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The Rays and the Initiations - Part Two - Section One - The Aspirant and the Mysteries of Initiation
The soul, therefore, as a separate entity, is fading slowly out of the picture because it is being absorbed into and by the personality, which is becoming more and more the soul in incarnation. Eventually the relation is established [505] between spirit (Monad) and personality (form or matter), with a tiny point of consciousness eternally present which is aware of both these factors and yet preserves inviolate its own identity. This latter realization is the result of aeonian work, carried forward by the soul. Paradoxically, we say that the soul fades or drops out, yet in the last analysis it remains, for in this solar system there is naught else but only this consciousness of being. One point I would touch upon here before taking up the seven ray methods of projection. The bridge to be built is called frequently the "rainbow bridge" because it is constituted of all the colors of the seven rays. Speaking specifically and from the angle of the disciple, the bridge which he builds between the personality and the Spiritual Triad is composed of seven strands of energy, or seven streams of force; he uses all the seven rays, having gained facility in so doing because again and again his personality has (in the long cycle of incarnations) been on all the seven rays many times. But his soul ray dominates eventually, and in the rainbow bridge the "colors of his rays are heard vibrating; the note of his ray is seen." The bridge built by humanity as a whole is one bridge composed of the multiplicity of individual bridges, built by the many disciples. It is therefore formed eventually of seven strands or streams of energy coming from the seven egoic groups (one group of each ray type). To this bridge the creative work of all human beings who reach the stage of soul contact contributes. Their dominant strands of light fuse into one whole and their lesser strands are lost to sight in the radiant light of the sevenfold bridge which humanity will eventually complete. Even in this finally completed bridge - at the end of the world cycle - one ray light and color will predominate, the second ray, with the fourth ray as the subsidiary ray. The fourth ray might be symbolically called "the main cable" for humanity, because it is the dominant note of the Fourth Creative Hierarchy. Now let us take up the seven ray methods, one by one. [506] As we consider these seven ray techniques with their accompanying Words of Power, you must bear carefully in mind that we are dealing entirely with the Will aspect. This necessitates a higher process of alignment and the evocation of a divine aspect hitherto relatively quiescent, except in so far as the will finds its reflection in the activity of the sacrifice petals of the egoic lotus, plus its distorted shadow in the mind nature. This consequently posits a fairly high stage of spiritual unfoldment upon the part of the builder of the antahkarana; it means that there are indications of it (to say the least) between the mind, the sacrifice petals and the atmic principle. This may be simply the most tenuous thread imaginable, a thousand times finer than a gossamer web, but it must inevitably be present. When, from the angle of the esotericist, this is a tangible fact, you will then have the following direct contact: This contact, when completed, marks an entire unit of spiritual work, if I might so word it, bringing the man upon the physical plane into complete alignment; this unity is consummated at the time of the fourth initiation, the Great Renunciation at which time the first aspect begins to dominate the other two. Then the soul life - as hitherto understood - fades out and the causal body disappears. The sum total of memory, [507] quality and acquirements is then absorbed into the Monad. The words "I and my Father are one" become true. The astral body also vanishes in the same great process of renunciation, and the physical body (as an automatic agent of the vital body) is no longer needed, though it persists and serves a purpose when so required by the Monad. From the form aspect, you then have the Monad, the sphere of the Spiritual Triad and the etheric body upon the physical plane. I would here remind you that the levels of conscious existence which we regard as formless are only relatively so, because our seven planes are the seven subplanes of the cosmic physical plane. The center of consciousness is now in the Will nature, when this point of attainment is reached, and is no longer in the love nature. Activity and love are still present in full measure, but the focus of the initiate's attention is in the will aspect of divinity. It has been said in an ancient book belonging to the Masters' Archives that: "The preservation of values is the task of the initiate of the first ray; the attainment of positively is the goal of the initiate of the second ray. He who works upon the third ray must reach the path from here to there. The initiate of the fourth ray arrives at the will aspect when conflict steps into its rightful place and causes no undue concern. These four attainments mark the goal for men and sway them all upon the lower point of consciousness. The ray of vision and of application indicates the way direct, evokes the will to follow, and welds the love of God, the love of man and all that breathes into the purpose underlying all, and towards that purpose and its earthly consummation the seventh ray gives all it has." It has not been easy to put these abstruse ideas, expressed in the most archaic language and symbolism, into modern terms and words. I have but conveyed the general idea - the collaboration of all the seven rays in the building processes of Deity and their planned interaction, on a tiny scale, [508] infinitesimal in comparison with the great Whole. Man responds within the circle of humanity, enclosed within the greater circle of the Hierarchy, and becomes conscious of this fusion and uses the potencies of both groups of lives, through the medium of the antahkarana. The moment the disciple approaches that point in consciousness and the antahkarana is firmly anchored (even if as yet but a tenuous structure), he becomes aware of the factor of the greater circle which encloses the other two - Shamballa, the Secret Place where the will of God is formulated for the immediate present and for the long range future.
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