18.1 Introduction 1
Esoterics divides world history into astronomical epochs, zodiacal epochs, of about 2500 years each. In the year 1950 the Piscean epoch ended, and the Aquarian epoch began. During the last epoch the emotional energies of the sixth department were the main influence on mankind. During the current epoch, the vibrations of the seventh department dominate. 2
During the Aquarian zodiacal epoch (1950–4450), especially those who have the seventh department in some one of their envelopes will be benefited by the pertaining cosmic vibrations. All seven departments are always active, however, although not equally active.
Those people who have no envelope of the seventh department, and hence cannot at all benefit even from the energies of the less active departments, do not incarnate but stay asleep in their causal envelopes, pending future opportunities. 3
The last epoch was one of subjectivism in which mentality was dominated by the arbitrariness, fancies, and diverse fictions of life ignorance. This subjectivism will be superseded during the next centuries (everything takes ample time) by order determined by law in all human conditions, by objective and matter-of-fact conceptions of the relationships of life with their continuous changes according to the basic law of evolution. Ritual and ceremony were the attempts of ignorance to mimic the conformity to law and finality of the processes of nature, not understanding the energies that must have their effects on the matter aspect as well as the consciousness aspect to achieve the intended results. 4
In the epoch of the seventh department, the energies coming from the second and fifth departments will be able to assert themselves in a manner previously unimaginable. In physical respect, the seventh department is incomparably the most important one. It is in physical reality that everything must be acquired, everything must show what it is worth, everything must be anchored. The physical world, physical matter, is the condition of the possible discovery of “spirit and matter”, consciousness and matter, as being two different aspects, and so it is also a condition of the identification of the motion aspect. It is in the physical world that these oppositions must be overcome and the understanding of the necessity of unity must be acquired. When the physical world has been made a paradise, then the entire cosmos will be a paradise and will have attained its perfection, will the cosmic purpose have been achieved at a first stage. 5
During a zodiacal epoch, the social, etc., conditions have time so to stabilize that they appear to be the final products of life. Hence the illusion that the established order is the only right thing, the only real thing. Philosophers of the Hegel type apply their acuity to prove this.
When the new epoch sets in, however, bringing quite different departmental energies, then the established order demonstrates its unfitness to live. If people will not see this and adapt to the new conditions, then the new vibrations will entail a revolution of the established order. The two world wars did the same service. The old emotional culture presented an obstacle to the future mental culture. The struggle still going between the old and the new will go on until the new way of looking at the things of the old culture has penetrated all spheres of human life. 6
The total changes entail violent revolutions. The planetary government, supervising human consciousness development, sees to it that sufficiently many clans of people at the stage of barbarism incarnate. Those clans have no understanding of culture and go in for demolishing the established order. When this work of destruction has been accomplished, clans of people at higher stages are born, people who have the task of building the new culture on the ruins of the old one. “New wine should be put in new bottles.” It is the task of the first department to see to it that the old bottles are destroyed. 1 7
Without esoteric knowledge it is impossible for mankind to see that the different civilizations and the cultures built upon them constitute different stages of development.
When the total consciousness of mankind has assimilated what was intended by them, they have done their service and must be replaced with new civilizational and cultural forms of life. The uninitiated, witnessing the ruin of what is presently unfit to live, always believe that a final disaster is unavoidable. The knowledge of life affords the certainty that evolution is going on just as it should. The history of the planet is the record of so many disasters at the verge of destroying all life that the esoterician regards all such things with his faith in the all- embracing wisdom and power of higher kingdoms unshaken. 8
Just as the individual is born, develops, and discards his envelopes, civilizations go through similar stages. They arise and reach their maturity, then languish away and vanish. 9
Every form is perishable. There are only two securities: leading a strong personal life and being anchored in that eternal value, essentiality (46), the life of unity. Our times are witnessing the death of an old civilization and the labour pains of a new one. The forms in which the eternal truths have been kept are fast dissolving, and new, more viable forms are developing. The old idiologies have lost their vitality. Everywhere is being heard the call for greater expediency, for new religious, political, educational, and economic forms for a freer intellectual life. It is understandable that those who are dependent on those forms for their existence fight the new ones with all their might, but they fight vainly. This leads to a struggle that is unnecessary, painful, and cruel. The same condition may obtain in the life of the individual: wrong thinking, physical habits hostile to life, and abortive emotional attitudes break the organism down. However, death is the renewer of the individual and of civilization alike. Without renewal there would be a static condition worse than anything else. Realities are permanent, forms are transient and doomed to be replaced. The monad is imperishable. 10
What characterizes the new epoch is that mankind, for the first time, thanks to the intellectual awakeness it has reached, will be able to follow the process, the dying of the old and birth of the new. The understanding of the rhythm of existence and of the opposition between consciousness in the fourth natural kingdom and consciousness in the fifth natural kingdom grows ever stronger. (The ancient juxtaposition of “spirit – matter” meant that opposition, among other meanings.)
18.2 Between Two Epochs 1
We are witnessing in our times the fall of a civilization and a culture which have become rigid in emotional and mental idiologies restricting life, in social systems and government structures unfit to live. Their unfitness to live appears in their inability of further development, which makes thorough-going revolutions necessary. They will have to go, by fair means or by foul. Life is unceasing change, and whoever will not follow along with this and serve evolution will make himself lose all. 2
The old civilization was doomed to disappear. It went under in the two world wars (1914– 1945). It had proved its unfitness to live, being an expression of the individualist will to power, the egoism of reckless individualism. A new age is upon us, which will be a manifestation of the universalist will to unity. The seven departments of the planetary hierarchy are occupied inspiring people to strive for communal life and building a new culture. Even if these new forms will not achieve stability until about 500 years hence, signs are already to be seen herolding the advent of a new age. 3
The two world wars (1914–1945) were necessary to sweep away the views that were obstructions to a right conception of the meaning and goal of life; to clear away the self- satisfied, complacent egoism that dominated the ways of thinking and made the “League of
Nations” a distortion of the ideal. There is a risk, however, that mankind will forget the 2 lessons it has learnt and will return to its old ways of looking at things, that it lets itself be lulled into the illusion of a false peace: the belief that the results gained are secured. 4
It is a stock phrase, even among that brand of esotericians who should be called more properly “occultists”, that our times are “materialistic”. The right term, of course, is “physicalistic”, since neither philosophers nor scientists (theologians can be left out of account altogether, being irremediable fictionalists) even suspect the existence of a whole series of ever higher, superphysical material worlds. 5
Without esoterics to guide it, science will never be able to answer the questions “what?” and “why?”. Sly dogs have realized this and speculate up a philosophy that is to teach us that those two questions are the outcome of ignorance and are nowadays relegated to the department of exploded superstitions, like all “metaphysics”. 6
Science has dismissed all esoteric facts as superstition without examining them. In so doing it has condemned itself as being untrustworthy. 7
Philosophers of the Bertrand Russell kind have convincingly demonstrated that they are in no position whatsoever to judge great individuals such as Pythagoras and Platon. What they know of the intellectual life of those great ones is just a collection of legends. 8
It really is about time a few thousand causal selves incarnated to put an end to the arrogance of scientists. Modern philosophy makes ever greater efforts to idiotize the wee bit of common sense still left. 9
The period of transition that commenced with the two world wars (1914–1945) bears a close resemblance, both emotionally and mentally, to the one that heralded the Piscean zodiacal epoch. This present period evinces the same tendency to dissolution of all concepts.
