The Spirituality of Sex

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Welcome to our continuation of the Gnostic Gospels. Today we will talk about the gnostic scripture of Philip, which emphasizes the nature of relationships.
 
We have here a famous Tibetan Buddhist painting of Padmasambhava who is considered the second Buddha in that tradition. He is with his wife, his consort Yeshe Tsogyal, and they represent the path of divine reunion. You find many types of representations within the Tibetan Buddhism, especially within their temples. They talk about the sexual nature of God, and that a couple, when properly trained, can take the power of life and create the spirit. But what is necessary is that both man and woman understand how to lovingly take that energy and how to harness it to empower the consciousness, our buddha nature.
 
Buddha in Sanskrit means “awakened one,” to awaken, to know. The very same energy that animates a human being can be utilized with specific techniques. While we are going to talk about the Gnostic Gospels, we start with this image because Padmasambhava taught that the path of the spiritual realization, of knowledge of the divine, is possible when the couple overcomes desire.
 
It might seem ironic that in this path of union, a marriage, that there must not be desire. In Buddhism, they teach that desire is the cause of suffering, pain, attachment, fears, worry. So when some people see this image, they become confused. How is it that a couple can be married and not have desire? It is because love is distinct, conscious love, the soul. Real love, divine connection, has no self, no attachment, no fear, no craving to mould the other person to “what we want.” It is tolerance, compassion united with objective knowledge about the nature of the soul. 

​The Societal, Familial, and Spiritual Purposes of Marriage

​In our lecture today we will talk about these principles, what we call alchemy in the West, or to break down the language: اللّٰه Allah-χημεία Khemia, “to fuse oneself with God.” On a basic level, there  are many facets of a matrimony. Really, the couple is the bedrock of society. We see that with the breakdown of families, you have the breakdown of institutions. There is a degeneration, a collapse, and not only the family unit, but really there is a deeper purpose to a matrimony than merely to propagate the species or to create order in our culture.
 
Marriage has a potential that few really realize, understand, or acknowledge. There’s a spiritual truth to what Jesus called “being born again” (John 3). Birth is a sexual problem. It is not a matter of belief. It is a matter of taking an act, which is usually animal for most of us, and making it divine. But for now, as we commonly understand relationships, we tend to approach sexuality with a mind filled with desire, attachment, or egotism. This is why in the Gospel of Philip it states:

Great is the mystery of marriage! Without it, the world would not be. The existence of the world depends on marriage. Think of sex. It possesses deep powers, though its image is filthy. ―The Gospel of Philip

​Marriage in the Private, Public, and Spiritual Spheres

​It’s also good to talk about the nature of marriage today, because in the West, we see a revision of attitude toward a tradition that has been perhaps abused, adulterated, or corrupted. Religious institutions have a purpose, not merely to protect the wellbeing of a society, to integrate people, but more importantly to liberate the soul, and therefore this sacrament was always a private institution governed by religious authority. But with the breakdown of religion and institutions, people had lost faith.

Now, we go a little bit further than the common ordinary discussion of marriage, like it’s a document, paper. Really, when husband and wife unite, man and woman unite, they are married before God, before the divine, because that creative energy, when it is unified between a couple, is a power to create. Therefore it has always been kept within a private sphere because it is sacred, and because the power of divinity to create through love is sacred―not merely physical children, but the soul.
 
The Gospel of Philip explains two types of marriage in its narrative: the defiled and the undefiled. We will be very clear on what that means. not merely from a moral standpoint, but from a psychological and a physical one. Defilement, according to Old Testament scripture, relates to orgasm. You find in the book of Leviticus, the Hebrew scripture, which states that any man who has an emission of semen must bathe himself in water and be unclean until even (Leviticus 15:16-18). That uncleanliness, that defilement, that act is, in itself, what creates suffering in the long term.
 
That energy must be conserved, must be protected, must be transformed, must be harnessed. In tantra, in Buddhism, that power must never be let out. However, when the couple, with love, takes that power and conserves it, elevates up the spine, they produce illumination. We will talk a lot about this, the waters of life, the spiritual symbol of baptism, and how with that energy, we are reborn. Instead of giving birth to a child physically, we give birth to Christ. 

No one can know when the husband and the wife have intercourse with one another except the two of them. Indeed, marriage in the world is a mystery for those who have taken a wife. If there was a hidden quality to the marriage of defilement, how much more is the undefiled marriage to true mystery? It is not fleshly, but pure. It belongs not to desire, but to the will. It belongs not to the darkness or the night, but to the day and the light. ―The Gospel of Philip

​That which is born of flesh is flesh, but that which is born of spirit is spirit (John 3:6). The same act, transformed, creates the soul, raises Sophia in the gnostic myth to pleroma, the heights, the truth. It is of the day and the light because that energy gives you experiences in meditation, in dreams, and even after death. It awakens you. It is the power of awakening. But we must be pure. We must have willpower. will to dominate the body, to train it, to make it work for us, and not the other way around. 

​Three Types of Marriage: Karmic, Dharmic, and Spiritual

​So when we talk about marriage, we talk about types of matrimonies. There is a teaching given by Dion Fortune in the Western esoteric tradition where she speaks about in a book called Esoteric Philosophy of Love and Marriage about different types of union.
 
We show these three images to parallel karmic, dharmic, and spiritual matrimonies, going from left to right. If you studied Buddhism, you know about karma: cause and effect. Karma is usually used in a negative sense, meaning, if I do something bad, my bad action will come back to me. Dharma means benefit, “the law,” literally from Sanskrit, and dharma means good deeds, good actions, happiness, good results. Spirituality, or the spiritual marriage, is the most ideal, because it is when the spirit, when divinity, our inner Being, the truth is manifest within the couple.

Karmic marriages are often relationships in which we see a lot of fighting, disagreements, pain. Instead of love, we see antagonism, and perhaps such relationships end in divorce because of incompatibility. If you look at our common, modern day life, we find a lot of people fall in this category. Karma, meaning cause and effect, can relate to relationships we have in life that are a recurrence from past lives. We often meet the very same people we knew from before. We just don't remember. But if you practice meditation, you can understand the connections. You can have an experience that shows you who in your life is a return from your past life, so that we don't repeat the same mistakes.
 
Karmic relationships are repetitions. They are often unconscious; and because they are unconscious, they are often filled with affliction because we don’t understand or comprehend how our own mind reproduces the same dramas, comedies, and tragedies of life. 

​We repeat! This is the wheel of Samsara, Bhavachakra in Buddhism. We just keep doing the same thing again and again expecting different results.

However, if we work on ourselves, psychologically, we transform our mind. We produce better circumstances. In this way, we have better relationships. We find a person perhaps who, or someone is in our lives who can help elevate our heart, elevate our spirituality.
 
Dharmic marriage is when there is 20, 30, 40, 50 years―happiness, contentment. Things work. The couple sacrifices for each other. There is a balance, a give and take, a reciprocity.
 
