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We have arrived at a very dangerous arcanum, the card associated with fragility.
There is a tendency in students and missionaries in this movement to regress, to become negligent, and to go backwards in one's development. This is something that pertains to people, this arcanum, who have been working for some time in this teaching. This card is known as the fulminated tower, the Tower of Babel, the arcanum of negligence, of failure, of falling. I have personally spoken with many missionaries and students, whether from the internet or in person, for a long time, where I have heard and I have been confessed to how after a period of time of working in chastity, these students have struggled to maintain it. They have once been filled with enthusiasm, with joy, with the longing to want to work very diligently in this path, having some successes in meditation and dream yoga, in alchemy―and yet, the great problem of students and even so-called teachers in this doctrine is consistency, or better said, the permanent center of gravity, which the master indicates in his writings how our mindset is defined by certain habits, certain conditions, certain qualities of mind. Our gravity tends to be in our defects, meaning, our focus, our means of acting, of living. We need to transfer our focus, our center of self, within the soul, within the Essence, to be awake, to be vigilant, to be conscious, because the problem is that people leave this path because they are not awake. They do not become aware of their own faults, the egos of lust that want to deviate, desires in the mind that contradict our most noble aspirations, our greatest longings, our most profound virtues. So as much as we want to believe, whether we have been in Gnosis for 10 years, 20 years, 5 years, or whatever, there will always be elements in the mind that will want to pull us from the path. This occurs through egos of doubt, of skepticism, and more importantly of desire, of animal lust, which pushes students to expel themselves from Eden, which is the natural bliss of the consciousness, particularly within a matrimony, within marital union, The greatest temptation is in sexuality, which is in husband and wife. If the couple is not careful in working on their mind, they can easily fall. They may want to, for a few brief moments, to give up everything. It happens. I have spoken with many people in this teaching for many years. Even missionaries have confessed to me that they are lustful, meaning, willingly. It is one thing to have nocturnal pollutions in the beginning of this path, because people who have been accustomed to fornication for many years have trained their body to expel the energies. So at night when they are regenerating themselves, or the vital body is regenerating the physical organism, the initiate cannot fully control those vital winds when a lustful dream enters in the mental plane, in the astral plane. But those people can make progress because it is one thing to willingly give up that energy, and to have accidents. But what I'm speaking about in this arcanum is people who have been very dedicated in the teaching, and yet for whatever reasons, whatever disillusionment they experience, they want to fall willingly. It comes to my mind a story of a missionary who was practicing alchemy for 10 years, and what happened was his wife wanted a kid, a child. She was gnostic too, or practicing the doctrine, and because she wanted to have a physical child through the orgasm and she was tempting and tempting him and pushing him to fall, he eventually gave in, and said that he lost everything―all of his powers, his abilities. His ability to meditate was lost. It is very tragic. It is very devastating. This arcanum is the arcanum of failure, of negligence, to not work on the ego. The reason why people become fulminated towers, who fail in their work, is because they are not meditating. They are not comprehending in their mind what they need to eliminate. Sadly, many people, their center of gravity is in lust or pride or anger, and any ego can pull us if we are not observing what in us is thinking, feeling, and pushing us to do things in our mind. The Meaning of Fragility and Spiritual Danger
This arcanum is Fragility: to be breakable. Fragility results from a lack of introspection, a lack of awareness of what one is, one's weaknesses, because all of us have certain tendencies that make us weak. As strong and noble as we may assume we are, there are elements in the mind that will, at any instant―if we are not careful―will push us to deviate.
Another problem with this card is that people tend to be very fascinated with novelties, spiritual doctrines. There is a tendency even among missionaries and Gnostic people to want to mix this type of knowledge with other things, which do not relate. It is one thing to look for Gnosis within Sufism or Buddhism or Judaism or Kabbalah, and look at those scriptures to understand that this teaching is not just from one man, Samael Aun Weor, although he gave a very explicit doctrine which is our focus here. We can find that his writings explain and elucidate what the Sufis wrote, what the Kabbalists wrote, what the Muslims wrote, etc., but it does not mean that those doctrines as they are today represent or reflect what they once were. All religions degenerate with time. People adulterate the teachings. They mix new wine in old wineskins. They do not create a new mind for themselves to assimilate solar ideas. This is the problem with many people in this movement too, is that they like to mix Gnosis with things that are incompatible, mixing Gnosis with lust, with desire, with animality, with things that truly are of the black lodge. It is very common. So, we warn that it is important to study, to know the doctrine, to really practice it, so that we do not become fulminated towers, failures, wrecked ones. I would like the read to you an excerpt from The Perfect Matrimony, which synthesizes the teaching of this lecture and the mysteries of the 16th Arcanum, in which Samael Aun Weor explains how there is the tendency in students and missionaries to want to follow the black path, because unfortunately that ego is very strong in people. The interest, the curiosity, the inclination is there to want to pull in that direction, because as the Master Samael taught us, we are 97% ego in the beginning. So there is a big weight and heavy conditioning that we all have to fight against, which pulls people very easily, because of course, their center of gravity is in the ego. It takes someone of tremendous will to go against Goliath, to be a David, a true king. But in this excerpt, I would like to relate, how the master explains that when the colleges of initiation closed to the public during the Kali Yuga, the dark age, the black lodge opened its doors and, in that way, many people were introduced to teachings that were very impure. When the dark age arrived, the colleges of Initiation were closed. This was a fatality. Henceforth, as a matter of fact, the great black lodges, which were born during the archaic darkness of the ancient times, became more active. The limit of light is darkness. Next to every temple of light another of darkness exists, and where the light more brightly shines, there darkness becomes more dense.
I believe Paul Tarsus taught that the spirit is strong, but the flesh is weak. It is difficult to control the sexual energy and it is difficult to really go into the roots of the mind to find all the elements of doubt, pessimism, morbidity, fatality.
I remember on one occasion, I believe I mentioned this story to you previously, I went to Egypt in the astral plane asking to enter the Temple of Giza. All I saw was darkness over Cairo when I flew over town. I came towards the entrance of the temple and a guardian stopped me with a dagger to my throat. All he said was “Many are called, few are chosen.” I was really struck, and I reflect on that experience quite often in relation to this card, Fragility, fatality, because as serious as I may consider myself in my work, there are elements of the mind that have to die. As strong and sincere as we are in our studies, as noble of a missionary we maybe or as dedicated a student, we have to remember that the ego is שָׂטָן Shaitan, the tempter, the devil. 
Description of the Card
We have to face those temptations and conquer them because if we do not, we end up like this card, which is the Fulminated Tower.
So we see in this image two figures falling face down into the waters of the card. The ray of cosmic justice fulminates the Tower of Babel, of which we will speak extensively about near the end of this lecture. In the waters of life, we see at the very bottom third of the card a staff of power, the staff of command, and a flail or whip of fragility. The staff of power and the staff of command can refer to the spinal medulla of both man and woman, husband and wife, but the third element, the flail or whip, which the master describes as the flail or whip of fragility, can represent the tendency in us to want to fornicate. That flail I believe, even the whip, was used to flagellate Christ 5,000 times, which is the symbol of how that initiate, or the Christ in us, faces those ordeals against the ego in the path of death and resurrection. We find that this flail represents weakness because if we let ourselves fall, we become whipped and scorned by karma, the divine law, divine justice. These three weapons are surrounded by two serpents, עד Od and עבד Obd, ו Vav and ז Zayin, Ida-Pingala: the solar and lunar serpents. It is interesting to see two fallen people or people falling head down. They represent fallen angels, fallen bodhisattvas, beings who once reached great heights of attainment, even resurrected, and yet because they were tempted and still obeyed their mind, even a solar mind, they entered into either a marriage when it was forbidden to them. Since they could not control the energy, they fell. They represent a couple that once built their tower. They built the solar bodies up the spinal medulla, raising the gold of the spirit up to the brain, to the heart. They created the temple of the mysteries in them, but because they could not overcome their own mind, they fell. They entered temptation. It seems difficult to comprehend. Why is it that a bodhisattva would fall? As we explained in our previous lecture on Passion, there are some who make the mistake of falling in love at that level.
It happened to Count Zanoni who was resurrected. He fell in love with an actress from Naples. He obeyed his mind rather than his first love, and he took a wife when it was forbidden to him, but that when he was with her, he could not control his energy, so he fell. He created problems for himself, in which he was executed in the French Revolution, of which Hector Berlioz in his Symphony Fantastique, the Fourth Movement, depicts the beheading of those initiates who fell with Zanoni.
Question: Was he an initiate? Instructor: Zanoni was a resurrected master and he became this fulminated tower. Question: I meant the opera, or what was it? Instructor: Berlioz. Yes, he was a great master of music. He depicts in that symphony the execution of Zanoni and the death of those who betrayed the mysteries. It is one thing to, in the case of many bodhisattvas to take a partner when it is forbidden, another thing is many of them also decided to fall and enter black magic, which is by far worse, because they knew that through the arcanum of Passion, if they were to first go down, and if by the grace of God and incredible work to rise from that point, they will go even higher. But as I explained in the lecture on Passion, that is a very dangerous path, and it can only be accomplished if the Being forgives that initiate for their crime.
So, they are a fallen pentagram. Notice that the legs of these two people are facing up, their head down, the inverted pentagram.
Other things we will speak about in this lecture about this card, we have the Hebrew letter ע Ayin in the top right, which means “eyes” (in Hebrew, עין) spiritual sight, perception. If we fall like Samson, we lose our spiritual sight. We become blind, spiritually. We become the blind leading into the abyss by blind leaders. It is important to really reflect on this card, as painful and uncomfortable as it is, because there are many initiates who let themselves fall. There are many who let the glass of Hermes spill. It is a symbol of the creative forces. Why Following a Master is Dangerous
In our movement, there are many fallen bodhisattvas. They are very common. But as I explained to our students online and in-person, we do not recommend people taking their time to find such people, because they are not anything extraordinary. In the past, they might have been resurrected, but now, they are demons. In fact, the Master Samael Aun Weor explains that many of them are worse, or that they are worse than demons, because at least a demon is consistent. They have always been in the black lodge, and they stay there. But a fallen bodhisattva was both in heaven and hell, and betrayed Christ, which is very serious.