Modern conceptual analysts appear to be reincarnations of those sophists whom Sokrates tried to fight. Our epoch, too, presents a “Sokrates” – D.K. This one they cannot execute. But they do their best to kill him by silence. 10
In the current period of transition to a new epoch, when ruling idiologies inevitably dissolve, most people are confused and many are desperate. The fixed norms that people held to be unchanging prove untenable. Manners, customs, conventions, views are being rejected.
People are increasingly disoriented. As Bertrand Russell says: “People often feel deeply uncertain about what is right and wrong. They are even uncertain whether right and wrong is anything else than old superstition.” 11
In fact people are not as primitive as could be inferred from their behaviours. When the esoteric holistic view has made its break-through, then we shall also see the better sides of their being, whereas now they mostly demonstrate their worst sides. 12
In the prevalent general disorientation in reality and life, many people have been obliged to be contented with a view that does not in the least correspond to their true level of development (their degree of understanding of life). A scientific system of thought has been lacking that could have been accepted as a working hypothesis. Consequently, many people have ended up in skepticism. The Jewish world view of the Old Testament and the outlooks proffered by philosophy have demonstrated their untenability, and the hypotheses used by science are too short-lived. All systems of thought that were once prevalent were fiction systems of life ignorance. You should be alive to the fact that realizing this alone implies a giant stride forward in the conception of reality, an amazing mental achievement, a necessary condition of understanding hylozoics. 13
Neither is it by any means certain that the views many people have accepted are on a par with their true levels. They have felt the need of an anchorage, something firm to cling to, and then generally that was the view which was in the closest agreement with what they acquired in their previous lives. Without perhaps realizing it themselves, this was an emergency solution, a sheet anchor. If they belong to the sixth department, the particular department of religions, they fight for their faith with fanatic zeal to convince themselves the more strongly 3 that they are in possession of the one and only truth. The esoterician discovers in such things the action of the law of destiny and the law of reaping. 14
In a period of transformation, when everything is changing, there are many people who discover that they have not been equipped with talents that enable them to function well in life or have not found opportunities in which they could get their bearings. Unfit for life is what they feel they are. 15
That wave of skepticism and pessimism now sweeping the world deprives mankind of the power that trust and confidence could afford. To despair is to refuse to accept the offers of
Life. It is to betray that embryo of god which exists in all beings and which can develop only in so far as the individual refuses to give up. Perseverando, hold out, hold out, until the day dawns! For day always follows night, and there is an end to sorrow. Not all incarnations are the same. And the incarnations of suffering are few as against those of joy and happiness. 16
Skepticism is an inevitable reaction to that tyranny of authority displayed by life- ignorance, which kept mankind down in the darkness of unreason during the Piscean zodiacal epoch. The increased ability of mental activity is accompanied by an increased power of reflection (analysis and synthesis) and critical judgement. This results in increased demands for objective positions, facts for everything, and that “facts” be facts, an ever growing vigilance against unwarranted claims. For experts to be respected it is necessary that they keep within their own areas of research in so far as these make real knowledge possible. It is heartening, too, to observe the reaction against the moralists’ spiteful aggressiveness and tendency to condemn people, based on the taboo regulations of traditional life-ignorance.
18.3 The Disorientation of Mankind 1
The two world wars and a menacing third one should be able to force people to see how abortive political and cultural life is, how helpless mankind is when it comes to the possibility of building a better world, where individual and national egoism must not rule. When will mankind grasp that the planetary hierarchy must be called back to guide it? 2
Actually, the Second World War could have been averted. During seven critical years there was a possibility to divert the catastrophe. However, the spirit of Christos had been lost in ecclesiastical organizations. Their sole interest was in dead dogmas and technical theology.
Good will was theoretical and negative, not practical and positive. Humanists had no real understanding of the values that were at stake. A general passivity, listlessness, and indifference made themselves felt among those who had a grasp of the situation. No measure taken by the planetary hierarchy could rouse them to powerful action or to give up temporary benefits for enduring ones. The individual was more important to himself than mankind. The fact that Hitler and his gang of bandits succeeded so in blinding and seducing people has deeper causes than people have yet been able to see. The ground for it is mankind’s ancient, unchecked selfishness, lust for power and wealth, and its constant sacrifice of all higher things for lower ones. Such an attitude must lead to disaster sooner or later. And if mankind will not learn from the two world wars that it must embark on the way opposite to the one trodden hitherto, then even greater disasters must be expected. We are faced with the choice between the matter aspect and the consciousness aspect: do we desire power, glory, and an insatiable craze for possessions, with indifference to our fellow men, or do we desire a human culture with right human relations? 3
What “ideals” have characterized European politics? Mussolini was bent on reviving the ancient Roman Empire at the cost of helpless, small nations. French culture had to be the dominant one, and the security of France had to outweigh all other considerations. British imperialism in the past has exceeded that of other nations. German hegemony with demands for Lebensraum had to be satisfied, and German supermen had to decide other’s people’s lives. American isolationism was about to let Hitler win. Russia has sufficiently revealed her 4 intentions. Japan sought to conquer Asia. When will mankind wake up to see the madness of such policies? See where it all must end? 4
Strange that the German nation, which ought to have known better, suffered itself be idiotized by the militarists, those advocates of violence, and tolerated an unbearable military regime that made people robots. How little that nation had learnt from its great humanists it boasts of! 5
There can be no peace on earth as long as hatred rules mankind, all criticize each other, moralists condemn one another, all violate the individual’s right to have his private life protected from the curiosity of other people. 6
The same state of affairs is seen between nations, a permanent cease-fire with a constant threat of war. Aggressive nations try to force their idiologies, basically hostile to life, on others. All of this bears witness to the fact that mankind still is close to the stage of barbarism.
