e-Pentagram

Electronic Bulletin of the

The Lec&"$i' R"%ic$'cia!' C"!&ac& I!f"$ a&i"! P'blic Ac&i(i&ie% Pa$able ab"'& &he Ge!e%i% "f a B")l O(e$c" i!g &he I

Lectorium Rosicrucianum

November 2013

e-Pentagram
C"!&e!&% The Lectorium Rosicrucianum Contact Information Public Activities Parable about the Genesis of a Bo l Overcoming the I

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* The te!t of this issue is from Pentagram maga#ine articles published b" the Lectorium Rosicrucianum.

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Parable about the genesis of a bowl

A tale about the genesis of human consciousness; from the start, through many consecutive steps and stages, to its high destination.

Unaware, sunk in darkness, the clay, the earth sleeps. At the same time, in the daylight, a master is waiting, a potters wheel, a cool place, an oven, the world of time and space, and a space for consciousness. Not all kinds of earth are suitable for burning a bowl. It must be clay. We can imagine how, in a lengthy process, during many rotations of the earth, stones and minerals are split, and after lengthy grinding, dust will be carried to the sea and sink to the depths. Compressed under the weight of many drops, the dust rests for days and nights. How long does a cosmic night, or a cosmic day last? Climate changes, ice ages, glaciers and the transformation of the earth then turn up what has been below for a long time. Clay may have been formed in this way.

And then grass covers it all. Who knows

where suitable clay can be found? The master. He removes the upper layer and digs up the clay. He takes the precious substance to his workshop and cleans it. The clay undergoes the touch, the change; light is all around it, but it does not know anything, it does not understand anything. What it perceives are the hands of the master. They surround it, they seize it. A tremor runs through the fertile, but still
10

lifeless substance, and still the clay does not understand anything. Yet the process has started. The master is the designer of a wondrous wheel, which is under his control too. Yet this wheel cannot move. Why should it? Everything has to return to where it comes from. The wheel has a vertical axis, like the axis of the stars, which consequently all point to the centre of the universe. The axis of each potters wheel points to the centre of the earth. The axes of carts stem from the same principle, but these axes are placed horizontally and thus revolve in a circle. The wondrous wheel of the master potter is now made to rotate. On top of the potters wheel is a lump of clay, unformed. Taken from chaos, it is brought into contact with the centre by the order of the axis. With certainty the hands of the master seize the unformed. Without hesitation they form that which rises up from the unformed and will have content. After all, no content without form, no form without content. The lump is opened up. The master adds water to the earth, grasps the inside and shapes. As by a miracle everything grows and gets a body. Moist and shiny the clay turns around. It smiles and says: Look, thats me. The master knows what he does, he feels what he knows and acts as his craft prescribes. His will is done. In that way the clay becomes a bowl. It revolves around its inner axis. That is why it doesnt go out of its orbit. It is under the

calm hand of the master. As a result, it approaches perfection. Its form encloses the empty space which develops around the axis. LaoTzu says: One rightly moulds the clay into a drinking bowl; precisely where there is nothing, lies the use of the bowl. The bowl is a tool to be used. Due to its empty space it can contain everything. It is imprisoned. It lets itself be enclosed, filled, emptied and carried. It wants nothing, it just wants to be useful, to serve. But all of this will come later. Now it is still happy, glad about the rotations, which slow down and eventually come to a standstill. Like a child the bowl would like to call: Again. The potter, however, takes it off the wheel, on which it is standing. It feels an unspeakable grief when the potter takes it away from the part of the earth from which it originated; takes it away from the potters wheel which had become its second nature. Now it knows that it came from the quarry, from the depth, where the great rotation could not be experienced. Now the bowl experiences for the last

time the movement in a wide arc and then stands quiet, warm, soft and moist next to others, which are already there. It looks around and sees the others: brothers and sisters of very different shapes and sizes. It feels kinship; it is surrounded by even more shiny appearances, yes, it feels at home. Also further on, at the end of the shelves, there are other, similar forms of different sizes, which do not shine. They dont look alive anymore. They do not make a soft impression. They seem rather hard and dry. So what, it thinks,we here in the front are closer to the light; we shine! Every day new bowls are made by the hands of the master. Fresh and soft they are put down. Room is made, things are moved further back, away from the light of the earthly day, further away into the cold, away from the moist surroundings. The newer ones are now in front and look around. One knows this look, one knows. One watches the activity, becomes ever dryer, becomes quiet and waits. From time to time the master comes and carries a group of cooled-down, dry
11

