We are not against anyone; we only reveal and indicate where the danger is. —Samael Aun Weor, Types of Spiritual Schools

A knowledge of even the elements of esoteric science leads to a complete change of all of our values. We see that things we considered of supreme importance are not the vital points we thought they were; we see that things we did not think mattered at all are the real strategic centres of our lives. —Dion Fortune, The Training and Work of an Initiate

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Definitions, History and Traditions

The very doctrine which centres about the immediate personal contact with the Divine, that is to say, a highly personal and intimate form of knowledge, is conceived as traditional wisdom. The fact is, however, that the idea of Jewish mysticism from the start combined the conception of a knowledge which by its very nature is difficult to impart and therefore secret, with that of a knowledge which is the secret tradition of chosen spirits or adepts. ―Gershom Scholem, Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism

Kabbalah, it must be remembered, is not the name of a certain dogma or system, but rather the general term applied to a whole religious movement. This movement, with some of whose stages and tendencies we shall have to acquaint ourselves, has been going on from Talmudic times to the present day; its development has been uninterrupted, though by no means uniform, and often dramatic. ―Gershom Scholem, Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism

It is a remarkable fact that the very term Kabbalah under which it has become best known, is derived from an historical concept. Kabbalah means literally “tradition”, in itself an excellent example of the paradoxical nature of mysticism to which I have referred before. ―Gershom Scholem, Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism

The secret of the success of the Kabbalah lies in the nature of its relation to the spiritual heritage of rabbinical Judaism. This relation differs from that of rationalist philosophy, in that it is more deeply and in a more vital sense connected with the main forces active in Judaism. Undoubtedly both the mystics and the philosophers completely transform the structure of ancient Judaism; both have lost the simple relation to Judaism, that naiveté which speaks to us from the classical documents of Rabbinical literature. Classical Judaism expressed itself: it did not reflect upon itself. By contrast, to the mystics and the philosophers of a later stage of religious development Judaism itself has become problematical. Instead of simply speaking their minds, they tend to produce an ideology of Judaism, an ideology moreover which comes to the rescue of tradition by giving it a new interpretation. ―Gershom Scholem, Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism

Revelation and Mystical Experience

Revelation, for instance, is to the mystic not only a definite historical occurrence which, at a given moment in history, puts an end to any further direct relation between mankind and God. With no thought of denying Revelation as a fact of history, the mystic still conceives the source of religious knowledge and experience which bursts forth from his own heart as being of equal importance for the conception of religious truth. In other words, instead of the one act of Revelation, there is a constant repetition of this act. This new Revelation, to himself or to his spiritual master, the mystic tries to link up with the sacred texts of the old; hence the new interpretation given to the canonical texts and sacred books of the great religions. To the mystic, the original act of Revelation to the community―the, as it were, public revelation of Mount Sinai, to take one instance―appears as something whose true meaning has yet to unfold itself; the secret revelation is to him the real and decisive one. And thus the substance of the canonical texts, like that of all other religious values, is melted down and given another form as it passes through the fiery stream of the mystical consciousness. It is hardly surprising that, hard as the mystic may try to remain within the confines of his religion, he often consciously or unconsciously approaches, or even transgresses, its limits. ―Gershom Scholem, Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism

​The documents of religion are therefore not conceived as expressing a separate and distinct world of religious truth and reality, but rather as giving a simplified description of the relations which exist between the ideas of philosophy. The story of Abraham and Sarah, of Lot and his wife, of the Twelve Tribes, etc., are simply descriptions of the relation between matter and form, spirit and matter, or the faculties of the mind. ―Gershom Scholem, Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism

The historical aspects of religion have a meaning for the mystic chiefly as symbols of acts which he conceives as being divorced from time, or constantly repeated in the soul of every man. Thus the exodus from Egypt, the fundamental event of our history, cannot, according to the mystic, have come to pass once only and in one place; it must correspond to an event which takes place in ourselves, an exodus from an inner Egypt in which we all are slaves. ―Gershom Scholem, Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism

​Supernatural illumination also plays its part in the history of Kabbalism and innovations are made not only on the basis of new interpretations of ancient lore but as a result of fresh inspiration or revelation, or even of a dream. A sentence from Isaac Hacohen of Soria (about 1270) illustrates the twin sources recognized by the Kabbalists as authoritative. “In our generation there are but a few, here and there, who have received tradition from the ancients … or have been vouchsafed the grace of divine inspiration.” Tradition and intuition are bound together and this would explain why Kabbalism could be deeply conservative and intensely revolutionary. Even “traditionalists” do not shrink from innovations, sometimes far-reaching, which are confidently set forth as interpretations of the ancients or as revelation of a mystery which Providence had seen fit to conceal from previous generations.  ―Gershom Scholem, Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism

Thy whole body will be seized by an extremely strong trembling, so that thou wilt think that surely thou art about to die, because thy soul, overjoyed with its knowledge, will leave thy body. And be thou ready at this moment consciously to choose death, and then thou shalt know that thou hast come far enough to receive the influx. And then wishing to honor the glorious Name by serving it with the life of body and soul, veil thy face and be afraid to look at God. Then return to the matters of the body, rise and eat and drink a little, or refresh thyself with a pleasant odor, and restore thy spirit to its sheath until another time, and rejoice at thy lot and know that God loveth thee! ―Gershom Scholem, Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism

The Body, Soul, and Spirit of Judaism

The Jews had three sacred books: the first is the body of doctrine, that is to say, the Bible. The second is the soul of the doctrine, the Talmud, where the national Jewish soul is. The third is the spirit of the doctrine, the Zohar, where the entire rabbinical Kabbalah is.