In this moment, there are many people who like to follow either missionaries or people who proclaim themselves to be masters. There is a tendency in our movement to want to go out and proclaim “I am the master of so and so. Follow me!” You find this in the Gnostic movements, very common, especially in Latin America, even in Europe. This is going on and it is creating a lot of problems, as you remember in our lecture on Turandot, especially the third act. The Prince Calaf was smart. He said, "My secret lies with me. No one shall ever know my name,” because all the people of Peking want to know who he is, the secret of this master. So it is ironic that people go around saying “I am so and so. Follow me.” Personally, I have gone in the astral plane to investigate certain people that I knew about in this movement, to want to know if this person is really who they say they are. I remember the case of one person, I will not say his name over the internet, but I invoked him, and I met with him. I found that, when I was with his followers, he was asleep, looking at his eyes in the astral body and the astral plane, his עין Ayin, because in that state you can see whether people are awake or asleep, subconscious, egotistically. People who are very awake, you can see through the eyes of the soul as Descartes said. I remember looking at this man. He was trying to impress his followers. He had a like a little medallion or bandana with eagle's wings on his forehead, but his eyes were completely asleep. I said to myself, “This is a waste of my time.” So I left and did other things. But this is a person that was very well respected by certain people. It became a very big cult. But it is interesting that Samael Aun Weor explains in his books, “Do not look for masters in this physical plane. Look for them in the astral plane, because there we will teach you,” he says. Use your ע Ayin, your spiritual perception, to know the truth, and do not take people's word for what they say, because the blind leading the blind will lead them into the abyss. That is what Jesus said (Matthew 15:14). What is interesting about this Hebrew letter too is that it is found in the middle of the word דעת Da’ath―ד Daleth, ע Ayin, ת Tav. ד Daleth means means “door,” as we explained in Arcanum 4: The Emperor. עין Ayin is "eyes," how we see, and ת Tav means “seal” or “truth” or “covenant” or “cross,” blessings from divinity, the perfection of the soul. That is the 22nd letter which we will explain at the end of this course. But if you want to know right from wrong, a master from a a false one, a shepherd from a wolf, learn to enter through the door of your own internal worlds―דעת Da’ath, ד Daleth― with your spiritual perception, which you awaken in meditation to know the mysteries of myein in Greek, to close one's physical eyes to illusion and go inside and meditate. Do not argue with people who say they are such and such. You will find many students, who are defending to the death, people that I know personally who are not who they say they are. I personally do not waste my time talking to them. I just advise people: learn to meditate and look for the masters internally so that you can receive the ת Tav, the seal or covenant of God, the truth. In that way, we avoid many dangers. Jesus said very clearly, “by their fruits you shall know them” (Matthew 7:16). But if you really want to know the roots of a person, look at their Tree of Life. Look at them in the internal planes and your divinity will guide you. Personally, I have done that with people and investigated certain situations and movements because I wanted to know who is this person that goes around saying that they are this and that. However, I really do not waste my time doing that anymore. I do other things, but I remember at that time I was filled with a lot of doubt because, like many students, I was confused and I wanted answers, because you find all these people in these movements going about proclaiming “So and so is this! So and so is that.” Personally, “How do you know?” is the question. Unfortunately, people like to go to the group with the most people, the big crowds. They do not want to really reflect internally about what they need to do. I really have more faith and more diligence in my work because of Samael Aun Weor. Personally, I have known him for many years, not physically―internally. He has been teaching me for over a decade or more instructing me about what I need to do to help, help humanity. We cannot just follow people at their word, but internally verify their qualifications. We have to teach people. If we are teaching, we have to teach people to know what they need to do, how to be independent and find the answers for themselves. Do not follow groups or people. Groups are useful and we get inspired. We learn how to defend ourselves, to protect ourselves and learn how to not be a fulminated tower. But, and I say this to missionaries here around and online, if you are leading groups, you need to know how to receive your answers internally, because it is a crime to teach people what you do not know or to lie about things or say things or teach about things that you do not necessarily have verification of. If you have doubt even intellectually, you do not understand a concept, but to go around groups and teach people what one does not know is a very serious crime. But the best way to benefit humanity is have experience, relate to the books that Samael Aun Weor taught, and to instruct people until they have certainty. But there are missionaries who are blind. I have talked with people who are fulminated towers. They say that they lead groups and yet they masturbate. They do evil wicked things. So, it is very serious. The blind leading the blind will all tumble into the abyss. Personally, I take the time and effort to teach things that I am familiar with. First, you learn to read. You become instructed in terms of having an intellectual certainty of things which is useful and necessary for people. Then, the more we practice, the more certainty we gain because of experience. That is how we grow, especially for our missionaries whom we are instructing to teach. So do not think that you need to know everything about the doctrine in order to teach, but teach the things that you have certainty of. That is what is going to benefit. In that way we do not become like fulminated towers, fallen pentagrams. 
The Holy Eight, Infinite Sign, and Sexual Power
It is interesting that the sign of the infinite represents brain, heart, sexuality. This is the continuum of tantra, the holy 8. If sexuality dominates the brain, then the fulminated tower results. Samael Aun Weor stated that the infinite is equal to the pentalpha. The infinite is found within the human being. So if our sexuality, our desires, control our mind and we give in to lust, then that pentagram which was once upright, falls. We must never spill the wine of alchemy. It is the nectar of the gods. The elixir of long life or longevity as we explained in Arcanum 14: Temperance. Remember that the Ens Seminis contains the Ens Virtutis, the virtue of the spirit, which is where we get words like virtue, virility, strength, virya, the warrior.
Prevent Falls through Self-Remembering and Self-Observation
Samael Aun Weor also explains that to prevent this Arcanum from happening in us, let our head be of Ra and our arms, body, hands, and legs be of Tum. Ra is the Solar Logos, the Christ. Tum is the Father. It is a very powerful mantra we mentioned in Arcanum 9: The Hermit, in which we invoke Christ from the Absolute down into our head with the consonant T, the cross or ת Tav in Hebrew. Then the vowel U is the solar Christ in our abdomen, in our heart circulating into our waters, our מ Mem. In synthesis: Father, Son, Holy Spirit.
Let our arms, hands, and feet be of Tum, meaning, let us always do runes, invoke Christ, charge ourselves with solar energy. May our mind always be solar, meaning Christic, filled with good things, good virtues, qualities of the soul, the beauty of the consciousness, divine thoughts, not egotistical fears, doubts, skepticisms, pains, worries, anxiety, depression, fear, hatred, negative thoughts. If you read that chapter from Treatise of Revolutionary Psychology where Samael Aun Weor is explaining how to self-observe, he gives a whole chapter on negative thinkers [Negative Thoughts] and says, the reason why people leave the path is because they identify with negative thoughts, a negative thought, an ego that thinks contrary to what we want to do. So as much as we love the teaching, if we are not observing ourselves, we are going to see that we will be influenced by the mind, by a fault that says, “I do not like this doctrine. It sounds fanatic. It sounds crazy. It sounds too painful. Why do I have to renounce the orgasm, desire?” Even people who have been in this doctrine for decades fall into this trap. They do not observe who in them is thinking or feeling or pushing in their mental center. In the words of Samael Aun Weor, their minds are filled with "noxious films, filthy images, pornographic elements." Question: What is the source of it? Instructor: It is the ego. The ego is the one who thinks and pushes the initiate to do this, this, and this. If we are not observant and vigilant of ourselves, we will not discriminate who or what in us is acting. Question: There is another entity in us. Is that what you are saying? Instructor: That is the ego. If we are not self-observing, we are not going to see the difference. We are just going to think “This is who I am. Yeah, I mean, I thought this teaching was very interesting, but now I am going to play football or do something else or go be with my friend.” You know, not really take the time to really question who is thinking in us. That is the ego. It is always thinking, feeling, wanting to do very negative things. But if we become athletes of meditation and self-observation, we will see in a moment when we see an ego come in and start thinking for us, negative thoughts, especially ones of doubt and skepticism, which are very deep and very profound and negative, which we all have. The solution to doubt is meditation. When you feel overwhelmed by negative elements or fear or suspicion or doubt about this teaching, it is like we have to remember and reflect upon what your experiences are in your Intimate Christ. Personally, I have had many experiences for practicing a very long time, which has given me a lot of faith. I know that when certain egos come up in me, I say, “Okay, I do not like this from you. Stop talking to me.” I state in my mind, “Do what I will.” Master Samael explains in Igneous Rose that when your mind assaults you with doubts and fears and negativities, say to your mind, “Mental body, you belong to me. I am your Lord, and you are my servant. You will do what I want.” But the problem is in this movement people do not really question what arises psychologically in themselves and then they mistake that egotistical thought or identity as who they really are. So they have no real genuine experience of the Being in many cases. Question: Well, then, there is more than one being in you. There is a positive one and a negative one? Instructor: Well, the Being is divinity, is the term we use for the Innermost, our Spirit, which is Ra, the solar energy, the divine Christ. But if we are not really very discriminatory in our mind, really sifting through in meditation what we experience in our thoughts and feelings and actions in a day, to really question what is true and what is false, then we just get caught up in the current of life and we go along with it. Modern Art, Media, and Lustful Impressions
But the solution to this problem of overcoming the danger of falling is to really be mindful of ourselves and comprehend what impressions we take in our life.