Therefore, it is hardly surprising that mankind cannot grasp the law of unity. But that it does not see the necessity of applying the law of freedom shows that it has learnt nothing from history. 7
Platon rightly asserts that there can be no peace between nations until the leading statesmen are philosophers and philosophers are leaders. But then they should be philosophers of the kind that Platon had in mind. And they are not easy to find in our times. 8
The theologians murdered all who doubted trinity, who did not believe in the verbal inspiration of the scriptures, who did not believe in witches, etc. The Bolsheviks murder all who doubt that the grotesquely one-sided theory of Marxism is the absolute truth. 9
Such a large percentage of mankind at the stage of civilization now have started thinking by principles (47:6) and are also able to apprehend the lowest perspective vibrations (47:5) that a critical time is approaching. The development of emotional consciousness to the stage of attraction (48:2-4) has been neglected, so that a lack of balance between emotionality and mentality has arisen which may prove precarious. Such phenomena as Nietzschean “supermen” with their disdain of things human are indications of an over-mentalization that may become disastrous. Emotional coldness prevails between people instead of the warmth that contact would bestow. The worst conceivable motives are ascribed to people on flimsy grounds and even without reason at all. Gossip, poisoning everything, reinforces the vibrations of hatred that penetrate people’s emotional envelopes and make it more difficult also for those who perceive the vibrations of attraction and so wish to live in them to keep themselves up in the sphere of attraction. They are dragged down to a lower level than their true one, so that the “general level” is lowered in the process. A general overestimation of what is exclusively mental can just debase psychological understanding of the truly human. In the current eon (the emotional eon) this understanding is chiefly emotional and must, as such, make the basis of a right assessment of people. No community can be built on the principle of envy, and no happy world will have hatred as its regulator. Without universal goodwill no happy communities will arise and endure. We must learn to respect all as human beings with human rights, human dignity, and a right to the happiness afforded by attraction. It is hatred that makes people unhappy and discontented with themselves and all others. The fact that this has not been generally recognized long ago is a proof how extremely shallow is the knowledge of the basic psychological factors. The first step towards a necessary radical change is for people to refuse to listen to gossip and react against it. Gossip poisons the minds of all people and strengthens hatred. 10
The spread of barbarism is not offset by preaching more Christianity. There is a lack of understanding of the causes of barbarism, a lack of understanding of the true causes and grounds of patent effects. Lawlessness certainly does not depend on too little religious instruction, that eternal nagging which merely breeds disgust. The entire communal spirit is poisoned by the corruption ruling in all spheres of life, by the cult of lies and universal 5 hypocrisy. Of all those blind in life the moralists are the most blinded ones, the biggest psychological idiots. Members of the older generation have led the way for the general break- down. The political, social, economic upheavals have brought about a total disorientation in a life sense, despite all Christian instruction, which has thus demonstrated its impotence. You do not change people by preaching to them. It takes other methods to do that. Let uprightness, honesty, integrity, sincerity be the guidelines of the older generation, and they will not need to complain about the younger one. 11 “Irrationality is a factor in our lives that is as inevitable and necessary as rationality, and if you cultivate the latter at the expense of the former, the consequences will be dire.” In existence as well as in cultural life there are irrational factors which only presumption believes it can eliminate. This is due to our almost total ignorance of life. We have explored only a small fraction of existence, and the conceit of human ignorance believes itself able to judge it all. Certainly everything in existence is accessible to consciousness, but this will not be until we have acquired cosmic omniscience. 12
The transitional period is characterized by mental chaos in all respects. Newspapers almost daily dish up passing fancies under headings as though they were great scientific discoveries. People take everything as fact. There is a total perplexity. 13
The middle ages are called the “dark ages”, and justly so. However, our epoch is even darker with all its science, technology, civilization. It is ignorant of 99 per cent of reality. 14
We are experiencing a literal mass invasion of clans at the stage of barbarism the task of which is to demolish all efforts at culture (literature, art, music, etc.). Disorientation is increasing in all respects. At the same time clans are coming in who have been living on the borderline between the physical and the emotional, all manner of “occultists” who without fail fall a prey to the illusions of emotional imagination, mediumism, clairvoyance, visions of all kinds. They believe they know everything about their own and other people’s previous incarnations, and spread their false doctrines also among people who ought to know better but who have never had the opportunity to reacquire their old knowledge. 15
The planetary hierarchy begs everybody not to accept anything that wars against their common sense. If the risk of illusions of all kinds was great during the Piscean zodiacal epoch, it is even greater during the Aquarian epoch. This new epoch is intended to enable people to acquire objective consciousness in the lower two physical etheric molecular kinds (49:3,4). This will increasingly facilitate the execution of so-called magical phenomena (the control of solid physical matter, 49:7, by means of etheric energies). The ignorant run the risk of being victimized by charlatans operating in this area. 16
It is of course inevitable that the adherents of public opinion parrot what others say and what they “saw in the paper” without thinking for themselves. However, it is a demonstration of the general cultural standard that individuals who set up to be critical and reliable repeat what “everybody says” without criticism and without examination. 17
If you want to know the general cultural level of our times, you should visit the variety shows to inform yourself of their taste and sense, and notice the gratitude and joy with which the audience demonstrate their appreciation of those samples. Most films, too, offer a very interesting material for study. 18
The people of our times live in a sexually overheated environment. Novels, theatre, films, weekly magazines deal scarcely with anything else. Sexuality has become the centre around which emotional and intellectual life rotates. It should be made “bon ton” again not to write, speak, or read of bedroom scenes. 19
In our times, the individual at the stage of culture must be contented to lead his cultured life in the world of daydreams. He will hardly find any food for his soul in our barbarous, anti-cultural civilization. 6 20
The demand of Swedish women for “equality with men” has not stopped even at the issue of “woman clergy”, of course. They have apparently overlooked the fact that “equality” is a social issue, and not a religious one, that the religious bodies decide themselves on the qualifications for their offices, that this problem lies outside the competence of secular society, even beyond the limits of what the sexes may judge. It is not to the honour of those injudicious equalizers that they push forward with such impudence. Society needs no priests at all and without doubt it would be best served not having any. 21
Everything is done in these days to set people free from “struggling for their bread and butter”. But how do they use their spare time? Mainly for physical activities. Taking that attitude they will be very slow to develop their mental consciousness. Yet this is the meaning of life and man’s most essential work
18.4 All Life is Change 1
The specific character of the different historical epochs depends on the departmental energies that influence mankind, different in different epochs. All that happens is the result of these energies, which periodically pervade all the worlds of mankind and all the forms in those worlds, thus all the natural kingdoms. Development is the result of interaction between the consciousness activity of the material envelopes and the consciousness-matter-energies pervading the envelopes. When the ability to assimilate and process those energies ceases, a state of crystallization ensues which must sooner or later be removed, if a new interaction shall come about. When a “culture” has crystallized and so has become a hindrance to development, it is burst to pieces by the incarnation of “heterogeneous” clans that revolt against that irremediable condition. 2
Cultures arise and vanish at regular intervals after they have fulfilled their purpose in the consciousness development of mankind. Mankind consists of 60 billion individuals, grouped according to their stages of development. Cultures arise when clans of higher stages incarnate, and they vanish when clans of lower stages take over the cultural heritage. 3
Civilization is technology, applied knowledge of the laws of nature discovered by natural research. Civilization is fully compatible with the absence of culture, which Nazism and
Bolshevism have clarified to all people endowed with common sense, if they could not see it before. 4
Every nation has had allotted to it a small share of this development, a share that nevertheless is a necessary one, a small part of the consciousness, matter, and motion aspects of existence. 5
There will probably always be prophets of culture who fantasize about a continuous development or the destruction of mankind. Such notions reveal our terrible ignorance and, even worse, the incurable conceit and arrogance of our ignorance. 6
There has been much talk about modern people as “lacking a sense of history” or having no understanding of either history or culture. The history offered mostly deals with phenomena at the stage of barbarism. And the culture supplied in modern literature, modern art, and modern music is a travesty of culture. All of this depends on the stages of development of incarnating clans. We never need to fear that we shall be without history, for it exists in the global memory of the causal world. And the culture which the new clans at the stage of culture will build must be preceded by a thorough purge. 7
Life forms are necessary to consciousness development. However, as soon as the self has learnt what it can learn in that form, the time has come to dissolve it, since otherwise it would become a hindrance to further development. 8
As seen from the matter aspect, development is transformation: the replacement of old forms for new ones, which are more expedient in enabling consciousness development.