Tea bowl with moon sickle and clouds on white background. Nonomura Ninsel, around 1660. National Museum, Tokio, Japan.

bowls to another room with an oven. Careful, so that nothing will break in this fragile phase or cracks will occur, they are placed close together. When the space is filled and nothing can be added, the oven is closed. The door is closed. Joy all around. One knows what was. No one wants to go out again, back to the clay quarry, to the revolving axis, to the moist and soft ones. One holds still and waits. One has heard that something fabulous, something incomprehensible will occur. It will become light. One has heard ^ one does not know what will come. One is quiet and waits. The master, who has built everything, knows what he does. This is his craft. He knows his creatures, his creations. The creature knows that it is one with the master.There is joy in the room; joy about the heat, joy about the new bowls. The dry bowls in the oven lose the last water which was still in them. It is chemically bound. By the fire of purification the last traces of immaturity are removed. Hour after hour all are together in the oven. In the darkness of the unconscious it dawns. Outlines become visible. The inner eye starts beholding. Where does this light come from? Nothing can be seen. There is no flame, no sun which shines. Yet, all see everything ever more clearly. It is like an aurora. It is like a sunrise. Softly each bowl shines of itself. Standing in rest, inwardly conscious of the axis, it becomes ever lighter. The light emanates from everyones inner reflection. All are standing together in indescribable heat and light. All are alight, radiate, and are standing in the enlightenment. Now they know, they remember the heat from which they once originated: we did not pull ourselves up from the clay. We ourselves did not erect the axis in us; we did not purify ourselves in the fire.

We are ^ but not on the basis of ourselves. We are standing, our axis directed in Tao. In this knowledge, everything old has passed away. They have become thoroughly hardened. Now it begins to cool down. It is silent. The time has come. Waiting has been learned.The expectation of what is new. Standing in the fire is a foretaste of an activity, of being able to fulfil a function in eternal light. Here in the state of transience, bowls are used which have learned to wait, to take, to give, to serve in the process of their creation. Now the door is opened, the door to a new stage, to a new phase. They are stepping outside, out of the space which until now was the oven. They are entering into a world which burns in another way, in an earthly way. All are still grouped together, but already the new masters are coming, the new lords of the house, and they choose, they select us. Each bowl gets its place, fulfils its function. In this process many have grown old, very old. They do not ask for content or emptiness. They do not ask for time. They are ready day and night. Many are highly valued, are precious in the eyes of people. Many are seriously damaged. Is it their fault that they exist? Havent they been erected on the same vertical axis? And the master? He watches the axes from above and laughs. The axis? From above it is only a speck. It is like a particle of dust from the clay, like air in a drop of water, like a seed burning in my heart.

12

Overcoming the I

Sometimes a seeker encounters something which strikes him as very special. A poem from an unexpected corner which strikes a long-buried chord and reminds him of his childhood. A teaching from ancient Gnostic times, which suddenly ^ quite contradictorily ^ awakens in him the understanding that it is the present which counts, or rather his reaction, his own action in the present.

A seeker who has become more or less

familiar with the ideas of the Lectorium Rosicrucianum, knows that the existence of two life spheres is the fundamental basis of its teachings. In the first life sphere a human being tries to build and maintain an existence in this nature. This makes up a large part of his activities. The second life sphere, extensively and profoundly discussed in literature, is unknown, confusing and vague to a large part of humanity. Many people categorically deny it, just as they deny God or the living principle in other human beings. Some of them have an inkling, but they do not know where to focus their seeking. Countless people experience a longing for unearthly happiness and pursue it in every earthly way possible. But there are also many people who are suddenly touched by the image of the living principle. They recognise it in themselves, and they see it in others. Or they see the harrowing suffering both on a world scale and on a smaller scale, close to home, and

they are touched by it: why am I not able to do more? They search for answers, from teachers, or in world literature; they read about a light spark, a soul spark, or about a spiritual principle. Jan van Rijckenborgh and Catharose de Petri write in their books about the spirit-spark, about a light principle in the centre of a human being which forms the essence of the inner God, of an inner, spiritual human being, who is directly linked to the second life sphere. This is what lies as a promise, as a plan, as a blueprint, around and within a human being. It is special when a seeker recognises something of this spiritual human being within himself. But he, or she, is not this human being. A long road lies ahead, before he can be it. At one time the classical Rosicrucians expressed this as follows: He is still hampered by a few eagles feathers. Firstly: he is a human being of the first life sphere. He necessarily needs to devote a large part of his attention and possibilities to this, because within this sphere he must live his life. Secondly: the properties of the potential new human being often do not at all correspond to what he deems necessary for daily existence. They are not properties of the I, which puts its own imagined importance in the forefront. This is a fundamental principle. Every past movement has pointed this out and every new attempt in the future will continue to point this out: the I-human being belongs to the first life sphere; only a com19

