Master Samael Aun Weor and the Gnosis
There are many people today that
understand that we live in times of great challenges and contradictions.
The world is facing many social and environmental problems. Wars, international
crime, political corruption, corporate greed and exploitation, poverty and the
unsustainable use of natural resources, drug addiction, epidemics, new diseases,
atmospheric pollution and much more.
The horsemen of the apocalypse are riding through the storm clouds that are
gathering over this troubled humanity and the planet we live on.
If we examine this web of inter-connected problems and try to comprehend their roots it is not difficult to understand that at the root we have a spiritual crisis on our hands. This is a crisis of immense proportions. It is a crisis of values.
At the same time we see arriving,
day by day, new (and old) systems of self-development, therapies, meditation
practices, religions, cults, sects and gurus in all shapes, sizes and colours.
The shops are stocked with books offering solutions and magazines are full of
adverts for workshops.
All are proposing, in one form or another, to remedy our problems, to make us
happier, to make us successful and make us more spiritual.
For determined sums of money one can buy initiation, one can become a healer
overnight, one can follow a saviour who will magic away our problems.
In the different ages of the world
there have been many spiritual paths and practices that have had their moments
of ascendancy and their moments of decay.
Every religion has its essence and its source. There have always been persons
who have attained superior levels of development and self realisation, inspiring
religions and spiritual movements.
At any particular moment we can find that there are certain places upon the
Earth that are magnetic centres of force in regard to spiritual wisdom. There
have been many cultures inspired by a true blossoming of spiritual inspiration,
learning and attainment.
All of this bears relation to the influences of the stars and the science we
call astrology, which interprets those influences.
It is certain that the wisest of
every religion transcend their particular cultural influences, whilst also heightening
them to their most transcendent expression.
Those beings that reach such transcendence and achieve inner realisation arrive
at the point of being able to leave behind the cycle of birth and death, that
in the oriental traditions is known as the Wheel of Samsara. This is the same as the resurrection of Christ.
All those beings that manage to reachillumination have achieved
self-mastery and such beings transcend the normal laws of
material existence. They are beings that have achieved a
continuous consciousness and as such are awake and present in the
atmosphere of our planet.
The Masters are a fraternity and in this fraternity there are masters from all
traditions: Buddhist, Indigenous, Christian, Sufi, Egyptian, Mayan, Celtic,
Chinese, Inka and many more. They know that in essence all is one. They know
that God is one.
In the Hindu tradition Krishna is
recognised as an incarnation of Vishnu, The Father. Rama was another incarnation
of Vishnu. Many Hindus also recognise Jesus Christ as being an incarnation of
Vishnu. Many Hindus als recognise Jesus Christ as an incarnation of Vishnu.
All of these beings incarnated the Intimus, the Interior Being.
In Mexico there was Quetzalcoatl, in the Andes, Huiracocha, in China Fu Hsi,
in Egypt, Horus and so on.
The Intimus is the internal Christ, the Solar Logos.
This extremely divine force lives in each one of us as the spark of our essence
known as the Budata. The Budata is a small fraction of our true being. To
reach this state of self realisation that so many people talk about
isdificult and to begin with we need to recognise that each one of us
has many defects. Our defects are multi faceted faces of the ego. The
selfish element that has made us seperate from our original state.
Essentially
we can say that our unconditioned and pure consciousness is bottled up
by the ego that acts to trap the divine spark in the patterns of
behaviour that characterise selfishness i.e. envy, laziness, anger etc.
The real spiritual work begins when we make this realisation for ourselves,
within ourselves. This kind of understanding underpins all real spiritual paths no matter what tradition.
Gnosis.
Gnosis
is a word of Greek origin and means direct knowledge. We use this word
to indicate that the only real path is the path of experiential
knowledge that comes through life intensely lived. Gnosis is the way of
initiation into the Greater Mysteries and lies at the heart of all the
great religions in their esoteric or inner aspect. Gnosis is to extract
the wisdom good, the bad, the day, the night, the positive,
the negativeetc. Really Gnosis is something that goes beyond a word or
denominationfor Gnosis is to search for wisdom in the profundity of
being .
The path of initiation is an exact science and its essence and formula never
differs for "Narrow is the path and steep is the way."
Much of what calls itself gnosis in these modern times is not really gnosis.
The modern "spirituality" tends to believe that we can discover our
own truth and make up our own way, thus practicing many contradictory methods,
believing that they will all achieve the same results. All is according to the
whims of the ego and the subjectivity's of the mind.
We want, however, to be clear and
say that YES, everyone's experience is individual but the real way is the same
for all because the path of initiation and inner knowledge of the mysteries
is a very exact science.
If we combine, scientifically, chemicals X, Y and Z and then we combine chemicals
A, B and C, obviously the result will be completely different, so it is in the
interior work, we need certain formula to achieve certain results.