The Bible, the body of doctrine, is written in code. Thus, if we want to study the Bible by combining verses, we will proceed in an ignorant, empirical, and absurd manner. We find the key to interpret the Bible only in the third book, in the Zohar, written by Simon Ben Jochai, the great enlightened rabbi.  ―Samael Aun Weor, Alchemical Symbolism of the Nativity of Christ 

The Foundations of Kabbalah

Aggadah: The Narrative Tradition

To understand the ways in which Kabbalah, and particularly the Zohar, finds it home within the earlier tradition, we need to distinguish five elements that are present in the legacy of medieval Jews received from the Judaism of the Talmudic age. [...] The first of the five elements is הַגָּדָה aggadah, the narrative tradition, contained in the Talmud and the various works of Midrash. Midrash is a hermeneutical term, rendered both as 'inquiry' and 'homiletics,' indicating a way of delving into Scripture that tends towards fanciful and extended rereadings. Much of aggadah is legendary in content, expanding biblical history and recreating the biblical landscape in the setting of the rabbinic world. But aggadah also includes tales of the rabbis themselves and teachings of wisdom in many forms: maxims, parables, folk traditions, and so forth. ―Arthur Green, A Guide to the Zohar

​What makes [Kabbalists] differ from the philosophers is the fact that for them the Aggadah is not just a dead letter. They live in a world historically continuous with it, and they are able, therefore, to enhance it, though in the spirit of mysticism. Aggadic productivity has been a constant element of Kabbalistic literature, and only when the former disappears will the latter, too, be doomed to extinction. ―​Gershom Scholem, Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism

Halakhah: Jewish Law

The second element is the tradition of הֲלָכָה halakhah, the legal and normative body of Talmudic teaching, the chief subject of study for Jews throughout the medieval era, and thus the main curriculum on which most Kabbalists themselves were educated. ―Arthur Green, A Guide to the Zohar

To the philosopher, the Halakhah either had no significance at all, or one that was calculated to diminish rather than to enhance its prestige in his eyes. Entirely different was the attitude of the Kabbalists. For them the Halakhah never became a province of thought in which they felt themselves strangers. Right from the beginning and with growing determination, they sought to master the world of the Halakhah as a whole and in every detail. From the outset, an ideology of the Halakhah is one of their aims. But in their interpretation of the religious commandments these are not represented as allegories of more or less profound ideas, or as pedagogical measures, but rather as the performance of a secret rite (or mystery in the sense in which the term was used by the Ancients). ―Gershom Scholem, Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism

Piyyut: Liturgical Poetry

A third element of the rabbinic legacy is the liturgical tradition. While liturgical praxis was codified within halakhah and thus in some ways is a subset of it, the texts recited in worship, including a large corpus of liturgical poetry, or פיוט piyyut, constitutes a literary genre of their own. Medieval writers, including the mystics of both Spain and Askhenaz, were much concerned with establishing the precise, proper wording for each prayer. The texts of the prayerbook, mostly fixed by compendia dating from the tenth century, became in the Middle Ages the object of commentaries, many of which sought to find their authors' own theologies reflected in these venerated and widely known texts by the ancient rabbis. This is especially true of the Kabbalists, who devoted much attention to the כַּוָּנָה kavvanah, or inner meaning, of liturgical prayer. While not formally canonized or seen as the product of divine revelation, as were the books of Scripture, the liturgical texts were regarded as sufficiently holy and mysterious to deserve and require commentary. ―Arthur Green, A Guide to the Zohar

Merkabah Mysticism

The fourth strand of earlier tradition is that of מרכבה merkavah mysticism. Merkavah designates a form of visionary mystical praxis that reaches back into the Hellenistic era but was still alive as late as tenth-century Babylonia. Its roots lie close to the ancient Jewish apocalyptic literature, except that here the voyager taken up into the heavens is usually offered a private encounter with the divine glory, one that does not involve metahistorical predictions. Those who 'go down into the merkavah' sought visions that took them before the throne of God, allowing them to travel through the divine 'palaces' (היכלות heikhalot), realms replete with angels, and at the height of ecstasy, to participate in or even lead the angelic chorus. The term merkavah ('chariot') links this tradition to the opening vision of Ezekiel, which was seen as the great paradigm for all such visionary experiences and accounts. It is also connected to the קְדֻשָּׁה qedushah formula ('Holy, holy, holy is Y-H-W-H of hosts [יהוה צבאות Iod-Chavah Sabaoth], the whole earth is filled with His glory!') of Isaiah 6, because it is this refrain that most merkavah voyagers recount hearing the angels sing as they stand with them in the heavenly heights. ―Arthur Green, A Guide to the Zohar

Sefer Yetsirah

The fifth and final element of this ancient legacy is the hardest to define, partly because it hangs on the thread of a slim body of text, but also because it contains elements that seem contradictory to one another. I refer to the speculative-magical tradition that reached medieval Jewry through the little book called ספר יצירה‎ Sefer Yetsirah and various other small texts, mostly magical in content, that are associated with it. Sefer Yetsirah has been shown to be a very ancient work, close in spirit to aspects of Greek esotericism that flourished in the late Hellenistic era. While the practice associated with this school of thought is magical-theurgic, even including the attempt to make a גולם golem [an anthropomorphic being fashioned from inanimate or amorphous material, such as mud or clay, while imbibed with vitality and life] its chief text contains the most abstract worldview to be found within the legacy of ancient Judaism. By contemplating the core meaning of both numbers and letters, it reaches toward a notion of cosmic unity that underlies diversity, of an abstract deity that serves as a cosmic center, in whom (perhaps better: in which) all being is rooted. ―Arthur Green, A Guide to the Zohar

According to Eliphas Levi, the three greatest books of Qabbalism are the Sepher Yetzirah, The Book of Formation; the Sepher ha Zohar, The Book of Splendor; and the Apocalypse, The Book of Revelation. The dates of the writing of these books are by no means thoroughly established. Qabbalists declare that the Sepher Yetzirah was written by Abraham. Although it is by far the oldest of the Qabbalistic books, it was probably from the pen of the Rabbi Akiba, A.D. 120. ―Manly P. Hall, The Secret Teachings of All Ages  ​

​Sefer Yetsirah was the subject of a wide variety of commentaries in the Middle Ages, with rationalists as well as mystics claiming it as their own. In the twelfth century, the language and style of thought formed in the work became central to the first generations of kabbalistic writing, as reflected by commentaries on it and by the penetration of its terminology into other works as well. ―Arthur Green, A Guide to the Zohar

Kabbalah must be seen as a dynamic mix of these five elements, with one or another sometimes dominating. It was especially the first and last elements―the aggadic-mythical element and the abstract-speculative-magical tradition―that seemed to vie for the leading role in forging the emerging kabbalistic way of thought.  ―Arthur Green, A Guide to the Zohar