But even dharmic relationships can be transcended. There are spiritual marriages, and this is a very important point within gnosticism, our traditions, but also many other schools which talk about twin souls, or destiny, or the marriage of the soul with Christ according to the early church fathers. In our tradition, we study the writings of Samael Aun Weor, especially the book The Perfect Matrimony, where he talks about the spiritual marriage. He calls it the perfect matrimony, in which the couple is in alignment within body, soul, and spirit. The couple is together because both of their inner divinities agreed to work. Therefore they have an affinity within thoughts, feeling, and will. Attraction, physically and energetically, the heart and the emotions are in alignment. Both agree within thought, and the will does not clash. They work together, and therefore, divinity can work more effectively through them.
 
It is important also to understand that we do not begin with the perfect matrimony. It is something that is developed. We earn it by eliminating, in ourselves, what creates conflicts, what creates incompatibility. It is the ego, our desires, our sense of self, which creates dissonance―not our zodiac sign, not merely our upbringing, not our belief, but our will. You transform your mind, your willpower. You create more beautiful, deep, profound, and lasting union. 

​The Spiritual Integration of Sex with the Psyche

​But in order to do that, we have to integrate Psyche with Eros.
 
We know from the Greek myth that Eros or Cupid awakens psyche; the soul. You can read about that myth in The Golden Ass of Apuleius, in the sacred text of Greek initiation.
 
Sexuality and will cannot be at odds. Everything about us, in terms of how we think, feel and act have to be in alignment, and this most definitely includes the energy of sex.
 
That teaching has always been taught symbolically, because people could not handle, in the past, the direct explanation of this teaching. It had to be taught in symbols, because the sacredness of the knowledge had to be transmitted to people who were mature, in order to escape judgments and persecution, such as from the Spanish Inquisition.
 
But we are in a very different time. We explain the knowledge openly so that people can practice it. These principles are very profound, and also when they are been taught symbolically, they are taught in that way because symbols convey more meaning than literal words. They are very dynamic, multidimensional. Any symbol can convey meaning on multiple levels of experience, and that is why we study symbols and what they mean so that we can extract deep wisdom.
 
In the process of this, we study ourselves. We study our psychological self-image, or we study our image. We do so that we understand our full potential, and the creative energy of sexuality is the most powerful source we possess. With that energy, we can be born again. We can be resurrected as a soul, and so we also study the symbol in the Gospel of Philip, which talks about the bridal chamber. That bridal chamber is precisely the Eastern Tantra, the perfect matrimony, divine union, and through this bridal chamber, which is respected with the most profound sacredness and love, we can become gods. 

Truth did not come into the world naked but in symbols and images. The world cannot receive truth in any other way. There is rebirth and an image of rebirth, and it is by means of this image that one must be reborn. What image is this? It is the resurrection. Image must arise through image. By means of this image, the bridal chamber must approach the truth. This is restoration. ―The Gospel of Philip

​So there is rebirth and the image of rebirth. Rebirth occurs when you take the energy, whether you’re married or single. You elevate it. You conserve it. You illuminate your mind. You give life to your soul with that very power. The image of rebirth occurs when, not only when we conserve that power and use it well, we eliminate our inner defects. We are purifying the consciousness. We are eliminating pride, anger, and lust. That image of rebirth occurs when we remove the psychological impurities, illusions and mistakes, so that we can truly be born again. We become a new person. We are not the same individuals we were a year ago or ten years ago. By practicing this, we become a new being. We begin as an embryo, spiritually. We become a full perfect human individual, an angel.

“Image must arise through image.” As we’re meditating, and understanding all the different psychological contaminants of mind and rectifying them, we become perfect. Therefore by means of this image, the bridal chamber and this image must approach the truth, meaning, whenever we are with our spouse, we approach the truth, not our desires, not the animal, but the spirit. In this way, sexuality must be integrated. It is not something to be at odds with, or to be confused, or to be involved with pain, or affliction. It is restoration. The soul returns to the doorway it left in the Garden of Eden. The word עֵדֶן Eden means bliss, pleasure, sexual delight. In Hebrew, it is the voluptuousness of the perfect matrimony. 

The Three Brains and the Two Witnesses

​So we study in this process the three brains, or the two witnesses, as we see this famous Caduceus used by Hermes, or Mercury, in the Greek and Roman mythology. We also find this image representing medicine, two serpents upon the staff with the wings of the spirit open, to take one from, we can say, this fallen world up back to Sophia, to pleroma.
 
These two circuits are full of energy in our spines. They arise from the sexual organs up to the mind. In the Book of Revelation, they are called the two witnesses (Revelations 11). Even the term witnesses from Latin is testes. So where do we get the term “testimony”? The power of the stone, or the two stones, the ovaries, of the testicles, have energy that rises up if we use it intentionally. Those serpents, those two channels, in Hinduism, in Yoga, are called Ida and Pingala, or to use biblical language: Adam and Eve, positive and negative, sun and moon. It is like a circuitry that allows divinity to manifest in the spine, so that the fire of Pentecost in the Christian Church, the Holy Spirit, or Kundalini, rises―Shekinah amongst the Kabbalists, the force of the divine feminine, the spirit.
 
In order to work with that energy, we study three brains. A brain in spiritual, esoteric language is a center of activity, physiologically, energetically, psychologically. We know we have an intellectual brain because we think, but our emotion is also a brain for feelings, and it’s very deep. It can register things that we don’t access or think about or are conscious of. You think of someone, you feel or sense in your heart that something is going to happen, and suddenly it does―intuition. Knowledge comes to us without having to think. But then you also have the brain of action, which is the spine, the sexual organs. It is how we process will or desire.
 
In Christianity, there is a trinity because we have energy in those three brains. We have the Father in the head, Christ in the heart, the Holy Spirit in sex. Or to use Hindu language, you have Brahma, Vishnu, Shiva. The trinity is represented  in all religions, in different ways, and those are energies, forces, potentials that we can actualize if we know how, if we meditate.
 
This is why in the Bible it said, I think, they asked Jesus, “What is the greatest commandment?” He said to love thy God with all thy heart, with all thy mind, with all thy soul, with all thy strength, and thy neighbor as yourself. There are no greater commandments than these (Mark 12:30-32). Three brains, three centers, three energies, but a unity if we create that unification in us, because in our common day, we tend to be  imbalanced.
 
The mind is not working with the heart, or the heart is not working with sex. We have confusion. We have a Tower of Babel, esoterically speaking, and so we have to respect these energies in our heart, mind, body, so that the energies rise with clarity and wisdom. If we have impure mind, heart, or physicality, the energies do not flow well. We know this from eastern medicine especially, Tai Chi, Chi Gong, acupuncture. If the energies are flowing well, you have health. If they are impure, you get sick, mentally, emotionally, physically.
 