In the path of awakening we need to know the directions, we need a map and we
need to know the essential work of awakening. Although the outer forms are different,
all the initiatic traditions that lead to awakening have the same basic understandings.
The Great Work.
Until
recent times the more interior aspects and practices of the initiatic
wisdom were kept secret from the public at large. The initiate was
required to arrive at a certain level of understandings in order to
receive these teachings. Recent history has seen the emergence of
various figures that have investigated and publicised the esoteric
wisdom present, as a basis, in many ancient cultures. For example
Rudolf Stiener, Helena Petrovna Blavatsky, G.I. Gurdjieff and the
Rosicrucian Krum Heller, but none of them revealed the complete
picture. However, in their works and the works of other spiritual
teachers and investigators we can see that they have prepared the
ground for a new way of approaching the mysteries of life and death and
the spiritual questions that face us. This new way is the same ancient
way now brought together in a synthesis that is not just a hotch potch
of different beliefs put in an ad hoc style but rather a cohesive
understanding of the underlying fundamental principles of all the
spiritual traditions.
This process reached its culmination when, in the 1950's an
extraordinary man emerged from Colombia in Latin America and
began to teach the secrets openly. His name is Samael Aun Weor.
Principally,
he taught about the incarnation of the being. He told us
that at the core of the human question and the question of awakening is
the question of sex for it is through sex that we can achieve the true
spiritual rebirth. Samael Aun Weor's first book was called "The Perfect
Matrimony" and when it was first published caused a great storm of
controvesy, breaking, as it did, so many taboos. People were
scandalised that someone should teach that sex is the key to human
salvation, after all sex has long been seen in the religious circles of
our time as a sin. However, the teaching of Samael, was that it is our
use of sex that is mistaken, not that sex itself is evil, as it is
throgh sex that life is created.
The three principles of gnosis that he gave as the fundamental basis of awakening are:
1. Death. We must die to ourselves psychologically by eliminating the ego.
2. Birth. The second birth is an internal birth in the spirit. This is alchemical and sexual.
3. Sacrifice. We need to make sacrifice in order to help our fellow man.
In order to arrive at the point of
elimination of ego we first need to comprehend each ego in all the levels of the sub-conscious. 
We cannot, however, eliminate the ego with mind power. The ego is
eliminated with Divine assistance and this can only occur with the help
of the interior fire of the Kundalini Serpent. The Kundalini Serpent is
Our Divine Mother. The serpent is sacred in many cultures and is a
symbol of the serpent of fire that lies inside us at the base of the
spine.
The awakening of the serpent takes place by degrees and is achieved by the practice
of sexual alchemy or tantra, that is to say the union of the male and the female
in sexual connection of the penis and vagina but finishing the act without reaching
the point of orgasm. The resulting energy is transmuted inwards and upwards.
Orgasm sends the energy to go down and out and thus we lose our life force.
We eliminate the egos with the help of our Divine Mother we incarnate the Christ
and through this process we arrive at the point of union with our Interior Father.
The Divine Mother and Interior Father are both aspects of the being.
Through sexual alchemy we also crystallise the solar bodies, Astral, Mental
and Causal.
There is much more that we could say about this doctrine of sexual alchemy,
more than space allows. In this moment it is enough to say that sexual alchemy
is the key. This is the "stone that the builders rejected."
Master Samael Aun Weor elaborates much more deeply and effectively on this matter
than we could hope to here and has written various books on the subject.
In
giving these teachings, Samael Aun Weor, broke the seal that kept these
teachings a guarded secret for many ages. In so doing he caused a great
deal of controversy amongst the different movements and orders in the
world of occult and esoteric study, among both those who knew and those
who didn't. He himsel said that he was given the divine authority to
unveil this wisdom publicly, because humanity is living close to a
catastrophe that we will bring upon ourselves. A catastrophe that will
put an end to our civilisation.
We
are living in the end times and this has come about because we are
breaking the laws of nature with our false science, our war
machines, pollution and disrespect for the planet and this will
inevitably cause a reaction. In addition we are heading nearer to big
wars between the powers that have come to dominate the world. The
teachings that were revealed by Samael Aun Weor are the fundamentals of
achieving a radical human transformation and right now it is only a
radical transfomation that will save us. Only those that truely manage
to change will be saved. Its up to us.
Master
Samael revealed the doctrine of the synthesis that brings together the
essence of the teachings of all religions from all corners of the Earth
and from all the ages. For this reason he is the Avatar of Aquarius.
Aquarius, whose symbol is a man carrying the waters of life
, is the age of Man, and it is completely appropriate that the Avatar
of this age should bring together the teachings of the wisdom
traditionsof humanity, demonstrating global consciousness.
How does all this relate to shamanism?