The Origins of the Zohar

The Sepher ha Zohar presumably was written by Simeon ben Jochai, a disciple of Akiba. Rabbi Simeon was sentenced to death about A.D. 161 by Lucius Verus, co-regent of the Emperor Marc Aurelius Antoninus. He escaped with his son and, hiding in a cave, transcribed the manuscript of the Zohar with the assistance of Elias, who appeared to them at intervals. Simeon was twelve years in the cave, during which time he evolved the complicated symbolism of the "Greater Face" and the "Lesser Face." While discoursing with disciples Rabbi Simeon expired, and the "Lamp of Israel" was extinguished. His death and burial were accompanied by many supernatural phenomena. The legend goes on to relate that the secret doctrines of Qabbalism had been in existence since the beginning of the world, but that Rabbi Simeon was the first man permitted to reduce them to writing. Twelve hundred years later the books which he had compiled were discovered and published for the benefit of humanity by Moses de León. The probability is that Moses de León himself compiled the Zohar about A.D. 1305, drawing his material from the unwritten secrets of earlier Jewish mystics. ―Manly P. Hall, The Secret Teachings of All Ages  

Interpretations of the Zohar

...all Jewish mystics, from the Therapeutae, whose doctrine was described by Philo of Alexandria, to the latest Hasid, are at one in giving a mystical interpretation to the Torah [the first five books of Moses or Pentateuch: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy]; the Torah is to them a living organism animated by a secret life which streams and pulsates below the crust of its literal meaning; every one of the innumerable strata of this hidden region corresponds to a new and profound meaning of the Torah. The Torah, in other words, does not consist merely of chapters, phrases and words; rather is it to be regarded as the living incarnation of the divine wisdom which eternally sends out new rays of light. ―Gershom Scholem, Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism

Rabbi Simeon says: "Woe to the man who says that the Torah came to relate stories, simply and plainly, and simpleton tales about Esau and Laban and the like. If it was so, even at the present day we could produce a Torah from simplistic matters, and perhaps even nicer ones than those. If the Torah came to exemplify worldly matters, even the rulers of the world have among them things that are superior. If so, let us follow them and produce from them a Torah in the same manner. It must be that all items in the Torah are of a superior nature and are uppermost secrets. 

"Come and behold: the world above and the world below are measured with one scale. The children of Yisrael below correspond to the lofty angels above.  It is written about the lofty angels: 'who makes the winds his messengers' (Psalms 104:4). When they descend downwards, they are donned with the vestments of this world. If they had not acquired the dress for this world, they would not be able to exist in this world, and the world would not be able to stand them. And if this is so for the angels, how much more so is it for the Torah that created these messengers and all the worlds, that exist due to her. Once it was brought down to this world, if it had not donned all these covering garments of this world, which are the stories and simplistic tales, the world would not have been able to tolerate it."  ―Zohar

The Tree of Life

It [the Tree of Life] is a glyph, that is to say a composite symbol, which is intended to represent the cosmos in its entirety and the soul of man as related thereto; and the more we study it, the more we see that it is an amazingly adequate representation; we use it as the engineer or the mathematician uses his sliding-rule, to scan and calculate the intricacies of existence, visible and invisible, in external nature or the hidden depth of the soul. ―Dion Fortune, The Mystical Qabalah

​Jewish mysticism in its various forms represents an attempt to interpret the religious values of Judaism in terms of mystical values. It concentrates upon the idea of the living God who manifests himself in the acts of Creation, Revelation and Redemption. Pushed to its extreme, the mystical meditation on this idea gives birth to the conception of a sphere, a whole realm of divinity, which underlies the world of our sense-data and which is present and active in all that exists. This is the meaning of what the Kabbalists call the world of the ‘Sefiroth’. ―Gershom Scholem, Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism

According to Luria, God was compelled to make room for the world by, as it were, abandoning a region within Himself, a kind of mystical primordial space from which He withdrew in order to return to it in the act of creation and revelation. The first act of En-Sof, the Infinite Being, is therefore not a step outside but a step inside, a movement of recoil, of falling back upon oneself, of withdrawing into oneself. Instead of emanation we have the opposite, contraction. The God who revealed himself in firm contours was superseded by one who descended deeper into the recesses of His own Being, who concentrated Himself into Himself, and had done so from the very beginning of creation. [...]

One is tempted to interpret this withdrawal of God into his own Being in terms of Exile, of banishing Himself from His totality into profound seclusion... The first act of all is not an act of revelation but one of limitation. Only in the second act does God send out a ray of His light and begin his revelation, or rather his unfolding as God the Creator, in the primordial space of His own creation. More than that, every new act of emanation and manifestation is preceded by one of concentration and retraction. In other words, the cosmic process becomes two-fold. Every stage involves a double strain, i.e. the light which streams back into God and that which flows out of Him, and but for this perpetual tension, this ever repeated effort with which God holds Himself back, nothing in the world would exist. ―​Gershom Scholem, Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism

The consensus of Kabbalistic opinion regards the mystical way to God as a reversal of the procession by which we have emanated from God. To know the stages of the creative process is also to know the stages of one’s own return to the root of all existence. In this sense, the interpretation of Maaseh Bereshith, the esoteric doctrine of creation, has always formed one of the main preoccupations of Kabbalism. It is here that Kabbalism comes nearest to Neoplatonic thought, of which it has been said with truth that 'procession and reversion together constitute a single movement, the diastole-systole, which is the life of the universe.' Precisely this is also the belief of the Kabbalist.​ ―Gershom Scholem, Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism

Abulafia calls his method “The Path of the Names,” in contrast to the Kabbalists of his time, whose doctrine concerning the realization of the divine attributes it referred to as “The Path of the Sefiroth.”  Only together the two paths form the whole of the Kabbalah, the Path of the Sefiroth the ‘rabbinical’ and that of the Names, the ‘prophetic’ Kabbalah. The student of Kabbalah is to begin with the contemplation of the ten Sefiroth. These, indeed, during meditation are to become objects of quickened imagination rather than objects of an external knowledge acquired by merely learning their names as attributes or even symbols of God. For in the Sefiroth, too, according to Abulafia, there are revealed the ‘profundities of the intellectus agens’, that cosmic power which for the mystic coincides with the splendor of the Shekhinah [the divine feminine that raises and elevates the chosen people of Israel back towards the truth]. Only from there is he to proceed to the twenty-two letters which represent a deeper stage of penetration. ―Gershom Scholem, Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism

