Towards a New Images of Cosmos and Anthropos
Sep 25, 1993 11:06 AM
by Michael R. Meyer
The following article summarizes my view on much of what has been
discussed on L-theos of late.
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Toward A New Image of Cosmos and Anthropos
copyright 1992 by Michael R. Meyer
TOWARD A NEW IMAGE OF COSMOS AND ANTHROPOS
by Michael R. Meyer
Today, more than ever before, the truth seeker's mind is assailed
on one hand by glamorous claims made by representatives of the
many particular religious, esoteric and spiritual traditions, and
on the other by intellectuals promoting fascinating multi-colored
mosaics composed of attractive fragments gleaned from various
traditions.
It is tempting to state that such a confused situation
exists today because traditionalists and melting-pot
intellectuals hold mutually exclusive views regarding the nature
of spiritual knowledge. And indeed, many gurus and religious
leaders tend to imply their particular tradition is intrinsically
superior to all others, while it is vogue among scholars and
intellectuals concerned with religious and so-called "new age"
studies to take an egalitarian approach, holding that all the
many traditions are of equal value and that their best tenets and
universal principles a particular and limited character and
formulation adequate to meet the particular needs of a particular
local culture during a particular phase of its life-cycle -- add
up to the perennial philosophy. The premise is flawed in two
basic ways: 1) it is based on the debunked 19th century
proposition that a whole is merely the sum of its parts, and
2) it assumes the whole of archetypal divine Wisdom was revealed
and accurately recorded in the deep past, and that a tradition's
recorded words, images and symbols carry the same meaning,
validity and significance for us today as they did for ancient
aspirants.
But the real cause of the confusion facing today's spiritual
aspirants lies neither in the glamorous claims of gurus and
traditionalists nor in the multi-cultural mosaics promoted by
intellectuals and "new age" thinkers. It lies instead in an
innocent ignorance regarding the one planetary source of
spiritual knowledge and Wisdom and how its many operative aspects
are periodically released and given form according to the cyclic
rhythms and exigencies of human and planetary evolution.
Since the last quarter of the 19th century, however,
definite and persistent efforts have been made to shift the
spiritual aspirant's attention from the glamor of the many
particular traditions to their planetary source. In all her
writings, for instance, H.P. Blavatsky pointed to what she called
the universal "Wisdom Religion," of which the many great occult
and spiritual traditions are partial reflections. Theosophia
(divine Wisdom) is a synonym Blavatsky often used in place of
Wisdom Religion, which she defined in The Theosophical Glossary
as "the substratum and basis of all world-religions and
philosophies." And Blavatsky carefully advised her students to
observe the distinction between theosophia (the Source and
substratum as a whole) and the particular teachings (based on an
aspect of theosophia) she and her Teachers formulated and
promulgated.
THE ONE PLANETARY TRADITION
AND ITS MANY OPERATIVE ASPECTS
A century later, Dane Rudhyar -- the premier philosopher of
Wholeness -- reformulated the core ideas and metaphysical
principles underlying the many great traditions according to the
holistic and planetary frame of reference he developed as early
as the 1920s.1 In Occult Preparations for a New Age, Rudhyar
carefully explains the distinction between what he terms the One
Planetary Tradition and its many operative traditions. The One
Planetary Tradition, which Rudhyar sometimes calls the one
Tradition, points to the same eonic reality Blavatsky termed
Wisdom Religion, theosophia and the fountain of primeval Wisdom.
It is the Wisdom and knowledge of the universal or divine Mind,
which was first embodied, sustained and revealed step by step to
humanity by Promethean Beings representing the seed harvest of a
previous world process.
The One Planetary Tradition does not evolve, at least not
during the vast "day" (manifest and objective) hemicycle of the
world process. (See sidebar, pp. 16-18). As humanity evolves step
by step during the "afternoon" phase of the great cycle of being,
however, successive operative aspects of the archetypal One
Planetary Tradition are released to meet new human needs and
opportunities posed by unprecedented capacities and situations.
