Contemplation spirituelle

Chapters 9 and 10 of The Aquarian Gospel: Elihu and Salome teach in their mystery school in Zoan

Salome taught the lesson of the day. She said, All times are not alike. Today the words of man may have the greatest power; tomorrow woman teaches best. In all the ways of life the man and woman should walk hand in hand; the one without the other is but half; each has a work to do. But all things teach; each has a time and a season for its own.

The sun, the moon have lessons of their own for men; but each one teaches at the appointed time. The lessons of the sun fall down on human hearts like withered leaves upon a stream, if given in the season of the moon; and so with lessons of the moon and all the stars.

Today one walks in gloom, downhearted and oppressed; tomorrow that same one is filled with joy. Today the heavens seem full of blessedness and hope; tomorrow hope has fled, and every plan and purpose comes to naught. Today one wants to curse the very ground on which he treads; tomorrow he is full of love and praise.
 Today one hates and scorns and envies and is jealous of the child he loves; tomorrow he has risen above his carnal self, and breathes forth gladness and good-will.

A thousand times men wonder why these heights and depths, these light hearts and these sad, are found in every life. They do not know that there are teachers everywhere, each busy with a God-appointed task, and driving home to human hearts the truth. But this is true, and every one receives the lessons that he needs.

And Mary said, “Today I am in exaltation great; my thoughts and all my life seem lifted up; why am I thus inspired?” Salome replied, “This is a day of exaltation; day of worship and of praise; a day when, in a measure, we may comprehend our Father-God.” Then let us study God, the One, the Three, the Seven.

Before the worlds were formed all things were One; just Spirit, Universal Breath. And Spirit breathed, and that which was not manifest became the Fire and Thought of Heaven, the Father-God, the Mother-God. And when the Fire and Thought of heaven in union breathed, their son, their only son, was born. This son is Love whom men have called the Christ.

Men call the Thought of heaven the Holy Breath. And when the Triune God breathed forth, lo, seven Spirits stood before the throne. These are the Elohim, creative spirits of the universe. And these are they who said, Let us make man; and in their image man was made. In early ages of the world the dwellers in the farther East said, Tao is the name of Universal Breath; and in the ancient books we read,

No manifesting form has Tao Great, and yet he made and keeps the heavens and earth. No passion has our Tao Great, and yet he causes sun and moon and all the stars to rise and set. No name has Tao Great, and yet he makes all things to grow; he brings in season both the seed time and the harvest time. And Tao Great was One; the One became the Two; the Two became the Three, the Three evolved the Seven, which filled the universe with manifests. And Tao Great gives unto all, the evil and the good, the rain, the dew, the sunshine and the flowers; from his rich stores he feeds them all.

And in the same old book we read of man: He has a spirit knit to Tao Great; a soul which lives within the seven Breaths of Tao Great; a body of desires that springs up from the soil of flesh.
 Now spirit loves the pure, the good, the true; the body of desires extols the selfish self; the soul becomes the battleground between the two. And blessed is the man whose spirit is triumphant and whose lower self is purified; whose soul is cleansed, becoming fit to be the council chamber of the manifests of Tao Great. Thus closed the lesson of Salome.

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Elihu taught; he said, In ancient times a people in the East were worshippers of God, the One, whom they called Brahm. Their laws were just; they lived in peace; they saw the light within; they walked in wisdom’s ways. But priests with carnal aims arose, who changed the laws to suit the carnal mind; bound heavy burdens on the poor, and scorned the rules of right; and so the Brahms became corrupt.

But in the darkness of the age a few great masters stood unmoved; they loved the name of Brahm; they were great beacon lights before the world. And they preserved inviolate the wisdom of their holy Brahm, and you may read this wisdom in their sacred books. And in Chaldea, Brahm was known. A pious Brahm named Terah lived in Ur; his son was so devoted to the Brahmic faith that he was called A-Brahm; and he was set apart to be the father of the Hebrew race.

Now, Terah took his wife and sons and all his flocks and herds to Haran in the West; here Terah died. And Abram took the flocks and herds, and with his kindred journeyed farther west; And when he reached the Oaks of Morah in the land of Canaan, he pitched his tents and there abode. A famine swept the land and Abram took his kindred and his flocks and herds and came to Egypt, and in these fertile plains of Zoan pitched his tent, and here abode. And men still mark the place where Abram lived – across the plain.

You ask why Abram came to Egypt land? This is the cradleland of the initiate; all secret things belong to Egypt land; and this is why the masters come. In Zoan Abram taught his science of the stars, and in that sacred temple over there he learned the wisdom of the wise. And when his lessons all were learned, he took his kindred and his flocks and herds and journeyed back to Canaan, and in the plains of Mamre pitched his tent, and there he lived, and there he died. And records of his life and works and of his sons, and of the tribes of Israel, are well preserved in Jewish sacred books.

In Persia Brahm was known, and feared. Men saw him as the One, the causeless Cause of all that is, and he was sacred unto them, as Tao to the dwellers of the farther East. The people lived in peace, and justice ruled. But, as in other lands, in Persia priests arose imbued with self and self desires, who outraged Force, Intelligence and Love; Religion grew corrupt, and birds and beasts and creeping things were set apart as gods.

In course of time a lofty soul, whom men called Zarathustra, came in flesh. He saw the causeless Spirit, high and lifted up; he saw the weakness of all man-appointed gods. He spoke and all of Persia heard; and when he said, One God, one people and one shrine, the altars of the idols fell, and Persia was redeemed.

But men must see their Gods with human eyes, and Zarathustra said, “The greatest of the Spirits standing near the throne is the Ahura Mazda, who manifests in brightness of the sun.” And all the people saw Ahura Mazda in the sun, and they fell down and worshipped him in temples of the sun.

And Persia is the Magian land where live the priests who saw the star arise to mark the place where Mary’s son was born, and were the first to greet him as the Prince of Peace. The precepts and the laws of Zarathustra are preserved in the Avesta which you can read and make your own. But you must know that words are naught till they are made alive; until the lessons they contain become a part of head and heart.

Now truth is one; but no one knows the truth until he is the truth. It is recorded in an ancient book. Truth is the leavening power of God; it can transmute the all of life into itself; and when the all of life is truth, then man is truth.