The Spiritual Power of Language, Symbols, and Mathematics

Language in its purest form, that is, Hebrew, according to the Kabbalists, reflects the fundamental spiritual nature of the world; in other words, it has a mystical value. Speech reaches God because it comes from God. Man’s common language, whose prima facie function, indeed, is only of an intellectual nature, reflects the creative language of God. All creation―and this is an important principle of most Kabbalists―is, from the point of view of God, nothing but an expression of His hidden self that begins and ends by giving itself a name, the holy name of God, the perpetual act of creation. All that lives is an expression of God’s language,―and what is it that Revelation can reveal in the last resort if not the name of God? ―Gershom Scholem, Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism

In Kabbalah, everything is numbers and mathematics. The number is holy and infinite. In the universe everything is measurement and weight. For the Gnostics, God is a geometrist. Mathematics are sacred. No one was admitted into the school of Pythagoras if they were not knowledgeable about mathematics, music, etc. Numbers are sacred. ―Samael Aun Weor, Tarot and Kabbalah  

All esoteric systems use a symbolic method of notation in their teachings. Each of the symbols employed indicates a spiritual potency, and the ideas associated with them indicate its method of function; their interrelation represents the interaction of these forces. If we have the key to one symbol-system we can readily equate it with all the others, for fundamentally they are the same. ―Dion Fortune, The Training and Work of an Initiate  

These cosmic symbols are further represented by the letters of a sacred language, which, in the Western Tradition, is Hebrew. Out of these letters are formed the Sacred Names and Words of Power, which are simply algebraical formulas resuming potencies. Thus is the universe represented to the initiate, and he is able to trace the correlation between its parts and see what invisible realities are throwing their shadows upon the world of Maya, illusion. ―Dion Fortune, The Training and Work of an Initiate

It is not required of those who would use the Qabalah as their Yoga that they should acquire any extensive knowledge of the Hebrew language; all they need is to be able to read and write the Hebrew characters. The modern Qabalah has been pretty thoroughly naturalized in the English language, but it retains, and must ever retain, all its Words of Power in Hebrew, which is the sacred language of the West just as Sanskrit is the sacred language of the East. There are those who have objected to the free employment of Sanskrit terms in occult literature, and no doubt they will object even more strongly to the employment of Hebrew characters, but their use is unavoidable, for every letter in Hebrew is also a number, and the numbers to which words add up are not only an important clue to their significance, but can also be used to express the relationships existing between different ideas and potencies. ―Dion Fortune, The Mystical Qabalah

Gematria, Notarikon, and Temurah

...in the literature of the Hasidism, prominence is given for the first time to certain techniques of mystical speculation which are popularly supposed to represent the heart and core of Kabbalism, such as Gematria, i.e. the calculation of the numerical value of Hebrew words and the search for connections with other words or phrases of equal value; Notarikon, or interpretation of the letters of a word as abbreviations of whole sentences; and Temurah, or interchange of letters according to certain systematic rules. ―Gershom Scholem, Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism

Basing himself upon the abstract and non-corporeal nature of script, [Abraham Abulafia] develops a theory of the mystical contemplation of letters and their configurations, as the constituents of God’s name. For this is the real and, if I may say so, the peculiarly Jewish object of mystical contemplation: The Name of God, which is something absolute, because it reflects the hidden meaning and totality of existence; the Name through which everything else acquires its meaning and which yet to the human mind has no concrete, particular meaning of its own. In short, Abulafia believes that whoever succeeds in making this great Name of God, the least concrete and perceptible thing in the world, the object of his meditation, is on the way to true mystical ecstasy. ―Gershom Scholem, Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism

This science [of mystical combination] is an instrument which leads nearer to prophecy than any other discipline of learning. A man who gains his understanding of the essentials of reality from books is called Hakham, a scholar. If he obtains it from the Kabbalah, that is to say from one who has himself obtained it from the contemplation of the divine names or from another Kabbalist, then he is called Mevin, that is, one who has insight, but if his understanding is derived from his own heart, from reflecting upon what he knows of reality, then he is called Daatan, that is, a gnostic. He whose understanding is such as to combine all three, to wit, scholarly erudition, insight obtained from a genuine Kabbalist, and wisdom from reflecting deeply upon things, of him I am not indeed going to say that he deserves to be called a prophet, especially if he has not yet been touched by the pure intellect, or if touched [that is to say, in ecstasy] does not yet know by whom. ―Abraham Abulafia, The Knowledge of the Messiah and the Meaning of the Redeemer

Practical Mysticism and Spirituality

Kabbalistic studies must be combined with work on oneself. One must be conscious of these studies, for it they remain only in the intellect they will be lost when one dies. Yet, if one is conscious of them, the knowledge will manifest itself from childhood. ―Samael Aun Weor

The esotericist, when endeavoring to formulate his philosophy for communication to others, is confronted by the fact that his knowledge of the higher forms of existence is obtained by a process other than thought; and this process only commences when thought is left behind. ―Dion Fortune, The Mystical Qabalah

The Qabalistic cosmology is the Christian Gnosis. Without it we have an incomplete system in our religion, and it is this incomplete system which has been the weakness of Christianity. ―Dion Fortune, The Mystical Qabalah

Intellectual and Intuitive Kabbalah

​There are two kinds of Kabbalists: intellectual Kabbalists and intuitive Kabbalists. The intellectual Kabbalists are black magicians. The intuitive Kabbalists are white magicians.

​On such a simple thing, scholars have written millions of volumes and theories that would turn anyone crazy who had the bad taste of becoming intellectualized with that entire arsenal. ―Samael Aun Weor, Tarot and Kabbalah

The intellect is a tool that is useful when placed under the service of the Spirit. But when the intellect seeks to control the Spirit, the intellect becomes destructive. Therefore, the intuitive Kabbalist is the one who learns through the experience of the consciousness. The intuitive Kabbalist learns directly, without opinions or theories. This one seeks a radical intellectual culture: a comprehensive knowledge of esotericism that is qualified by direct investigation.