But each particular operative tradition is necessarily limited
and conditioned by the relatively narrow receptivity of the human
minds to which it is directed.
In throwing light on the one planetary source of divine
Wisdom and knowledge and how it impacts humanity, we need also
consider archetype Anthropos -- the total pattern of Humanity.
It is in humanity as a whole and in every human being that is,
was and ever will be. It holds all that is, was and, in the
fullness of time, will be human. Archetype Anthropos and divine
Wisdom interpenetrate. They may be thought of as two aspects of a
transcendent reality, the One Planetary Tradition -- the seed of
Humanity and all its potential faculties and the whole of
archetypal Wisdom and knowledge it is humanity's destiny,
function and purpose to hold and manage in accordance with the
cyclic movement of the world process.
Civilization advances through a long series of cultures.
Each culture acts as a carrier-wave for an aspect of archetype
Anthropos released during its birth stage and periodically
realigned during its life-cycle. Each new variation on the theme
Anthropos is to varying degrees interwoven with an aspect of
divine Wisdom. Together they make possible new types of humanity
and new qualities of mind and personhood.
Each new type of humanity and quality of mind and personhood
are at first impersonated by an Avataric personage -- a "divine
incarnation," a supreme prototype -- or by human agents or
mouthpieces through whom some of the transcendent power released
either by the Avataric impulse or by an Occult Companionship
flows. Occult traditions also speak of an "avatar of one's own
divinity," which corresponds to what the neo-Platonists termed
theophania. For the purpose of this article, instances of all
these variations of "Avataric descent" and theophania are broadly
and conveniently termed Avatars.
A series of closely related Avataric manifestations of
varying magnitudes constitutes a process bringing down a
transformative spiritual impulse through successive levels -- the
archetypal, the mental, the "akashic," the socio-cultural and so
on. A particular Avatar's magnitude, scope and function is
linked to the cycle, subcycle or phase It inaugurates by striking
a founding tone and by revealing a fundamental purpose.
Additionally, the Avataric impulse may manifest through a
transformative event, discovery or movement as well as through a
personage.
In the preceding paragraph an Avatar was referred to by the
capitalized neuter pronoun "It." The reason for using the neuter
pronoun is that the Avataric impulse is released by a
transcendent source. Spiritual Power and Compassion flows from
this source through the Avataric personage like light flowing
through a translucent lens. The Avataric personage's sense of
will and identity reside not in the biology, sexual polarity and
psychology of the body and personality, but in the mission or
destiny the Avatar is meant to fulfill. It is fully Its destiny.
Through a long series of Avatars of varying magnitude,
successive aspects of archetype Anthropos are released and
anchored to Earth's biosphere. Each aspect is a seed invested
with a quantum of divine Compassion or spiritual-creative power
adequate for its actualization. An Avatar sows a mutant seed upon
the human field. The field is a disintegrating culture nearing
the close of its life-cycle. The mutant seed eventually
germinates into a new culture which acts as a womb or matrix
within which a new type of humanity and a new quality of
personhood safely gestates.
Only a small part of humanity, however, is ever able and
ready to respond to an Avatar's vibration and seed ideas. A seed
group of utterly dedicated and consecrated men and women
embodying the transferable seed harvest of a disintegrating
culture become attracted to and organized around an Avatar's
light, power and destiny. Such seed persons resonate to an
Avatar's new vibratory quality and together they act as a lens
bringing the archetypes, seed ideas and principles released
through an Avatar into existential focus.
After the death of an Avataric personage's body, Its
disciples or their followers eventually formulate an esoteric
tradition based on the aspect of divine Wisdom and archetype
Anthropos revealed by the originating Avatar directly to Its
disciples. The Avatar's personality, character, gestures,
appearance, major life-experiences, tests and achievements are
mythologized and interwoven into an esoteric tradition, which is
preserved by a self-perpetuating line of custodians. Upon the
esoteric tradition is built an exoteric religion, metaphysics and
philosophy which in turn forms the foundation for the
characteristic symbols and language, images and myths, rites and
customs, social and religious institutions, shared values and
beliefs, basic assumptions and emotional responses, psychological
attitudes and modes of behavior, ideal of the Good, the True and
the Beautiful, and the way of life and the particular approach to
art, dance and music of a new culture.
