In our studies of gnosticism or gnosis, the student is endeavoring to comprehend something which may conflict with much of what is taught in our contemporary culture. So, students who approach gnosis often find themselves in conflict, presented with a teaching which causes a certain vibration or reaction in the psyche that can sometimes feel disturbing or challenging. This is often times the first ordeal that causes the student to abandon these studies, because of the nature of that conflict or the contradiction that appears in the mind can be so overwhelming or uncomfortable. And, lacking the method to accommodate the challenge, the students will often leave.
In today's lecture we will discuss the three types of mind, the understanding of this lecture can help every student in their own study of the teaching, and the realisation for themselves of it's truth, of it's effectiveness.
The study of gnosis is comprised of two primary roots or two primary symbols, which are presented in the Bible as the two trees of the garden of Eden. The Tree of Life is symbolised in the map that we call the Kabbalah, which is a series of spheres organised upon three pillars. This Tree of Life has many levels of meaning, which represents both the nature of consciousness and the levels of reality; so it symbolises both the psychological (in other words, an internal face) and also an external face, but not merely physical. It also encompasses all the levels of manifestation and all the dimensions of nature. In other words, the Tree of Life is a symbol of matter and energy and how they interrelate.
The other great symbol is the Tree of Knowledge, in other words Alchemy, or the science of the transmutation of energy. These two are interrelated, and we have to study both trees in combination with each other, otherwise we arrive at incomplete understanding.
The Nature of Mind
The Tree of Life, or the Kabbalah, symbolises the levels of matter and energy. At the top of the Tree, we have the Ain, the Ain Soph and the Ain Soph Ur; these are the levels of unmanifested nature. When that light manifests into the world to create all that exists, that creation condenses in levels in the same way that a vapour condenses into a gas into a liquid into a solid.
The Tree of Life descending downwards symbolises the density of nature. The entire Tree of Life is mind, mind in levels, so there are many levels of mind; or, we can say in another way, there are many levels of being.
Now when I am saying mind in this context, I am using it in the Buddhist sense, when mind is the word we use for consciousness. But, in gnosis, we actually make a differentiation between each of these two words, when we get more specific. Mind, properly understood, is a vehicle, an intermediary.
So, looking at the Tree of Life in this way, we can say that every sphere of the Tree of Life is mind, in it's level; it is an intermediary between other levels, a mediating factor between that which is above and that which is below. Thus, we can say in that context that every sphere is a form of mind, a form of consciousness. But, when we analyse ourselves, we have to become a little more specific than that, to understand that mind as a term that generally is used in a very sort of expansive way or general way, but there are actually specific types of mind, with specific functions and outcomes.
The mind in itself is merely a vehicle. When we look into our own selves, we perceive or experience that which we call mind; many of us make the assumption that this mind is “our self.” We believe or assume or have been taught that mind is our identity, and yet there is a contradiction within ourselves in relation with this concept.
If, for example, any one of us were to be given the opportunity to abandon the mind we have and instead have the mind of Bill Gates, or the mind of Donald Trump, or the mind of Albert Einstein, we would probably exchange it, because those types of mind, the minds of these other people, have qualities that we wish we had. And, because we have that impulse, that we feel and believe we could potentially change our minds with someone else, it demonstrates that really we know that our self is not the mind, that our self is something other than the mind.
In a similar way, we can look at our physical body. Many of us make the assumption that this physical body is the self, and yet the same contradiction exists; that, if we were given the opportunity to exchange this physical body for a physical body that we admire somewhere else, for example an actor or an actress or some athlete, we would gladly do it, which demonstrates that in our depth we do not really believe that the body is who we really are. This is precisely what gnosis teaches us.
Both the body and the mind are animated by superior principles; superior in the sense that they are principals which have dominance over the body and the mind. But, unfortunately, we do not know what those principals are; as we are now, our physical body and our mind are dominated by forces about which we remain ignorant and thus we are tossed through life, battered between different events, different drives, different impulses, different desires, manipulated by external and internal forces with little control.
The mind that we have is also not limited to the brain. This is another common assumption, that somehow the brain itself is the mind, and this is contradicted also by our own experience. As an example, we can look at the very common experience of being out of the body, even the materialistic scientists of this day and age recognise that one in ten people have had an experience out of the body, and yet they cannot explain it. They try, but their science is limited, and so there are many theories but no real understanding in contemporary science.
The nature of an out of body experience is that a person, a self, a sense of identity, experiences existence free of the limitations of the physical body, and likewise the limitations of the physical brain. Such experiences can happen due to a near death experience, while in surgery because of an accident, or in a dream. In each of these cases, we can see that that person can be cognitive, cognizant, aware, active and perceiving outside of the physical body and away from the physical brain.
So, this demonstrates in a simple way that the brain is also merely a mediator, an intermediary between two levels. In this case, the brain is a vessel or vehicle which provides an interface with the mind itself. The mind that we have is the result of certain causes.
Evolution and Devolution
One of the foundations of gnosis is that there is nothing without cause. Everything exists because causes and conditions have caused it to become so; therefore, when we look at ourselves, we need to look for causes of why we are the way we are, and through understanding those causes, we can create new causes, in order to originate new circumstances. This is why we study the three types of mind, first to grasp and understand the mind that we have now, and the causes that brought it about; second, to develop new causes, so that more favourable conditions can be created.
