or of form can evoke a response from the Monad. There remains only the great pull of the consciousness of humanity as a whole and to this, response can be made via the completed antahkarana. Down—or rather [495] across—this bridge, descent can be made at will, in order to serve humanity and to carry out the will of Shamballa.

This is a statement of the final consummation. But before that can take place in its perfected completion, there must be a long period of gradual approach of the two aspects of the bridge—the higher, emanating from the Spiritual Triad, in response to monadic impulse, and the lower, emanating from the personality, aided by the soul—across the chasm of the separating mind. Finally, contact between that which the Monad projects and that which the disciple is projecting is made, and then come the fifth and sixth stages.

5 and 6. Stabilisation and Resurrection. The bridge is now built. Thin and tenuous may be its strands at the beginning, but time and active understanding will slowly weave thread after thread until the bridge stands finished, stable and strong and capable of being used. It must perforce be used, because there is now no other medium of intercourse between the initiate and the One Whom he now knows to be himself. He ascends in full consciousness into the sphere of monadic life; he is resurrected from the dark cave of the personality life into the blazing light of divinity; he is no longer only a part of humanity and a member also of the Hierarchy, but he belongs to the great company of Those Whose will is consciously divine and Who are the Custodians of the Plan. They are responsive to impression from Shamballa and are under the direction of the Heads of the Hierarchy.

The “freedom of the three Centres” is Theirs. They can express at will the triple energy of Humanity, the dual energy of the Hierarchy, and the one energy of Shamballa.

Such, my brothers, is the goal of the disciple as he begins to work at the building of the antahkarana. Reflect upon these matters and proceed with the work.

(In some Talks to Disciples, the Tibetan makes the following remarks which apply here with peculiar force. A.A.B.) [496]

“Your major need is for an intensification of your inner spiritual aspiration. You need to work more definitely from what might be called a point of tension. Study what is said about tension and intensity. It is intensity of purpose which will change you from the plodding fairly satisfactory aspirant into the disciple whose heart and mind are aflame. Perhaps, however, you prefer to go forward steadily, with no group effort, making your work for me and for the group an ordered part of the daily life, which you can adjust pretty much as you like, and in which the life of the spirit receives its reasonable share, in which the service aspect is not neglected, and your life presentation is neatly balanced and carried forward without much real strain. When this is the case, it may be your personality choice or your soul decision for a specific life, but it means that you are not the disciple, with everything subordinated to the life of discipleship.

“I would like here to point out two things. First: if you can so change your tension that you are driven by the life of the spirit, it will entail a galvanic upheaval in your inner life. For this, are you prepared? Secondly: it will not produce any outer change in your environing relationships. Your outer obligations and interests must continue to be met, but I am talking in terms of inner orientations, dynamic inner decisions, and an interior organising for service and for sacrifice. Perhaps you prefer the slower and easier way? If that is so, it is entirely your own affair, and you are still on your way. You are still a constructive and useful person. I am simply here facing you with one of the crises which come in the life of all disciples, wherein choices have to be made that are determining for a cycle, but for a cycle only. It is pre-eminently a question of speed and of organising for speed. This means eliminating the non-essentials and concentrating on the essentials—the inner essentials, as they concern the soul and its relation to the personality, and the outer ones as they concern you and your environment.

“I would give you three key thoughts for deep reflection [497] during the next six months; will you ponder on them, one each month for three months, within the head, and during the second three months brood on them in the heart. These key thoughts are:

1. The necessity for speed.

2. The reorganisation of standards of thought and of living.

3. The expression of: Sincerity, Sacrifice, Simplicity.” [xi]*

In the many strands of light, woven by the aspirants, disciples and initiates of the world, we can see the group antahkarana gradually appearing—that bridge whereby humanity as a whole will be able to abstract itself from matter and form. This building of the antahkarana is the great and ultimate service which all true aspirants can render.

The immediate Task ahead
What I have now to say is in the nature of a generalisation. I would like to indicate, as far as possible (asking you to remember that all generalisations are basically sound but erroneous in detail), the point where humanity stands in relation to the antahkarana. It might be said that the whole goal of normal evolution is to bring humanity to the point where a direct line of contact is established between the personality and the Spiritual Triad, via the soul—or rather, through the medium of using the soul consciousness to achieve this awareness. This is consummated at the time of the third initiation. We will now for a minute consider the Monad.

I would remind you that there is an analogy in the relation between personality and soul, to that between the Triad and the Monad. This is an analogy that is essentially complete, from the standpoint of consciousness, but not from the standpoint of form. What finally takes place at the most advanced stage of development is the complete fusion of the unified personality and soul with the unified Monad and Spiritual Triad. Only when this has been truly [498] accomplished is there the complete release of the Lives informing our solar system from all form control. Bear this carefully in mind, realising the significance of the word Service, used so frequently in the occult science, and realising also the fact that, for aspirants and disciples, the immediate task ahead is:

1. To bring about the at-one-ment of soul and body, through the medium of alignment.

2. To build the antahkarana, using the six modes or means outlined by me previously, and thus evoke response to the Triad. The thought of Alignment-Invocation-Evocation are the three major ideas for you to hold in mind as we proceed with this study.