OCCULT COMPANIONSHIPS AND THEIR MANY ESOTERIC TRADITIONS
The custodians and representatives of the many traditions,
however, seldom explain their particular tradition and its
doctrines within such an all-inclusive context. Indeed, more
likely are subtle and not so subtle innuendos that a particular
tradition actually is the one and only ancient and ageless
Tradition, the repository of the One and Only Truth. This
obviously creates a very confused and confusing situation which
every aspirant to the spiritual path eventually encounters. In
Occult Preparations for a New Age, Rudhyar states that strong and
sincere aspirants
may find a line of approach leading them to individuals
who still represent a truly ancient and primordial
Tradition unsullied by the pride of mental achievement and
the excitement of emotional cravings. But will it be, can
it be, the one Tradition? Can anything that is formulated
in terms of a specific culture, however ancient, and in a
particular language and symbols be the one Tradition? One
should face these questions in every possible manner and
at almost any cost; and the way one approaches the
possibility of giving them a valid answer is bound to
influence the seeker's entire spiritual life and his peace
of mind and soul. (pp. 17-18)
And a few paragraphs later, Rudhyar states that the one
Tradition -- archetype Anthropos/divine Wisdom -- is in
every great occult Tradition and in the multiplicity of
lesser cultural traditions. If one is a weary, confused,
and disappointed searcher after mysterious and exotic
truths, one may long for some stabilizing, reassuring,
illuminating knowledge of that one Tradition. But looking
for it in any particular place, according to any special
technique, and in terms of Sanskrit, Arabic, Chinese,
Tibetan, Greek, or Hebrew is, I believe, hardly the way to
find it. The moment one depends upon specific
"traditional" techniques and particular words or mantrams,
one is outside of the one Tradition, even though there may
be direct reflections of it everywhere. (p. 19)
Yet one often hears and reads that the conditions, methods,
procedures and rules appertaining to spiritual living "always
have been and always will be the same" and that esoteric
teachings "never change." Individuals claiming such, however,
forget or conveniently ignore that humanity evolves and is today
standing at the perilous threshold of a global age. Our
unprecedented world situation poses unique opportunities and
special needs which both require and makes possible a more
inclusive and truly planetary frame of reference. With the aid of
such a holistic and planetary frame of reference, the occult
concepts and metaphysical principles comprising an esoteric
tradition may be reintegrated and restated to better answer the
needs of postmodern minds. Additionally, the approach to the
spiritual path has necessarily to change, because today's
aspirants start it from much different positions than did their
ancient counterparts.
This suggests that today's spiritual aspirant should not be
too occupied with seeking an elusive and illusionary ultimate
Truth and acting in mechanical conformity with some ancient
formula or recipe for spiritual living. Indeed, the modern
aspirant would do better to tune into and resonate to the new
aspect of Anthropos and Wisdom which, although it has not as yet
fully reflected itself on the existential level as an Avataric
personage or event, is even now cascading tier by tier from its
transcendent source.
In so doing the sincere and resolute aspirant may come to
the attention of "Earth-grown" Beings of Spiritual Light and
Fullness who in their togetherness embody Earth's spiritual-
mental field, the Planetary Mind. Such Beings have entered and
experienced to its culmination the Path of Transformation. They
have taken over the function once performed by Promethean Beings.
Each is a full realization of a unique Quality of Anthropos. They
constitute the Pleroma, the spiritual harvest of the current
world process, which is even now being realized cell by cell.
With the unseen and often unsuspected aid of Pleroma
Beings, the aspirant may be drawn to Their human agents and
emissaries. As a new influx of divine Wisdom cascades from its
transcendent source through the Planetary Mind and "downward"
toward the collective human mind, such agents and emissaries
assist Pleroma Beings in giving it existential form and
disseminating its message among receptive minds.