The mind that we have now has evolved. It has, in other words, gone through a process of a complication of energy. When we look at this physical world that we live within, we see that there are different kingdoms in nature. The simplest forms of matter in this physical world, we would put in the mineral kingdom; these are very simple organisms, and yet they have a level of mind. And, even though Newtonian physics has not recognised that, quantum physics has.
Unfortunately, most of humanity remains ignorant of the content of the more advanced sciences, for most of humanity has not yet realised that even the scientists have perceived and measured that atoms have consciousness, that light has consciousness; simple elements have a form of cognizant ability, but common people have not realised this. Common people are still stuck in the dark ages of their understandings of energy and matter.
In gnosis we know that every atom is actually a trio of matter, energy and consciousness. Thus, in these simplest levels of material existence, the mineral kingdom, there is mind, but it is a very simple form of mind. The animating principal of that level of mind is a spark of consciousness, which has descended from the Ain Soph Aur. Such a spark has entered into manifestation in order to elaborate itself, to evolve, to develop.
In the plant kingdom we find a more superior form of mind, a type of mind that has become more complex, more sophisticated, but nonetheless it is a very simple form of mind. Plants have consciousness, a consciousness that is more evolved and more sophisticated than that in the mineral kingdom. Likewise, when we advance upwards into the animal kingdom, we find that animals have a form of mind which is more sophisticated than plants. Those sparks of consciousness which have been evolving up through these kingdoms have gradually been gathering more and more understanding of matter and energy, but yet have not acquired self reliance, independence or individual mind.
In all these levels we are seeing collective mind, or a form of mind that is not yet individualised. In order to prepare for individual mind, for individual will, those sparks of consciousness which have been evolving in the animal kingdom, are allowed the right to enter into the humanoid kingdom. In other words, they are given humanoid bodies and are then called intellectual animals. The reason for this is that the mind they have is an animal mind, but that has intellect; they now have the capacity to reason, to compare.
So, an intellectual animal is any one of us. We are all animals or “anima,” souls which have come out of the animal kingdom and have received the gift of the intellect. With that gift we have the capacity to compare. It is through comparison, through reasoning, that we begin to develop individual will or individual responsibility. Thus, when we enter that kingdom, the intellectual kingdom, we are given a new set of instructions and the opportunity to become human beings and all these inferior levels—mineral, plant and animal—the type of mind that exists in those creatures is a mind that is free of degeneration, is a mind that is pure, a clean mind. All of the minerals and plants and animals on the evolving side of life live and act in harmony with nature. In other words, all these kinds of minerals and plants and animals do not destroy their own habitats, they do not kill for pleasure, they do not fornicate just to enjoy themselves; all of these creatures obey the laws of nature and live in harmony with nature.
Unfortunately, upon entering into the intellectual animal kingdom, when the gift of reasoning was given, the intellectual animals became confused, became misled, began to use to power of reasoning in order to justify their animal desires. This is all related in all the world scriptures about the fall of human kind, in other words, of the fall of the intellectual animal.
This situation has resulted in the state of humanity that we have now; these intellectual animals that are actually worse than the animals. Only an animal who is deranged or diseased or desperate will commit an act of violence outside of it's normal behaviour, such as for example, to eat; only an animal who is deranged or diseased will harm himself; only an animal who is deranged or desperate or diseased will destroy indiscriminately, and yet we do that.
The intellectual animals are destroying not only their own habitat, but also their food supply, the air they breathe, the water they drink; destroying their loved ones with anger, with rape, with murder and envy. We kill because of an idea, we kill for fun. Animals do not do that.
Thus, we can see that this intellectual animal is no longer evolving: it is devolving, it is degenerating. The animal mind has become corrupt with ego, with desire. Previous to that entrance of the ego, the mind was a vehicle which could be used, to be in harmony with nature in order to interact, to be an intermediary between consciousness and energy and matter. But, when the mind became corrupted with desire that intermediator began to filter and alter it's reception and projection of images and sensation, and in that way all of our actions, all of our perceptions became corrupted by desire, by lust, by pride.
We can see this reflected in a very interesting way in the development of the child. When a fetus is first conceived in the womb, it has the appearance of a mineral. As that young life begins to develop and grow, it gradually moves through stages of development which mirror or reflect it's ancient evolutionary past. The embryo, at one stage, looks like a plant, and as it develops further it begins to look like a little animal. As it develops further still, it gradually begins to take on the appearance of a human being and eventually is born and at the beginning it is beautiful.
What we see in that child is pure essence, not mind. What we see is consciousness, we see the purity, the innocence, that exceptional beauty that exists in the newborn, and that is the heart of our true self, that innocence.
But, little by little, as the recapitulation of the past continues, the baby begins to accommodate it's mind; it begins to gather to itself it's karma, it's ego and so the baby starts to become bitter, angry, envious, proud, jealous, fearful, in other words: ugly. The baby starts to look like one of us and it loses it's splendor little by little over the course of it's growth, until eventually, when that mind has become fully embodied within that person, the innocence of the baby is lost, is not visible.
All that can be seen at that point is the tremendous filthiness of the ego, which is filtered by the personality. The recapitulation of all that evolutionary past is a very powerful thing to perceive when you really look closely, but what is interesting is the intellectual animal is in a unique position; it is only in this place in the evolutionary scale, in other words at the peak of mechanical evolution, that the human being can be born. It is from that capacity of reasoning where individual will can develop, and that is the birth, the starting place, of a real human being. But, in us, that baby, that innocence, that beauty becomes trapped in pride, in animal instinct, in the impulse to violence.