So we work with the spine, these energies, these two channels, Ida and Pingala, Adam and Eve, in order to be anointed. The Gospel of Philips states:

Those who receive the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit and have accepted them must do this. If someone does not accept them, the name will also be taken away from that person. The person receives them in the Chrism, with the oil of the power of the cross. The apostles call the power of the right (Pingala) and the left (Ida). This person is no longer a Christian but is Christ. ―The Gospel of Philip

​To receive the name as the Father, Son, Holy Spirit means: purify your minds. Purify your heart. Purify your body. The three brains so not accept superior forces within our interior if they have their “name” taken from one. Their name in Hebrew means השם Hashem. In Judaism when you’re in the Synagogue, we say ברוך השם יהוה Baruch Hashem Adonai, “Blessed be the name of the Lord!” They use this as an appellation for יהוה Iod-Havah, Jehovah, as it is a sacred name not to be spoken in vain. Iod-Havah, male-female, brain in sex. 

​If you relate the Hebrew to the body, Iod means “head” or can mean the head. Havah, Eve, the “mother of the living” is the sexual organs, and when you unify all that you have the blessings of your inner Being.
 
You receive it through the Chrism, with the oil of the power of the cross. A cross is the symbol of the matrimony―the vertical phallus, the horizontal uterus―in which we crucify our passions, or egotism, so that we can be anointed―not to be a Christian, a believer, but to become Christ, perfect. 

​Chrism

​So the word Chrism is the oil that is used in our anointments, such as when confirming in the Catholic Church, or blessing a new soul who’s entering the spiritual path.
 
We have an image here of the Lingam Yoni within Hinduism. It is a symbol of the cross. You have the horizontal uterus and the vertical phallus. This is the power of Shiva-Shakti. Shiva-Shakti is the creative and destructive power of sex, because sexuality can ennoble or condemn depending on our usage.
 
The word chrism even sounds like the Hindu slang जिस्म jism,  which literally means “body” or the “female or male genitals,” “the vulva or penis,” “seminal fluid” (1899); earlier “energy or strength” (1842). Literally, the creative energy is what gives a person strength.
 
We know from boxers or from Chinese medicine that they advise: do not go to your partner when you’re sick, or as in a case of a fighter before you fight, because the word virya (sexual potency) indicates virility, a “warrior.” That term refers to the strength that ennobles the hero. Even the word hero sounds like Eros, the power of the saints who conquered themselves, their eroticism. That oil, that energy, which in most people tends to be wasted, is instead used to conserve and transform, to become the light that illuminates the mind.  

​Sexual Propriety and the Requirements of Chastity

We have an image here from an early lecture on the Gnostic Mysteries of Chastity, from this course, where angels attend to the bedroom of a couple. That is a beautiful symbol of the way that sexuality should be treated. It should be treated with great reverence in awe. I believe in the Acts of Thomas you find a myth in which Jesus of Nazareth, the twin of Thomas, attended to the bedside of a bride and groom in order to guide them in these mysteries. This mystery is―you are connected with your partner―when man and wife are united to remember God, not desire, not animality, but love.
 
Your inner divinity watches everything we do. Even the masters of the great hierarchy, within the divine kingdoms, these Elohim, or the Hebrew term for angels, watch to see what we will do, and we can ask for their help to raise the fire, awaken Kundalini, ascend.
 
So the ancients were very respectful. They knew the sacredness in this act and had propriety. Their matrimony is obviously a private affair. We find that represented here in the Gospel of Philip where they talk about, in a conventional sense, what was considered ethical at the time. While it might seem outdated to a modern mind, in truth these are esoteric principles. They are symbolic. 

If a marriage is opened to the public it becomes prostitution, and the bride plays a harlot not only when she’s impregnated by another man, but even when she slipped out of her bedroom and is seen. Let her show herself only to her father, to her mother, and to the friend, to the bride and groom, to the son of the bride and groom. These are permitted everyday to enter into the bridal chamber. ―The Gospel of Philip

We’re not talking about literal people. Obviously there might be one level of meaning there. But when you enter the bridal chamber, you do so knowing your Divine Father and your Divine Mother, your Being, is watching.
 
We have that duality, Shiva-Shakti, Adam-Eve, male-female, the Holy Spirit, which is both the Divine Father the Divine Mother, or the Hebrew term in the Bible: יהוה אלהים Jehovah Elohim, which is the name of God that “created man in His image. Male-female He created them” (Genesis 1:27). “Show oneself only to the father and the mother,” meaning, we must not think of other things. We must only remember divinity.
 
Who is the friend of the bridegroom? Amongst the Gnostics, Christos, Christ which is not a person, but an energy. That energy is what guides the couple like in the Acts of Thomas. Christ, the energy of life, is the one that is our deepest friend, and we must remember our own inner Christ, the light. That is the friend of the bridegroom who is permitted to enter the bed chamber―no one else―not pride, not anger, not laziness, not lust. They cannot enter, we have to put them aside. In the beginning, it is not easy. We cannot be perfect in the beginning, but we train little by little to make it perfect.
 
Who are the sons of the bridegroom who are permitted to enter the bridal chamber? We call them solar bodies: the sons of Noah. Noah in the Old Testament, the book of Genesis, symbolizes the soul who has three sons. We call them, in esoteric language, a solar mind, a solar heart, and a solar will.

These are vehicles that we activate and create as represented in this image, the Tree of Life, these lower spheres, הוד Hod (the astral body), נצח Netzach (the mental body), תפארת Tiphereth (the body of will), within the Jewish mystical tradition. Solar bodies are the wedding garment of the soul. These are vehicles that we can use when we dream. They are superior. They manifest the divine so that our dreams are not incoherent, but visionary. We can then navigate these higher worlds with competence, with skill.
 
We need a solar mind, solar emotion, and solar will, meaning: Christ is manifested there whenever we enter the sexual act. We do not need to have solar bodies already, these vehicles prepared, but we need to have these attitudes. We have to approach the act with utmost care. 

How Alchemists Are Defined, Made, and Recognized 

​This is how we are defined, made, and recognized according to the Gospel of Philip.
 
Alchemists are those who are precisely tantric initiates that work with the creative force.

We have here, I believe, the anointment of the King Saul. I don't remember the biblical figure that was first anointed, but that is the symbol of how we take the oil, the שמן shemen in Hebrew, which is the literal term for ointment, and by preserving it, raise the energy up to our head to become crowned with glory. שמן Shemen means “oil.” This is where we get the term semen, and when we work with the energy, the chrism, the anointment, you are transforming yourself.
 
It is important to remember that in many traditions, it is a symbol, not a literal fact, for most people. Many people can be anointed through catechism, that is, with the Catholic Church, and receive the type of baptism and ritual. These are symbols of a deeper reality.
 