But, one may ask, if such an influx is really flowing from
transcendent spheres into receptive and highly focused minds, how
does it operate and what formulation may it take, or even now
taking?
Rudhyar touches on these questions in the following passage
from Occult Preparations --
[The One Planetary Tradition has] its being
essentially beyond the cultural level; it must be
transcultural, in the sense that while it may operate
through any culture, it is not bound to, limited by, or
essentially conditioned by any one culture or by local
factors. Its [supernal] custodians, just because they are
"universal" or planetary beings, aware of the need for a
new release of their knowledge and intervention, are
inwardly compelled out of love for humanity to answer this
particular need in whatever way makes the answer most
effectual. As this happens, what I have called the one
Tradition is seen operating in the aspect which is
specifically able, ready, and willing to exteriorize the
spiritual-mental answer. It operates through an Occult
Brotherhood. (pp. 36-37)
But what actually is an Occult Brotherhood? Is it not one of
those terms we hear and read so much about but really understand
so little of?
The first thing to realize is that an Occult Companionship
is bi-polar -- human and supernal -- and both poles are graded or
multileveled.2
Around the core of the human pole stands a group of
consecrated men and women who have initiated and to some degree
have experienced the long and arduous process of spiritual-mental
repolarization and radical transformation known as "the Path,"
and more specifically the approach to "the Path" initiated and
exemplified by a particular Avatar.
At an Occult Companionship's supernal (transphysical,
metabiological and transindividual) pole stands an unanimous
Pleroma of Compassionate Sages, Beings of Light and Fullness who
during previous ages, and through their own self-devised, self-
induced efforts, pursued to its culmination a way through the
Path of Transformation. In the Pleroma state individuality and
unanimity perfectly interpenetrate in a condition of multi-unity.
It is a condition of light, in which the wave condition and the
particle state interpenetrate.
On the most inclusive planetary level, all particular
Pleromas integrate into what the 19th century formulation of
theosophy termed the "White Lodge." On a less inclusive and more
specific level, the planetary Pleroma steps down or
differentiates its white light, so to speak, into the colors of
the spectrum. The vibratory quality of each color acts as a
carrier-wave for the Light and Power of a particular Pleroma and
its Occult Tradition. Each in turn further differentiate into
various lineages or variations on a theme.
When a fully individualized person emerges out of the
collective matrix of a particular culture and begins to modulate
his or her center of consciousness and sense of identity from the
levels of biopsychic imperatives and appetites, cultural
conditioning and psychomental desires, reactions and complexes to
the spiritual-mental level of Wisdom and all-inclusiveness where
individual selfhood and funtionality and group unanimity
interpenetrate, his or her mind may become attuned to the
particular Occult Companionship operating within the vibratory
range (or Ray) and field of activity to which his or her unique
spiritual Quality (Monad, divine Archetype, Augoeides or Letter
of the Creative Word) resonates. The individual is drawn along
magnetic lines and is eventually -- if all goes well! -- brought
into contact with a Representative of an Occult Companionship.
Behind such a Representative (who is, in the fullest sense, a
living link between the Occult Companionship's human and supernal
poles) stands one or more Pleroma Beings who release some of the
Light and Power of the Pleroma through the lens of the human pole
of the Occult Companionship for the purpose of helping humanity
take its next evolutionary step.
The sincere and resolute aspirant may also come eventually
into direct contact with one or more Pleroma Beings who, within
the constraints of karma, may provide help and guidance; but the
aspirant must face his or her transformations as an individual.
When an actualized Pleroma Being -- termed a Master, Adept,
Mahatma, or Elder Brother in early theosophical literature --
communicates with a human aspirant, It reassumes the
characteristics of the personality through which It attained
Pleromahood, and "appears" as an individual much as light appears
as a stream of discrete particles (photons) when observed
striking an opaque object.