In order to be a complete Kabbalist, one has to study; one has to record the teachings in the memory. ―Samael Aun Weor, Tarot and Kabbalah

The Synthesis

The objective of studying the Kabbalah is to be skilled for work in the internal worlds... One who does not comprehend remains confused in the internal worlds. Kabbalah is the basis in order to understand the language of these worlds. ―Samael Aun Weor, Tarot and Kabbalah

​One is filled with admiration, on penetrating into the Sanctuary of the Kabbalah, at seeing a doctrine so logical, so simple, and at the same time so absolute. The necessary union of ideas and signs, the consecration of the most fundamental realities by the primitive characters; the Trinity of Words, Letters, and Numbers; a philosophy simple as the alphabet, profound and infinite as the Word; theorems more complete and luminous than those of Pythagoras; a theology summed up by counting on one's fingers; an Infinite which can be held in the hollow of an infant's hand; ten ciphers and twenty-two letters, a triangle, a square, and a circle,―these are all the elements of the Kabbalah. These are the elementary principles of the written Word, reflection of that spoken Word that created the world! ―Albert Pike, in Eliphas Levi's Transcendental Magic 

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Gods and demons live in eternal struggle. The Gods defend the doctrine of chastity. The demons hate chastity.  In sex, the root of the conflict between Gods and demons is found. ―Samael Aun Weor, The Perfect Matrimony, “The Great Battle”

No one puts a piece from a new garment on an old one; otherwise the new makes a tear, and also the piece that was taken out of the new does not match the old. And no one puts new wine into old wineskins; or else the new wine will burst the wineskins and be spilled, and the wineskins will be ruined. But new wine must be put into new wineskins, and both are preserved. And no one, having drunk old wine, immediately desires new; for he says, "The old is better.” ―​Luke 5:36-39 

​Lust and Sexual Energy

​What Constitutes Masturbation?

Masturbation: From the Latin words manstuprare, from manus "hand" (as in manual) + stuprare "defile" (oneself), from stuprum "defilement, dishonor," related to stupere "to be stunned, stupefied" (as in stupid). ―​Gnostic Glossary: Glorian Publishing

What is Semen?

Unfortunately, women, like men, lose the divine forces when they commit the error of reaching that which is called "orgasm" or "spasm" in organic biology. ―​Samael Aun Weor, “Woman’s Saintly Predestination”

Religions on Masturbation and Sexual Transmutation

Ye have heard that it was said by them of old time, Thou shalt not commit adultery:
 
But I say unto you, That whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart.
 
And if thy right eye [that looks at pornographic images] offend thee, pluck it out [eradicate your desire], and cast it from thee: for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not that thy whole body should be cast into hell. ―Matthew 5:27-29

And if any man's seed of copulation go out from him [or the woman’s as well] then he shall wash all his flesh in water [of transmutation], and be unclean until the even [the death of the ego in the meditation]. ―Leviticus 15:16

Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water [seminal matter] and of the Spirit [the creative energy], he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.
 
That which is born of the flesh [through orgasm] is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit [through chastity] is spirit. —John 3:5-6
​
Furthermore, if in these instants [sexual union] the woman teaches the man the necessity of being "continent," if instead of reaching the final consummation of immense passion she has the valor to restrain the animal impulse, to avoid that which in organic physiology, or biology, is termed "orgasm" or "spasm,” he could retain those mystical forces of the Third Logos, of Mahachoan, of the Hindustani Shiva. With such subtle forces, she will be able to create within herself something different. She will be able to convert herself into a victor. She will pass to an extraordinary level of Being. She will never again have misery or pain, for her there will be no suffering. Many faculties will emerge in all of her organism; she will be completely different. A woman thus transformed by her own creative energies would be able to transform man and transform the world, because woman has a unique power: to form beings in her own womb. —Samael Aun Weor, “Woman’s Saintly Predestination”

I [Shiva] am the semen, Sakti [the Goddess] is the generative fluid; when they are [perfectly] combined in the body [through this practice], then the body of the Yogi becomes divine [immortal].
 
Ejaculation of semen [orgasm] brings death, preserving it within brings life. Therefore, one should make sure to retain the semen within. ―Siva Samhita: “Preserve the Semen”

For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you abstain from sexual immorality; that each one of you know how to control his own body in holiness and honor, not in the passion of lust like the Gentiles who do not know God. ―1 Thessalonians 4:3-5

And if thy right hand [used in masturbation] offend thee, cut it off [abandon your lusts], and cast it from thee: for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members [your ego] should perish, and not that thy whole body [soul] should be cast into hell. ―​Matthew 5:30

​Masturbation without Orgasm

Without energy control your sexual activity is fornication... ―Yeshe Tsogyal

Wherever we direct attention, we expend creative energy. ―​Samael Aun Weor, Fundamentals of Gnostic Education

​Sexual Fantasy and Impotence

Sexual fantasy produces impotence of a psychosexual type. People with that kind of illness have normal erections; they are apparently normal men, but in the moment in which they try to connect the penis and the vulva, the erection abates making the phallus fall, leaving the man in the most horrible state of desperation. They have lived in sexual fantasy and when they really find themselves facing the crude sexual reality which has nothing to do with fantasy, they become confused and are unable to properly respond to reality. ―​Samael Aun Weor, The Perfect Matrimony

​Incubi and Succubi

Incubi and succubi are formed from the sperm of those who perform the imaginative anti-natural act of masturbation (in thoughts or desires).

And because it comes only from the imagination, it is not genuine sperm (material) but corrupt salt.

Only semen that comes from an organ selected by Nature for its development can germinate in a body.

When sperm does not come from appropriate matter (nutritious substratum) it will not produce anything good, but will generate something useless.

For this reason, incubi and succubi that originate from corrupt semen are harmful and useless in accordance with the natural order of things.

These germs which are formed in the imagination are born of Amore Heress, which signifies the type of love whereby a man imagines a woman, or vice-versa, in order to copulate with the image created within the sphere of his mind.

The expulsion of a useless, ethereal fluid results from this act, incapable of producing offspring but instead bringing larvae into existence.

Imagination used in this way gives birth to an exuberant shamelessness which, if pursued, can make a man impotent and a woman sterile, because during the frequent practice of any such unhealthy visualization, much real creative energy is lost.

The larvae-egos of lasciviousness are real, thinking, autonomous entities within which a good percentage of consciousness is imprisoned. ―Paracelsus, cited in The Mystery of the Golden Flower by Samael Aun Weor

The larvae to which Paracelsus refers are none other than those cultivated forms of thought that owe their energy and existence solely to unnatural imagination. ―​Samael Aun Weor, The Mystery of the Golden Flower

​Sexual Attacks in the Astral Plane

Pornographic Media

Intellectual criminology is found in books, magazines, bull fighting arenas, movie theaters, pamphlets, etc.