We are truly baptized and anointed when we’re working with sex daily, transforming the energy, so that we give birth to the soul, so that we become true queens and kings of our psychological and moral universe. This is why the Gospel of Philip states:

But let the others yearn to enjoy listening to her voice and to enjoy her ointment (שמן shemen), and let them feed from the crumbs that fall from the table like the dogs. Bridegroom and bride belong to the bridal chamber. No one should be able to see the bridegroom with the bride unless they become such a one. ―The Gospel of Philip

​When you experience your soul, such as through meditation, out of the body in dreams, like in the Tree of Life, and you have these mystical visions―seeing your God teaching you through symbols―you become inflamed, inspired, and driven to receive even the crumbs of the bread of knowledge. Even those little meditative states, which you may get, from time to time, produce spiritual hunger to the point that we are Tantalus, in the Greek myth, at the table of the Gods. So we strive to receive those experiences because we want to know the truth.
 
Bridegroom and bride belong to the bridal chamber, and no one should be able to see the bridegroom and the bride unless they become such a one, meaning: an alchemist.
 
When you meet, perhaps, initiates of the white lodge in the superior dimensions, not physically, but internally, you recognize them. When you’re working with this science and you awaken in your dreams, you see these masters come to you and you recognize them immediately. You cannot recognize them if you are not working, if you are not awakening, because our dream is very incoherent and scattered in the beginning. They are not unified. They are not profound. But when you perform this, they come to you, and you immediately see them for who they are because you are awake. You are no longer dreaming. You are conscious. We gave a whole course on this called Dream Yoga and Astral Travel. You can listen to it on our podcast. It talks about a lot of these principles. 

​Requisites for Alchemy

​So what are the requisites for alchemy? We see a beautiful couple here in the sign of their honeymoon. There is a basic requisite according to the Gospel of Philip for this, but also we include a synonymous verse from The Perfect Matrimony by Samael Aun Weor:

A bridal chamber is not for the animals, nor is it for the slaves, nor for defiled women, but it is for free men and virgins. ―The Gospel of Philip

​Obviously the language can be very dissonant, especially to our modern mind. However, it is symbolic, not literal. A bridal chamber is not for the animals. Who are the animals? Pride, anger, laziness, lust, appetite, desire―we all have animals within. We call them egos, defects, vices, errors, our craving and aversions. They can not enter the sexual act, or at least to a degree enough so that we can practice. Obviously, in the beginning we are swarmed with many elements that we see in ourselves as we try to practice the science. We have a lot of lust, a lot of internal adultery, prostitutions, defects which are very chaotic. In the beginning we see them, but little by little we eliminate them.
 
What is important is that when we begin the practice that we do not let that define the act. We do not let that define our marriage or relationship.
 
Now, we must not be a slave to passion, addicted to sensation. The union itself is beautiful. It is sacred. It is pleasurable, but that is not the point. It is not merely to have sensations. They are present, but we must not be attached to them, neither repress, hide from, or reject them. There are two extremes. The middle path is the Tao: white and black, black and white, yin and yang, opposites unify.
 
“Nor for a defiled woman.” Really, this is referring to Eve, and Eve is a sexual symbol: הוה Havah, “mother of the living.” It is the sexual organs. Our sexual organs must not be defiled. We must not reach the orgasm. That is the forbidden fruit from the Tree of Knowledge. When you smell the aroma, but do not transgress, its boundaries, we gain knowledge. We tame the serpent Kundalini up the spine.
 
“It is for free men and virgins.” What does it mean to be free? Really? Are we free from pain, from addiction, from ego? And what does it mean to be virginal? It does not mean “to not have sex.” It means to be pure: transform the impure act into a pure act, so that you can give birth like an immaculate conception. Obviously that part of the Christian tradition became confused, where people believe that Mary gave birth without sex, because people thought and think of sex as something filthy. However, it can be immaculate, and this is how we give birth to the soul. “Free men and virgins” are people who have some form of stability, so that they can, little by little, gain more ground., make their marriage more and more perfect. This is why Samael Aun Weor said in The Perfect Matrimony:

We understand people of normal sexuality to be those who have had no sexual conflict of any kind. ―Samael Aun Weor, The Perfect Matrimony, “Normal Sexuality"

This is the basis of alchemy. Obviously in our world, what we call normal is very different from what the Elohim, the Gods, consider normal. Our planet is very abnormal if you look very deeply.
 
Normal sexuality means, according to esoteric terminology, people who have conscious control of themselves to some degree, who are not overwhelmed or driven by so many dramas or perhaps psychological conflicts that they are not willing to practice or to change. Obviously, any person can perform this path, can approach the normal, angelic way of engaging in this act. But obviously in the beginning, we start with where we’re at. We gain balance little by little. We must not have enough contradictions in ourselves that will impede the work, and the way that we do it is by meditating on ourselves.

Spiritual Conception, Awareness, and the Merits of the Heart

​Here we see Jesus baptized by John in the River Jordan. These verses from the Gospel of Philip are very beautiful. They really emphasize the most important aspect of alchemy.
 
There are many people who read The Perfect Matrimony by Samael Aun Weor and become very inspired to want to enter this path. They hear about the love between husband and wife, and the spiritual potential they have.
 
But some people get married and approach sex with ambition, pride, and desire, and there are some who enter relationships perhaps out of loneliness, fear, guilt, shame, or fear of being alone, and that it becomes the basis of their matrimony.
 
There are, perhaps, spiritual ambitions between people, couples that may get together because they are gnostic, or they practice a certain faith, a certain religion, rather than love. Really, love is the defining principle of any union. It should be the most important thing, because there are people who seek a partner out of fear or ambition to be spiritual. They fail because they do not love their partner. Love is the requisite. 

​We are born again through the Holy Spirit, and we are conceived through Christ in baptism with two elements. We are anointed through the Spirit, and when we were conceived, we were united. No one can see oneself in the water (מים mayim) or in a mirror without light (אור aur), nor can you see yourself in the light (אור) without water (מים) or a mirror. So it is necessary to baptize with two elements, light (אור), and water (מים), and light is chrism. ―The Gospel of Philip

​We are born again through the Holy Spirit by working with the creative power. But the one who spiritually conceives the union is Christ in the heart. We are born again through the Holy Spirit and we are conceived through Christ in baptism with two elements. We are anointed through the spirit and we are conceived. We are reunited.
 