TOWARD A NEW IMAGE OF COSMOS AND ANTHROPOS
During and immediately preceding unprecedented human
situations, a number of factors operate together for the release
of a new aspect of divine Wisdom (and its formulation into words,
images and symbols) and archetype Anthropos (and its existential
realization as new human faculties and forms of social
organization) adequate to meet unprecedented human needs.
A new aspect of Anthropos and Wisdom is released at the
archetypal level before the needs it answers become apparent.
The release must occur before conditions polarizing it become
well-developed because it takes time for any new aspect of
Anthropos and Wisdom to gradually assume definite existential
form as it cascades from the archetypal world to the existential
world.
As the new aspect of Wisdom and Anthropos is released, a
group of Pleroma Beings, whose Qualities of Will, Activity and
Consciousness best suit them to respond to developing human
needs, become organized around its particular Tone and Quality.
These Compassionate Beings of Light and Fullness "embody" and
sustain the new aspect of Wisdom and Anthropos. They also
comprise the supernal pole of a new Occult Companionship, a new
organ in the unanimous organism of the Planetary Pleroma.
In their unanimous Mind of Wholeness, the Pleroma Beings at
the supernal pole of the newly formed (or forming) Occult
Companionship gradually give more definite, yet still essential,
form to the newly released aspect or quality of Wisdom and
Anthropos. Their subjective work culminates, yet by no means
concludes, with the advent of the originating Avatar, toward
which a Pleromic Being may contribute a "reflection" of its
spiritual-mental principle in a manner Blavatsky outlined in her
remarkable article "The Mystery of Buddha."
As this highly subjective activity occurs in the Pleroma
Mind, a few human members of and aspirants to the many Occult
Companionships may resonate to the new aspect of Wisdom and
Anthropos being "stepped down" and gradually particularized by
the Pleroma Mind. These future-oriented individuals
"reconfigure," forming the human pole of a new Occult
Companionship. At their core stands one, two or three exemplary
individuals who have realized a conscious, two-way relationship
with at least one Pleroma Being at the Occult Companionship's
supernal pole. Yet the entire Occult Companionship is organized
around and sustained by the Avataric impulse.
After the death of the originating Avatar's body, the
members of the companionship's human pole, who may be separated
geographically, give the new aspect of Wisdom and Anthropos a
more definite, existential and operative form than did the
originating Avatar. They do so because the Avatar's chief purpose
as the prototype of a new type of humanity is to carry, fully
impersonate and anchor the Tone and Quality of a new operative
aspect of Wisdom and Anthropos in the Earth's biosphere, as well
as to reveal its qualities and faculties through acts performed
in service to humanity and to draw around It a circle of
disciples to whom It reveals directly (esoterically) the seed
ideas of a new tradition. The disciples give the seed ideas
revealed by the originating Avatar a particular, existential
character by formulating them into words, images, symbols and
creative acts and by disseminating its message among receptive
minds. In addition to formulating, disseminating and perpetuating
new images of cosmos and anthropos, to some extent they also
exemplify a new variation on the theme Anthropos and, in some
instances, may even perform avataric roles of lesser magnitudes.
In a symbolic sense, the human pole of an Occult
Companionship consists of a head (or heart) and two arms. The
head is represented by the very few individuals who serve as
initiators of the Companionship's activities and formulators of
its new image of cosmos and anthropos. One arm represents
disseminators and creative artists; the other preservers and
custodians. The three functions may overlap and an individual may
shift from one function to another during a lifetime.
The work of initiators and formulators, which may initially
involve a long process extending over three to five centuries,
give an adequate existential form to a new aspect of Anthropos
and Wisdom. Human formulators, who initiate new transformative
processes on the existential level, are necessary because the
Pleroma Beings and the Avataric impulse standing behind them
exist beyond culture, and therefore (after the death of an
Avatar's body) lack an adequate point of contact with the
collective human mind it is their function to help transform.