As we explained in our lecture on transforming impressions (Transform Your Life), we have to learn to take in good elements psychologically. A problem with many people in this teaching is that many people are fascinated with very bad television, very negative movies, pornography, elements that have a lot of lust, anger, violence, very bad articles in newspapers, television and movies especially. If you look at Hollywood, most of the things are being produced today are total garbage. I have had students ask me, “How is it that I am not able to meditate or comprehend myself?” I asked, “Well, what are you doing in the day? Do you watch television and movies and things?” They say, “Yes.” “Well, what do you do?“ “I watch Game of Thrones,” or watch things which are very barbaric. Very difficult and very negative. So it is like, well, you are trying to meditate while punching a hole in your boat. It is like being in a boat, and while you are trying to peddle out the water, meanwhile you are punching holes in the bottom. If you fill in your boat with water, if you are trying and allegorically speaking, if you are trying to meditate, but you are ingesting garbage all day, not just physically, but mentally, psychologically, of course it is going to be very difficult to overcome the mind. It is counterproductive. Question: What about modern music? Instructor: Modern music too. Most of it is very bad. There are some things which are more neutral, more in limbo, you can say, but a lot of music like extreme forms of gangster rap, death metal, you know a lot of music that is very violent today, very low. Comment: What is shocking, talking about alpha and omega, if you listen to Nocturnes or Chopin's music and then you listen to this other stuff, the gap is so huge. It is a question of vibration. There is something in these people who like this rock and roll and satanic types of music. They do not even have a chance to see the other side. Instructor: Which is why we are giving lectures on The Secret Teachings of Opera, to teach people that there is food that is very beneficial for the soul. We have to be very careful with what impressions we take in. We emphasize that the impressions we take in either nourish our soul or the mind, and a lot of art reflects consciousness, whether for good or for ill. We explain this a lot in our lectures on opera, especially, as a divine form of art which you can study on our websites. We emphasize that we have to be careful with the impressions we take in because, in the words of the Sufis, certain impressions can either feed the soul or feed desire. This humanity is very much addicted to pornography and violence and negativity, which is why those forms of animal behavior permeate art and television, movies, etc. 
Comment: ...this art, it is full of lust and nakedness.
Instructor: Well, what we want to say in this graphic, to prevent falls, we have a representation of St. Anthony surrounded by women and lust and figures who are tempting this figure. It is a symbol of how the soul has to face temptations in the mind. But yes, this type of art form is a representation of the psyche, of the consciousness, what happens psychologically, subconsciously, when we are learning to meditate and look at ourselves, to see what in us is negative and what in us has to be faithful to our Being. Purifying Our Lustful Perceptions
The Sufis explain that lust or desire is off three kinds, and if we want to work on developing our chastity, it is important to refrain from digesting elements which feed the ego, feed desire. There is a teaching given by Hujwiri, a great Persian mystic, in his book Revelation in the Mystery, where he explains the work of developing chastity. I believe the Sufi that he references is Al-Shibli, where he explains the nature of developing chastity through sight, through purity.
“Tell the believers to refrain their eyes” (Qur’an 24:30), as follows: “O Muhammad, tell the believers to refrain their bodily eyes from what is unlawful, and to refrain their spiritual eyes from everything except God,” i.e. not to look at lust and to have no thought except the vision of God. It is a mark of heedlessness to follow one's lust and to regard unlawful things, and the greatest calamity that befalls the heedless is that they are ignorant of their own faults. For anyone who is ignorant here shall also be ignorant hereafter: “Those who are blind in this world shall also be blind in the next world” (Qur’an 27:74). In truth, until God clears the desire of lust out of a man's heart, the bodily eye is not safe from its hidden dangers and until God establishes the desire of Himself in a man's heart, the spiritual eye is not safe from looking at other than Him. ―Revelation of the Mystery, Al-Hujwiri, Pir Press Edition, pg. 156
So to answer your comment about modern television or movies and art, this image has a lot of nudity for sure, which we can interpret with our own desires, our own lusts, our own egotism. But also we could see through here a representation of something psychological, of a spiritual truth. Of course, to interpret art is a very delicate thing, because art is a reflection of consciousness. If we learn to reflect or awaken our perception, we can in turn interpret what those works of art represent, psychologically speaking.
Question: He is holding a skull? Instructor: Yeah, and the skull here is a symbol of working in the death of desire, the death of the ego, which, notice his consternation and his look of disgust towards these lustful women. It symbolizes all his lustful egos coming at him. So this work of art represents in a very conscious way, initiatically, this precept of the Qur’an, "Tell the believers to refrain their eyes from lust, from desire” (24:30). But we are just stating that in works of art that are very common today, they do not teach the path of initiation in the light with chastity, because these forms teach people how to be more violent or negative or harmful. But of course they tend to be mixed, because you find even good characters in these shows which can be very violent and very graphic. Of course, we find that. But in terms of finding works of art that really reflect and teach how to develop the soul is very rare, because, of course, the black lodge is working very diligently to teach people how to awaken in desire through animality, through hatred, through violence. But of course this image is graphic and yet we find, in its symbolism, representations of how to work against the mind. We also find that Al-Shibli mentioned a demarcation between those who are in love with God and those who are in love with lust: It is related that one day when Shibli came into the bazaar, the people said, “This is a madman.” He replied, “You think I am mad, and I think you are sensible. May God increase my madness and your sense!” i.e., inasmuch as my madness is the result of intense love of God, while your sense is the result of great heedlessness, may God increase my madness in order that I may become nearer and nearer to Him, and may He increase your sense in order that you may come farther and farther from Him. This he said from jealousy (ghayrat) that anyone should be so beside one’s self as not to separate love of God from madness and not to distinguish between them in this world or the next. ―Revelation of the Mystery, Al-Hujwiri, Pir Press Edition, pg. 156
Of course, people who hear about the doctrine of chastity obviously think it is very insane, especially in our modern culture, people who are very fascinated with adultery and fornication and behaviors which are very degenerate.
How We Feed Lust
But lust is of three kinds: through eating, speaking, and looking.
This image of [St. Anthony] represents how we have to control our sight, to not let desire govern our psyche, our conditions. There is a teaching in Islam about eating what is lawful and, as I said, it can represent not only food but the impressions we eat. What does it mean to eat that which is lawful, psychologically speaking? Physically? It means not to look at any person with lust, with desire, with fornication, but to be pure of mind. As we find in this text too, we learn to control our sight through meditation. It is a teaching from a Sufi initiate. I believe his name was Al-Asamm, where he explains how we have to control our vision, whether we walk on the street and we see people of the opposite sex, or women or men, and control that desire in the heart, the tendency to adulterate or commit adultery with that person, harboring desire or fornication in the heart. Lust is of three kinds―lust in eating, lust in speaking, and lust in looking. Guard thy foot by trusting in God, thy tongue by telling the truth, and thine eye by taking example. Real trust in God proceeds from right knowledge, for those who know Him aright have confidence that He will give them their daily bread, and they speak and look with right knowledge, so that their food and drink is only love, and their speech is only ecstasy, and their looking is only contemplation. ―Revelation of the Mystery, Al-Hujwiri, Pir Press Edition, pg. 115
So if we are looking at art with contemplation is one thing, but to be looking with desire is another thing. It is good if we ingest art and food for our soul, which will strengthen our consciousness, but if we can watch certain things with contemplation, if one can do it, is very difficult to not look at lustful images with desire. But unfortunately, because we are so conditioned by the ego, the mind easily takes those impressions subconsciously and in the mental and astral planes, those images reproduce themselves in the mind and become effigies: entities in that dimension which fornicate with the disciple and cause them to have nocturnal pollutions. This is the danger of looking at images of a lustful type.
But if one can contemplate nudity or lustful graphic images without identifying, it is a skill that one can develop in meditation. But of course, we develop that little by little the more we work on our ego, our desires. Accordingly, when they know aright they eat what is lawful, and when they speak aright they utter praise (of God), and when they look aright they behold Him, because no food is lawful except what He has given and permits to be eaten, and no praise is rightly offered to anyone in the eighteen thousand worlds except to Him, and it is not allowable to look at anything in the universe except His beauty and majesty. It is not lust when thou receivest food from Him and eatest by His leave, or when thou speakest of Him by His leave, or when thou seest His actions by His leave. On the other hand, it is lust when of thine own will thou eatest even lawful food, or of thy own will thou speakest even praise of Him, or of thy own will thou lookest even for the purpose of seeking guidance. ―Revelation of the Mystery, Al-Hujwiri, Pir Press Edition, pg. 115
A lot of levels of knowledge here. When the Sufis explain that food is lawful, it means it is obviously not pork or alcohol, according to that tradition. So they are very strict in their dietary guidance, but what constitutes lawful food is, will that element physically, psychologically, emotionally, feed our consciousness or feed our ego? That is the question.
Of course, we develop discrimination by awakening our soul, awakening our consciousness. That is what it means to be with working with ע Ayin, spiritual sight, because spiritual sight, discrimination against the ego, is madness to fornicators. It is not common sense for them. Another level of this too is that more and more we learn to rely on the Being to guide us in our meditations and also in our daily life, how to better live more consciously with more purity, taking in good foods, good nutrition for our soul, our consciousness. Consequences of Falling
We explain that initiates who lose their chastity lose their crown and their sword. The crown is in the pineal gland. The sword is the Kundalini. As happened with a case of an initiate who followed Zanoni, he lost his powers. He lost his crown, his cape, which internally in the astral plane, we can receive those vestures as a symbol of our work. But those are taken away if we fall.
How to Become Victorious
The Master Samael Aun Weor explains that there are also four occult pillars granted towards the victorious one, those who learn not to ever fall sexually. They conquered the kingdom of life, מלכות Malkuth, the submerged mineral kingdom, the molecular region or astral plane, the mental plane, and the electronic or spiritual world.