A guard rides haute e cole. Nobuzane, approx.1200 BC.

pletely different human being, a soulhuman being, can belong to the new life sphere, often called the Kingdom (by Jesus, who brought the Christ), or Nirvana (by the Buddha), or the New Life Field (by the Lectorium Rosicrucianum). This is why it is not surprising that many traces of movements can be found
20

throughout history, which have tried to make the I decrease, yes, which even used this as a point of departure for the genesis of a spiritual, inner human being. The I is ignorant, the ancient Gnostics stated. Gnosis, inner knowledge of the heart brings true knowledge, and can link the human being with the Sophia,

the light human being of old. The old human being, the old Adam as was stated in the Middle Ages,was totally unsuitable, and hence an instrument of the devil.That is why the new Christ had to be resurrected to save the human soul and take it to his kingdom.The great Bogomil, Paulician and Cathar movements fanned out in the northern countries around the Mediterranean, taught the endura in which the old human being ^ symbolically, but no less real ^ died with respect to his earthly nature and was reborn in three stages. Then he would overcome the earth and his first joyful step on the way of the stars would be a fact, because a totally new ensoulment had come to the fore. On the eastern side of the Mediterranean, an Arabian wisdom developed. When the Roman empire disintegrated, and the West, depopulated and without culture, made the first attempts to achieve a social structure, a civilisation rich in knowledge, inventive in physics and chemistry, and overwhelming in its eastern beauty, flourished on the Arabian peninsula and in Persia. Islam was a religion which had a high regard for tolerance and hospitality, but soon the last representatives of the ancient Egyptian Gnosis were compelled to go underground. This cannot be blamed on any specific religion, such as Islam or Christianity, but rather on religion as a general dogma: by definition, enforced rules are detrimental to an inner, free encounter with the spirit of the original life sphere. This explains why, very soon, an inner path emerged as a reaction to the development of the Islamic exoteric teachings.

Classical Sufism

Just as it is part of human nature to suppress free inner development due to ignorance, or a lack of knowledge, so does searching for a way to God belong to the human being, and this can never be permanently suppressed. An inner explanation of the Koran developed, and other holy writings were created, but the main concern was with the practical way of life, which would lead human beings out of the swaddling cloths of society, religion and time. People who followed this path were called Sufis, after the woollen garments they wore. Numerous writings, particularly between the 9 th and 13 th century, shed light on the path from various angles. This is the time of classical Sufism. The directions and reflections written at that time are still of fundamental importance to its practitioners up to this day. Descriptions of experiences, biographies and parables testify of the enormous depth, which is found whenever human beings and the Gnosis form a unity again and emerge into a new dawn. This is why it is gratifying and at the same time self-evident that much has been preserved in the works of the Sufis concerning the overcoming of the I through a mode of life, which has its centre in God. This sort of Sufi writing describes what the Cathars called the endura, a path of self-surrender to the divine soul principle in a human being. Detailed observations alternate with a wealth of short statements, which stimulate reflection and show that traditional thinking patterns are useless on the path of soul liberation. They merely served as a guide for others, still far behind, in
21

their quest. The Sufi writings show that the path is a matter of the present in ones own life and that each subsequent step can only be taken with the available light at that moment.
The journey and the oasis

Just as a journey through the desert is impossible, or even suicidal, without stopping places at the right distances, oases where both camels and human beings can find food, shade and water, so the Sufis often divide the path into states of being (hal) and resting places (maqam). Both are an indispensable necessity for a candidate. The state of the traveller, that is the state of being of the seeker, is being on the path, the journey through the desert. Without his own, tireless efforts, neither traveller nor candidate can progress one step in the desert. Without an oasis or resting place both will perish, because at the stopping places they find shade, teachings, refreshment and greater inner depth; they are offered the right food to continue the journey. We can see this around us. Thus, the oasis is like a temple. We can see this as an inner accomplishment: thus, the oasis is the growing soul garment. The journey and the stages are passing phenomena, the resting places are permanent. It is said: every state of being is a gift, the resting places are accomplishments. The journey, the path, is a blessing; by going forward, a resting place is reached. The various stages of consciousness stem from pure generosity and these stages are born of the utmost exertion. Whoever possesses a resting place is based on a firm foundation, his state of
22