As Rudhyar writes in Occult Preparations --
the release of occult knowledge has always to conform
to the nature of the general mentality of the potential
students of that knowledge. For this reason, nothing can
be transformed except by someone who has been and at least
externally remains a part of that which requires
transformation. This is why a great Adept who is a member
of an Occult Brotherhood cannot directly and publicly
operate in a society in need of spiritual transformation,
especially one as materialistic and individualistic as our
Western society . . . Someone who to some extent belongs
to the two realms of knowledge (occult and cultural) must
serve as an intermediary or channel for communication.
This must be an individual able to withstand both the
downflow of occult power through his organism, and the
scorn, indifference, or attacks of individuals and
institutions of the society in which he was born, but
which his consciousness and will have emerged in at least
relative freedom. Only such an person can serve as a link
between an occult Brotherhood and the collectivity whose
time for transformation has come, according to some
planetary cycle. (p. 40-41)
Around the formulators and initiators gather a group of
disseminators and creatives who help weave new images of cosmos
and anthropos into the fabric of the collective mentality and way
of life of the age. They do so by restating, elaborating upon,
dramatizing and, to varying degrees, simplifying the
formulation's core principles, images and symbols in terms of the
many fields of human knowledge and activity -- philosophy and
social organization, the arts and literature, psychology and
education, science and medicine, and so on.
There is yet a third function preformed by members of an
Occult Companionship's human pole -- preservation. A group of
human custodians or preservers work to keep the message and its
formulation "pure" and free of centrifugal elements. Their work
largely figures after the formulators', or at least after a
generation of formulators have concluded their part of a larger
work. The activities and personalities of preservers and
disseminators, however, sometimes conflict because the former are
concerned with forever preserving a past formulation in its
"pure" and "original" form, while the latter work to disseminate
a new message to the widest possible and most varied audience.
Preservers and custodians sometimes stand in the way of and
even oppose the work of newer generations of formulators aligned
with their particular Occult Companionship. And when a new aspect
of divine Wisdom is being first formulated and disseminated, a
few members of the many occult traditions may obstruct and
challenge the work and message of a newly formed Occult
Companionship. They do so because they have, in their utter
devotion and dedication to a particular tradition, immortalized
the time and conditions of the seed moment that inaugurated their
particular Occult Companionship and its tradition, and they may
tend to see their originating Avatar not as an Avatar but as the
Avatar. Additionally, initiators of new formulations have a
destructive aspect, because in breaking outmoded mind-sets they
need expose the limiting factors inherent in obsolescent
teachings and traditions. Preservers therefore often view them as
heretics.
Regarding the past-oriented features of preservation,
Rudhyar writes in Occult Preparations --
One of the problems that meets the knowledgeable
seeker, once the first phase of enthrallment is past, is
that a claim is nearly always made that this Tradition is
the original one, more real and effectual than any other.
Such a claim may be inevitable because, by temperament as
well as because of the character of their work, the
[human] custodians of the pure ancient Traditions must be
conservative and to some extent dogmatic. They embody a
form of spiritual inertia, because they have to resist all
attempts at introducing changes in the past "Revelation."
H.P. Blavatsky spoke of "the inertia of spirit." This
means that the original impulse at beginning of a large
cycle of existence has to be maintained during the
progress to outer growth in which an immense variety of
relationships are bound to induce centrifugal types of
thinking, feeling, and behavior. The divine alpha state
has to be reproduced in the spiritual harvest of the omega
state. The seedhood has to remain invariant during growth.
If there is to be a mutation it can only be during the
winter period of the seed. (p. 25)
The life-cycle of any tradition passes through four phases,
corresponding to the seasons. The seed ideas of a tradition and
its transformative new message -- which is transformative because
it is new and uniquely suited to answer unprecedented situations
and needs -- germinate during the symbolic spring; and the
message flowers into a cultural movement during the symbolic
summer. The transferable seed of a new cycle is released during
its symbolic autumn and the tradition and its culture experiences
decay or disintegration during the winter phase.