There are pornographic magazines that prostitute the minds of male and female youngsters in different countries.

When a pornographic representation reaches the mind, the unconsciousness traps that representation and elaborates its conceptual content. The conceptual content elaborated by the unconsciousness is the exact outcome of the quality of the representation. The psychological “I” traps that representation within the depths of the mind’s unconsciousness and elaborates its conceptual content with it. The conceptual content is translated as semi-conscious images within the world of the cosmic mind. These are the effigies of the mental world. The psychological “I” fornicates and commits adultery with those images within the plane of the cosmic mind. This is what the prostitution of the mind is. Nocturnal pollutions (wet dreams) are the morbid outcome of the prostitution of the mind.

There are also magazines [now matchmaking websites] for failures. In the magazines for the failures, women announce themselves. They solicit for a husband who is short, fat, skinny, with money, etc. Many young ladies are following that ultramodern example. This is mental prostitution. The outcome of this mental prostitution is critical. The interchange of writing begins. They start falling in love with someone they do not know and they start projecting plans. Yet, in the end, on the day when the couple meets, failure is the inevitable outcome.

Ladies who have never been prostitutes—honorable and distinguished young ladies—allow themselves to be cheated by modernism and fall into the crime of mental prostitution.

If a clairvoyant were to study in the mental plane the announcements of love of all of those magazines [matchmaking websites], one will see houses of prostitution. Each announcement of love corresponds in the mental world to a horrible mental bedroom of a whorehouse. Every clairvoyant is astonished when seeing those whorehouses of the mental plane.

Within each bedroom of those horrible dens a prostitute is found lying there. Men enter and leave from those bedrooms. Each announcement of the magazine corresponds to one of those bedrooms. The woman who placed the announcement is lying down in her bedroom. This is what the prostitution of the mental plane is.

True love has nothing to do with those whorehouses of the mental plane.

Thousands of young and distinguished ladies are perverting themselves with those types of magazines [and websites].

True love begins always with a flash of delectable affinity. It is substantiated with the force of tenderness, and it is synthesized in infinite, supreme adoration. ―Samael Aun Weor, Sexology: The Basis of Endocrinology and Criminology

The Struggle against Masturbation

​Techniques to Overcome Masturbation

How to Counter Lustful Obsessions

​How to Cleanse Oneself and Home

​Masturbation and Mental Health

Unfortunately, although it is pitiful to realize it, nowadays many children of twelve and thirteen years of age are already copulating. Moreover, those who are not yet copulating commit the crime of masturbation [and sodomy]. They eliminate their hormones, degenerate their brains and atrophy their pineal gland through masturbation. This is how they become sure candidates for a mental home.

It is well known that after coitus, the phallus continues with certain peristaltic movements conducive to receiving vital energies from the feminine uterus in an attempt to replace its wasted creative principles.

However, when masturbation [and sodomy] exists, instead of assimilating vital feminine energies with such peristaltic movements, useful principles for existence, the masturbator [or sodomite] absorbs cold air [or flatulences from the bodily fecal matter derived from ingested food and the secretions of the intestines], which passes directly to the brain. The outcome of this is idiocy, mental degeneration or insanity [devolution].

The vice of [sodomy and] masturbation is, unfortunately, also very popular among the feminine sex. Obviously, with such a vice, many women that could have been genial or good wives have prematurely become degenerated, have aged quickly, have lost their sexual potential, and have become true victims of life.

Therefore, it is important to know all these aspects of sex; it is important to know what sex is.

For adolescents to have sex is absurd, because they are mere seeds which have not yet completed their development. ―​Samael Aun Weor, Sexology: The Basis of Endocrinology and Criminology

​Healing the Damages of Masturbation

​Curing Impotence

The aloe is a great panacea for the healing of impotence.

The procedure is as follows: put into a casserole dish, pan, or pot one white panela (hard sugarcane commonly found in Colombia) so it can be melted by the fire. This casserole dish must not contain water.

Once the panela is liquefied, you must add the gel of a complete aloe plant, then add ten grams of iron. While it is on the fire, stir this very well with a handmill. When everything is very well stirred, then take the casserole dish from the fire and bottle up this substance, adding a little bit of sodium benzoate so that it cannot ferment. Label it, and take one spoonful of the remedy every hour. Impotence is cured with this marvelous formulae. ―​Samael Aun Weor, Esoteric Medicine and Practical Magic

​Another Remedy for Virility

Listen: Lucifer represents the sexual potency. Who could deny that a male goat possesses a great sexual potency?
 
Sexually impotence is due to weakness. There exist different types of sexual impotence: i.e. sexual impotence because a damage to the nervous system, or because a damage to the creative organs. However, when the sexual impotence is totally due to weakness in the physical organs, this can be cured with the sexual hormones of that animal.
 
The testicles of the male goat must be boiled in milk and thereafter sweetened with sugar or honey. This milk charged with testosterone must be drank by the sexually impotent one. This will cure his impotence, because the sexual hormones of the male goat have the power to cure those who suffer sexual impotence. —Samael Aun a Weor, “Moses, the Great Kabbalist and Alchemist Magi”

​Can Supplements Heal Damages from Masturbation?

​Wet Dreams

Question: Would it be good to apply the technique of meditation on the death of the ego to the defects that we have in our dreams?

Samael Aun Weor: Many letters have been sent to me from people that have nocturnal pollutions. Almost all of them demand from me a recipe in order to be healed from that frightful sickness and I always answer them that as long as the egos of pollutions continue to exist, the pollutions will continue to exist.

Let us suppose that this person has a morbid dream, thus as a consequence he has a nocturnal pollution. What to do? In the precise moment of awakening physically, this person has to intensively work upon that ego that produced such a pollution. And he must appeal to the Divine Mother Kundalini Shakti so that she can disintegrate it and he must continue during the future periods of time working upon that ego. But if during another day another nocturnal pollution emerges, it is because another lustful ego produced it. Thus, the work must be repeated again until one day all of those types of egos related with pollutions will be terminated. That is the only way in order to be healed. ―​Samael Aun Weor, “Questions About the Elimination of the Ego”

​Massage During Vajroli Mudra

Regarding the massages over the prostate/uterus area and the sexual organs, there are three types: 
​
a) Gentle massage upon the prostate [lower abdomen] and creative organs.
b) Moderate massage upon the prostate/uterus [lower abdomen] and creative organs.
c) Strong massage upon the prostate [lower abdomen] and creative organs.