being helps the traveller along. The candidate needs both the help of the resting place as well as his own tireless efforts. Al-Ghazzali, an Arabian theologian, who, after years of searching, switched to Sufism, and tried to reconcile orthodoxy and Sufism in his work (an attempt which was, by definition, doomed to failure). In the systematic way that characterises much of his work, he divides a stage into three aspects: knowledge or insight, attitude, and action. He says: Insight is the root. It leads to a state of consciousness and this state of consciousness generates actions. Hence insight can be compared to trees, the state of consciousness to branches and the actions to the fruits. This is generally true for all stages of him who goes the path to God. Yet, in reality experiences are usually not as clearly systematic as they are in literature. In reality, the various resting places and states of consciousness are mixed up and mutually influence each other. This is why it is not surprising that many variations on this theme can be found in the various treatises.
Repentance

Many Sufis considered the first stage on the path to be repentance or turnabout (tauba). How correct, how irrefutable! At least, when we see this concept of tauba as the searing realisation of being separated from the original life. This is the first force needed to deviate from the wide road of unconscious religiosity, the path of the masses, the sharia. This is only possible by a conscious turnabout on the path of life (often coming from the outside), and by setting out on a new way of acting: tariga.

A legend about the Sufi Ibrahim Ibn Adham relates: One night he heard a strange noise on the roof of his palace in Balkh. The servants found a man, who in the presence of Ibrahim stated that he was looking for his lost camel on the roof. When the prince spoke sternly to him on account of his absurd undertaking, the man answered that Ibrahims attempt to find heavenly peace and a truly religious life amidst all his luxury, was as absurd as looking for a camel on the roof. Ibrahim repented and renounced all his possessions. This turnabout is often accomplished through an unexpected situation or event in our outer life: it is the moment of a new phase of consciousness. In Sufi texts this is a crucial moment. This moment causes a first, conscious turning towards the original life field, towards God. It is often a blow of fate, a disappointment, or a special encounter which gets this going! For a brief moment the seeker beholds; he is lifted above his ordinary consciousness and he sees the possible ideal before him. It is important that the heart awakens from the sleep of indifference and that a human being sees the pitiful condition in which he finds himself, at least with regard to this ideal. All of this is achieved, because he is granted the grace to hear with the ears of the heart to the admonitions of the God that appears in his inner being. In practice, tauba led many Sufis to turn away from the world of matter, which often went too far and in many took on extreme forms. Asceticism and poverty became important; they became cultural phenomena instead of a simple state of being in and of itself.

Poverty and renunciation

A poor person needs to take care of his poverty just as much as a rich person of his wealth. This very renunciation of the world is for the outsider the most noticeable stage of development of Sufism. The classical Sufi treatises abound with examples describing a life of poverty ( faqr) and rejection of the world. These typically exoteric explanations of inner teachings often play a large role with Sufis who are at the beginning of the path. In this way the candidate hopes, for example, that by reduced eating and long periods of fasting he will acquire an aversion for this world and thus find pleasure in the eyes of God, but this has ensuing problems. Wealth and the care for possessions and property, are seen as possible obstacles, just as they are in other cultures in which, at certain times, mysticism becomes popular. The result is that asceticism and complete negation of the material world often became the pride of the sufferer. Moreover, a wise teacher also pointed out that an excess of asceticism and renunciation is the expression of anxiety and fear. And fear of the nature order in which we live is just as binding as is wealth and abundance. What is important is to really see its possibilities and its limitations. Renunciation consists of seeing this side with the eye of transience, so that it becomes of little value in your eyes and easy to turn away from. For many Sufis poverty and asceticism are effective only when the persons outer life reflects the inner state of being. For those who strive after inner life, it is not worldly matters, which form the greatest
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hindrances on the path, it is their own I. Treat your I like someone who does not need it, although one cannot escape it. Whoever controls his I, is mighty, whoever is controlled by the I is not capable of doing much. The Sufis summarise the desires and inclinations that drive a human being in the concept of the passionate soul, nafs. The nafs is a tempter that should not have its own way. The (earthly) soul is like a devilish horse. When you give it free rein, you cannot be sure that it will not throw you off. Some Sufi biographies show that their lives changed when they obtained insight concerning the true obstacles, and their path was no longer marked by outer or inner extremes of deprivation. The inner renunciation develops through the power of insight. While external poverty is described as an illusion, inner poverty is closely related to becoming less (literally: diminishing), self-surrender; a later stage. Do not give me back, after you have torn me loose, and do not make my I see, after you have screened it off against me.
Trust in God and self-surrender