So spiritual conception is when two partners, two people meet and become filled with love. That spark, that unexplainable hunch, and that whisper in the interior of our being, calls us to know this person and to know ourselves. It is inexpressible, but for the one that has lived it knows it. That is the spiritual conception when Christ brings two souls together, our inner divinity, so that we can be perfect. This is why Samael Aun Weor stated in The Perfect Matrimony:

Love begins with a flash of delectable sympathy. It is substantiated with infinite tenderness, and it is synthesized with supreme adoration.―Samael Aun Weor, The Perfect Matrimony, “Love"

It begins with the flash, a spark. It is substantiated with tenderness, with getting to know the person. It is synthesized in a matrimony. When Christ, our inner divinity, unifies us with our partner, it is divinely ordained. It is sacred, and you will know that through experience. You will be given experiences, insights, which teach you about this. Obviously I am speaking for people who are not married, maybe who are looking for a partner, but also if we are married, we should consider, meditate, on this truth: how love is born, how it is substantiated, how it is inspired, how it is deepened, because that is the spiritual conception.
 
The two elements that baptize are water and light, or water and spirit. The Hebrew term for light is אור Aur: א Aleph, ו Vau, ר Resh (reading left from right), and then the water is מים Mayim, מ Mem, י Iod, and ם final Mem: water and light. Water is the creative energy, the sperm in a man and the ovum in a woman. The water of life is what we symbolically drink when we transmute. We take the energy and create light in ourselves. Light is born from the energy of life, as we see here.
 
Also, as we are practicing with the energy of creation, we start to see things, and that is how we are really baptized spiritually. Water and light―we take the light out of the water, the fire out of the water, by extracting it through mantra, sacred sounds, prayer, meditation, and therefore you start to see things in your visions. No one can see oneself in the water or a mirror without light, אור Aur in the water, מים Mayim, nor can you see oneself in the light without water or a mirror. So it is necessary to baptize with two elements: light and water, and light is Chrism. Literally, the power to see spiritually is the sexual power. You must extract light from the darkness. 

 יְהִי אֹור וַֽיְהִי־אֹֽור 
Yehi Ha-Aur, Va-Yehi-Aur
And Elohim said, “Let there be light, and there was light." ―Genesis 1:3

I believe Rumi, in the Muslim / Sufi tradition, stated that “those who look at water in a cup will see their own faces in it if they’re filled with desires. For those who are in love with Allah, they will see Him.”
 
This approach to sex: what do we see in the act? Is it our own passion, or is it love? We have to meditate on that. 

Spiritual Liberation through Kabbalah and Alchemy

​Here I briefly mentioned the Tree of Life, this image or glyph of the Jewish mystical tradition, which maps out the whole cosmos, from the more dense level of matter, energy, or experience up to the most spiritual―ten spheres, ten modes of being.
 
We are in מלכות Malkuth, which is the physical body.
 
Above that we have יסוד Yesod , which is our vitality, the creative sexual energy.
 
הוד Hod is the emotional body, our emotional experiences.
 
נצח Netzach is our mind.
 
תפארת Tiphereth is will.
 
Above that we have the divine soul, which is the spiritual consciousness.
 
To the right we have חסד Chesed, the spirit, our inner God.
 
Above that we have the top trinity: Father, Son, Holy Spirit―כתר Kether, חכמה Chokmah, בינה Binah, the trinity, Christ.

This glyph is very profound. We will explain it in relation to this scripture because the Gospel of Philip uses this abstract language of kabbalah to teach something very deep about the nature of sexual liberation and alchemy. Obviously, I’m using the term sexual liberation not in the conventional sense, because neither giving into passion or rejecting it is the way. Understanding it, comprehending it, is the middle path.
 
They talk about three buildings that are used for sacrificing in Jerusalem. One of them is called “the holy,” another facing, I believe, the west, and the one facing the south: “the holy of the holy,” and then the one facing east is “the holiest of the holiest.” This is in relation with the four directions: north, south, east, west.
 
It is a symbolic language. The north can relate to חסד Chesed, the spirit, and even in many mystical writings, you find that even Nietzsche talked about spiritual understanding as being up in the mountains, up in the cold, like you see here in the Three Mountains poster, which is a map of the whole path from beginning to end.
 
The south can relate to גבורה Geburah, the divine soul, the source of spiritual strength, נשמה Neshamah in Hebrew, or the divine soul that knighted the hero תפארת Tiphereth, the warrior. תפארת Tiphereth is Lancelot, גבורה Geburah is Guinevere, and חסד Chesed is Arthur, symbolically.
 
The east relates to דעת Da’ath, which is up toward the top Trinity. דעת Da’ath is the Tree of Knowledge. It means “knowledge” in Hebrew. It is sexual knowledge. It is the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. It is the wisdom we extract when we practice the perfect matrimony. 

​You take this image of the Tree of Life and put it on a human being, the top trinity in the head, middle trinity in the heart, lower trinity toward sex. דעת Da’ath is in the throat, because in the sacred matrimony, you are praying in the act and using mantra to transform the creative force into light. That is the source of mystical knowledge.
 
The Gospel of Philip emphasizes all of this. I’ll read it for you:

There were three buildings specifically for sacrifice in Jerusalem. The one facing the west was called "The Holy.” Another, facing south, was called "The Holy of the Holy.” The third, facing east, was called "The Holy of the Holies," the place where only the high priest enters. Baptism is "the Holy" building [מלכות Malkuth]. Redemption is the "Holy of the Holy.” [גבורה Geburah] "The Holy of the Holies" is the bridal chamber [דעת Da’ath]. Baptism includes the resurrection and the redemption. The redemption takes place in the bridal chamber. ―The Gospel of Philip

​It’s very deep. I am going to unpack this to the best of my ability.
 
Sacrifice in this sense has nothing to do with the killing of animals for ritual. Better said, it is a symbol of sacrificing our ego, our animal desire.
 
Facing the west is “the holy,” which is where baptism takes place. Interestingly enough, not only the physical ceremonies of ritual water are performed in מלכות Malkuth, the body, but that is where the water of life exists. We can baptize ourselves through this science.
 
Facing the south is גבורה Geburah, “the holy of the holy.” We call it that because גבורה Geburah, the divine consciousness, is the spiritual soul. She never enters impurity. She is virtuous, as represented in Wagner’s operas, the Valkyries, who sing before going to battle in Act 3 of Die Walküre, the Valkyries in the Nordic Mythology. גבורה Geburah is like a glass of alabaster that contains the spirit, a pure translucent and divine state―very sacred. She never mixes with ego. Therefore, she's holy because she contains all the mystical attributes of Christ above. But you also find that redemption is “the holy of the holy.” We are redeemed through her. 

​If you have ever seen picture, I believe The Accolade, a beautiful princess knights a warrior with a sword. It is a symbol. She is the one who decides whether we enter initiation or not. The hero, the soul, fights against the ego, has to be knighted by her. She is the redemption. She determines whether we pass or fail, and she is our own conscience. She is the root of that voice that says, “this is right” and “this is wrong.” “Do this” and “don't do that.” When we obey her we rise, and when we obey her, we kneel.
 