We achieve this through working with the eye of Horus, אור Aur, the light. אור Aur in Hebrew means “light” and Horus, oros in Spanish means “gold,” the gold, the Spirit, which we develop by working in chastity. The eye of perception, ע Ayin, because even if you look at the word Aurus (אור Aur, “light” in Hebrew) the pronunciation of that name, Horus, the light of אור Aur descends from the Absolute down into our head and expresses through our throat, “Aaauuurrrooosss.” The fire of ש Shin, the creative energy, is working there and that feeds through mantras and prayers our spiritual sight, our perception. That is working with ע Ayin in Hebrew, דעת Da’ath. The symbol of Horus is the falcon, a symbol of the Innermost, and it can represent the solar wings of the initiate, which rise up the spine when we are purifying our sight, purifying our perception. 
The Human Specter vs. Solar Bodies
They also refer to the solar bodies. We have explained that the intellectual animal does not have a soul yet.
We have what is called lunar bodies, lunar specters, vehicles that we work with or operate within the world of dreams: the astral plane, the mental plane. These are not true vehicles of Christ, the Christic energies. They do not really have any luminosity or light, power, virtue, consciousness. These are vehicles that are material. They are not vaporous, vague, or phantasmagoric, like if you wake up in the astral plane and if you look at your body, you may see that you are very dark, transparent, lunar, like a ghost. That represents literally for us the lunar bodies, the lunar vehicles. We have to create Christic vehicles, solar bodies, which can allow us to operate in the astral plane with cognition. Many people in this movement write to us asking, “How do I have experiences in the astral plane? How can I be more awake in that dimension?” The solution is, if you are married, work in alchemy. Create those bodies so that you have the capacity to generate more light. Work with Aurus, the fire and the light of the אין סוף אור Ain Soph Aur in you, so that you can navigate those regions with more lucidity. Pornography: The Ultimate Weapon of the Black Lodge
In that way, when you have more cognition, you can prevent yourself from falling, from being tempted, from being misled, because, as we said, there are many wolves in sheep's clothing in this physical plane. The black lodge is very active in humanity, such as in our television and movies, and music especially, where violence and pornography and lust and desire is being propagated in order to pull people down into lust, and especially against the white lodge who is working to develop chastity in students, in missionaries. That is mostly where that weapon is being lodged against.
I remember the Master Samael Aun Weor was told internally that after the publication of The Perfect Matrimony, there would be a great retaliation from the black lodge. So, Samael Aun Weor waited for years looking for publications that would speak against his book, which never came around, and then he eventually found out that what the black lodge was doing is producing pornography. That is the method and weapon that they have been using to pull people from the doctrine. It is lust. So what we have to remember is that if we want to prevent temptations in the mind, if we are filled with a lot of sexual fire, a lot of energy that needs to be transmuted, it is important to be married, to work in alchemy, especially if one has that Dharma, that blessing, to create the solar bodies so that one is very awake internally and can channel more light internally. 
Immortality through the Second Birth
But of course, that is a process. We have to learn to develop the soul so that in the internal worlds, we can investigate things more clearly. A lot of people, they often say, believe that they have an immortal soul. This a fatality, that people already think they are immortal, that one day when they physically die, they will go into the next life with full cognizance, awareness, and benedictions from God, that they are immediately going to go to heaven just by their beliefs. Unfortunately, no one is born again by believing. The human being is not born from the parchment of theory, but from chastity and from working in a marriage. Birth is a result of sexuality, and the birth of the soul is no different.
The Need for Christic Bodies and Internal Investigation
But of course, there are certain procedures that one needs to work with to avoid fragility, to avoid failure. We have to create what is known as a Christ mind and the Christ astral so that we have more cognition internally. Otherwise, we can easily be misled internally.
So it is important that we learn to awaken our consciousness, awaken our Soul. We have to learn to be athletes of astral travel, astral projection, and in that way, we can investigate any teaching, any book, any scripture, any teacher, any prophet, and really know the internal truth of that person, place, thing, or idea, so that if we are tempted by the teachings of such and such, writings that teach one to fornicate, etc., we can, of course, investigate those people and see what they are. I’m this image we see a woman who is levitating, flying towards an open window, a symbol of astral projection, astral travel. It is important to learn how to navigate in those worlds with lucidity, with cognition. Techniques for Awakening Consciousness
We often practice what is called the Key of SOL, which is an acronym for Subject-Object-Location. Subject, meaning at all times, we are aware of where we are at physically, aware of our mind, aware of our body, aware of ourselves, and also becoming aware of the objects of any place we are at, such as in this studio, this place―the objects in the walls, the doors, the people in front of us, the different Buddha statues, the clock―and also looking at the location, the streets, the city, where we are at, our surroundings.
Subject-Object-Location is a method we use moment-by-moment, questioning ourselves, “Where are we at? Who are we? What is our location? What are we doing here? How did we get here?” and becoming conscious of who we are talking or who we are with because, oftentimes, we go into the astral plane without any awareness, knowledge of where we are at, or what we are doing. The problem is we do not have any cognition of where we are at physically. That is the ironic and scary part. People believe that when they die, they will go to some heaven and they will continue to exist forever, ignoring that if they are not awake in their dreams, they will not be awake after death. The same life that people live physically is the same life people live internally. If we are unconscious physically, meaning in a spiritual sense, then we go to sleep at night, eight hours pass, we return to our body, and we have no awareness of where we are at and what we did. This is a profound reflection of a state of ignorance, or as we taught in the four states of consciousness, Eikasia: complete unconsciousness. But also there are Pistis: sleep with dreams. We may dream a few dreams at night and wake up in the morning and realize that we were not really aware of where we were. We could have had dreams about our work, our job, where we were doing strange things, things that do not make any sense, and then we physically awake and do not really pay much attention to that state. It is very ironic and unusual that, again, people think that when they die that they are going to be conscious of heaven, but meanwhile, their psychological sleep is reflected in their daily sleep. 
This is why the Greek myth of Hypnos and Thanatos taught that they were brothers. Where we are in physical sleep is where we will be in death, and this is the great problem. If we are not aware of our daily states, we will not be aware after death, which is why in this teaching we practice the Key of SOL: Subject-Object-Location.
Be aware of where you are at. Know who you are and what you are doing mentally, emotionally, physically. Be aware of the objects of where you are at and then look at your location. This is an expansion of consciousness from our individuality to our surroundings. If we question in our physical life, “Where am I? What am I doing here? How did I get here?” and a little trick you do is pull your finger. You do not have to pull too hard or injure yourself but hold your finger and pull it so that you try to stretch it. The reason being is that when you go in the astral plane, if you do the same questioning as you do physically, you may pull your finger and realize that it is stretching because in the astral plane, the lunar astral body is elastic, plastic. It is subjected to different laws, and you can pull your finger and see that it stretches. Then you realize, “I am not here in the physical dimension, but I am in the internal planes!” That gives you certainty of where you are at, and in that way, you can go off and investigate what you need to investigate. Subject-Object-Location, the Key of SOL, reminds us of sun, sol, solar, to awaken the consciousness. Why Practice the Key of SOL
Why do we talk about the Key of SOL in relation to Arcanum 16? People who do not awaken in their dream state are dreaming in physical life and they can easily be misled by the black lodge, and in that way, lose development. We need to learn to investigate in the internal planes with lucidity and with a lot of dedication. The Key of SOL can help us with that.
Another analogy we can think of in relation to this dynamic is imagine a candle placed in front of a series of mirrors. That light reflects back and forth in all the mirrors so that it is one light that is reflected in many―subject, object, location.
Expand your light. Be attentive of where you are at and what you are doing at all times. Question, “Where am I? What am I doing here? How did I get here?” Because a lot of times we walk down the street, we don't really have any awareness of what we are doing. We are thinking about our friends or girlfriend or fiancée or whomever, and then we realize we walk two blocks and “How did I end up here? I don't realize how I ended up in this place, because I was thinking so much about my job, my career, my worries, my problems.” That means that we are dreaming. We are not awake. If we are constantly dreaming in our physical state, daydreaming, never attentive, never aware, then when we go to sleep and enter the astral dimension, we do the same thing. Eight hours go by, we return to our body, and all we have are incongruent fragments of the dream state that do not have any real substance. But what we want in these studies is to have full cognition of where we are at so that in the astral plane, if we have an astral body, more easily could we travel to the temples of the white lodge, receive guidance, receive instruction, be taught what we need to do in our daily life, so as to avoid problems, avoid situations which can harm us, great difficulties for us, difficulties for others. This is essential. It is fundamental. If we want to avoid falling, deviating, making mistakes, we need to receive that direct guidance from God, from our Being. Why People Leave Gnosis
If we are not talking face-to-face with our inner God, not learning from Him internally, obviously people become filled with despair and doubt and fear and uncertainty, and they say this teaching does not work. “Why am I doing this?”