Sentimental ignorance has always regarded this destructive side of existence as demoniacal. It 7 is, however, charitable, a necessary condition of a richer life. The corresponding is true of thought-forms, cultural forms, etc. When they have taught mankind what they have to offer, they must be annihilated. When this happens, however, mankind goes out of its senses, screaming that the end of the world is near. Then it has forgotten all prophecies of a new heaven and a new earth (the symbolic expression for a new zodiacal epoch). To be so enamoured of the form that you believe you cannot live without it is to demonstrate your ignorance of life. 9
So it always happens when a civilization and culture that is unfit for life must be annihilated to prepare the way for a more viable one. Man sees his own short time only, and does not know why but, being a wiseacre, he believes that he can judge the phenomena of life.
He comprehends nothing, and the sooner he sees it the better, for then he will avoid forming idiotic ideas that will just hinder his further development. 10
The cultural decay of our times demonstrates that our old culture is unfit to live. Primitive clans have been allowed to incarnate in the West to pull down what remains after the destruction wrought by the great war (1914–1945). 11
Such incarnating clans as are on the lower levels of the stage of civilization are in no position to estimate the values of our traditional culture. They perform a necessary purging work without which the new values could not assert themselves. This demolition may be deplored, and many people there are who watch this work of destruction with sorrow and regret. It is hard to descry the new, tentative efforts at a fresh growth, which will take its time to strike root but, when this is done, will soon enough demonstrate its viability in one area after another. The geniuses of the new age, particularly within the seventh department, will make their contribution when time is ripe for a new culture and the work of construction can be begun. It cannot be said to reach its full efflorescence until about a thousand years hence. 12
The new clans by no means have an easy task, since they become the targets of spiteful attacks from those representing the old forms and also from the barbarians who want to run riot. 13
Men want to have everything firm as a rock and everything absolute. But everything is changeable and relative. The various forms of religion are adapted to mankind’s ability to comprehend. As soon as mankind is able to grasp something more expedient and therefore closer to reality, we shall receive such a form from the planetary hierarchy. Perhaps you understand why no form lasts for ever. In fact, new religious forms must arise when a new zodiacal epoch begins, since the general ways of looking at things requires a more suitable form. The same is true of the world view. The mental system is constantly changed, being better adapted to the ideas of causal intuition so that some time in the future they can become the common property of mankind. If the pace of evolution can be maintained, which exclusively depends on the individuals of the fourth natural kingdom, then some million years hence about 60 per cent of the sixth root-race will have access to the world of Platonic ideas.
Those who possess the esoteric knowledge latently have no difficulty in understanding this.
The fact that the others cannot understand, that they do not even bother to comprehend, makes no difference in this case. The laws of development do not care if people accept or reject. It is the individual’s own business if he does not desire to comprehend and so delays his own development. It cannot be too strongly emphasized that esoterics does not proselytize, does not make propaganda to persuade people. Anyone who has done with the old idiologies seeks for a more rational explanation. The esoterician has no reason to try to persuade philosophers and scientists to accept his world view. Those people must find their way pursuing different paths. Only what is the result of experiment and experience has an enduring value as an ever- growing fund in the subconscious, a ground-work to expand upon. The esoterician must see to it that no one be left in the dark as to the existence of the esoteric knowledge, no one become 8 a victim to emotional illusions and mental fictions unnecessary to consciousness development.
18.5 The Plan of the Planetary Government 1
All events are the effects of causes. Those causes lie in the past. To foresee the future you must have a knowledge of the laws and of the past in the worlds of man (47–49), a past that always lives in the “present” of the world of ideas. No experiences had are lost. They exist in the individual’s subconscious and in the various globe memories. 2
Of course, plans form the basis of the different developmental processes. However, it depends on the cooperation of the participating monads to what extent these plans need to be modified. The goal is fixed, but not the way in which to reach it, which is always conditioned by the contributions of the individuals. 3
The planetary hierarchy has the plan fixed within rather narrow limits (approximately 2000 years), and this plan is what has been called the “prevision of the future” or, more correctly, of the future possibilities. 4 “Those cosmic ideas pertaining to consciousness development, which are to be realized in the human and lower kingdoms, are laid down by the planetary government and effected by the planetary hierarchy.” KR 2.17.1 5
In many cases, those ideas have a revolutionary effect. Those idea energies which entailed the emancipation of the bourgeoisie were released in 1775; those who effected the emancipation of the working class, in 1875; those who are to emancipate the intelligentsia from intellectual dictatorship will impact in 1975. Their effects remain to be seen. 6
It is the mission of the planetary hierarchy to supervise the consciousness development of mankind. Thanks to their work mankind has developed so that a Platon, a Shakespeare, a
Lionardo, a Beethoven were able to appear; that people have been able to acquire the ability to formulate ideas, to construct various mental systems in philosophy, science, politics; to create beauty; to discover the “secrets of nature”; to develop instinct into intellect and soon further into intuition. 7
People are so blinded by the idiologies concocted out of their life ignorance (above all those concocted out of historical ignorance) that they cannot rightly judge phenomena of their own times, discover the meaning of what is happening. Only the esoterician is able to do so as he is informed about the plans of the planetary hierarchy for the future. He also is in a position to ascertain that the predictions come true. 8 “At the present stage of mankind’s development, the planetary hierarchy must not take any measures that would affect mankind in vital respects without being “released” to do so by mankind itself.” (D.K.) As the new epoch dawned mankind entered a new stage of responsibility. More than ever before, mankind has to take the consequences of its own doings. It is in a better position to understand the meaning of life, to develop emotional and mental consciousness, greater prospects of ascertaining the validity of laws of life. This also entails a greater responsibility. In technological respect, mankind also has reached the level where it can exterminate organic life on our planet. The “crisis” is not overcome yet. Madmen still have the power to release annihilating energies. And mankind is responsible for the government it gets itself. 9
An illustration of the dependence of mankind on the planetary hierarchy in respect of ideas is the following remarkable statement by the secretary of the planetary hierarchy, 45-self D.K.