A seed splits as it germinates during spring. Likewise, a
tradition experiences during the spring and summer of its life-
cycle (or sub-cycle) a differentiation of its originating impulse
and seed ideas. Each differentiation or variation on a theme
becomes a foundation for one of the many lineages operative
within a particular Occult Companionship, each meeting the
particular needs of a particular type (or subtype) of personhood.
The disseminators who originally give variations their particular
form shift function, becoming the initiators and exemplars
of an Occult Companionship's many lineages.
By the time the winter period is reached, the tradition has
exhausted the quantum of spiritual-creative power that infused
its originating aspect of Anthropos and Wisdom and anchored by
its originating Avatar. As the originating power is spent, it is
replaced by the collective psychism of generations of adherents
and devotees. Its esoteric tradition is largely replaced by the
ancient yet exoteric images, symbols and doctrines of the popular
religion and social institutions long ago founded upon the
tradition's seed ideas. During a tradition's autumnal and winter
phases, those performing the three functions discussed above --
formulation, dissemination and preservation -- also assume a much
different character.
As a tradition's winter phase (or subphase) approaches, most
of the custodians still in touch with its living power withdraw
and reconfigure. They are replaced by past-oriented individuals
who become so locked into a crystalized and institutionalized
mind-set that they mistake the form taken by the tradition's (or
lineage's) originating seed ideas for the One and Only Changeless
and Absolute Truth. In other words, they mistake particular forms
and formulas for the whole of divine Wisdom.
Having also lost touch with their tradition's living power,
the disseminators of the cycle's close merely repeat an official
doctrine, usually expressed in the simplest possible terms and
aimed at the lowest common denominator. The creatives are
replaced by producers of cliched propaganda.
During the autumnal and winter stages, the function of the
initiators and formulators is taken over largely by the group who
replaced preservers, who now hold or imply that no new message
will be forthcoming because the doctrines and formulas of the
particular tradition they uphold is somehow a final, certain
Truth to be forever repeated. Indeed, having replaced earlier
generations of preservers, these past-oriented, dead-letter
worshippers -- who desire desperately to be correct and to align
themselves with a tradition providing certain and absolute Truth
-- eventually usurp the true functions of formulators and
disseminators, dominating and determining the activities of the
crystalized shell left behind by the once vital Occult
Companionship.
There are, nonetheless, individuals who periodically attempt
to produce innovative and "up-to-date" renditions or explanations
of a tradition's official doctrines in the cliched words and
fashionable images of the popular culture and its mass mind. But
these individuals have lost hold of the living power that once
inspired the minds and lives of the earlier formulators and
exemplars with new images of cosmos and anthropos. Lacking vision
and the capacity to resonate to a new aspect of Wisdom and
Anthropos, they instead follow the lead of the rabble. Reduced to
pandering, the first becomes the last.
Yet another group -- who operate, to varying degrees, always
-- come into special prominence during the closing phases (or
subphases) of a tradition's life-cycle. They are characterized by
highly imaginative persons who, often after becoming dissatisfied
with the tradition to which they once attached themselves,
confuse their own subjective images and mental activities for a
divine "Revelation" or messages from "Masters." Instances of this
type are abundant and well publicized.
While all these confusing situations occur, however, the
mutant seed carrying a new aspect of Anthropos and Wisdom is
released.
A NEW MESSAGE FOR THE NEW CENTURY
But what features should characterize the new seed ideas
making possible a new interpretation of reality adequate to
answer the needs of the 21st century? An indepth investigation
into the subject falls outside the scope of a short article, so
we can here only touch lightly upon the question and refer the
reader to Rudhyar's Rhythm of Wholeness and The Fullness of Human
Experience, and to my work in progress, The Movement of
Wholeness: The Theosophical Worldview Revisited.
