INVOLUTION - II

__The contemporary renaissance of primordial spirituality is a necessary function of collective cyclic law and concerted individual resolve. Within the triadic framework of human evolution, the relative balance of the monadic, mental and physical components varies with the cycles and sub-cycles of Race evolution through the Rounds. At the same time, the rich fabric of Nature itself and the cumulative rapidity of karmic precipitation of events initiate significant changes according to the parameters of the yugas. The inherent complexity of the Manvantaric scheme cannot be reduced to a simplistic model. Yet there do exist fundamental axioms of cyclic evolution which may be applied with Buddhic discrimination to the shifting circumstances and opportunities presented by the moving locus of human growth.

__Witnessed from the standpoint of Eternal Duration, the entire changing universe is but a kaleidoscopic reflection of divine thought in the Divine Mind. Witnessed from the standpoint of the compassionate hosts of Bodhisattvas freely incarnated in evolving manifestation, the transformations of time, of pravritti and nivritti, are a perpetual yet progressive re-enactment of a single cosmic archetype. Each and every cycle of existence may be grasped in relation to that which Ever Is, that which was in the beginning and which will be at the end, for it is ever-becoming. To the apprehension of the Rishi mystically attuned to Brahma Vach, cyclic events are, one and all, circumscribed within the principle that the first shall be the last, and last shall be the greatest. For the individual seeker this principle helps to unravel not only the cycles and sub-cycles of birth and death, but also the mysteries of self-conscious self-insertion into the broader cycles of Race evolution.

__Since the inception of Manasic humanity upon this globe over eighteen million years ago, and through every successive transformation of the myriad faculties of man, the Mahatmas have maintained intact the integrity of the Mysteries for the sake of the spiritual enlightenment of humanity. Gupta Vidya is a comprehensive framework of initiations into the spiritual and psychological mysteries that underlie human evolution. In every civilization throughout the past eighteen million years, the sacred fires of the Mysteries have been preserved in sanctuaries for groups of enlightened seekers who fulfil the preparatory conditions for spiritual wisdom, having taken vows and undergone a period of probationary self-training resulting in the incomparable strength of moral purity and mental reliability. Through deep meditation each aspirant must acquire a capacity for effortless resonance with the minds and hearts of all other aspirants, and thereby learn to come closer to Mahat, the cosmic Mind behind manifested nature and the great hebdomadal heart of all humanity. Without such systematic self-training, in personal invulnerability, impermeability to lower titanic forces and a quickened sense of the immortality of the soul, it is not possible for the lanoo-shravaka to become fully attuned to the collective mind and heart of the human race.

__In order to become a candidate for initiation into the Mysteries, it is necessary to draw closer to the living centre of universal humanity, and therefore to draw apart from mundane concerns. In practice, this means developing the capacity to withdraw from the sensorium and to enter transcendental states of consciousness through meditation based upon intensified powers of concentration, calm contemplation and a greater continuity of consciousness in Spirit. Mystically, this means attuning oneself to the music of the spheres and becoming able to listen, amidst diverse temporal circumstances, to the Soundless Sound, the Voice of the Silence. Such an awakening to the reality and presence of Spirit implies a retraining and refining of the senses, bringing about a fundamental alteration in their polarity. Each of the sensory faculties has its ultimate origin in one of the seven Dhyani-energies that constitute in their aggregate the Logos. On the universal plane these seven centres have virtually unlimited creative potential, but in their restricted reflections on the astral and physical planes the range and reach of each are severely restricted. They are limited not only by the intrinsic properties of matter and the radius of perception appropriate to the sense-organs on the physical plane, but also by the insufficient use of the sensory powers by individuals under karma. There is, therefore, an enormous variation amongst human beings in the perception of colour and sound, a variation based on their relative capacities to use sight and hearing. There is a further variation in the capacity of individuals to correlate the entire set of sense-organs and sensory faculties in daily life.

__The mystical seeker, concerned to awaken the compassionate creative capacity of the higher faculties, must turn from a half-life of outwardness to a full life of inwardness. By progressively withdrawing attention from the phenomenal plane, and intensifying the power of concentration combined with vairagya, he must detach his mind from the world and the concerns of the separative self. As he does this, the polarity of the linga sharira, the astral form, which is the seat of the subtle sensory powers, will change. There follows a gradual unfoldment from within without, bringing an attunement to supersensuous spheres of consciousness and a correlative extension and integration of the range and scope of perception.

__This inward mystical development, the process of withdrawal (nivritti), must be understood in relation to the overall collective development of humanity throughout the Rounds and Races. Otherwise the aspirant may fall prey to the fatal delusion called individual progress. Because everyday consciousness has fragmented so violently in the present period of evolution, most human beings are highly susceptible to psychic intoxication when confronted with the enormous potential of the inner senses. Without a firm grasp of the cyclic laws pertaining to the evolution and involution of the sensory faculties, they can scarcely hope to avoid a disastrous moral inversion of their aspirations when met with the first stirrings of their dormant power. Specifically, the future awakening of the sixth and seventh senses represents a cyclic return of the wave of human evolution to a degree of spirituality shared by all of humanity in prior Rounds and Races. A future era in which sight and hearing are experienced as mental correlates is prefigured in that distant age pointed to by the Vedas wherein radiancy and colour, light and sound, sight and hearing, were synonymous terms. Assembling both philological evidence that all representations and conceptions of light and sound are found to have their derivation from the same roots, and mythological evidence of the correlation between the deities of light and the divine singers of the Vedic hymns, H.P. Blavatsky spoke of that time when all the senses were united.

__Beginning with the First Root Race of the present Fourth Round on this globe, the evolution of primitive humanity on the physical plane proceeded through the development of one of the seven senses in each of the successive Sub-Races. The separation of the senses characteristic of humanity in the Fifth Root Race represents a later and transitory stage of development which will eventually be resolved through a return to an earlier integrity of the faculties.

__Human speech, as known to us, came into being in the Root-race that preceded ours – the Fourth or the 'Atlantean' – at the very beginning of it, in sub-race No. 1, and simultaneously with it were developed sight – as a physical sense – while the four other senses (with the two additional – the 6th and 7th – of which science knows nothing as yet) – remained in their latent, undeveloped state as physical senses, although fully developed as spiritual faculties. Our sense of hearing developed only in the 3rd sub-races. . . . 'Sound is seen before it is heard', says the book of Kiu-ti. The flash of lightning precedes the clap of thunder. As ages went by mankind fell with every new generation lower and lower into matter, the physical smothering the spiritual, until the whole set of senses – that had formed during the first three Root-races but one SENSE, namely, spiritual perception – finally fell asunder to form henceforth five distinct senses.

The Theosophist, April 1886____
H. P. Blavatsky _____

__This paradigmatic and dominant mode of cognition characterized the entire Third Root Race and extended into the early periods of the Fourth Root Race. The gradual differentiation and subsequent fragmentation of spiritual perception into the present set of five senses all occurred during the present Fourth Round. This is of critical importance in comprehending the relationship between mental or self-conscious Manasic evolution and the development of the physical vestures. The full implications of these past periods in the present Round cannot be understood, however, until they are placed in the yet larger perspective of the overall balance between spirituality and mentality as affected by the cycling of the Rounds. Before the unfoldment of self-consciousness in the Fourth Round, the incipient humanity of the Third Round was characterized by a supernal and ethereal quality of vesture and form which pervaded the use of all the inner sense-organs in the Third Round.