On the subject of the “eight points” and “four freedoms” of the Atlantic Declaration he says: “Enough light has been permitted to penetrate by the efforts of the Buddha, to lead to a worldwide recognition of the desirability of these formulas; and there is enough love already in the world, released by the Christ, to make possible the working out of these formulas.” 9 10
This is an item of information worthy of consideration about the dependence of mankind on ideas and energies from higher worlds. What remains, namely implementation, is the free choice of men. However, all proposals for improvements in human conditions are faced with such an inertia that the Buddha has been obliged to assign himself a special task of calling forth in men also the desire of realizing these inalienable rights. 11
Those who wonder at the fact that the planetary hierarchy must consider which ideas are permitted to be “released” over mankind should reflect on the fact that ideas are energies and that if those ideas are not correctly apprehended they are misapprehended, often with dire consequences. There must be a pre-existent understanding of those ideas and they must also be willingly received. 12
Mankind is still unable to see what it lost by banishing the planetary hierarchy from the physical world and letting unrestrained selfishness rule. Yet no historian has expounded the misery and unspeakable suffering of mankind during the last twelve thousand years. Instead history is embellished with deeds of valour, great exploits of generals, martial honour and glory, extravagance of rulers, cunning of diplomats, and all other manifest iniquities are glorified. Historiography has been used to throw dust in people’s eyes. 13
However, what the planetary hierarchy could not do in the physical world it went on doing in secret. The emotional, mental, causal, essential, etc. worlds exist in the physical world. They surround us. An undeveloped mankind, lacking the requisite objective consciousness, sees and perceives nothing. 14
There are esotericians who cannot see why it was necessary for the planetary hierarchy to withdraw from the “affairs of the world”, to let mankind manage by itself, and so the more easily fall prey to the power of the black lodge and be at “the mercy of Satan”. The knowledge of reality and life had to be lost and disorientation had to increase. The religions that were instituted were paltry substitutions for the lost knowledge and proved eventually, because of the intervention of the black ones, to contribute to the further disorientation and idiotization of mankind. Religious fanaticism, being always obsessed with dogmas created through absolutification of original mental ideas which, being taken out of their contexts, must lose their original meaning (value in life), combined with repulsion dominating mankind, led to hatred of some of the worst kinds, religious hatred, so intense because it seemed so justified. Gradually it has been understood that “odium theologicum”, theological hatred, comes closest to the fraternal hatred of civil war in rage and madness. 15
As the planetary hierarchy withdrew, it was in a way reasonable that mankind should feel “deserted by god”. Was there no other way, those esotericians ask, of applying the law of sowing and reaping? That is a question which probably only the planetary hierarchy can answer. Over and over again mankind been on the verge of destruction, and the question probably remains open in our times whether power (this time based on an insane political idiology), in its desire for destruction, will lead to extinction. How many times yet will mankind have to begin from the beginning? If so, it will now be the third time. 16
There will be a day, however, after countless failures, when mankind has acquired so much common sense that it understands that man is unable to solve his problems of life. Then mankind will call the planetary hierarchy back. If it had done so twelve thousand years ago, we would all have been spared many incarnations of unnecessary suffering. 17
When the planetary hierarchy has been called back and may lead mankind, the political, social, economical problems will “solve themselves”. Mankind will understand that the meaning of physical life is to develop consciousness. If this understanding with its concomitant aspiration turns into a striving of community, then about 60 per cent of total mankind and most of the people in incarnation will be able to rapidly acquire ever higher kinds of mental consciousness, and millions will approach and attain the causal stage. The very striving of community, everybody directing his energies towards the same goal, will 10 make it easier for all, to an undreamt-of extent, to reach higher without cease. The sense of community, leading to a contact with the world of unity (46), is the very “divine love” which mankind must acquire and which is the most accelerating factor of development. There will be no more talk of “equality”, but everybody will sense that he is part of unity, whatever level of development he is on. The energies of unity perform their work, and in unity the sense of difference and the sense of isolation disappear. The “incurable loneliness of the soul” is cured for ever. All know that they have a common goal: to enter unity. To work for the reappearance of the planetary hierarchy is at present the greatest task a man can assume.
18.6 The Awakening of Mankind 1
A sign of the new epoch setting in is the general awakening of nations, their vision of a better future, and an indomitable resolution to realize this vision: be it called a new world order or transformation, united nations, brotherhood, international goodwill, a new civilization, demands for improved conditions for all, universal security, possibilities for all, international welfare. There is an awakening understanding that these values must be made available to all and not just to certain nations. 2
In Atlantis, man did not have a free will, since he was incapable of self-determination.
Nowadays there is a tendency to free will, manifesting itself in demands for freedom and independence, free thought, and the right of self-determination. Will is truly free only when the motive is the good of the whole and not only the good of the individual. The broad mass of people, however, approximately 85 per cent of mankind, is still the victim of the authoritarian spirit, must be taught what is right and wrong, etc. Still a relatively small part of the population settles all important national affairs, and so it is in all countries. 3
The demand for freedom for all, for the right not just to an existence fit for human beings, has its limitation, too, if it directs attention to national peculiarities and rights, religious differences, etc., everything that counteracts the international tendency, reinforces national egoism. 4
Both tendencies assert themselves manifestly, international “sharing” and national (also racial) egoism. 5
It would be a good thing if there could be a general understanding of the law of life saying that mutual understanding and fair distribution are the only path to abundance for all could be generally realized. The planetary hierarchy does what it can to create understanding of that law. 6
The conflict between dictatorship and democracy (true freedom is possible only under the laws of life) makes people start thinking. For the first time in human history, the majority is able to tell the difference between right and wrong, between “spiritual” freedom and enslaving physical conditions of existence. 7
Perhaps people will finally be able to see that it is not a matter of “saving souls”. They are saved by learning in incarnation upon incarnation, until they have learnt their lesson. Mankind is at stake, its existence or non-existence. We are at the verge of self-destruction. If mankind and life on our planet are annihilated, it will be long until we shall have the opportunity of continuing our development, until new life develops, a new civilization and a new culture become possible. Mankind is totally ignorant of reality, life, the meaning of life, and the factors of consciousness development. “Where there is no vision, the people perish.” 8
Men live in the physical world and have a physicalist attitude. Individuals as well as nations and all their organizations are bent on promoting political, social, economical aims.