“The holies of holies,” the bridal chamber, is דעת Da’ath, because that is the sexual act. That is where real redemption takes place, like the myth of Parsifal. Within the Wagnerian opera with that name, the hero must face sexual temptation, to decide whether he would redeem the Gnostic Church from the fall of its main priest, Amfortas. It is my intention to show the opera at one point, give a lecture on it, but if you want to know more about that symbol, you can study the book Parsifal Unveiled by Samael Aun Weor where he talks about that opera and its esoteric symbol [see also The Secret Teachings of Opera course].
 
Baptism includes resurrection, because physically, the body must really purify itself, and redemption takes place in the sexual act itself, where we do decide our fates. That is where the real high priest enters. A real priest is a magician in control of four elements: fire (the emotions), air (thought), water (sex) and earth (the body). The high priest or a magician must officiate within his or her psychological temple. Just as there are priests, there are priestesses. Every husband is a priest who is performing this work, and every wife is a priestess, and that way we fulfill the sacraments of the Gnostic Church, as we were talking about in an earlier lecture: How to Be a Gnostic Priest.

​Blood, Semen, Solar Bodies, and the Sexual Organs 

​We included this image of a chalice, the Holy Grail, to represent a woman. The Holy Grail, while an artifact, represents for us woman, the spouse, the yoni, the feminine sexual organs, in which the blood of the redeemer is found. It is precisely in the sexual organ where we find the water, the blood, and the wine of redemption according to gnostic ritual (the Gnostic Mass made public by Samael Aun Weor in Secret Notes of a Guru).
 
Wine is an alchemical symbol. When you ferment or transform the sexual water, the semen into the wine of the spirit, you intoxicate the soul with bliss. Now again, semen does not refer literally to men. It is the water, the oil of creation, whether from man or woman. Both man and woman have sexual energy, potential that must be transformed, transmuted into wine, because the first miracle of Jesus was transforming water into wine in a marriage (John 2:1-11). We know that also the sperm or ovum―I believe one drop of sperm is the equivalent of eighty drops of blood. The quality of our blood determines the quality of our potency, the sexual force. It is from these waters that we create those solar bodies, so these are the vehicle of our soul as I mentioned. To do that we must be baptized. We have here in the Gospel of Philip:

The cup of prayer contains (יין Ayyin) wine and (מים Mayim) water, since it is appointed as the type of the (Daleth, Mem: דם Dam) blood for which thanks is given. And it is full of the Holy Spirit, and it belongs to the wholly perfect man. When we drink this, we shall receive for ourselves the perfect man. The living (מים) water is a body. It is necessary that we put on the living man. Therefore, when he is about to go down into the (מים) water, he unclothes himself, in order that he may put on the living man. ―The Gospel of Philip

​This is not referring to the literal, physical man, but sex. Man, even from Sanskrit, signifies manas, which means “mind.” Superior manas is תפארת Tiphereth. It is willpower, whether in man or a woman. The living man is not strictly limited to the male sex. It is the solar vehicles we create in a matrimony. It is from the blood and wine, it is from our heart and the sexual potential, in which we gave thanks, because it is full of the Holy Spirit, and the perfect man or the perfect woman, the perfect human being, arises from it.
 
So we must unclothe our egotistical garments, our lunar rags. If you studied dream yoga and astral travel, you know that we have lunar astral body, lunar mental body. These are vehicles given to us by nature. They are mechanical. We do not create them through a marriage. We just have them so that we can exist. But to go into the higher planes, you need to put on the living garment, the solar vehicles, so that we can go to higher states.
 
Now you can access a temporary state of enlightenment, a vacation, but to become a citizen there, we must have a solar body. That is fundamental. Therefore, we must go down into the water, as in baptism (the sexual act). Initiation is the result of a descent. Every exultation is a result of humiliation as we must face trials or ordeals within the perfect matrimony, to see whether we qualify for the path.

​The Origin of Sexual Potency, Beauty, and Spiritual Potential

​We also talk about three Hebrew letters: א Aleph, ש Shin, מ Mem. We found א Aleph in one of the Hebrew words אור Aur, “light,” as in א Aleph, ו Vau, ר Resh. ש Shin is fire. מ Mem is water. These letters represent principles, truths, and they are the essence of sexual potency. They are also the source of real beauty, not merely physical, but spiritual.
 
We see here that the Gospel of Philip emphasizes two elements: fire and water, and that within the water of sex is the fire of life. Therefore from the fire, temptation, by conquering lust, we gain light, wisdom, victory. 

Soul and spirit came into being from water (מ Mem) and fire (ש Shin). The attendant of the bridal chamber has come into being from water, fire, and light. Fire is Chrism. Light is fire. I do not mean ordinary fire which has no form, but other fire which is pure white in appearance, beautifully bright imparting beauty. ―The Gospel of Philip

​Who is the attendant of the bridal chamber? It is any person who is working in the perfect matrimony, nd that. really, we come into being through the fire and  light, through anointing ourselves. This is the astral light mentioned by Samael Aun Weor in The Perfect Matrimony―not literal fire―but spiritual fire. We meet masters like him in the astral plane who have beautiful golden appearances, shining the light of the Absolute, of all the Tree of Life through them, the Region of Barbelo amongst the Gnostics. 

​The Spine, Sexual Organs, Energy, and Source for Change

​Here we see that we have the Tree of Life transposed on the human body. יסוד Yesod relates to the sexual organs. יסוד Yesod means “foundation,” and these Hebrew letters י Iod, ס Samech, ו Vav, ד Daleth, spell “foundation” in Hebrew. It is the foundation because it is the rock of our church, the stone of Peter, literally Patar or slang for “phallus.” You can also rearrange those Hebrew letters with י Iod at the end to make סודי Sodi, which means “secret.” This is the secret knowledge that was never taught publicly until the sixties, and it is the ninth sphere from the top to bottom. The number nine relates to alchemy, transmutation, the sacred work.
 
We want to raise the energy up the spine over our Tree of Life because the spine is a tree of life in itself. It is this energy which can help change us and catalyze our spiritual development. It is also the energy that helps us crucify our passions, as I said. Here is what the Gospel of Philip stated:

Philip the apostle said, "Joseph the carpenter planted a garden because he needed wood for his trade. It was he who made the cross from the trees which he planted. His own offspring hung on that which he planted. His offspring was Jesus, and the planting was the cross." But the Tree of Life is in the middle of the Garden. However, it is from the olive tree that we got the chrism, and from the chrism, the resurrection. ―The Gospel of Philip

​Very deep! What is a carpenter? It is any one of us who is working with the Tree of Knowledge or fashioning wood to build the house of the spirit. It is from the cross of the Tree of Knowledge in which we eliminate our passions, because Shiva-Shakti, the power that creates and destroys, creates spiritual life but destroys the ego.
 