It is because people do not have any faith. This is why people leave the doctrine. They do not see results because they are not really working on themselves or not working effectively. But if you have that experience in the internal planes where they talk to you and show you what your state is, you can get a lot of personal help. I work with Samael Aun Weor where he teaches me internally things related to my job, my career, my alchemical work, my spiritual work, my meditations, and that gives a lot of faith for me. I know that I am not alone, and people who are working in the same way can receive help. But this is why we get so many letters from people filled with despair, that they are not seeing any changes in themselves. “I do not understand meditation. I do not understand the transformation of impressions. I do not understand what the ego is,” things which are really fundamental and basic. It may seem a little strange, but it is unfortunate that many people work and try to work on themselves, but do not see the results they want. Of course, we always go back to the fundamental question of chastity. Without that energy, there is no light. There is no fire. We cannot raise any energy up the spine to the brain, to the head, to the heart, and in that way, open the wings of the Aurus [Horus], the falcon of the Spirit! so that with those wings, we can go in the astral plane and to jinn states and get the help we need. But it is really tragic. I talk to many people online, people who are suffering a lot. They really want to change and enter the mysteries of this doctrine but admit that they are very tempted by other things as well. The problem is not the teaching. It is the the application. It is the ego. The ego is the problem. Lust is the problem. Feeding the mind with a lot of negative impressions, saturating the ego with a lot of weight, it makes it very difficult to meditate and to comprehend the subconsciousness because, “we become what we eat,” is the famous saying in culinary studies or conventional studies. Like “you become what you eat,” cause and effect. What you are psychologically determines more things for us. We become what we think. If what we think is animal and violent and negative and perverse and degenerate, we become that. So why feed the ego with those elements, especially with certain shows and things that can be very negative? But of course, you know, we choose what we eat psychologically. It is good to eat good things, psychologically, like with opera, classical music, things which are very elevated, which come from the Absolute. Really that music comes from the אין סוף אור Ain Soph Aur and reflects all the Tree of Life. It is very beautiful and it is good to take in those impressions. So we are just mentioning some basic things which can help us to prevent us from losing any development. Subject-Object-Location is a key, the Key of SOL. In that way, in the astral plane too, we avoid falling sexually, because many times if we are working very diligently in chastity, we get tempted internally by the black lodge, even by our own mind, where certain witches or sorcerers, people of the opposite sex, will come to us and will try to lure us into a bed or get us to engage in fornication. Overcoming Temptations in the Astral and Mental Worlds
I have had this happen many times where I will be walking in the astral plane and suddenly I will be assaulted by a witch, a woman trying to tempt me―very beautiful, diabolic temptations. But fortunately, I follow my heart and I meditate on my lust and discriminate what am I seeing here and question. When I know that I am in trouble, I conjure and I fight them, reject them.
I will tell you one case in which I was practicing the Key of SOL. I was walking in some building, very awake, in a samadhi. I was helped by a group of angels to have a very awakened state, after conquering a certain ordeal earlier that night. I remember walking down this hallway, seeing a lot of people, and suddenly someone bumped me. I followed my heart and I intuitively knew, “Do not respond.” I said to myself, “If this person bumps me a second time, I know it is a witch.” I just ignored and kept on walking. I got a second bump. I turned around and it was a woman, very diabolically beautiful, very evil. But I knew she was a sorceress, so I started conjuring her, “By the Holy Tetragrammaton!”―just repeating it again and again. We locked hands. It was a battle in the astral plane where she was conjuring me, trying to pull my lust and ego, trying to awaken me down in קְלִיפּוֹת Klipoth. I was fighting with my consciousness to reject her, but fortunately, I defeated her and was able to leave that place. It was a very difficult battle. I remember that I would not have been able to prevent myself from falling if I didn't practice the Key of SOL. It is the key of awakening consciousness: be aware of yourself, where you are surrounded by, and where your location is. So that whole time, fortunately, because I got a lot of help from a group of angels, they were warning me and telling me, “You need to be very awake tonight. We are going to help you.” I had to be in the astral plane for many hours in a vigil state, and so they were warning me and showing me things. I had a face those temptations. But if I wasn't as serious as I was, practicing the Key of SOL, I could have easily fallen. It could have taken me and awakened me in hell, and I could have been that. I could have just said, looked up and said, “You know what, it is more joyful down there and then up there.” But fortunately I knew better. A lot of people do not. They do not discriminate by what they see, what they perceive. They just go with the flow, which is why in today's society, you see so much garbage. It is really run by awakened people, the black lodge, not the white lodge. Of course, the white lodge is using Hollywood and people and things to make some changes with certain things, but it is very rare, very hard to find. Psalm 119
So we will talk about the Hebrew letter ע Ayin. We talk a lot about the Book of Psalms. This series of verses from Psalm 119, verses 121 to 128, begin with the Hebrew letter ע Ayin, from right to left, which summarize many of the things we have been talking about today:
עָשִׂיתִי מִשְׁפָּט וָצֶדֶק בַּל־תַּנִּיחֵנִי לְעֹֽשְׁקָֽי׃
So, "I have done the just and right thing; do not leave me to my oppressors," meaning we are working in chastity and then internally we get persecuted. "Let not the proud oppress me," like this witch that came after me, very proud, thinking I am a demon because I am working with Christ. This is how they think, inverted, like the witches in Macbeth, "Fair is foul and foul is fair. Hover through smoke and filthy air” (Act I, scene 1). They know how to fly in the astral plane. They know how to be awake in that state. They know how to manipulate people. This is what they are doing in this humanity right now, very actively, sucking people down, and internally, they fight us. They are proud.
"My eyes fail for your salvation and for the word of your righteousness," meaning we are meditating and we are seeking guidance internally. We want to have that spiritual perception of God where we get that insight, comprehend the ego and annihilate it, receive guidance internally. Another practice we can use for that to help remember our dreams is a very beautiful mantra called Raom Gaom. You prolong it so that if you have experiences internally and you want to remember them when you first wake up, we do that mantra.
Prolong it. Sing it mentally until the memories of your experiences enter your mind. In that way, “Our eyes don't fail for his salvation and for the word of his righteousness” because we remember what we experienced, the guidance we received internally. In that way we remember what we perceived internally, because sometimes people have experiences, but they return to their body, and they do not remember anything because the connection between their internal vehicles and their physical brain is not good.
There are ways to remedy that. I believe there is a diet you can eat in the mornings, ground almonds with honey and citrus fruit, grapefruit especially is good [see How to Remember Dreams for many practices to aid dream recall]. But “Deal with your servant by your mercy; teach me your statutes,” internally and through meditation. "I am your servant, make me consider and I will know your testimonies." To testify is to work with the testes, to testify, to know. We can not testify and experience the truth if we are not working with the energy daily, the creative forces. "I am your servant, make me consider and I will know your testimonies. It is time for יהוה Jah-Havah to work. They have broken your law," meaning those fornicating black magicians break the law of chastity and therefore they fight against us very diligently. So "I have loved your commands more than gold, even fine gold." The gold of Horus, Auros (Oros), the light. "And I count all your precepts as sacred. I have hidden every false way," meaning those doctrines that teach people how to be more demonic, more angry, more violent, more hateful, more lustful, more proud. The Hebrew Letter ע Ayin
The way that we can learn about it is through the mysteries of ע Ayin. עין Ayin spelled out in its letters equals the number 130. Even the word יהוה Jah-Havah, if you add the letters of י Iod- ה Hei- ו Vav- ה Hei, adds up to 26. 2 plus 6 is 8, the infinite. But ע Ayin, if we add 26 times 5, 26 related to יהוה Jah-Havah, times 5, the pentalpha, equals 130. So the perfected human being made into the image of Jehovah is the work of ע Ayin, דעת Da’ath, Gnosis.
We find that the Christ is in us, is in the microcosmos, the pentalpha. So there is a famous statement given in the Book of Psalms, chapter 118, verses 22-23, about the work of the stone of יסוד Yesod, which it pertains to this Arcanum very beautifully: “The stone which the builders refused has become the headstone of the corner. This is the doing of יהוה Jah-Havah, and it is marvelous in our eyes." The stone that the builders rejected is chastity, is a marriage, alchemy. The word stone in Hebrew can mean אבן Aben, or is spelled אבן Aben, א Aleph-ב Beth-נ Nun. בן Ben can also mean “son” in Aramaic, which is in reference to חכמה Chokmah, יהוה Jah-Havah in Kabbalah. When you add the letter א Aleph, the breath, the wind, to your stone, your אב Ben, which means “son,” the Christ, you spell אבן Aben, which means “stone.” So when you are working with your ovaries or testicles, with transmutation, you are working with your stone. The builders refused to work with the stone, meaning, those people who build this whole planet of Babel, this humanity, all the cities filled with their garbage and pollution and negativities and crime and extortion and violence and adultery. Those people refused to work with their [sexual] stone, and yet that has become the headstone of our corner, the temple of Christ in us, our own tower, our spine. “And it is marvelous in our eyes,” meaning, if we are awakening our spiritual sight or perception in meditation and astral travel, we find that this is marvelous. Having those experiences where you are awake in the astral dimension and you are receiving all that help from God is a very marvelous thing, such a rare thing too. The problem is chastity. People do not want to resolve the problem chastity. They do not want to work with that power. They are tempted. They want to be fulminated towers. The vision of divinity, the spiritual side of God, is everywhere, omniscience, and this power of omniscience is the eye of Ra, the solar logos. Divinity sees heaven and hell, and if we awaken to our inner Being, our true nature, we can know all the Tree of Life and even the infernal dimensions too. We do it to the power of ו Vav and ז Zayin, the two witnesses of the spinal medulla: Ida-Pingala. As it states in the Book of Proverbs: The eyes of יהוה Jah-Havah are in every place beholding the evil and the good (meaning both in יסוד Yesod and above in דעת Da’ath in the Tree of Life). ―Proverbs 15:3
So this letter ע Ayin is dualistic. It can be positive, or it can be negative, because spiritual perception can be awakened in consciousness and the Being or it can be awakened in the ego through desire.
Spiritual Sight and Blindness in the Qur’an
We have a very beautiful teaching from the Qur’an, from the longest Surah, Al-Baqarah, the Cow, I believe verses 6 to 20, which talks about how Prophet Muhammad was precisely teaching the initiates of his time, how to work with עין Ayin, their spiritual sight, and not to be fulminated towers. You have to remember that in Arabia there were many fallen bodhisattvas trying to rise at that time, and there was also a lot of sorcery. So Prophet Muhammad was fighting very diligently against the sorcerers of his time. Even physically he had to defend himself through holy war.
Indeed, those who disbelieve―it is all the same for them whether you warn them or do not warn them―they will not believe. ―Qur’an 2:6
So it's important that we unpack what belief means in Arabic. The word believer is mu'min, المؤمن al-mu'min or the plural المؤمنين al-mu'ninin, which relates to מים Mayim (or Arabic مائي mayiy), the waters, working chastity. Also to be-lieve, to be through love. To be, through the power of the libido, is the power of belief, when you really know for yourself from experience what these things mean. But when we have those conscious experiences and teach people this doctrine, often many people have a lot of resistance because they do not have that experience for themselves, and so Muhammad or the Prophet of Islam had this difficulty.