That is the spirit ruling in the world. A great percentage of mankind have reached so far in their development, however, that they should be able to understand that this cannot be the meaning of life, and only when people have understood this will they be able to gain the right perspectives on life and arrange their affairs accordingly. 11 9
How the planetary hierarchy looks upon physical life, mankind in particular, at its present stage of development, is best seen in a statement by a 45-self: “This is the true hell.” There is no other. But the one we have is enough. 10
Everywhere people are victims of propaganda. To be able to judge it, the individual must see it from the viewpoint of freedom. 11
Two basic tendencies always have asserted themselves in mankind. The one tendency desires brotherhood, right human relations, and unselfish goals. The other one desires self- assertion, appropriate to itself as much as possible by all means and in disregard of the rights of others, is aggressive, and often cruel. Two additional groups can be distinguished: the unreflecting masses controlled by propaganda and victims of their leaders, and the so-called neutrals. 12
These neutrals are as much a hindrance to evolution as the ones actively combating it.
They say they support altruism in theory, but they do nothing for evolution. Many are afraid of saying or doing anything at all, feeling helpless. Others, in their isolating superiority, are dominated by their false life values and refuse to consider their inevitable responsibility for what is happening. This is true of individuals and nations. These neutrals throw all responsibility on others. They theorize and speculate, give advice but refrain from action and are unwilling to sacrifice anything. 13
The planetary hierarchy asserts with vigour that in the struggle between justice and injustice, freedom and slavery, for and against consciousness development, the neutrals side with the enemy, whether they want to see it or not. There is no neutrality where evolution is concerned. He who is not for is against. The aggressive ones regard neutrality as a justification for them. Pacifism does not exist for the planetary hierarchy as long as evolution is being combated. The hierarchy does not betray its own, those who fight the “good struggle” against excessive violence and oppression.
18.7 The New Epoch 1
As the vernal equinoctial point left the zodiacal constellation of Pisces and entered that of
Aquarius in 1950, vibrations started to cease which had been dominant in our planet during the old zodiacal epoch. They are superseded by vibrations of a new kind which affect physical, emotional, and mental matter and its consciousness. This will bring about a radical reconstruction in all mental respects. We are already affected by the mental chaos resulting in mankind before its mental consciousness has managed to adapt to the new kinds of mental vibrations. We are witnessing how old and new views fight a violent struggle, and this will go on until new, more apposite forms have taken shape (been elaborated by those who are able to do so). A culture that is new in all respects will be the inevitable outcome of this, and the period of transition (the next five hundred years) will be difficult. According to the planetary hierarchy, mankind has evolved so far in its consciousness development that it will be able to assimilate, in an unprecedented manner, the new kinds of vibrations, a new kind of mental atoms with a new kind of consciousness. Mankind is faced with the greatest crisis in its history, greater than that of Atlantis, because now a greater responsibility falls upon “all” mankind. If mankind makes the right choice, the planetary hierarchy will be able to reappear. 2
We live in an epoch when all the old things made under the influence of the energies of the sixth department have to be replaced with the new life forms that will be the result of the energies of the seventh department. This can be seen in the vegetable and animal kingdoms.
Everywhere the researcher is faced with “missing links”, since these links were ephemeral phenomena, vanishing rapidly. 3
The corresponding is true of history. The transition from one zodiacal epoch to the following cannot be ascertained by historians, since the “links” have not left traces or, in any case, have never been seen to be “links”. All of this is due to the fact that the transition 12 simultaneously brings about a destructive period in which much of the old and also the transient new is quickly annihilated. 4
We are faced with a complete revolution in the world of thought. This will be accompanied by a complete transformation of all political, social, economical, and cultural conditions. The new epoch will display totally new forms, presupposing an intelligent elimination of old forms of religion, government, economy, and social idealism. There is a great need of people able to formulate the new ideas. 5
There will be great upheavals in the perception of reality as well, and the discoveries of the immense energies of light and sound will revolutionize science. This means that what is presently valid also in esoteric teaching (esoteric, that is, until mankind has accepted hylozoics) will be regarded as antiquated, forming a transition to the new teaching. The present author thus is fully aware of the fact that however revolutionizing may appear the new things he conveys, they will be seen as outdated in some hundred years. Even the one who is a connecting link has a mission, however. Hylozoics as such will always remain, but everything said in relation to it to facilitate understanding is part of the transitory stage. Development makes no leaps. Revolution in an esoteric sense thus means that whatever mediates the transition will be a rapidly transient phenomenon, however necessary it may appear to those who try to master the revolutionary views. 6
The phenomena of the transitory stage may also be said to include those occult societies (genuine or spurious) that arose after the year 1875. It should be considered here, however, that the societies founded by the Satanists will prove much more viable than the Theosophical
Society founded on the initiative of the planetary hierarchy and promoted by disciples
Blavatsky, Besant, and Leadbeater during the years 1875–1920. The reason for this failure is that this Society no longer has the backing of the planetary hierarchy, and that is why it has become stagnant. The false societies are supported by the black ones, however, who with all means at their disposal will try to attract the attention of the intelligentsia lacking in judgment, and above all will appeal to people’s irremediable egoism, and this they will easily do by dangling physical gain and profit. This is clear also from the greater material resources they have had hitherto. 7
The new age will usher in an entirely new outlook on all things human. Historians will have to change their views. Short-sighted national policies will not do anymore. Individuals will have to sense their solidarity with mankind, not just with their families and nations. All must be given opportunities of acquiring knowledge and understanding of reality and the meaning of life to the extent of their capacity. Mankind is beginning to understand that it makes up a unity, and that this unity must desire the freedom and self-determination of all.