So, these beautiful children grow up to be murderers, to be rapists, to be politicians who are greedy for power and money, to be stockbrokers or real estate agents or garbage men or whatever role we play in life, but that innocence becomes absorbed, consumed, trapped within all the impulses of the animal mind. Therefore, evolution reaches a peak, mechanical evolution.
Some believe that humanity will enter into a golden age; that somehow we are on the precipice of becoming a very great civilisation. Yet, there is no evidence to support that belief. Where is this golden age going to come from, out of what part of our society will a golden age arise? Humanity does not want a golden age. Humanity does not want peace. If humanity wanted peace, we would not be living the type of life that we live now.
If you observe even the superficial mathematics and statistics of this modern age, they tell us that global military expenditure and arms trade, weapons trade forms the largest percentage of spending in the world, and it is increasing. If humanity really wanted peace, would we invest the most of our time and money into developing weapons? And, what about our habits, our tendencies to destroy our own environment, to destroy our food supplies, to destroy our habitat? Why are we raping the forests, why are we polluting the oceans and the atmosphere? Why are we producing atomic wastes that we do not know what to do with? Humanity is not making a golden age, humanity is digging a grave for itself. Thus, the mind, through mechanical evolution can only reach a certain level. It reaches a peak in the intellectual animal, then it begins to devolve, to degenerate.
Now, early on, as we evolved up through these kingdoms, we had at those times the capacity to perceive more than only the physical, and even our ancestors could perceive things beyond the physical world. This is where we get all of our mythologies, stories about fairies, about goblins and elves, stories of the gods. This is because in past times, the mind was not so degenerated and trapped in desire. Thus, the mind was free to act as an intermediary between physical and superior worlds. As a consequence, we had the powers of clairvoyance to a limited degree, we had the powers of clairaudience, astral projection, we could remember our past lives, etc. But, in the ages since that time, as we have degenerated the mind, we have lost all those abilities. The reason is because our animal mind has become so identified with sensation, with the senses, the physical senses and thus we arrive at the first of the three minds.
The Sensual Mind
The sensual mind is that aspect of mind which is identified with the impressions that come through the physical senses, which only wants that interaction, the interaction between perception or consciousness and sensation, physically. This, ultimately, is the route of the degeneration of mankind.
When we became identified with the senses, we began to lose our capacity to perceive with our other senses, the seven superior senses, which are related to the consciousness and the soul. By being overly identified with the physical senses, the five senses, we gradually lost our connection with the seven superior senses, until the point we are at now, where we laugh at the very idea that anyone can perceive anything beyond the five senses... to us that seems ridiculous.
There is an interesting contradiction here, because even modern science now recognises that visible light is only a small fraction of all of the available light that exists, and the physical dimension is only a small fraction of the dimensions that actually exist. We just simply have lost the capacity to perceive them, even the scientists recognise this; we cannot perceive beyond the physical world. We used to be able to, and we can recover that, and that is the point of gnosis. This is why we study this knowledge, and why we study the two trees in combination; it requires the understanding of both in order to recover, to recuperate those lost abilities. This tendency to be identified with the five senses we call the sensual mind, we also call it materialistic scepticism or materialism.
In theses lectures or in the books of gnosis, you will often hear about the materialistic scientists or materialistic theories and this is referring to physical material, to those people who are identified with the sensual mind and only believe what their physical senses can tell them. People that are identified with the sensual mind refuse to accept anything that they cannot perceive with the physical senses, and thus they laugh at out of body experiences, they reject the notion of god, they laugh at the ancient gods, they do not believe in angels, they do not believe in other dimensions and they do not believe in heaven and hell; they only believe in physical matter and how can you blame them?
It is true the sensual mind cannot perceive anything beyond the senses, but fortunately, this is not the only kind of mind that exists. From this point of view, from the sensual point of view, the reasoning of the intellectual humanoid becomes inferior; it is subjective. In other words, the reasoning of the person trapped in their sensual mind is limited to their perceptions of the physical world, which of course is the most inferior sphere on the Tree of Life. It is the lowest level, excepting of course the Klipoth which is even more inferior… but it cannot be perceived with the physical senses either, so from that point of view we can say that the sensual mind develops and encourages subjective reasoning. The word subjective means, “below, inferior.” The sensual mind does not perceive the animating principals which allow physical reality to exist.
A very simple example: scientists will tell you that your physical body is made up of organs, which are made up of molecules, which are made up of atoms. Atoms, in themselves, are mostly empty space. So, what animates the physical body, if this physical body is mostly water or mostly empty space, according to whichever viewpoint you look at it? What causes it to live? What causes it to be existent? How do we die and why? How do we come to life and why? The scientists cannot answer this, because the animating principals, those forces which cause the physical body to arise to life and to cease living are beyond the physical world; they are not in the physical world.
Scientists do not understand why the brain will function and then not; why the physical body can be so beautifully harmonised, with all of it's systems and then simply stop working. They have theories, but the theories always reach a certain point and then are unanswerable because their theories only penetrate the third dimension. They do not realise that the physical body can only exist and be animated because of the vital body, which is in the fourth dimension.
Chinese medicine knows about the vital body, and that is what they treat with Chinese medicine. But, even that medicine has a limit because even the vital body, which animates the physical body, is animated by a yet more superior principal.
To perceive those superior principals, we need superior perception. That superior perception remains inaccessible to us so long as we reject anything that is outside of the physical senses, and thus the sensual mind is very, very limited.