human being, then his trust in God is also healthy. For his honest trust in God enables him to renounce that which is available. This phase of renunciation, of letting go, is of the utmost importance, but at the same time extremely subtle. After all, it concerns the removal from power of the I-forces controlling the personality. Of course, this can never happen frivolously. It must be based on a growing new and responsible consciousness. Watchfulness and great understanding are expected from a candidate, in addition to which he should possess a certain inner stability, a soul equilibrium. Only then will it become possible to surrender ones own destiny to the inner God: When certainty has been accomplished, it is called tawakkul.
Patience

Trust in God (tawakkul) is an inner and an outer state of freedom from worry, protected by the loving care of God. It is the next important stage on the path of the Sufis. The degree to which this state of being is rich and mutually inspiring is revealed in the following two quotations: Whoever removes all love for this side from his heart will find peace. When the heart has become empty to receive this love, renunciation enters. And when it has entered, it will bring him the trust in God. While the reverse is equally true: When renunciation is healthy in a
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Patience is to faith what the head is to the body. It is said: Patience consists of remaining equally well disposed towards trials as towards well-being. Perfect patience (sabr), even in the face of the most severe blows of fate or inner ordeals, is also one of the supporting pillars of the path in the Near East. Three stages can be distinguished: 1. he, who tries to be patient; 2. he, who is patient under temptation; 3 . he, who is patient under all circumstances. This subtle differentiation is an example of the utter precision with which the Sufis saw the phases and inner states of the path. Countless stories show the necessity for perseverance and patience. Here too, the classical image of the overcoming of the I, the journey through the desert, occupies a large part of it. This patience can only be realised by means of a special power, a power in which the candi-

date attains inner equilibrium during a long development. On the one hand, there is the indestructible orientation toward God ^ patience with God ^ and on the other the openness for the divine power amid temptations ^ patience without God. For the road is full of stones and in order to reach the goal, countless obstacles have to be overcome. This is illustrated by the following short story: A man went to Ash-Shibli and asked: Which kind of patience is most difficult for the impatient person? He answered: The patience in God. The man, No! Ash-Shibli: The patience for God. The man, No! Ash-Shibli: The patience with God. The man, No! Ash-Shibli: What then? The man, The patience to persevere without God. Then Ash-Shibli cried out so loud, that he almost gave his last gasp.
Love and decreasing

Love ( fana) is the fruit of insight. Whereas natural love is connected with another human being, an object or a skill, divine love describes something completely different. It is a state of being at the end of a path of development, which shows that, ultimately, it was the active force at all stages and stopping places! For this reason, arif, he who has insight, is often an advanced Sufi. Al-Ghazzali writes: Love without insight is impossible ^ one can only love what one knows. The concept of the beloved plays a big role in Sufi literature, for it is the personification of the link with the divine. It is said that love is a fire in the heart, that burns everything the beloved does not want. Love becomes the last stage on the path, only through the inner knowledge that stems from it. While in the beginning

absolute obedience with respect to the master (shaikh) is demanded, at this stage marifa follows; inner knowledge or knowledge of God. Only the advanced Sufi knew the power and the possibilities of true, serving love; knew that it is the fastest way to, and the condition for, the unification with God. For the simple, religiously inclined human being in Islam it was virtually impossible to overcome the state of obedience ^ after all, the word itself means submission (to the will of God). For this reason love and decreasing are placed on the same level. This love for God, which does not exclude any part of creation, is nourished by the longing for divine manifestation, and by rending the veil, which obstructs transcendental inner sight. After temporary forgetting, asnai, the living knowledge of the primordial origin is revivified. Only the stage of the decreasing of the I makes knowledge of the origin and the glory of eternity possible. This last step on the Sufi path is, in reality, not an end. We might say: here we lose track of what our natural consciousness can comprehend. At this point, the Sufi can go the path towards the true purpose of human existence, the path to the spiritual human being, the ultimate fulfilment of the divine plan. To give any information on this path is fundamentally impossible.To decipher the writings of the few Sufis who have written about this especially for their pupils, is equally difficult.

Bibliography: Consulted literature is available from the editors. 25