It
is interesting to know that Master Samael spent many years travelling
in Colombia from place to place and during this time he knew and
studied with the indigenous shamans of different tribes and traditions
including the Kogi of Santa Marta. He also studied the profound wisdom
of the Maya and Aztec cultures in Mexico and revealed their hidden
meaning in the light of his esoteric investigations. He stated on more
than one occaision that man's salvation lay in a return to the bosom of
Mother Nature and a new social structure not unlike the indigenous ways
of living. In many respects he acted as a bridge showing that the
mystery traditions of the European cultures and their forerunners in
Egypt, Greece, Persia and elsewhere were working with the same things,
the same processesof transformation and alchemy. He spoke of the
alchemical tradition in Europe, of the esoteric tradition that has been
secretly passed through the ages by the small groups of men and women
that kept it alive at the risk burned at the stake, imprisioned,
tortured or hung by the fanatics of the establishment religions and the
inquisition. He also spoke of the wisdom of the east, the meditation
techniques of the Buddhists, the Tibetans, Zen etc wisely revealing the
common thread in all, the common goal of all spiritual practice.
Clearly Master Samael was no stranger to the magic of plants and
elemental beings as he dedicated various works to the subject and in so
doing he also demonstrated that communion with the intelligent spirits
present in nature is an essential part of an authentic spiritual
practice. He spoke of the ancient spiritual rituals of the Druids,
Romans, Ancient Greeks, Egyptians and many others and outlined the same
cosmic principles that are being expressed in all cultures under
different names. In truth, humanity has lived for ages bottled
up in its own particular language, understanding and
culture, often unable to see beyond the surface of images, customs and
traditions into the underlying principles that are the basis of them
all. To understand this is to understand that there is a common root
and that by returning to this root we can regenerate ourselves whilst
also taking into account the experience that we have had.
Humanity
stands at the edge of a great catastrophe caused by our own ignorance
and disobediance of the fundamental laws of nature and God. Everywhere
people search for solutions, they argue, they debate and discuss. Some
think the solution is with politics and inventing new systems, others
that there is nothing we can do and so on, but in general there is some
kind of awareness of a growing environmental problem, changing weather
patterns, the growing gap between rich and poor, although few are able
to come to terms with or even see the root of the problem. The message
of Samael Aun Weor is that the root of the problem is inside us...that
the devil, hell, heaven and God are real and are within ourselves.
We
humans are manifesting our inner hell in the world arround us with our
selfishness, gred, avarice, gluttony or envy and the world arround us
with all its problems and injustices is the collective consequence of
our collective actions. If we want to create a better world we need to
finnish with the ego. The ego is Satan. It is that within us, which is
in rebellion against God and due to our rebellion we find ourselves
trapped in this material realm with all our sufferings and problems.
Mamy people have spoken of a new age and a resurgance of ancient wisdom
but it has all too easily become lost in the labyrinth of marketing,
money making and advertising and has become contaminated by so many
people who only want to be important, to have power and influence. If
we are to have a new age of light and illumination for humanity first
we need to deal with the harsh reality we face. Where from among so
much greed, aggression, competition, war, racial hatred and so on will
a new age emerge? If we are practical people we will logically conclude
that we have to make some kind of special effort to change. We are
talking of a change that steps outside the mechanical process of
evolution and involution. Modern science and many intellectuals have
the theory that we are in a never ending evolutionary climb, but they
do not recognise or observe that in nature things evolve, grow and
reach maturity and then they decay, they involve and return to dust
again. This is the cycle of existence, the cycle of birth, growth,
maturity, ageing and death, that is observed in nature.This cyclical
process is very much present in the shamanis consciousness. The spark
of God that we are, is born and dies, returning to be born again. First
a rock, a mineral, the in the plant kingdom, as herbs,
trees, flowers and then into the animal kingdom before becoming a
human being.
In
truth, the human being as he finds himself is like a point between the
animal and the true man. We are intellectual animals and still live
subject to the animal instinct. We have the capacity to reason,
however, and this is what differentiates us. The wisdom of the Vedas
states that once the spark reaches the human state it has 108 lives in
which to reach perfection and if it doesn't it begins once more to
involve and passes into the infernal regions, the recycling plant of
the soul where each spark is cleaned of it's impurities and defects.
The spark must pass through the different regions of hell, each one
more dense and painful than the last until all the defects are reduced
to dust and the spark can begin again to evolve once more.
The
key given by the eternal wisdom revealed by Master Samael is that
during the human state we have an oppurtunity to make a re-evolution of
the consciousness and step off this mechanical cycle into a higher
spiral of evolution. This is to become a true man, free from the anmal
instinct and with the consciousness completely awakened. In this state
we go beyond sex, becoming angels, with the male and female integrated
and fused. Thus we need to make a super effort. To concentrate our
forces and impulses and channel them into making a revolution of
consciousness
May the light of Christ shine in your hearts.
HARE KRISHNA!
GNOSTIC SHAMANISM OF LIGHT.