In the Bible the sensual mind is called Satan. The sensual mind or the materialistic mind is that mind which only believes in sensation, physical sensation and thus is opposed to the soul; it does not believe in the soul, it does not accept in the existence of the soul because it cannot perceive it. Thus, in us, the sensual mind is our own Antichrist; it is symbolised in the book of Revelation as a beast which all of the world worships. The beast does wonders, it makes many apparent miracles and all of the people worship the beast. This is the sensual mind with its materialistic science, which is making atom bombs, making guided rockets and making chemical warfare and making internet pornography, and making all these degenerate tools that we love so much.It is the sensual mind that is teaching humanity how to become more creative in it's destructive abilities, our media, our movies, our television and video games, etc. One of our biggest sellers, one of the things that people consume the most, teachings about violence, teachings about ways to kill, to hurt, not just physically but also through humour, through ridicule. If you look at the most popular shows on television, usually there are shows that demonstrate to us how to be cruel to others, how to make fun at people, how to laugh at people, how to dominate and so humanity is fascinated with dominating others. This is the animal mind, which has become corrupted with desire; this is the Antichrist which everyone has within.
The Intermediate Mind
The next type of mind that is very common in humanity is called the intermediate mind and this type of mind is not related to the senses instead it is related to theories and beliefs. The intermediate mind is that level of mind that inherits or adopts a particular dogma, tradition, religion or theory, and believes in it and will fight for it. The intermediate mind is the mind of all of the believers.
So, in the sensual mind we have all of the sceptics, those who do not believe because they cannot see. However, in the intermediate mind, we have all the fanatics, those who believe even though they cannot see. The fanatics, the believers will fight or kill for a belief, for a theory. In this way we can see that the entirety of humanity is more or less grouped into these two forms of mind. Both are attached to subjective forms of reasoning; the sensual mind is that which says it only accepts that which it can perceive, the intermediate mind says that we must simply believe even though we cannot perceive.
So, even amongst these two types of mind we have conflicts; they fight with each other, this is actually the origin of the separation between religion and politics or governance. What happened was that there were two camps of believers: those fanatics, those believers in the doctrines of science—because, yes, when we talk about fanatics, we are not just talking about religious fanatics, you can be a fanatic of any theory, any idea, any belief. So, in times past the fanatics of science wanted to separate from the fanatics of religion, because they wanted to dominate the fanatics of religion and so they began to rely on the ideas of the sensual min: that you must be able to prove empirically, with the physical senses, that which you state. Thus, this division began to arise in some of our cultures. But, in past times, there was no such division.
In a great, enlightened culture, the priest teaches both religion and science because both religion and science—true religion and true science—are products of awakened consciousness. Nonetheless, the intermediate mind says that we must believe, we must "have faith."
So, religions usually rely on this idea of faith, and scientists usually rely on this idea of the sensual mind. Scientists want some kind of evidence and believers want some kind of faith. But, really, what they are calling faith is just belief.
What the word faith really means is experience. To have faith in something means that you can give witness to it's truth, because you have experienced it. So that word used to be used like this: “I give faith that it is true,” which means that it is my experience that it is true.
So, when we analyse the nature of this word faith we have to understand that this is not just belief. What is curious about the people who fall into the intermediate mind is that the beliefs that they adopt are not their own; people become fanatics about someone else’s ideas. We hear about, or we read about, or we are told a doctrine, a dogma, a theory, and then we become attached to that, we become dependent upon it. From that point on, we become a fanatic.
A fanatic is blindly attached, has no experience of the truth, or lack of truth for that belief, they merely believe. In the Bible these people are called Pharisees. Pharisees love to show themselves in the temple, to appear holy and just, to be admired, to be on top of the world and yet they do not have any experience of what they talk about, the same is true in science. Scientists will fight and argue over concepts and theories which they themselves have never experienced, and many of the followers of the new priesthood of science do the same; they fight and argue over doctrines and dogmas which they themselves have never experienced or confirmed but have read a paper or in a book and they believe it, because it adopts well to their sensual mind and it's form of reasoning. In other words, in both of these forms of mind we create idols, we create forms in our mind which we then worship.
These forms are theories, dogmas, beliefs, ideas, points of view, when we can really start to see this in ourselves it becomes painful. We do not like to see it. We do not like to see that the idol we have created of our own self image is not seen by anyone else in the world. Not a single person in the entire world sees you the way you want to be seen. No one. In fact, if someone tells you what they really see in you, you will not believe them. You will reject their belief because we all have this intermediate mind, which has become a fanatic of our own religion: the religion of our own false self, this idol that we worship of our own supposed identity.
Some of us believe that we are good people, spiritual people doing our best and yet if someone comes to us and says; you did this wrong, you did that wrong, I cannot believe you did this and that, we do not believe them, we justify ourselves. Some of us see ourselves as bad, some of us have this idol in the mind that we worship that we are terrible people; we love to punish ourselves, we are masochists. If someone comes and says, “you have done a good job,” we do not believe them, we doubt it. Whatever form our own self worship has, it is an idol which has no relationship with the truth.
Both of these forms of mind, sensual and intermediate, are subjective. They rely on forms of perception which have nothing to do with actual reality. That is why we need to know about the third type of mind, this is called the inner mind.
The Inner Mind
With this third type of mind we begin to enter into objective science, objective perception. In other words, superior forms of perception, which are beyond merely physical forms of perception that see what is, not what we think, not what we believe, not what we wish but what is. But, to have that kind of perception, we have to abandon subjective perception.