Because humanity today stands on the perilous threshold of a
global age, we need a truly planetary (and, in a larger sense,
galactic) approach to and formulation of occult ideas and
metaphysical principles. This in turn requires an explicitly
holistic foundation because only a holistic mind-set can help
humanity as a whole shift its focus from egoism, individualism,
nationalism and the private agendas of the many separate classes
and self-interest groups to the Earth as a whole. And it is only
by viewing the Earth holistically that humanity as a whole can
realize and fulfill its purposeful planetary function.
In terms of occultism, esotericism and metaphysics, the
shift from an atomistic to a truly holistic worldview should,
among other things, enable us to take a new look at doctrines
assigning absolute individuality to spiritual "monads." As a
corollary of absolute monadism -- personal individualism taken to
cosmic proportions -- modern occultism and esotericism usually
depicts evolution in highly individualistic and personalistic
terms and images. One often hears and reads about how, according
to "the esoteric tradition," the spiritual monad is a lonely
pilgrim traveling up a hierarchical ladder from lower forms to a
human being, to a "planetary logos," to a "solar logos" and so
on. In the course of its long evolutionary journey, the lonely
pilgrim seems always to preserve a glorious and highly personal
sense of achievement and absolute individuality.
Similarly, "esotericists" have written much giving the
impression that an "Adept Hierarchy" is a graduated chain of
command and authority headed by an "Occult Hierarch" resembling a
powerful pontiff, an emperor or the CEO of a vast and powerful
multi-national corporation. All these images of spiritual
individualism are deceptive and stand in the way of the more
inclusive images of cosmos and anthropos humanity now needs.
Such pictures, however, might have been necessary for a 19th
century mind conditioned by atomism and its corollary egoism,
individualism, materialism, formalism, nationalism and
imperialism. But more realistically, Pleromas and Occult
Companionships are holarchies -- unanimous hierarchies of
interrelated and interdependent wholes within wholes within
wholes integrated by the holistic organizing principle of
containment rather than bound together by the dictates of
command.
Another feature inherent in all past occult, philosophical
and metaphysical formulations is the negation and denial
syndrome. The new formulation and worldview humanity now needs
will feature what Rudhyar terms "a total affirmation of being,"
because a truly holistic worldview does not need to deny any
experience taking place at any particular moment in the cyclic
world process. And because a Mind of Wholeness sees and
experiences every phase of the great Cycle of Being and its
contents for what they inherently are, a philosophy and
metaphysics of Wholeness is free of the language of negation.
Terms like non-being, non-manifest, non-existence, timeless,
changeless and the Absolute confuse more than elucidate. They
need to be replaced by meaningful terms of affirmation.
And those who formulate new images of cosmos and anthropos
based on a new aspect of divine Wisdom, and those who disseminate
its seed message to receptive minds, will not try to convince us
that the new formulation is the one and only ancient, certain and
absolute Truth. They will instead attempt to show its value and
validity in terms of the needs it answers.
An inherent feature of the new message for the new century
will be its insistence that as humanity evolves step by step, new
aspects of archetype Anthropos and divine Wisdom are periodically
released and passed down to help humanity take its next
evolutionary step ahead.3
_______________________
N O T E S
1. Rudhyar's early formulation of a holistic and planetary
worldview was published in 1930 as a series of articles in
Will Levington Comfort's "little magazine," The Glass Hive.
More mature and developed presentations of the philosophy
and metaphysics of Wholeness may be found in Rudhyar's
Planetarization of Consciousness: From the Individual to the
Whole (Santa Fe, New Mexico: Aurora Press, 1970); Occult
Preparations for a New Age (Wheaton, Illinois: Quest Books,
1975); Rhythm of Wholeness: A Total Affirmation of Being
(Wheaton, Illinois: Quest Books, 1983); and The Fullness of
Human Experience (Wheaton, Illinois: Quest Books, 1985).
2. The term "Companionship," which may be unfamiliar
to some in this context, is used here because it both carries
the meaning implied by the more familiar word "Brotherhood"
and is free of biological and gender connotations.
3. The etymological source of the word "tradition" is the Latin
traditio, meaning to "hand over" or to "pass down." It is
closely related to the words "traitor" and "betrayal."
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