Allah has set a seal upon their hearts and upon their hearing and over their vision is a veil, and for them is a great punishment. And of the people are some who say we believe in Allah and the Last Day (the Day of Resurrection). ―Qur’an 2:7-8
Which, at the end of the path through the second mountain, one will fully unite with God. It does not mean that by believing in Islam or Judaism or Catholicism, that by thinking that Jesus is our savior, that we are going to immediately go to heaven and our physical body is going to resurrect from the grave and enter into some samadhi. This is not the meaning. Resurrection only applies to people who are fully dead as an ego. So here, Prophet Muhammad is talking to a lot of people who are very advanced, but also to people in the audience who are sorcerers, and there are many who say they believe in Allah and the Last Day. Or like many people who say they believe in Samael Aun Weor and the doctrine, and yet they do not believe because they are not chaste.
They think to deceive Allah and those who believe, but they deceive not except themselves and perceive it not. In their hearts is disease, so Allah has increased their disease and for them is a painful punishment because they habitually used to lie. ―Qur’an 2:9-10
Very harsh language, of course, for the punishment of fornicators, but we have to remember that it is also beautifully stated in the Qur’an too: Allah does not give any injustice to the just. Are just deeds the same as unrighteous deeds? We reap or earn what we sow, what we do.
And when it is said to them, “Do not cause corruption in the earth,” they say, “We are but reformers.” ―Qur’an 2:11
Look at the Gnostic movement today. People are taught by the Master Samael, “Do not be fanatic. Do not be dogmatic. Do not traumatize your students,” and yet there are many people going to other groups trying to steal students, going to other movements saying, “We are but reformers trying to reform the Gnostic movement.” It is very crazy. But you look at the Qur’an and what it says about these kinds of people.
Unquestionably, it is they who are the corrupters, but they perceive it not. ―Qur’an 2:12
And these are the types of missionaries who go about teaching, who do not have any experience of what they teach, and they create many problems.
And when it is said to them, “Believe as the people have believed,” they say, “Should we believe as the foolish have believed?“ Unquestionably, it is they who are the foolish, but they know it not. ―Qur’an 2:13
And I like that statement by the Master Samael Aun Weor, "They not only ignore, but they ignore that they ignore." They are profoundly ignorant.
And when they meet those who believe, they say, “We believe,” but when they are alone with their evil ones (their egos), they say “Indeed, are with you (the egos); we were only mockers.” But Allah mocks them and prolongs them in their transgression while they wander blindly. ―Qur’an 2:14-15
…because people need to pay their karma gradually in this society, in this physical plane. More and more people are going to suffer the consequences of their actions. It is building up more and more and more until finally the Tower of Babel will be fulminated in this humanity, a symbol of the end of the Aryan race.
Those are the ones who have purchased error in exchange for guidance, so their transaction has brought no profit, nor were they guided (meaning internally). ―Qur’an 2:16
It is sad that many Muslims in this physical world believe that they are guided by Allah because they simply think and feel a certain way, meaning, they do not have samadhis in meditation or talk to their inner God to receive knowledge. So that is the guidance we are talking about, internal experiences.
Their example is that of one who kindled a fire, but when it illuminated what was around him, Allah took away their light and left them in darkness so they could not see. Deaf, dumb, and blind, so they will not return to the right path (the path of chastity). Or it is like a rainstorm from the sky within which is darkness, thunder, and lightning. They put their fingers in their ears against the thunderclaps in dread of death. But Allah is encompassing of the disbelievers. ―Qur’an 2:17-19 
Meaning, not only people who are at the black lodge, but also the our own egos. Sometimes our Being comes to us like lightning, the Rune Sig ᛋ, as you see in the image of the fulminated tower. You have the lightning bolt striking the tower, the Rune Sig ᛋ, the Divine Mother, that lightning of Allah which punishes the fornicators, people who destroy themselves sexually.
The lightning almost snatches away their sight. Every time it lights the way for them, they walk therein. But when darkness comes over them, they stand still. And if Allah had willed, he could have taken away their hearing and their sight. Indeed, Allah is over all things competent. ―Qur’an 2:20
So, it is a very beautiful symbol of how when we are working with our light, we receive guidance. But also that power is also very terribly divine. It rejects the negative forces.
Another beautiful teaching is from Surah Al-Imran: So is one who preserves the pleasure of Allah like one who brings upon himself the anger of Allah and whose refuge is hell? And wretched is the destination. ―Qur’an 3:162
Because of course devolving in the interior of the earth through successive states of devolution is very painful. So is one who pursues chastity and virtue the same as a fornicator? Obviously, this is not. But of course, people do not like to believe that their actions and their sexual perversity is producing their damnation. That is why they were expelled from Eden.
There are varying degrees in the sight of Allah, and Allah is seeing of whatever they do. ―Qur’an 3:163 
So these are the eyes of Horus [Ra, the Solar Logos], what we call prajnaparamita intuition, the capacity to see the Being of a person, the אין סוף Ain Soph of an individual, our own supra-atomic star that we talked about in Arcanum 2: The High Priestess of this course.
Alchemy: How to Awaken Spiritual Sight
So how do we develop our spiritual sight? We work with our stone, our testes. The stones of a person, the ovaries of the woman or the testicles of the man, is אבן Aben. When we work with יסוד Yesod, the sexual energy, we are working with א Aleph through the science of סודי Sodi. יסוד Yesod is the acronym of סודי Sodi, meaning “secret,” the secret knowledge. We transmit the power of our stone up our our ו Vav, so as to release ז Zayin, the Kundalini through alchemy. נ Nun within אבן Aben is the sexual sperm or the ovum of the woman, and then that נ Nun becomes ז Zayin, the sword which defends us against any negative entity.
We work with that stone by א Aleph, אבן Aben. It sounds like Amen too. When you transmute the power of your stone and raise the Kundalini up the vertebrae of the spine to your head and into your heart, you say אמן Amen, “so be it,” “it is accomplished.” Another important point too is that the power of our stone and alchemy is controlled through breath, which is why a couple should pronounce mantras in sexual union, in alchemy. But, if there is too much movement, too much breathing, erratic breathing and lust, then obviously the energy, instead of going inward and upward, they go from in to out, which is why we work with א Aleph very diligently. If the couple needs to restrain that fire, they have to pause and breathe very deeply, restrain that energy. Be patient. Do not stimulate so much fire that one loses it, because those initiates or bodhisattvas who cannot control the fire of sex in their marriage, the energy goes in and out and therefore, they become blinded like Samson. They lose their spiritual sight, their perception. The Crimes of Fallen Spiritual Masters
It is interesting that Samael Aun Weor mentions that the crimes of those who fall, he says that those bodhisattvas who fall lose their divine sight, their clairvoyance, their powers. He even said that they become wandering Jews. It is the trope of the wandering Jew, exiled from Israel. Israel (Kabbalistically) is not in the Middle East on this planet. It is really the reference to the Absolute―Isis-Ra-El―the power of Isis, the Divine Mother; the power of Ra, the Solar Logos; the power of El, the Spirit―Israel.
Those Bodhisattvas who fall under cyclic existence and wander are given many opportunities to rise again. If they stubbornly refuse, they are sent to קְלִיפּוֹת Klipoth accused of three crimes according to Samael Aun Weor:
How We Fall
We have to guard our sight from fornication and adultery, says Jesus (Matthew 5:28-29). The fulminated tower exists if we let our lust govern our mind. As I said, looking lustfully at other people or other images pornographically can produce nocturnal pollutions where we lose our energies at night when we are sleeping, which is why Jesus said in the Book of Matthew:
You have heard it that it was said by them of old time, you shall not commit adultery. But I say unto you that whosoever looks on a woman to lust after her has committed adultery with her already in his heart. Therefore, if your right eye offends you, pluck it out and cast it from you. For it is profitable for you that one of your members should perish and not that your whole body should be cast into hell. ―Matthew 5:27-29
Anger destroys clairvoyance. Lust destroys clairvoyance. We lose our sight, spiritually speaking, because clairvoyance is like a beautiful lake that can reflect the waters of heaven inside of us. But if we are filling our waters of our mind with garbage, the mind becomes disturbed and filled with impurities. Very difficult to control that. Therefore, it's good to still the waters, clear our clairvoyance, not fill it with gibberish, which is represented by the Tower of Babel.
The Kabbalistic, Mystical Significance of the Tower of Babel
The Tower of Babel is a symbol of the abuse of the Word. So there are many Christian movements today that emphasize or talk about speaking in tongues, where they just pronounce gibberish. It is a very silly adulteration of the doctrine because angels do not speak in gibberish. We leave that to Monty Python. But, you know, Babel is a symbol of the abuse of the Word. Christ above is heavenly, but down here is gibberish, ego, egos.
We will read for you this whole excerpt from the Book of Genesis about the abuse of the Word because it is a symbol of this fallen humanity. 1 And the whole earth was of one language, and of one speech.
ש Shin, נ Nun, ע Ayin, ר Ra―you hear the word or אור Ur, نور Nur there, “light” there. But you have ע Ayin in the middle, meaning that light is not pure because ע Ayin can be impure or pure. The land of שִׁנְעָר Shinar is a symbol of this physical plane where the power of נ Nun and the power of אור Ur, the light, is trapped in materialism, in animality, in desire.
3 And they said one to another, Go to, let us make לְבֵנָה brick (libana), and burn (שָׂרַף, seraf) them throughly (שְׂרֵפָה). And they had לְבֵנָה brick for אֶבֶן stone, and slime had they for mortar. ―Genesis 11
The language in Hebrew is very interesting because it hides many acrostics and symbols here. So why use brick instead of stone? They are trying to use slime to build this tower. What does this tower even symbolize? For many people it is this society, but also even our own mind, thinking that we can reach heaven through our intellect. That brick is used for stone, meaning, it is an imitation. It is not working with אבן Aben, the power of chastity, to build the solar bodies in our spine through an objective work.