The sensual and the intermediate minds form their concepts based on sensorial data, information that comes through the five senses. Firstly, in the sensual mind: being identified with sensations; and through the intermediate mind: through beliefs and dogmas that we hear, that we learn, that we study. In both cases, these are forms of attachment which develop a quality of the heart.
People in the sensual mind and the intermediate mind believe very much in what they fight for; they feel it in the heart. The scientists, the materialists who only accept physical reality believe that it is true, and that is all that exists. They believe that in their heart, and the fanatics and the believers who adopt a religion, or adopt a science as their chosen dogma, believe very much in their heart that it is real. Unfortunately, they are not seeing the whole picture.
The inner mind forms it's concepts, forms it's understandings based on the direct perception of the awakened consciousness. In other words, consciousness that is not trapped in desire, consciousness that is not trapped in the animal mind. Put another way: if we are a fanatic about a given religion and we try to meditate to open the inner mind, that fanaticism will obscure our perception. This includes being a fanatic of gnosis.
There are many who become fanatics of this teaching, who study this teaching, who believe very much in this teaching, but do not experience it. Thus, they stay in the intermediate mind. Let us state very clearly: the purpose of gnosis is not to convert sceptics into believers, it is not to convert sensual mind devotees into intermediate mind devotees. The purpose of gnosis is to awaken your own consciousness, to open your inner mind, to perceive for yourself the objective truth of your own existence. To do that, the consciousness needs a mediator, it needs a mirror, a device by which it can purely reflect the outside or the inside. That mediator is a solar mind not an animal mind.
The Solar Mind
Humanity has developed through these lower kingdoms, and has developed a lunar mind or animal mind, a collective mind. To develop individual mind, we need to give birth to that. This is what Jesus was addressing in the Gospels when he said we must be born again. That birth is the birth of the solar mind.
The birth of the soul is the development of the true human being. We need to become a real human being, not an intellectual animal, but a human being.
The word mind is derived from the Sanskrit word, manas. Manas has different interpretations but in general relates to mind. The mind that we have dominates us: the animal mind. The animal mind is ruling over our activities, we are victims of animal impulses, lust, pride, envy, jealousy, etc. To become a real human being is to put the “Hu” (which is a word that in Sanskrit means, “spirit”) in charge of manas: to be hu-man. It is to have the spirit, to have God, to have the consciousness be in charge of our mind, doing and performing the acts that God puts us to do. That is only accomplished when we have created a human mind, a solar mind. In that way the consciousness can then perceive the objective truths. The science to accomplish that is the science of the Tree of Knowledge.
The solar mind is born through the science of the Tree of Knowledge; it is activated through awakened consciousness. These are different things. To give birth to the solar mind is one thing, to awaken the consciousness is another thing. But, then if we have given birth to that solar mind and we have awakened consciousness, we also have to develop that solar mind. The solar mind is developed with meditation.
So, you see here many aspects to the teaching, this is a deep science. Meditation is not spacing out. It is not just to repeat a mantra. It is not to sit in a posture and fall asleep; by mediation, we mean a state of heightened conscious perception. Not just a state of equanimity, a state of conscious perception within which objective truth can be perceived. Another word for this is samadhi. This is how the inner mind is developed through meditation.
This development is in relation to seven superior senses, which relate to the seven chakras or churches. Each of these seven senses are things like clairvoyance, clairaudience, polyvoyance, remembrance of past lives things, intuition, etc. Those seven senses are the abilities that are latent in every person, but that can be developed and that can give us the capacity to perceive beyond the physical senses. They are senses in the same way the physical senses function; the superior senses also perceive, but they perceive in a different way. This is like comparing a microscope with a telescope, in the famous example: if you want to study something that is very far away in space you cannot use a microscope. In other words, you cannot use the sensual mind, you need a telescope, you need a mode of perception, an intermediary that allows you to perceive that and that intermediary is the solar mind. Through the perceptions that we retrieve, through the combination of the seven superior senses and the five physical senses, we then start to develop objective reasoning.
As stated, the solar mind is developed through meditation. But, by meditation I am referring to a state of heightened conscious perception; this includes the physical senses. It includes all twelve of our senses and it is through conscious objective perception that we perceive, directly, the truth, the state of things as they actually are.
Through these twelve senses we see not only the third dimension, but the fourth, the fifth, the sixth, even the seventh. In that way, we can see the animating principals of each level. With these forms of perception, we are able to then see what are the animating principals of the physical body and what are the animating principals of the vital body, or the astral body, or the mental body. But, this is not used as a form of entertainment. This is not something that is done just because it is interesting. This capacity of the inner mind is an absolute necessity. It is only with the perceptions of the inner mind that we can perceive the causes of suffering, and we can directly investigate why we suffer. We can then discover the causes of our pain, the causes of our problems and then derive new causes in order to solve them. So long as we remain ignorant of the causes of our own lust, our own pride, our fear, our gluttony, our greed we will be unable to change them, and those things can not be seen with the physical senses; physically, we only see the results.
This is a very important thing to comprehend. Meditation in this way can be understood to be the heart and soul of this teaching. We study the Two Trees of the Garden of Eden, in order to understand the two fundamental aspects of the knowledge, but to really understand them, to perceive them, to live them, we have to meditate, we can not become just believers.
