Law
V
There is naught but energy, for God is life. Two energies meet in man, but other
five are present. For each is to be found a central point of contact. The conflict of
these energies with forces and of the forces twixt themselves produce the bodily ills of
man. The conflict of the first and second persists for ages until the mountain top is
reached - the first great mountain top. The fight between the forces produces all disease,
all ills and bodily pain, which seek release in death. The two, the five, and thus the
seven, plus that which they produce, possess the secret. This is the fifth Law of Healing
within the world of form.
This Law
can be resolved into certain basic statements which can be tabulated as follows:
- We live in a world of energies and are a constituent part of them ourselves.
- The physical vehicle is a fusion of two energies and seven forces.
- The first energy is that of the soul, the ray energy. It is the producer of conflict as
the soul energy seeks to control the forces. [137]
- The second energy is that of the threefold personality - the personality ray as it is
resistant to the higher energy.
- The forces are the other energies or ray potencies which control the seven centers and
are dominated either by the energy of the personality or by that of the soul.
- Two conflicts, therefore, proceed between the two major energies and between the
other energies, focused through the seven centers.
- It is the interplay of these energies which produces good health or bad.
There has been much teaching given anent the agelong struggle between personality and
soul, but it has always been presented in the language of spiritual approach, of mysticism
and of religion, or else in terms of character reaction, of abstract aspiration and of
purity or non-purity. With these I shall not deal. My theme is the effects of this
conflict in the physical body. I wish, therefore, to confine myself only to the
physiological and psychological problems incident to the struggle which, in the main, make
hard the lot of the disciple. It might be posited that:
A. All diseases and physical difficulties are caused by one or more of three things or
conditions:
- A developed soul contact, thus producing the vitalization of all the centers in ordered
rhythm, according to the soul ray. This necessarily produces stress and strain in the
physical vehicle.
- Personality life and focus, which attempts to negate this soul control, and which is
largely expressed through the activity of the throat center (predisposing an activity of
the thyroid gland) and of the centers below the diaphragm. [138]
- A cycle in the life of the aspirant wherein personality control begins to weaken and in
which the emphasis and consequent activity shifts into the centers above the diaphragm -
again causing trouble and readjustment.
B. Certain objectives present themselves to the aspirant at various stages, and each
involves progress, but at the same time certain attendant difficulties.
- The objective before the initiate is to have every center in the etheric
body responsive to the ray energy of the soul and with all the other seven ray energies
subsidiary to it. This process of stimulation, of readjustment, and the attainment of
established control goes on until after the third initiation. Then, when that initiation
has been taken, the physical vehicle is of a totally different caliber and quality, and
the Rules and Laws of Health no longer apply.
- The objective before the disciple is to promote control of the centers in
the body, via the soul, through stimulation, elimination and eventual stabilization. This
inevitably produces difficulty, and the vitalization or inspiration (either of these words
would be appropriate), or their lack or deficiency, affect the bodily organs within the
areas around the centers and affect all substances surrounding the centers.
- The objective before the aspirant or the probationary disciple is to transfer the
forces from the centers below the diaphragm, via the solar plexus center, to the centers
above the diaphragm. The energy of the base of the spine has to be transferred to the
head; the energy of the sacral center must be lifted to the throat, whilst the energy of
the solar plexus must be transferred to the heart. This is done in response to the
magnetic "pull" of the soul ray as it begins to dominate the personality ray. It
is a long and painful [139] process, covering many lives and carrying, as the result, many
physical ills.
- The objective before the average man (unconsciously effective) is to respond
fully to personality force, focused primarily at the middle point, the solar plexus, and
then steadily and intelligently to coordinate these forces so that an integrated
personality is presented eventually to the soul for control and use.
- The objective before the primitive or undeveloped man (again unconsciously
effective) is to live a full animal and emotional life, thereby gaining experience of
growth, of contact, and eventually of understanding. By this means the response apparatus
of the soul in the three worlds is built.
I would also call attention to the thought which I have here interjected, that the
objectives intrinsically in themselves have an effect upon that towards which man is
striving. This is a thought warranting careful consideration.
These generalizations will be useful only if you remember that they are
generalizations. No aspirant at any stage is perfectly clear cut in his endeavor until
after the third initiation, nor is he entirely particularized in his life and effort. Men
are at all imaginable stages of development, and many of these stages are intermediate to
the five stages above mentioned. These all merge and blend into each other, and often
constitute a formidable and confusing arena for thought and activity. It is only in the
life of the undeveloped individual that clear simplicity is to be found. In between - from
the stage of infancy of the race or of the man to that of the state of liberation from
personality life - there is nothing but complexity, the overlapping of states of
consciousness, difficulty, disease, psychological problems, illness and death. [140]
This must
obviously be so when the vast number of energies and forces which constitute man's being
and form his environment are brought into relation with each other. Every human being is,
in reality, like a miniature whirlpool in that great ocean of Being in which he lives and
moves - ceaselessly in motion until such time as the soul "breathes upon the
waters" (or forces) and the Angel of the Presence descends into the whirlpool. Then
all becomes still. The waters stirred by the rhythm of life, and later stirred violently
by the descent of the Angel, respond to the Angel's healing power and are changed
"into a quiet pool into which the little ones can enter and find the healing which
they need." So says the Old Commentary. |