Even the word burn, שָׂרַף seraf, to burn with lust, reminds us of the word קשׁר qesher, which means treason, conspiracy―שָׂרַף seraf / קשׁר qashar, has the same letters but reversed (with ק Quf and ף Final Peh. To burn also relates with the fiery seraphim that afflict the Israelites in the wilderness and who are healed through the bronze serpent in Numbers 21). We commit treason when we fornicate, and literally the word for slime is a very obvious sexual symbol. People are building their towers in their mind of what they idolize in this humanity by fornicating. They expel their semen. They are filthy, and then they would burn these bricks thoroughly. The word for thoroughly is שְׂרֵפָה seraphah, which reminds us of סְפִירָה Sephirah. So, people are trying to reach heaven, the סְפִירוֹת sephiroth, but look at their behaviors. Look at all the Christian movements today, and people who really idolize divinity and really love divinity, but they continue to masturbate and be adulterers and fornicators. So, how are you going to reach heaven with this this type of society? It is a tower that is going to be fulminated very soon in terms of this Aryan root race. All that is treason. Trying to approach God with lust is very crazy. 4 And they said, Go to, let us build us a city and a מִגְדָּל tower (a migdal, reminding us of a Gedulah, Gadal, Gadol, Great God), whose רֹאשׁ (rosh, head) top may reach unto heaven (שָּׁמַיִם Shamayim)… ―Genesis 11
Meaning, there are people trying to reach heaven by being fornicators. They are building a tower in themselves or idolizing false gods: anger, lust, violence, pride, resentment, greed, fear, hatred, and everything that this Aryan race worships. Let it reach unto ראש rosh, meaning, their heaven, so that it may reach into the heavens, because people want to reach heaven with their intellect. They think that they can know God through the mind and it is the opposite. You know it through the heart.
4. …and let us make (נעשה Na’aseh / עָשָׂה, Assiah) us a (שם Shem) name (but not השם Hashem, יהוה Iod-Chavah), lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth. ―Genesis 11
Encoded in the word for “let us make” is עשיה Assiah, and the word עשיה Assiah is the world of matter and action, this physical plane. "Let us make a name for ourselves." People are always trying to make a false sense of identity with this humanity or the society. “Let us make a שם Shem. Let us make a name for ourselves. Let us leave behind a lot of money and goods and material things for our family and loved ones because we will go to the grave and that will be it.” People think very simplistically. Obviously, you want to help our loved ones and family, but thinking that this is the whole maximum of what we are and what we should do is limited.
“Let us make a name for ourselves. Let us be on the top of our politics. Let us belittle others. Let us be violent with our speech and our words and our hatreds and our pride.” But that name is not the Name, השם Hashem. People that want to follow השם Hashem, which is Christ, and the Jews say ברוך השם אדני Baruch Hashem Adonai (which is really ברוך השם יהוה Baruch Hashem Jehovah). “Blessed be the name of יהוה Iod Havah.” They are referring to Christ, חכמה Chokmah in the Kabbalah. But people do not want to make a name for God. They do not want to worship divinity in them. They want to make a means of themselves materially, and thinking that nihilistically they will die, and they will cease to be, “Lest we be scattered abroad the whole face of the Earth.” 5 And the LORD came down to see the city and the tower (meaning in our own spine, divinity looks in us to see what our development with the Kundalini is), which (בן האדם Ben Ha-Adam) the children of men builded. ―Genesis 11
The children or sons of men is בן Ben and that אדם Adam means “man.”
6 And the LORD said, Behold, the people is one, and they have all one language; and this they begin to do (being fornicators): and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do. ―Genesis 11
…because people are now in this humanity are trying to travel to Mars and other planets in order to spread our degeneration there. For example, there are movies like Total Recall… I mean to be kind of funny with it, but literally, you look at that kind of film and see what are the behaviors of this humanity that we want to bring as a colony there, and it is ridiculous. Society prostitutes and sexually degenerates. That cannot exist. This is why divinity is going to annihilate this humanity to prevent that.
7 Go to, let us go down, and there בָּלַל confound their שָׂפָה language that they may not understand one another's speech.
Let us בָּלַל balal, “confound” their שָׂפָה sefa, safa, their “language” that they may not understand one another's speech. Even the word בָּלַל balal is a name of a demon, בעל Bael, whom we reject.
In the name of Gabriel, may Adonai command thee and drive thee hence Bael! ―Conjuration of the Seven
The word אדני Adonai means Lord and בעל Bael is a lord too, but of hell.
So, people are confounded in this day and age. People are very confused. People love the degeneration, violence, all these things which corrupt the psyche. Therefore, divinity says, “Let us confound their language,” and obviously people literally interpret this as a symbol of how all the languages of the earth developed. There is that historical component to it. It relates to the times of Atlantis and even Lemuria, of how humanity became divided, but if you look at the word שָׂפָה safa, language, you add the letter ר rosh (and י Iod), you spell סְפִירָה Sephirah. Let us confound their סְפִירוֹת sephiroth, meaning, you have that Tree of Life developed in you, but if you become a fornicator, God will confound it. Meaning, the fulminated tower will exist. If you fall when you fornicate, you lose all the powers of the סְפִירוֹת sephiroth, the Tree of Life in us. 8 So the LORD scattered them abroad from thence upon the face of all the earth (all those bodhisattvas who decided to enter fornication): and they left off to build the עִיר city (psychological landscape, city, country, ע Ayin of דעת Daath, using the י Iod, sexual energy, for רֹאשׁ Rosh, the intellect). ―Genesis 11
So, this is the psychological country that Samael speaks of in The Great Rebellion, our psychological country, because ע Ayin is the perception of the eyes of the spirit, but channeled through י Iod, the sexual energy, and רֹאשׁ Rosh, the head. So that city of the demons of this whole planet, whether it be Chicago, New York, L.A., whatever cities exist on this planet, is ruled by demons and populated by demons. Obviously, this is the psychological city that people live in too, but also psychologically in us.
9 Therefore is the name of it called בָּבֶל Babel; because the LORD did there confound the language of all the earth: and from thence did the LORD scatter them abroad upon the face of all the earth. ―Genesis 11
Obviously, people think of it as a literal history, but it really has to do with, psychologically, we become babbling idiots. People who speak gibberish, psychologically speaking, because when we have anger and lust and pride and all the ego, we are a Tower of Babel that is going to be fulminated, unless we learn to build ourselves upon solid ground, the stone of the temple אבן Aben.
Conclusion: Samson, Heracles, and the Need for Chastity
So in conclusion, we will talk about the story of Samson, which Samael Aun Weor quotes from Eliphas Levi quite extensively. He also speaks about how the astral light, which is the energies of the astral plane, but also found on our semen, grants beauty either in heaven or hell. When that light coagulates in a flower, he says that that light makes great beauty and makes people fall in love with it. The same with the opposite sex. People who have beauty or physical attraction have a lot of astral light and obviously hypnotize many people. People who live bewitched by the astral light are always looking at women or men on the opposite sex with lust, and always end up being fulminated towers because that desire, even if one doesn't act on it, is always going to exist in the mind, until it grows stronger and bigger or until it drags one down.
As Christ said metaphorically, if your left eye offend thee, pluck it out. If you see your lustful senses looking at, you know, in sexually degenerate way towards other people, go home and meditate on that ego and look at that fault in yourself, so that you can eliminate it through the help of your Divine Mother. In this way we do not become like Samson. Woe unto to the Samson of the Kabbalah if he permits himself to be put to sleep by Delilah. The Heracles of science who exchanges his royal scepter for the distaff of Omphale will soon experience the vengeance of Dejanira and nothing will be left for him but the pyre of Mount Oeta in order to escape the devouring folds of the coat of Nessus. ―Samael Aun Weor quoting Eliphas Levi
This is this is a very dense statement that the Master Samael did not really explain. He expects that people are going to investigate and study. I will explain some of this for you.