Through the process of awakening the inner mind we begin to develop objective reasoning, objective science; in other words, we begin to arrive at real faith, because we experience the truth. We no longer just believe it, we experience it. But the problem exists that, even if we take this knowledge very seriously, we enter into the science of transmutation and we give birth to the soul, we give birth to that inner mind, the ego still exists; our desires, our animal impulses, our capacities for violence still exist and the danger is still there. This is a very grave situation, because in this context we have a capacity to create a lot of problems for ourselves and others.
The example given often is that someone who has the inner mind open and begins to perceive things can then begin to misinterpret them, because of the influence of their own sensual mind or intermediate mind. And, through those misinterpretations, can create problems. They may start to proclaim themselves as being a master or to start defaming others, or claiming other people are sorcerers or black magicians and these kind of problems are quite common.
So, it is necessary for us to have a great deal of restraint and to know this: the developed inner mind has no scepticism. The developed inner mind does not commit acts of violence, violence in the sense of animal impulses which seek to dominate others. The inner mind is that mind of a real human being, someone like Buddha or Jesus. A person like this is an embodiment of serenity, of compassion and therefore that inner mind, when it is developed, does not harm itself or others. It always seeks the good of others.
So, if we observe in ourselves the desire to gossip, the desire to criticise, to blame, to talk badly of others, none of these have anything to do with the inner mind. It is our animal mind which seeks to dominate. The real man, the real human being, wakens and opens the inner mind and has become a hu-man. This person thinks for themselves. The real human being does not imitate the beliefs of others, or adopt a doctrine, or theory, or a dogma and imitate it; the real human being investigates the truth consciously, for themselves, and then lives that.
This is not something easy to do. In order to accomplish it, the ego has to be removed. What allows the opening and awakening of the inner mind is the removal of the ego. When desire is present it creates problems. Desire is lust, is pride, fear, the craving to have recognition, a craving to be seen, these are all forms of desire. Those who remain enthroned in their sensual mind and remain sceptical, doubting all things that they cannot perceive, become what the Bible calls Pilate or Judas. These people remain attached to sensation, to materialism and they become capable of betraying the Christ, betraying their own being.
What happens is that, even if we develop the inner mind, the sensual mind is there to tempt us. It is the sensual mind, Satan, that tempted Christ, Jesus in the wilderness; tempted him with all the pleasures in the world, tempted him through the bread of knowledge, tempted him to perform miracles, tempted him to worship the sensual mind. Every initiate faces these temptations, the temptations to sell the master for money.
Those initiates who develop the inner mind, the solar mind, and begin to perceive things objectively, or beyond the physical world, begin to see themselves as being very wise, begin to believe themselves to be great masters and even begin to believe themselves to be more wise than their own master… thus, they become Judas.
The result of the intermediate mind when it is enthroned within us is the Pharisee. The Pharisee is the one who loves to be seen at the temple, the one who likes to be worshiped, the one who believes himself to be holy and good, and all other men are less than him... the Pharisee betrays the Christ.
The development of the inner mind is a very demanding process, and there is a great conflict which unfolds itself in the life of any initiate who seeks it's development. That conflict is internal, psychological, spiritual, between these different types of mind that we all have within.
All of us now have sensual mind and intermediate mind; we have things that we will only accept if we can perceive them physically, and we have things that we accept on mere blind faith. Once we develop the inner mind and open the inner mind, then there is another player in the conflict, and we are always being tested to see who will we empower. Where do we put our trust? Do we put our trust in our faith, in blind faith? Do we put our trust in what we can perceive with the senses, in materialism, in money, in power? Or, do we put our trust in our own inner Christ, the Christ mind?
In the Bible, Jesus advise his disciples to not eat of the yeast of the Pharisees and the Sadducees. The Pharisees are those believers who have enthroned their own intermediate mind, and who represent a certain doctrine or a teaching, and teach it and present themselves as great masters or leaders of men and who demand obeisance. They teach their doctrine, their religion, but they inject into it their own point of view, their own ideas, their own beliefs, their own fanaticism and that is the yeast that they put into that bread of wisdom. Gnosis recognises that every religion springs from the same universal root, and that every religion has great beauties and gifts for mankind. But, unfortunately they have all also been infected with yeast of the Pharisees and Sadducees.
The Sadducees are the scribes, the intellectuals, those who only believe in their sensual mind. Thus, they may teach a doctrine, or a theory, or a belief, but remove from it anything that they cannot perceive directly such as reincarnation, the nature of the soul and things of that sort. So they inject yeast into that doctrine and it becomes impure.
Do you know what yeast is? Yeast is a bacteria. People put yeast into bread because that bacteria consumes little proteins in the bread, and when the bacteria consumes it that bacteria then releases gas, which inflates the bread and makes it appear bigger and more tasty and more attractive to the senses.
The symbol of putting the yeast into the bread is quite profound, because the Pharisees (the fanatics), and the Sadducees (the intellectuals) inject into religion, into doctrine, into dogma, into theory this bacteria, and it is a bacteria that produces hot air, flatulence. So, it inflates that doctrine as if to make it more tasty, to make it more agreeable to the taste of the buyer so it is a deception, it is impure.
What we see is the Sadducees, all the intellectuals and the Pharisees, all the fanatics, the believers are injecting yeast into their religions, into their dogmas, in order to make their religions and dogmas more attractive, so that people will like them better. What is the easiest way to do that? Offer them bread that supports their lust, that says it is okay to fornicate, it is okay to be proud, it is okay to have anger, it is okay to hate, it is okay to commit violence or it is okay to be a sexual degenerate, and so they develop theories and doctrines and beliefs that feed the ego. This is all garbage. The inner mind has nothing to do with it.