Those who counteract this striving are the enemies of mankind. 8
Human beings are equal with respect to their origin (the animal kingdom) and their goal (the fifth natural kingdom). They are unequal with respect to individual levels of development, differences that only are a matter of time. 9
The current Aquarian epoch is intended to establish right human relations based on justice, the equal right of all, the right of all to the same opportunities independent of race, colour, sex, life view; the abolition of crime and selfishness through expedient upbringing (the opposite of the present laissez-faire system). 10
People will be taught that everybody’s view corresponds to the level of development he has reached, that each nation has the social structure best suited to it but entirely unsuitable to another nation. It is necessary that the individual and the nation can feel complete security and not this insecurity dominating mankind hitherto. 11
All mankind must learn that it may be compared to one single big family comprising adults and children of various ages. We must not line our pockets at other people’s expense any more. We develop the most rapidly if we realize that anyone who does his best to help 13 others to reach physical independence and mental development does the best service to himself as well. This may be egoism of a subtler kind but is requisite at the present stage of mankind’s development. When such motives are no longer needed, they will be dropped. 12
The struggle now raging on our planet is activated mainly by energies from the sixth and seventh departments, between old cherished, traditional, worn-out views, and the new ones, which are organizational and determined by law. The three warring idiologies (dictatorship, democracy, and communism) do their work of destruction and reconstruction. When the pertaining extreme ideas have merged into a unity, we shall have the ultimate world organization in political, economical, and cultural respect. 13
Unless a third world war, bringing about a definitive relapse into barbarism, thwarts all plans for the future, the intention is that clans at the stages of culture, humanity, and ideality will incarnate to such an extent that in unison they will be able to take over the management of the public affairs of most nations on our globe. This is one of the conditions of a unified league of nations. After that, any nation that violates the basic human rights will be expelled and isolated.
18.8 Consciousness Development in the New Epoch 1
According to the planetary hierarchy, the new epoch that dawned around 1950 is the most important one in the history of mankind up to the present, and is to a certain extent comparable to the mass transition of animal “men” to the human kingdom through their acquisition of causal envelopes nearly 22 million years ago. The time has come when people are going to think for themselves, to form their own views independent of authorities, to dare to think differently and to have the courage of their convictions. This implies self-initiated consciousness activity, which will speed up consciousness development to an extent never dreamt of. As a mass phenomenon it entails “mutual assistance”, since everybody receives suggestions to reflections, resulting in ever increasing freedom of thought and decreasing dogmatic thinking. Everybody acquires his own view of life, forms his own “religion”, and is no longer hampered by alleged words of god or divine authorities. Man can begin to apply the law of freedom to an ever greater extent. He begins to understand that he is fully free to think, feel, say, and do whatever he wants within the limits of the equal rights of all, thus as long as he does not overstep those limits. Thereby the law of freedom has come into force, and everybody respects the equal right of all, so that tactlessness, curiosity about the private lives of other people, and violations of rights of other kinds are considered subhuman. 2
Intellectuals of the growing generation are characterized by their demand for “freedom of thought”, and their search after knowledge, their endeavour to comprehend and understand.
They despise the traditional teaching of both religion and philosophy. Lacking a firm ground on which to stand, they seek in all possible and impossible directions, which has brought about the chaos in which most people live. 3
The man in the street, too, makes his own reflections, and has absorbed idiologies to an unforeseen extent. The new civilization will grow out of this mass thinking and will not be enforced by some oligarchy. This is something hitherto unknown in the history of mankind. It is a state of affairs for which the planetary hierarchy has worked for close upon two hundred years. The emancipation of the intelligentsia from dogmatic and authoritative thinking has already made a great stride. More and more people become sensitive receivers of the vibrations emanating from the different departments of the planetary hierarchy. This does not imply any imposition of ideas, but everybody assimilates what he finds useful in order to formulate ideas for his individual contribution to the solution of the problems of the present. 4
Any individual who has gained freedom and uses the power thus obtained only to serve and to help others will also have the opportunity of acquiring objective consciousness in his higher envelopes: physical etheric, emotional, mental, and causal objective consciousness. 14 Along with this goes the ability to study the matter aspect and the energy aspect in the pertaining worlds. 5
Hitherto it has been possible for rare exceptional people (raja yogis, for instance) to acquire emotional (but not mental) objective consciousness. The only advantage they gained by this was their knowledge of the fact of the existence of a higher world than the physical world visible to all, and thus the refutation of the Western denial of the possibility of superphysical (“metaphysical”) knowledge. However, this advantage was neutralized by a serious disadvantage, since it is impossible for these “clairvoyants” (having only emotional clairvoyance) to rightly interpret what they experience in the emotional world, and so a multitude of idiologies was obtained also in respect of the “occult”. 6
The new age will be accompanied by greater prospects for the acquisition of even mental and causal objective consciousness and, therefore, for exact, “scientific” research in the all the worlds of man. This will do away with the barriers between exoterics (religion, philosophy, and science) and esoterics (the knowledge of reality). 7
The word “spirituality” as used by the orthodox religions demonstrates that they have never understood what it is about. Everything is “spiritual” that aims at understanding, kindness, unity and community, the creation of beauty. Everything is evil that counteracts the striving to refinement, unselfishness; that causes disunion and raises barriers between individuals; that engenders fear and vindictiveness; that brings about violence and oppression; that bans freedom of thought and expression. 8
The individual will learn how to lead both a physical and an intellectual life. More and more in addition will lead an intuitive life in the world of ideas. 9
The current new epoch, the Aquarian age, will facilitate to those at higher stages of development to acquire mental will instead of the emotional will dominating hitherto. Then it will be important to see that only causal consciousness makes it possible to acquire true knowledge of reality, life, and the Law, and of the past (history). External authorities will be dropped, and therefore the individual must have trust in the Law, which entails trust in self.
Those who want the right are on the right track. Mistakes are unavoidable as ignorant as we are, and through mistakes we learn. The planetary hierarchy does not care about our mistakes but about the motives of our actions. The motives are the essential things. They also show how serious we are in our endeavours. 10
Probably only esotericians can descry how the esoteric view of life slowly and imperceptibly penetrates into general ways of looking at things. Every now and then we run across “ideas” of esoteric origin which for all their distortion yet keep something of their originality and which thanks to their inherent realism slowly transform thought. It is fascinating to observe this process going on in the collective unconscious. 11
Mankind has now reached such a stage of development that most people can begin to make their own independent reflections, so that they need not just parrot others. This, in conjunction with the great changes in all domains that will result from the entry of our planet into the Aquarian zodiacal epoch, has brought about a situation that is unprecedented in the history of mankind. Those who make use of the possibilities of development to be offered during the next millennium will be able to make a more rapid progress than ever before.