The word שמשון Samson comes from שמש Shemesh אוֹן Aun: שמ Sham, שון Shon. שמשון Shemesh in Hebrew means “sun,” the solar light, and אוֹן Aun is the sexual strength or virility of God. אוֹן Aun is also similar to עין Ayin because how you perceive is how you work with your אוֹן Aun, your sexual strength. The distaff of Omphale, Heracles, he inadvertently murdered Iphitus and was commanded by the Delphic Oracle Xenoclea to be a slave to Omphale for a year, with the compensation to be paid to a King by the name of Eurytus from Oechalia, I believe. So in this myth, Heracles had to wear women's clothing. He had to a hold the basket of wool and a distaff where women could sow with him and spin with the maidens of Omphale. This is symbol of degradation. You got a solar masculine force being put into a lunar element. It is a symbol of how any bodhisattva who falls gives away all the kingdoms of Christ above to become a lunar animal, a demon, which is degrading. It is very tragic. Heracles (Christ, the solar logos) is also in love with Iole, daughter of Eurytus, the latter who is the King of Oechalia. Heracles claimed Iole for marriage and he did so by winning a contest, but Eurytus refused to give his daughter to marriage based on Heracles' reputation as a womanizer. So, Heracles then wooed Dejanira, took her for a wife, and then Dejanira became jealous that Heracles would love Iole more since he sacked the city of Oechalia and then took Iole as a concubine. Because Dejanira did not want to lose Heracles to the younger and more beautiful Iole, she wanted to charm him. She used the coat of Nessus. Nessus was a centaur who wants to ferry Dejanira across the River Evenus. I believe Nessus was a centaur, and he ferried her over the River Evenus and tried to rape her when they crossed. Heracles saved her from Nessus by shooting him with poison arrows. Nessus told her with his dying breath that if he soaked Heracles cloak in his blood it would serve as a love charm. Very interesting symbols. Obviously, Nessus is a big ego―half man, half horse―half divine, half diabolic, a Hasnamuss. But Dejanira believed his lie that Heracles would no longer want any woman afterwards, so she wanted to prevent Heracles and Iole from being together. She gave him the cloak. He put it on and the poison went into his body and then it was going to kill him. When she realized her mistake, Dejanira killed herself. Heracles, knowing he would die, climbed Mount Oeta and built his funeral pyre. It is a very complicated story, but you can see that Heracles is the solar initiate, a bodhisattva who was poisoned by his own ego. Dejanira, we can say, is the feminine aspect of our soul. She wants to marry Heracles, but in order for him to do so, he has to climb the Mountain of Oeta, the mount of initiation. In that way, he builds his funeral pyre, incinerates all that poison he has in himself, the poison of desire. We kill lust through initiation, through the death of the ego. So, do not be like Samson, meaning, you have a lot of power in heaven that you are developing, then give it all away for a few moments of desire, because many people fall and fail on that way. Of course, feed your mind with good food, psychologically speaking, good impressions, and in that way, we prevent many problems, psychologically, for ourselves. Do you have any questions? Questions and Answers
Comment: You mentioned chastity, which is kind of synonymous with the libido that has to be purified. Now over and over you mentioned the mechanism of the work and the sun. From what I have read, it dovetails a lot to with Samael Aun Weor says. In that act of meditation, first of all, and it relates to the first card (Arcanum 1: The Magician), the sun, to make yourself transparent, they say. You have to be calm, otherwise nothing will happen, to concentrate, not too hard, to see that light coming down into your heart. Some occultists say automatically it raises the vibrations and helps purify the libido.
Instructor: Yes, so you can do certain imagination exercises which will bring the solar energy into your mind. You can visualize Christ from the Absolute entering into you, and in that way, we charge ourselves. So we work with transmutation practices, but also the runes. So, the runes are very powerful for that. Do the Rune Man, arms above your head, facing the East. Say those prayers to the Solar Logos that we mentioned: Oh Thou, Solar Logos, Igneous Emanation, substance and consciousness of Christ, powerful life whereby everything advances, come unto me and penetrate me, enlighten me, bathe me, go through me and awaken within my Being all of those ineffable substances that are as much a part of Thee as a part of me.
You are invoking the solar energy to come down into you. With the seven runes too, especially the Rune Sig, in which you are kneeling on the ground or trying to bend your knees as much as you can, pronouncing the vowel S, the letter S, or certain mantras that work with the libido, not only to bring that energy down, but also to transmute your energy back up.
When you work with the seven runes, like we have explained previously, you are invoking Christ down your Tree of Life:
The last two really work with the libido themselves.
Imagine that energy descending down into you, down your Tree of Life, charging your whole body with Christ. When that energy mixes with your sexual energy in your libido, the Rune Man, the mantra M, and then with Sig, you are sending it all back up through your spine to your head. You are creating a circuitry, a transparency of forces in you where Christ is flowing in and out. Question: That raises your vibrations of your body, right? And your etheric body also? Instructor: Yes, and we need to work with that energy very diligently so that we can awaken our ע Ayin, our imagination, because spiritual sight does not only refer to self-observation too, but it is all related to the faculty of imagination, how you perceive images of a psychic type. You can also do those mantras when you are seated in your chair. I, E, O, U, A, M, S. Imagine the solar light. If you don't want to stand up, sometimes we do runes here and we stand for a long period of time. You can also sit in your chair. Do those mantras. Visualize the energy descending down into you then returning back up your spine, the vowel S. That is how you form aurus, Horus in you, and create the solar light. Comment: It is quite a few mantras. I think you mentioned to find one that you find more comfortable with and that you may find more effective. Instructor: Yes, so obviously to try to practice every mantra that is available in this teaching is impossible. But you work with the ones that are really effective for you, which is why the Master Samael gave so many different practices to awaken our ע Ayin. With that energy, we naturally awaken in the astral plane, the mental plane, the causal plane, and get the help that you need so you can learn to navigate those realms with cognition, with awareness. Comment: The problem is to get to that plane and to get there to begin with. Instructor: So that's why we work with the Key of SOL: Subject-Object-Location. In that way you are aware at all times of what you are doing. Question: You say every day, that routine, no matter what you do, to be constantly aware of that? Instructor: Everything you do and be mindful. Mindfulness is when you are attentive all day and just be aware of your thinking. Comment: When you are driving, there are many things you have to be attentive to... Instructor: Obviously self-observation is not this intellectual process: “Okay! I am looking at my socks and my shoes,” and acting like Dick Tracy, where you are trying to, you know, investigate everything in a very intellectual way. It is not intellectual. But obviously when you are driving a car, you need to be very careful. That is the great way to practice self-observation because obviously people who drive in Chicago are quite bad. New York is even worse. Sorry for our listeners in New York. Question: Is it better being happy, living in the moment, doing what you love, becoming the great artist, becoming the great painter, becoming the great teacher, becoming the great singer? All my work is actually, you know, every day reading, getting more of this knowledge or being the great human, becoming the great human living in the moment. Instructor: The more you work on your ego, the more you remember your Being and the moment too. The greatest artists have always been intuitive. They did not necessarily have a type of religious belief system or upbringing, but they were conscious of what those religions taught, like Beethoven, Wagner, Mozart, Chopin, Liszt, great initiates who taught in music the path that leads to Christ, divinity, in a very cognizant way. We always emphasize to students and people around the world too that the more you work on your ego and the less ego you have, the greater and more profound your art will be, more beautiful, like the great writers, the great poets, great musicians, really, the best of humanity, they all really reflected God in them. In that way, they were able to give to humanity a very precious gift, which of course, people do not really appreciate now. They kind of taken it for granted, but obviously, the more you work on your ego, eliminate desire, the more your Being can express through you and express that perfection to others, so you develop more certainty that way too, more faith. Comment: It's an ongoing process. Instructor: Yeah, it takes a long time. DaVinci and Beethoven and all of them did not become what they were until... Comment: The world all says it is never ending. Instructor: No, it is always a delicate process. Another Instructor: Well, you know there is a difference between... it's not enough to just be awake in the moment. To just be awake in the moment is the starting point. So you are saying there is all these people who follow religion blindly and they are just like, “Nope, can't do that, can't do that,” but they never really awakened to, “Why can't I do that? Why can't I touch the fire?“ You know, they never actually tried those things out like in your example. Well, if I had just shunned my anger and I never find out what my anger is and how to master it, then I don't become the golden warrior, right? So first we have to be awake to our situation, but then there is two ways to awaken. If I awaken to my situation and I think, “Okay, now that I am awake, I could take advantage of other people and I could get a lot of money and a lot of power…” and then you awaken negatively. Comment: The left-hand path… Another Instructor: Right. Or you can awaken positively and say “Okay, I am awake. Let me help people. Let me find creative ways to serve humanity and connect with my inner divinity.” Look at someone like R. Kelly, you know, a famous artist, lots of hits. People love his art, and look at what is coming out right now about the way that he has terribly treated women and you know, pedophilia and stuff like that. So you can build the tower on the foundation of slime and become famous and seem successful, but someday that tower is going to fall and then all that good stuff that you got from the left-hand path is going to fall on your head and become, you know, your curse, versus building on the foundation of divinity and awakening positively in getting rid of desire. Then that foundation is immortal because it is rooted in the eternal. Question: What about positive desire? Another Instructor: You mean to desire for divinity? Question: Desire to help people? Another Instructor: Well, is it a desire to help people because it makes me look good? Or is it a desire to help people because genuinely, I feel compassion for their suffering? Comment: There is the ego involved which wants to make you look good. Another Instructor: That is why we have to be awake because if you are not awake and you are just like, “Oh, I am just trying to do the good things,” you might just be doing the good things for yourself. Instructor: Like those people who go on saying “I am the Master so and so” in the Gnostic movement. They think they are helping people. I even get emails sometimes from these groups, like they are saying “The master so and so has commanded… we ex-communicated such and such, because he is a witch and a sorcerer” and really weird crazy things, like, why would you go around pointing your finger at someone saying they are a witch, meanwhile you have three fingers pointing towards you and your thumb up to heaven saying, “Look at me. I am a hypocrite!” We often think of people of that type, the Pharisee, who always thinks they are doing good. We all have that Pharisee inside that thinks that we are doing the right thing and good thing for people, but “by their fruits, you will know them.” You know, meditate on the results. Are our actions producing the welfare and happiness of others? Or are we feeding degeneration in others? So we have to discriminate. Question: So the hubris comes in somewhere, doesn't it? Instructor: Yeah, thank you for that, because hubris is, in literary studies, at least it refers to, kind of like a mystical pride of a character who thinks that they are infallible. Like you find that with Odysseus in The Odyssey. His fault is that he thinks he is so great. That is what always gets him into trouble to the point that he nearly dies many times. It is a quality of an initiate who thinks that they are very high up and therefore they can't fall. That lack of discretion is what gets them into trouble, thinking that they are so infallible that they can conquer anything, but in the meantime, they create problems for themselves. They enter many dangers that are unnecessary. Pride always comes before the fall. If we think that we are self-sufficient, then we will be fulminated because only God is sufficient. As the Qur’an teaches, one of the names of Allah is the Self-sufficient, the Praised. Comment: Sometimes misfortunes in life are a wakeup call. That's another thing. Instructor: Yes, we need to take advantage of the worst moments so that our sight is awakened spiritually, and then we minimize mistakes. Walk with caution. So, I thank you for coming! Editor: We highly recommend, if you wish to deepen your understanding of this topic, that you read, view, and study the following lecture from Glorian Publishing: Spiritual Danger You Do Not See.
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