The one who opens the inner mind begins to see the objective truth, the objective realities of a religion, of a doctrine or a dogma, becomes the greatest enemy for those Pharisees and Sadducees, because the one who has the inner mind can see the yeast, can see the impurities and can point them out. Then, the Sadducees and the Pharisees, and all the intellectuals and fanatics, become enraged because the prophets, the bodhisattvas, those real human beings who have objective reasoning and objective perception begin to take away the yeast from the religions. Thus, the Pharisees and Sadducees begin to lose money; they begin to lose power, they feel threatened. That is why they crucified Jesus, that is why they crucified Peter, that is why they punished the gnostics, that is why the inquisition existed. That is why there have been so many Prophets and saints who have been martyred, because they perceived the yeast, the leaven, the impure elements that are added to the bread.
What we need is pure bread, unleavened. No bacteria, nothing added and nothing taken out, but the pure bread of the Eucharist, which is that bread of wisdom that Christ provides through all his teachings; not just Christianity, not just what we call gnosis, but the pure bread of wisdom that is the heart content of every religion. This is what humanity needs. But we cannot consume that bread if we take that religion merely as a belief, or if we take from that religion only what we can grasp or see with our physical senses. That bread is not for the sensual mind, the bread of the Christ is not for the intermediate mind, it is for the inner mind, for the consciousness itself. Therefore, we have to dominate our mind, to conquer it; to conquer the sensual mind and the intermediate mind, to put the inner mind in charge.
The inner mind under the guidance and command of the inner being guides us, if we learn how to receive his instructions.
Questions and Answers
Instructor: Do you have any questions?
Audience: How do Marxism and Leninism relate to the subject of this lecture?
Instructor: The doctrines related to Marxism are doctrines of the sensual mind, because they are doctrines that reject religion and only accept what is physical, the sensual mind. But what is very strange about those doctrines related to Marxism, that Carl Marx propagated, is that they were created by the intermediate mind. The doctrine of Marxism was created by a Rabbi who wanted to destroy religions, in order to implant his own. So, this is a very devious thing. It was a mechanism to manipulate the sensual mind from the point of view of the intermediate mind.
Any other questions?
Audience: Are the sensual and intermediate minds are destroyed as we progress along the path?
Instructor: Yes and no. The intermediate mind is, because that mind has no ground to stand on; it is merely blind faith. This is an aspect of the ego that has no grounding in objective truth. The sensual mind however, is that aspect of mind which acts as an intermediary between the physical world and the consciousness, and we need that. So long as we are living in the physical world we need the mechanism to receive the impressions of sensation, which arrive through that mind, but that mind has to be clean, pure, under the control of the spirit.
Any other questions?
Audience: What are the differences between the solar and lunar mind?
Instructor: The Lunar mind is developed in the inferior kingdoms of nature, all of which are under the command of the moon, the lunar forces, the Divine Mother in other words. The job of the Divine Mother Nature is to provide this womb or environment within which that mind can evolve, until it is ready to leave that womb and develop itself fully.
So, while the mind is within the womb of the mother nature it is a lunar mind. It's collective because all the bodies of those physical bodies of those different creatures in the mind level are united. That is why, when we watch birds, they move as one.
The physical body we have is a component of many parts. It is a collective which is a reflection of that mind as well. So, when we look at the movement of animals or plants or birds or minerals we see they move in groups. The highest form of animals begin to move as individuals, to prepare themselves for that experience of developing individual mind.
Individual mind is solar mind; this is a mind that is under the guidance of Christ and can act as an individual, as a solar individual and that is outside of the womb of mother nature so there is a great difference.
Yes, a child has animal mind. When we first see the baby, what we see is just the essence, the consciousness, no mind. The animal mind is not there yet and that is why that child is so beautiful. We see the purity of the baby. It is little by little that that inheritance, karmic and egotistical inheritance, begins to incorporate itself within that organism and that child changes. Sometimes you can see how a baby has certain qualities which will vanish over the coming years and that baby will have a totally different mode of behaviour after a couple of years. That is because of that animal mind which is now incorporated and absorbed or obscured the consciousness. It is gradual. It depends upon the heaviness of the karma.
Other questions?
Audience: Is the golden age based on the solar mind?
Instructor: The real golden age will come, but a golden age cannot come out of the animal mind. When we say golden age, we are talking about a time, a civilisation, a way of living and existing, which is harmonious. There is nothing harmonious in the ego, there is nothing harmonious in this civilisation that we have now. So, in order for a golden age to arise it has to be produced by causes which can support it, which can result in that condition; the ego cannot produce a golden age, it is impossible. It is like saying that anger can solve a problem... anger cannot solve anything. Anger is a fire that destroys. It is like saying violence can solve a situation, it does not. It may postpone something, if you have a conflict with someone and you kill them, you solve it in a sense, temporarily, but there is a cycle of energy there that has to be satisfied. So, in the next existence you will be killed... then a perpetual suffering is engendered.
For a golden age to exist there has to be causes which give rise to it, and those causes are found only in the inner mind, in the consciousness. That is why, when we study gnosis, we find a great deal of information related to the golden age and prophesies that are made about the fate of this current humanity. Those who remain seated on the throne of the intermediate mind, remaining just as believers, have no future in the golden age. Those who remain enthroned in their sensual mind, only accepting what they can perceive with their physical senses, also have no future in the golden age, and the Bible states as much.