The one that hangs on this is יהשוה Yeshua, the savior. The savior fire or INRI in Latin: Ignus Natura Renovatur Integra, is the esoteric translation of Iesu Nazarenus Rex Iudaeorum: “Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews,” the real initiate. He is the fire arising from the chrism. The Tree of Life is in the middle of the garden because the Garden of Eden is sex and the Tree of Life rises from it. We gain the chrism, the sacred oil of God, through the Tree of Knowledge, which shares its roots within יסוד Yesod. That is how we achieve spiritual resurrection.

​Is Abstinence Spiritual?

Now we will conclude with one more explanation about the nature of our sexuality. There are many people who think of the spirituality of sex as something contradictory. There are many people in different faiths and religions that feel that real spirituality is divorced from sex and that the sexual act does not have the potential to transform, only to condemn.
 
Now abstinence is obviously practiced by many priests of different faiths or maybe monks and nuns. What is important to remember is that these monks and nuns from different faiths are practicing their tradition if they are transmuting the energies. It is not enough to just, well, practice devotion in the heart or study in the mind, but to conquer the creative force. There are many traditions that lost the meaning of this. Monks and nuns used to practice as a single person to transmute their creative force so they would be trained for matrimony and be prepared. Obviously the conventional churches have lost the meaning of this.
 
A real priest is, as I said, a magician who conquers the sexual act itself. It is not possible to renounce something we have not conquered. We can ignore sex and avoid it, but still that energy will act, usually in subversive ways. So it is important to take that power intentionally and use it for good things like creativity, art, painting, sculpture, being conscious, being a better person. One can only abstain from sex when one has conquered it.
 
It is important to remember that sex is not merely the end in itself but is a door. It is a door of Eden that leads from יסוד Yesod to the heights. When the work is fully done, we perfect ourselves. There is no ego, no mistakes left. We paid all our debts. Sex is then forbidden. One does not need it anymore. That is when one can renounce sex itself. But we need the energy of the creative power to enter the work.
 
Here’s what Samael Aun Weor said about this in The Major Mysteries:

In the beginning, we must be intensely sexual [transmuting our sexual energy in sexual cooperation with our spouse]. Thereafter, we must renounce sex. In the beginning, we have to develop powers. Thereafter, we have to renounce them. Some people do not understand the former statements, and act awkwardly, as when someone wants to take part in a horse-race without having a horse, or if they have it, they want to begin the race facing towards the rear of the horse instead of its head. Yes, some wretched people understand everything in reverse; in other words, they want to renounce sex without first having awakened the sacred fire, or they want to renounce powers without first having acquired them. How foolish they are, renouncing something that they do not have, yet they are incapable of renouncing what they do have. Indeed, this path is very difficult. This is the path of the razor’s edge. Understand that only the one who has become christified (perfectly divine) can renounce sex, and only the one who is already prepared to enter into the Absolute can renounce his powers. ―Samael Aun Weor, The Major Mysteries

​The Absolute is known as the region of Barbelo, on top the Tree of Life. It is the goal of the gnostics, the return.

​Resources

​To help you in your studies, we have two books which teach about alchemy in depth; The Perfect Matrimony, and The Mystery of The Golden Flower by Samael Aun Weor. They go very deep into the nature of pretty much everything related to this work. It can help you begin practicing especially if you are married, and even if you are single, obviously The Perfect Matrimony teaches everything about the gnostic path itself in great detail.
 
That is time! I invite you to ask questions. 

​Questions and Answers

​Question: So you talked a lot about, in the scripture, about the bride and bridegroom and I heard it said that esotericism that the bride can represent מלכות Malkuth, kabbalistically, in the physical body. In that case, if that’s true, would the bridegroom be Christ coming into the physical body?

Instructor: Yes, there is that level of meaning. Alchemically, the bride is the wife or the priestess, and the groom is the husband, the priest. On a deeper level, obviously bride and bridegroom activate Christ within themself, and then divinity can enter and manifest in them. There are multiple levels of applications.

Question: I am still struggling to understand how to utilize the principle of the four elements and in general, what I meant to learn with the whole magician pieces. Does this control the self within the matrix and therefore releases us from it? Kind of like you were saying about understanding sex and then renouncing it.
 
Instructor: Yes, so I would study a course given by Glorian Publishing called Meditation Essentials. When you learn to meditate, you control the four elements. You will learn to let the layers of the mind to stratify, to calm so that we can begin to receive understandings about our experiences and our psychology. 

In that course you will learn that image you see on the wall to your right. It is the nine stages of meditative concentration, stages of serenity, which begins with a monk chasing after a wild elephant ascending up a widening path up to a height, and finally equipoised in perfect peace. That is a symbol of how we must chase after our own mind with willpower, concentration, in order to calm the mind.
 
Now, what’s important to remember is that as we gain stability of consciousness, concentration, being able to focus on one thing without forgetting it, we start to get insight into that particular thing. That is how you can begin to understand any experience. Also, more importantly, it will teach you how to calm the four elements. Literally with Asana, posture, you calm your body, the earth. With energy work, you work with the waters. With meditation and concentrations, serenities, you calm the air (the mind) and the heart (the fire). When you control those four elements, you can enter, like you see monk on the very top of that image, the higher dimensions. That is dream yoga.
 
When you meditate and fall asleep, your mind is in perfect equipoise, and suddenly you enter the astral dimension and see reality for what it is. It will give understanding about any particular experience you have had. You just concentrate. You can visualize the experience and wait for the answer. Suddenly, the insight comes. It hits you. Meditation Essentials is very deep. I would study that course.
 
Comment: Thank you.

Instructor: You’re welcome.

Another Instructor: Can I speak on that, the four ordeals?
 
Another part of the path of initiation (which is the path when we become initiates, or we try to become the magician) is that―especially in the beginning, but also various points again of the path―we experience the four ordeals of the four elements. By conquering these ordeals, we can develop that mastery of ourselves. So, if you are thinking of a matrix style world―that everything that happens in manifested reality, our relationship with other people, our experiences in life―is just there as a sort of spiritual test for us to learn something about ourselves, for us to master ourselves, then we associate the four ordeals with different types of experiences.
 
You might experience an ordeal of fire in your physical life as someone you are close to criticizing you a lot and that brings up anger, that brings up shame, that brings up these fiery feelings within. When we learn to master that, to acknowledge the situation―which is to develop serenity and sweetness of character, to not get totally identified and upset about the situation, but rather to transform the situation in a positive way―then on that level, we master that ordeal. We develop some level of magic to transform our life in a positive direction.
 
Briefly the ordeal of water would relate with overwhelming changes of circumstances where you feel like you are drowning in a new social situation. You must learn how to swim. You must learn how to adapt.
 
Air can relate to loss: loss of a job, loss of a partner, loss of something that brought you stability before. Now you feel like you are falling with nothing to hold on to. So how do you develop the flexibility to be able to fly, even when you feel like you have nothing to hold on to? How do you have faith?
 
With earth, we can feel the sort of pressure, pressing circumstances where you have to develop a lot of perseverance, really, to push through them, to not give up, but to keep developing strength of will to get through them.
 