The reason that I am giving out what was earlier regarded as some of the preparatory work prior to the third initiation is due to the fact that the race is now at the point of development which warrants complete change in the approach to divinity as taught by the Hierarchy. This does not mean that past teaching is abrogated, but it is shifted back to the earlier stages on the Path of Discipleship, whilst the teaching given in those stages now becomes the work done by the aspirants upon the Probationary Path. Emphasis has been laid upon purification, upon the need for the development of the Christ life, upon the mystical vision and upon philosophy. Occult truths have been given to the race and have evoked much interest, criticism and discussion; they have appealed to all types of mind; they have been distorted and misapplied. Nevertheless, they have been instrumental in aiding advanced aspirants to move forward on to the Path of Discipleship, with a paralleling moving forward of accepted disciples. Once firmly established upon the Path, the truths become self-evident and individual application and verification can be made, leading the disciple inevitably to the Portal of Initiation.

The race as a whole stands now at the very entrance to the Path of Discipleship. The racial gaze is forward to the vision, whether it is the vision of the soul, a vision of a better way of life, of an improved economic situation, or of [499] better inter-racial relationship. That this vision is oft distorted, that it is materially oriented or only partially seen is sadly true; but in some form or another there exists today an appreciable grasp of the “new and desirable” by the masses—a thing hitherto unknown. In the past, it was the intelligentsia or the elect who were privileged to have the vision. Today, it is the mass of men. Humanity, therefore, as a whole stands ready for a general alignment process, and that is the spiritual reason which lay behind the world war. The “sharp shears of sorrow must separate the real from the unreal; the lash of pain must awaken the sleepy soul to exquisite life; the wrenching away of the roots of life from the soil of selfish desire must be undergone, and then the man stands free.” So runs the Old Commentary in one of its more mystical stanzas. Thus it points prophetically to the close of the Aryan Race—not a close in the sense of completion, but a closing of a cycle of mental perfecting, preparatory to a cycle wherein the mind will be rightly used as an instrument of alignment, then as the searchlight of the soul, and as the controller of the personality.

For the masses—under the slow processes of evolution—the next step forward is the aligning of the soul and the form, so that there can be a blending in consciousness, following on a mental appreciation of the Christ principle and its deep expression in the life of the race. This is something which can be seen quite clearly emerging, if you have the eyes to see. It is evident in the universal interest in goodwill, leading eventually to peace; this desire for peace may be based on individual or national selfishness, or upon a true desire to see a happier world wherein man can lead a fuller spiritual life and base his efforts on truer values; it can be seen in all the planning which is going on for a new world order, based on human liberty, belief in human rights and right human relations; it is demonstrating also in the work of the great humanitarian movements, the welfare organisations, and the widespread evocation of the human mind through the network of educational institutions throughout the world. The Christ spirit is expressively present, [500] and the failure to recognise this fact has been largely due to the prevalent human effort to explain and interpret this phrase solely in terms of religion, whereas the religious interpretation is but one mode of understanding Reality. There are others of equal importance. All the great avenues of approach to Reality are spiritual in nature and interpretive of divine purpose, and whether the religious Christian speaks of the Kingdom of God, or the humanitarian emphasises the brotherhood of man, or the leaders against evil head the fight for the new world order or for the Four Freedoms or the Atlantic Charter, they all express the emergence of the love of God in its form of the spirit of Christ.

Humanity in the mass has therefore reached a point of emergence from darkness; it has itself evoked the reaction of the powers of evil, and hence their attempt to arrest the progress of the human spirit and to stop the onward march of the good, the true and the beautiful.

Aspirants and probationary disciples are occupied with a definite process of focussing their consciousness in the soul. This process falls into two parts:

An intensification of the personality life, so that it is developed to its highest individualistic powers.
A process of moving forward into the light and of conscious soul contact.

This involves the earlier stage of the alignment process, which is a mode of focussed, concentrated effort, according to the ray and life purpose of the soul. This may take the form of a profound application to some scientific endeavour or a deep concentration on the spiritual work of the world, or it may be a complete dedication to humanitarian effort; it matters not. I would call your attention to that statement. In every case the motivating power must be betterment; it must be carried forward by extreme effort; but—given right motive and the effort to develop simultaneously a good character and a stable purpose—the aspirant or probationary disciple will eventually find that he has succeeded in establishing a definite soul relation; he will have discovered that [501] the path of contact between soul and brain, via the mind, has been opened, and that he has mastered the first stage in the needed alignment process.

When this has been accomplished, the man passes on to the Path of Discipleship and can undertake the work I am outlining for you in this treatise. Thus you can see how the entire human family has reached a central and most important point upon the evolutionary path. The immediate path ahead for all—each in his own place—is to stand with right orientation, undeterred by circumstances, and then unflinchingly move forward.

I have given you the six methods of building the antahkarana, and as we proceed to take up our next point, I would have you refer to them at frequent intervals. The ray methods with which we shall be concerned are the methods, uniquely possible on the seven major lines of emanatory energy, which differing ray types will bring to bear on these six stages of the building process. All disciples on all these seven rays use the same building technique of Intention, Visualisation, Projection, Invocation and Evocation, Stabilisation and Resurrection. Of these the first two are uniform in technique for all the rays, but when the stage of Projection is reached, then the ray techniques begin to differ, and it is these techniques or methods of ray work, coupled with the seven Words of Power, which we shall now proceed to consider.