18.9 The Knowledge in the New Epoch 1
“What in our times is it that has stood in the way of man’s becoming human, that has committed itself to bring man’s striving after liberation to nothing?” Alas, it is not only in our times but in all times. It is mankind’s total ignorance of life and disorientation. It is all those idiologies which have led mankind astray and so left to the individual to try to find the way out of the jungle of illusions and fiction on his own. 15 2
The mental and emotional chaos that mankind lives through in our times is the best proof that the idiologies ruling hitherto are untenable, the proof that they are not fit for either world view or life view, the proof that they do not agree with reality or life. 3
It is beyond question that the nations need guidance such as all the idiologies of ignorance have idiotized them in religious, social, and political respect. What the present mankind needs is understanding of the fact that existence is ruled by laws. Arbitrariness and self-will are lawlessness. We become free only by applying the knowledge of the Law. Lawlessness leads to chaos and to a war of all against all. It will be possible for people to live together without friction only by respecting the equal right of all. 4
Hitherto power in all its forms (political, military, administrative, etc.) has been the thing most coveted. We are approaching an epoch in which the knowledge of reality will take the position of eminence. The universities of the future will be extremely differentiated so that they will have a wide variety of functions. The present-day division into faculties was suited to the barbarous age of scholasticism. The university of the highest kind will be the esoteric one. The university of the lowest kind will provide a general orientation and teach history so as to counteract narrowness and compartmentalization. The faculty of theology will be replaced with a university for the study of life views, historical forms of religions, and above all the laws of life, and the universal religion, the religion of wisdom and love with its emphasis on essentiality (46). 5
The planetary hierarchy has decided that mankind will eventually receive the facts of reality so that it will be able to understand Pythagoras’ hylozoic mental system. It is not enough to give out the facts, however. Those who are stuck in their fiction systems or who in their skepticism reject them must be taught by efficient criticism to see that the ruling idiologies are untenable. These idiologies must be pulled down in spite of the indignation this will stir up. If the mere giving out of facts does not suffice, then hammer-blows will be needed to drive in the nails of knowledge into the blockheads. For close upon one hundred years the planetary hierarchy has attempted, through its disciples, to rouse people from their apathy. Not even the doomsday trumpets of the two world wars (the inhumanities of Nazism and Bolshevism) seem to have been able to wake the sleepers up. 6
It will be long, of course, before the hylozoic world has been generally accepted as the only tenable working hypothesis. And then it will take time before people have learnt to understand what its consequences are in political, social, religious, philosophical, scientific, and cultural respect. This is long-time work. The pervasive and cherished views from the times of Greek and Roman “culture” and pseudo-gnosticism are not replaced that easily with new, untested ones which yet lack the sentimental values obtained through the work of feeling and imagination, values as necessary as furniture to make any new-built house liveable and comfortable. 7
Whatever great things happen, happen quietly. The planetary hierarchy makes its preparations imperceptibly. Those ignorant of life can never judge the “signs of the times”.
From the year 1875 on, an increasing number of esoteric facts of reality have been permitted for exoteric publication. The various attempts made to systematize those facts have proved unsatisfactory. Nevertheless those systems have been very important. They roused remembrance in those who had the esoteric knowledge latently, so that they could liberate themselves from the idiologies of ruling ignorance. Since the majority of those former initiates had not reached high degrees in esoteric knowledge orders, they were satisfied with those new, primitive systems. The deplorable feature of this was that the systems were dogmatized, so that the new systems ever richer in facts that are constantly added were rejected by those who had already got stuck in some system. And this resulted in the multitude of occult sects that banned each other’s systems. However, the new systems will soon demonstrate such a manifest superiority that the older system will be abandoned by the new generations who will have the opportunity of comparing the different systems. The main thing is that the new systems are formulated so as to be able to satisfy the demands of philosophers and scientists for a rational orientation and acceptable working hypothesis. This will supply a common ground for philosophy and science. It will be more difficult in relation to the religious sects, since they are at the emotional stage and are not amenable to rational arguments. When the intelligentsia have once accepted esoterics as the most rational working hypothesis, however, it will be possible for it to understand the necessity of calling back the planetary hierarchy as the guide of the further evolution. This is the goal that was set by the planetary hierarchy when it decided to permit the publication of the esoteric knowledge. The new political systems, above all bolshevism, are indications that tremendous powers are at work to thwart that plan. Fascism and Nazism, which also were such attempts, perished in the Second World War. It will apparently be more difficult to set mankind free from the Russian and Chinese powers. Probably, we can only hope that the intelligentsia in those empires eventually realize that the idiology ruling them is untenable. 8
The condition of development is community, common experience, knowledge (facts we receive from others, facts elaborated into systems of knowledge). When people have once received upbringing, education, knowledge, etc. for nothing, they refuse to “play along” any more. As if they were not indebted to mankind for what they have received. If they refuse to do their share, then they have no right to knowledge in lives to come. We cannot develop alone. The least thought should suffice to make this clear, if the capacity for reflection is there. We do not reach the fifth natural kingdom without being helped by members of that kingdom. And we receive no help, if we do not help others to reach where we are. Is this really impossible to grasp? 9
There are many ways of abusing the knowledge. You may refuse to learn although you see that the knowledge is important. You may abuse it to gain a position of eminence. After you have been told that “there is no hurry”, after you have been liberated from uncertainty, worry, and fear, you live even more heedlessly than before. That is not the reason why members of the planetary hierarchy relinquish their consciousness development, devote themselves to the task of making this unteachable, intractable mankind grasp the knowledge. Knowledge entails responsibility. That cannot be too strongly emphasized. Anyone who does not learn willingly and gratefully should not expect to be born with a suitable brain, into a suitable race, nation, family or cultural standard or any other favourable conditions of life in his next incarnation.
18.10 Conclusion 1
The planetary hierarchy expects great changes during the current epoch: a new way of life for people and a complete reorientation of human thought. Much needs to be done to change conditions and to build a new civilization with new values, a civilization that will enable the planetary hierarchy to reappear. 2
The planetary hierarchy foresees that those who attain the stages of culture and humanity under the influence of the new energies will contribute actively to building a “new world” politically, socially, economically, giving people greater opportunities of consciousness development. 3
If the will to unity has been roused to life in someone, he will always find some possibility of doing his own little share in the work for the welfare of all. Wishful thinking and beautiful theories amount to nothing. Instead of the senseless waste with billions on unnecessaries, luxurious habits and amusements, a rational use of existing resources would guarantee a dignified existence for everybody. Is it impossible to grasp what this would mean for civilization and culture and for all of us, even those egoists who do not look beyond their own profits? 17
Endnotes by the Translator
To 18.5.9 “Enough light has been permitted… etc. From The Externalisation of the Hierarchy by Alice A. Bailey, p. 349.
To 18.9.7 “It will apparently be more difficult to set mankind free from the Russian and
Chinese powers.” It should be pointed out that this was written in the 1960-ies, when
Communism still ruled Russia and adjoining parts of Eastern and Central Europe.
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