It is obvious that for men a strong massage on the prostate {lower belly] and sexual organs produces the erection of the phallus, this is clear, this is how it is; this is why the third type of massage is advisable for bachelors. Thus, when the phallus is erected, the transmutation of the semen into energy is produced, which one raises to the brain.

Regarding married men, the first or second types of massages are convenient for them, nothing else; rather, the first type is more than enough since they have a wife and of course they bring the phallus to a complete erection by means of the Sahaja Maithuna. ―​Samael Aun Weor, Sacred Rites for Rejuvenation

​White and Black Vajroli Mudra

​Finding an Alchemical Partner

Impure women are for impure men, and impure men for impure women, and pure women are for pure men, and pure men are for pure women: these are not affected by what people say [who are scandalized and offended by chastity]: for them there is forgiveness, and a provision honorable. ―Qur’an 24:26

​What to Do When Breaking One’s Chastity?

And just look at these men: their eye says it—they know nothing better on earth than to lie with a woman.
 
Mud is at the bottom of their souls; and woe! if their mud also has spirit! ―Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra

Whosoever spills his semen after having worked with the Kundalini inevitably fails, because the Kundalini then descends one or more vertebrae in accordance with the magnitude of the fall... The initiate falls when he spills the semen. The work to raise the serpent after having fallen is very difficult and arduous. The Lord of Perfection said, "The disciple must never let himself fall, because whosoever falls then has to struggle a great deal to regain that which was lost." ―​Samael Aun Weor, The Perfect Matrimony

The Reality of Sexual Falls

You cannot expect from a weak man something that requires strength. One can make demands of a man only in accordance with the strength he has to fulfill them. —Gurdjieff

As long as a man does not separate himself from himself he can achieve nothing, and no one can help him. To govern oneself is a very difficult thing — it is a problem for the future; it requires much power and demands much work. But this first thing, to separate oneself from oneself, does not require much strength, it only needs desire, serious desire, the desire of a grown-up man. If a man cannot do it, it shows that he lacks the desire of a grown-up man. Consequently it proves that there is nothing for him here [in the esoteric school]. What we do here can only be a doing suitable for grown-up men. —Gurdjieff

Our mind, our thinking, has nothing in common with us, with our essence—no connection, no dependence...

The mind is capable of functioning independently, but it also has the capacity of becoming identified with the essence, of becoming a function of the essence. In the majority of those present, the mind does not try to be independent but is merely a function...

At present we are not capable of controlling our states, and so it cannot be demanded of us. But when we acquire this capacity, corresponding demands will be made.

In order to understand better what I mean, I shall give you an example: now, in a calm state, not reacting to anything or anyone, I decide to set myself the task of establishing a good relationship with Mr. B., because I need him for business purposes and can do what I wish only with his help. But I dislike Mr. B. for he is a very disagreeable man. He understands nothing. He is a blockhead. He is vile, anything you like. I am so made that these traits affect me. Even if he merely looks at me, I become irritated. If he talks nonsense, I am beside myself. I am only a man, so I am weak and cannot persuade myself that I need not be annoyed—I shall go on being annoyed.

Yet I can control myself, depending on how serious my desire is to gain the end I wish to gain through him. If I keep to this purpose, to this desire, I shall be able to do so. No matter how annoyed I may be, this state of wishing will be in my mind. No matter how furious, how beside myself I am, in a corner of my mind I shall still remember the task I set myself. My mind is unable to restrain me from anything, unable to make me feel this or that toward him, but it is able to remember. I say to myself: “You need him, so don’t be cross or rude to him.” It could even happen that I would curse him, or hit him, but my mind would continue to pluck at me, reminding me that I should not do so. But the mind is powerless to do anything.

This is precisely what anyone who has a serious desire not to identify himself with his essence can do. This is what is meant by “separating the mind from the essence.”

And what happens when the mind becomes merely a function? If I am annoyed, if I lose my temper, I shall think, or rather “it” will think, in accordance with this annoyance, and I shall see everything in the light of the annoyance. To hell with it!

And so I say that with a serious man—a simple, ordinary man without any extraordinary powers, but a grown-up man—whatever he decides, whatever problem he has set himself, that problem will always remain in his head. Even if he cannot achieve it in practice, he will always keep it in his mind. Even if he is influenced by other considerations, his mind will not forget the problem he has set himself. He has a duty to perform and, if he is honest, he will strive to perform it, because he is a grown-up man.

No one can help him in this remembering, in this separation of oneself from oneself. A man must do it for himself. —Gurdjieff, Views from the Real World

​Repentance

According to the lexicons, tawbah (repentance) means "to return." Taba, aba, and anaba all have one meaning, which is "to return." Thaba is similar; people say, "The milk returned (thaba) to the udder." Outward repentance is the return from blameworthy actions to praiseworthy ones and from foul words to righteous ones. Inner repentance, with which the Sufi folk are concerned, is to turn away from all things and toward God, mighty and glorious. Repentance is not valid without three things: remorse for sin, abstention from it, and the resolution to not return to it. When one of these conditions is not met, repentance is not valid. This is the rule for repentance for sin between the servant and his Lord...

Ibn Mas'ud, may God be pleased with him, related that the Prophet, God bless and cherish him, said, "The one who turns from sin is like one who never sinned." ―A'ishah al-Ba'uniyyah, The Principles of Sufism

Satan frightens you of poverty and prompts you to [commit] indecent acts. But Allah promises you His forgiveness and grace, and Allah is all-bounteous, all-knowing. ―Al-Baqarah 268

O you who have faith! What is the matter with you that when you are told: "Go forth in the way of Allah," you sink heavily to the ground? Are you pleased with the life of this world instead of the Hereafter? But the wares of the life of this world compared with the Hereafter are but insignificant.

If you do not go forth, He will punish you with a painful punishment, and replace you with another people, and you will not hurt Him in the least, and Allah has power over all things. ―​Al-Tawbah (The Repentance) 38-39

Comprehension, Self-Reflection, and Honesty

​Meditation, Psychedelics, and Awakening

Desire never rests by enjoyment of lusts, as fire surely increases the more butter is offered to it. ―Laws of Manu 2.94

What Is the Difference between a Hallucination and a Mystical Vision?

​Experiences through Drugs

The extra-perceptions of a drug addict have their own roots in the abominable Kundabuffer organ (the tempting serpent of Eden).
 