So briefly, I would say that is another good place to recognize, “what element this situation that I am struggling with in my life might be representing.” Also, you can see: “what do I need to master within myself to not be overwhelmed by this situation, but to recognize the situation for what it is?” This info “brings the quality out of my own soul, to transform it into a positive situation for the other people involved, and myself as well.”
 
Question: Samael Aun Weor states that the perfect matrimony consists of two souls, one who loves more, and one who loves better. Could you elaborate on that?
 
Instructor: Two pillars of the Tree of Life, wisdom and love. You see that kabbalah has three pillars: the right, the left, and the middle. On the right we have the pillar of mercy, on the left we have the pillar of severity, and in the middle we have the pillar of equilibrium. You can also say wisdom and love, from the right to the left.
 
Now these relate to certain conventional norms, obviously with man and woman, in terms of psychological disposition. Or esoterically speaking, the one who loves more is a woman―more heart, more feeling, more love. But also, man has more wisdom, knowing better―more conceptual―rational, I mean, if we break it down in that sense. But that is not to say that paradigm defines every relationship, because couples are mixed. People are unique and different.
 
But when we find wisdom, with knowing how to live on the right pillar, and love through the left pillar. It is interesting that on the left pillar on the Tree of Life, we have this severity relating to love, primarily because real love can be severe. Really, if you’re married and your wife loves you, she will be very severe with you when you deserve it, for your own good. As a husband, one has to try to be wise as well. But obviously, there’s wisdom and love in both couples. But, that’s a very profound and obviously enigmatic statement, which I think, if even by trying to define it, in a sense I butcher it, because when you love someone, you deeply find that in your soul there are principles that relate to the Divine Father, and the Divine Mother. Wisdom is the Divine Father. Love is the Divine Mother. Together they have the path of equilibrium, which is דעת Da’ath in Hebrew, real knowledge.
 
Question: This might be a whole class, but I was kind of curious about the difference between, I guess, good desire and bad desire, and how will relates to desire?
 
Instructor: Yeah, in esoteric language, we say that desire is ego―you know, “I want, I crave, I need”―ego. Obviously, there is another quality related to the soul, the longing, the yearning for divinity, the thirst of the consciousness for the truth. The Sufi way of describing those truths, it talks about desiring God. Obviously, they have a poetic way to talk about the same principle. You know, our soul, our willpower free of ego, aspires. We tend to break it down a little bit further because in the west, we tend to be very conditioned by language, in a sense like we have a certain interpretation on what desire means. Since we are, strictly speaking, about 97% desire, ego, we tend to go in accordance with our conditioning, interpreting anything, like seeing scripture, life, or spirituality in that way. We have 3% consciousness free, that can aspire to the heights, and we are trying to free the rest of our psyche from conditions. We do that by yearning for God, longing.
 
Rumi, obviously, one of my favorite poets from the Sufi traditions, talks about desiring God. I believe there is an Arabic term, Murid and Murad, which means the seeker/desiree and the desired/sought-after, the longing for the truth. When they talk about desiring God, it is a sexual trope, alchemical teaching. If you want to know more about that topic, specifically, I would study the course we gave in our podcast. It is called Sufi Principles of Meditation, as well as The Sufi Path of Self Knowledge. Especially the last course, the lecture called Divine Love. It is all about that. Yeah, very profound.

Another Instructor: But I wanted to add on to an early question about a distinction, or at least the relationship between desire and will. Because I hear a lot that question around that “If I have no desire, what am I going to do? I’m like, just go sit around?” A lot of us used to be motivated by the things that we want, our goal and aspiration by the things that we desire. When this instructor is saying “an ego,” we think of it in terms of “I.” There is a self there that we feel wants to attain things, that wants to accomplish things.
 
When we live in a state where everything we do has some kind of selfish motive, some desire there, we cannot really conceptualize what it would be like to live without that. But I want to say that there is an quality to yourself, who we are here physically, and then there is a divine self. Until we can comprehend our self and restrain desire enough, which we can do through alchemy or pranayama, or meditation or reflection, until we restrain that self, we do not know much about the divine self. When we look at masters, beings like Moses, Muhammad, Jesus, Buddha, they have the divine self fully incarnated enough to serve humanity, to give spiritual teachings, to perform spiritual miracles.
 
Unfortunately, while there is so much of this selfish, false self active and moving through us, there is not enough space for divinity to come in. I think there is a phrase that God or the divine fills the vacuum, fills the void. So, we need to create enough emptiness within and remove desire so that divine will can come and act through us.
 
Instructor: The Sufis even collaborate that one is only a Sufi when they renounce desire. But also one must have, or better said, the will to practice. But one must also be a Sufi in the sense of having the will at all, to the point that in your individual work, the more divinity manifests in the psyche, His will is active, not ours.
 
Question: Do you have any tips or suggestions when meditating on an ego? Because I know the visages and the faces of these egos very well, but sometimes I still would have a great amount of difficulty holding an image in my mind for more than a few seconds.  So could you, like, maybe give some guidance on how to increase that or get better?
 
Instructor: Sure, practice visualization exercises. You can take a candle, view it, light it, observe it, and close your eyes and imagine it. Try to visualize it with as much color and depth as you can. You can even smell the candle internally, even if your body is falling asleep, because those are senses that will activate when you train. The ability to perceive more imagery in terms of the spectrum of consciousness depends on how active we work out that muscle.
 
You can visualize an image, a candle, could be something very simple in the beginning. That is usually what is recommended by for many Tibetan Buddhist monks as they are trying to visualize very complex images like, say, the stages of serenity, or the murals that you see in many Tibetan monasteries. If you take a complex image, you can take one section, say like a chakra poster, and you can visualize maybe one aspect, maybe the hand to begin with. Or maybe the head, and then as you start to gain more sustainability of the image, you can hold it in your mind or consciousness without losing the quality or the state of it, you can expand your practice make it more robust. Picture the head, the shoulder, and then the body, until finally you can visualize an entire image with lucidity.
 
But obviously, start small―five minutes, ten minutes, small objects so that you train your consciousness to have enough strength to first recall the image without it changing and adapting, because of the mind, and then kater, you can increase more depth, maintaining it with continuity.
 
Yeah, there are some practices we gave in the Sufi Principle of Meditation course, especially the lecture called Awareness, Unveiling, and Witnessing. We give a practice where you can even take a plant, imagining its birth as a seed, as it grows into a sprout, finally a flower in its prime, and then its decay. As you are imagining that process of birth, death, evolution, devolution, and you fall asleep, you will enter the dreaming state with more awareness. You can even talk to, say, the physical plant, the soul of that plant. The same quality, the same ability to imagine or visualize, is the same quality that you have when you dream. If you can perceive more in your dreams, it means your imagination gets more robust or has more potential. But yeah, start with a small visualization practice.