In the Bible it says:
No disbeliever or sceptic, no man without faith can enter into the new Jerusalem, those who doubt had better prepare themselves to enter into the abyss.
This is very powerful. We have to study ourselves to remove from ourselves the sceptic, the fanatic, and that way, we open the inner mind and begin to see the objective truth. Then we can gain entrance into that golden age. But that has to be earned. It is not earned as if someone is going to grant you the right, it is earned when you develop the causes that allows that to happen spontaneously.
Audience: What role does the abyss play in relation to these minds?
Instructor: Obviously the Inner mind has nothing to do with the abyss. The inner mind is the mind of the free consciousness, the mind that sees objectively. The abyss, or hell, is the inferior levels of nature, which are entirely constituted by all those elements which only perceive subjectively. Thus, the sensual mind and the intermediate mind reflect that, they relate to that.
Really, the abyss is a medicine, in the sense that it is by the means of the purifying fires of the abyss, that great engine, that the mind can be cleansed. So, all of those false beliefs, false ideas, subjective dogmas and theories can be cleansed off of that consciousness and made pure. This is very painful. It takes a long time. It is better if we do it ourselves. It is better for us if we avoid the descent into the abyss and the second death, because that process is very painful, very long and in the end we gain nothing by it. But, if we take seriously the science, we analyse ourself every day, we dominate our mind, we reject our own inner Pharisee, the fanatic who just believes, we reject the sensual mind that demands physical evidence for everything then we have the possibility to change and open that inner mind and thereby gain the capacity to perceive directly for ourselves. This is an inner revolution that we have to perform, no one can do it for us.
The best approach for a beginning student is to not accept gnosis or reject it; to not make a decision. In other words, to not let the mind go into extremes of yes or no, for or against, accepting or rejecting.
The tendency of both the sensual mind and the intermediate mind is to do exactly that; to immediately classify every impression and put it in the yes camp or the no camp, like we have a filing cabinet in our mind.
We hear an idea, we say that is not true, we put it in the no box. We hear another idea and say that must be true and we put it in the yes box... we have to avoid that.
The approach that a gnostic student should take is to do the practices; to try it, to experiment, to work with it, it is only in that way that we can really see anything anyway. Whether we accept it or reject we gain nothing, it is only by experiencing it that we gain something. This is difficult because of the mind that we have. Our mind either wants to accept it or reject it. It takes a kind of maturity for us to be able to study it without attachment either for or against but with an open mind. This is actually the symbol of the Buddha holding the bowl in his open hand; if you look at paintings and sculptures of the Buddha, you see that he has an empty bowl facing upwards and this is symbolic of the beginner mind. The beginners mind contains all possibilities, anything is possible in the mind of a child, the beginners mind, but in the mind of the expert there are no possibilities. The one who thinks he knows already will not accept anything else and this is the problem with fanatics, believers and sceptics: they think they know, they believe they know, but they do not.
If the sceptics and the believers actually knew something, they would not need to fight, there would be no need for them to fight. None of us have to fight over the colour of the sky, we can all see it and say, “Yes, I can see the colour. So what?”
In ancient times it was the same way. The ancient humanities could perceive the gods, they could all see the gods, there was no need to fight over the gods. But nowadays we fight over things which we cannot see. The same happens with students who come into the teaching: they accept some things, reject other things; they believe some things, they do not believe other things and they create conflicts for themselves and others. So, again, the best thing is to suspend your judgement. Neither believe nor disbelieve; neither accept nor reject, perform it, this is the whole point of gnosis.
If gnosis were to become a mere belief, all of this would be a waste of time. None of us are interested in gnosis becoming a belief, no gnostic instructor should be trying to make a sceptic into a believer, or to fill the ranks with people who merely accept the teaching. The purpose of a gnostic instructor is to guide the student to experience that truth for themselves. In other words, for that student to become self reliant, to stand on their own, to not be dependent upon a belief.
Audience: [Question about the Buddha's bowl turning upside down.]
Instructor: This is true. The problem happens that when we think we know, when we think we are an expert, when we become a believer, the 'bowl' of our own mind turns upside down; we become a supposed 'expert' or supposed 'master' or a supposed 'great instructor' and in that context, when we become that so called 'expert' that bowl is pointed downward, meaning that our mind is then perceiving the subjective levels of nature. It is no longer perceiving what is objective. In that way people make mistakes. This is why the beginner mind is so important.
Those who become full of themselves, believing in their own expertise or their own mastery or their own achievements begin to bring those klipothic elements, subjective elements of hell up. That is what their bowl is receiving, and some of them do it in wrong ways and begin giving the teaching in wrong ways, like taking drugs, using mushrooms or marijuana or other kinds of intoxicants to stimulate the senses to perceive something beyond the physical world. This does not result in the perception of anything objective; those forms of chemical influences only open the perceptions of hell. They open subjective animal mind perception, that is all. Likewise, practitioners of black tantrism who fornicate, who meditate, who work with their consciousness, they perceive beyond the physical world but they do not perceive the objective worlds, they only perceive and have power in the Klipoth, hell, in the animal mind, and this is evidenced by their behaviours, by their teachings, by their violence, by their anger, their pride, their fear, resentment. These are not people of serenity, of compassion, so we have to make a clear differentiation for ourselves. It is a very important understanding for a gnostic student to have to really study these three types of mind in ourselves and outside. Many people in these times appear on the outside to be saints, they appear to be good and holy and pure but they are Pharisees; they look like masters but they are wolves.
Thank you.