The consciousness imprisoned within the multiple elements that constitute the ego is limited in its processes by virtue of its own imprisonment.
 
Egoistic consciousness comes in a comatose state with hypnotic hallucinations very similar to those of someone under the influence of any drug.
 
We can present this matter in the following way: Hallucinations from the egoistic consciousness are the same as hallucinations brought about by drugs.
 
It is obvious that these two types of hallucinations have their original causes in the abominable Kundabuffer organ (Read chapter 17 of The Great Rebellion). ―Samael Aun Weor, The Great Rebellion

Student: There are many stimulant plants like marijuana, which, for example, serve in order to achieve astral projection in a quick manner…
 
Samael Aun Weor: The chemical elements of drugs are harmful. 

​Note that marijuana, like many other drugs, is one hundred percent subjective. It is true that by means of hallucinogenic mushrooms, LSD (Lysergic acid), etc., astral projections are achieved, indeed, but they are subjective and inhuman kinds of projections. They are processed in the infra-dimensions of nature and the cosmos, and are not conducive to authentic, transcendental, objective enlightenment. They fail. They are a detriment. ―Samael Aun Weor, “Questions About the Path”

Are Drugs and Psychedelia Natural?

Therefore the Conqueror (Buddha) said that just like
A turtle putting its neck through the hole
Of a yoke floating on a vast ocean,
A human life is extremely hard to find.
―Shantideva

​The Dangers of Drug Use

Obviously, drugs annihilate alpha waves. Then, unquestionably, the intrinsic connection between mind and brain is lost. This, in fact, results in total failure. ―Samael Aun Weor, The Great Rebellion

​Drugs: A Gateway to Spirituality?

​Objective Consciousness and Reality

​The Philosophy and Religion of Drugs

A drug addict turns vice into religion. Being misled, he thinks he experiences what is real under the influence of drugs. Unaware that the extra-perceptions produced by marijuana, L.S.D., morphine, hallucinogenic mushrooms, cocaine, heroin, hashish, tranquilizers in excess, amphetamine, barbiturates, etc., etc., are merely hallucinations produced by the abominable Kundabuffer organ.
 
Drug addicts devolve and degenerate in time. In the end they are submerged permanently within the infernal worlds. ―Samael Aun Weor, The Great Rebellion

​Peyote, Astral Projection, and Shamanism

Student: You as well as the Master Huiracocha once spoke about peyote, precisely as help for these cases of astral projection.
 
Samael Aun Weor: Peyote is quite different. The elemental of peyote cooperates, yes, with meditation, it does not create any kind of tendencies. Yet, the elemental is very demanding: it demands chastity. In no way will peyote help, for instance, the indecent, lustful ones. It has rules.
 
Master Huiracocha talked about peyote. He narrated how the Master Rassinchi, inside the Temple of Chapultepec, used peyote in order to cause an astral projection. This is the only recommended plant with the condition of not abusing of it, since this is only for the K. H. [Kosmic Humans]. A student who wanted to use it for the third time, after receiving several instructions, was called to order by the lords of karma, and was prohibited from continuing with it; to be more precise, he was abusing it. Therefore, peyote’s elemental is useful, but one needs to know the proper procedures, and do not ever abuse it.
 
As for other drugs, I will not say anything.
 
We cannot consider peyote as a drug. It is a harmless plant that doest not create any kind of habit and that only cooperates with meditation, when one knows how to meditate. Someone could ingest much peyote and will not have any results. Another could chew a little bit of it, a few grams, and get an extraordinary result. The secret is to know how to meditate. The elemental cooperates with the one who knows how to meditate. The elemental really helps, but since it is illegal in some countries, of course we cannot in anyway recommend it. ―Samael Aun Weor, “Questions About the Path”
 
We do not recommend the use of this marvelous cactus... Indeed, what we recommend is practice, much practice, and soon you will act and travel within the Astral body. ―Samael Aun Weor, Aztec Christic Magic

​Did God Create Drugs?

​The Demon of Alcohol

Never drink the accursed liquor, I tell you, because if you drink it you will quickly stray from the path. ―Samael Aun Weor, The Mystery of the Golden Flower

With the sinister demon Algol, it is impossible to make compromises, arrangements, or any kind of crooked deal. Alcohol is very treacherous and sooner or later will stab us in the back. Many people with Thelema (will) only drink one or two glasses a day; a terrific ruse, isn’t it? ―Samael Aun Weor, The Mystery of the Golden Flower

There is no question that being a product of disintegration... alcohol has a vibratory disintegrating, dissolving and destructive tendency, drying our tissues and destroying the nerve cells, which are then gradually substituted by cartilage.
 
It is clearly evident that alcohol tends to eliminate the capacity for independent thought and calm judgment since it fatally stimulates fantasy. It also shockingly debilitates ethical sense and individual liberty. ―Samael Aun Weor, The Mystery of the Golden Flower

O you who have faith! Indeed intoxicants [alcohol, drugs], gambling, idols and the divining arrows are abominations of Satan’s doing, so avoid them, so that you may be felicitous. ―Qur’an 5:90

Flee from lust and alcohol. Kill the most inner roots of desire. ―Samael Aun Weor, Tarot and Kabbalah

Liquor and fornication must be banished from the bosom of Gnostic homes. However, we must not be fanatics. Whoever is incapable of handling one drink at a social gathering is as weak as someone who cannot control his liquor and gets drunk. ―Samael Aun Weor, The Perfect Matrimony

Regarding social gatherings: those initiates who have strong will, sometimes politely allow themselves to sip or to taste up to three small quantities of liquor or up to three small quantities of beer. They never go beyond three; if they do, they violate the law. ―Samael Aun Weor, The Divine Science: "Logos, Mantra, Theurgy"

And who are these idiots who seek to negotiate with Satan? Listen, my friends! With the sinister demon Algol, it is impossible to make compromises, arrangements, or any kind of crooked deal. Alcohol is very treacherous and sooner or later will stab us in the back.  ―Samael Aun Weor, The Mystery of the Golden Flower

​Drugs and Gnostic Medicine

​Smoking

​Medical Marijuana

​The Astral Atmosphere of Drug Addicts

By permitting his senses to become deadened through indulgence in habit-forming drugs or alcoholic stimulants, the individual becomes temporarily en rapport with these denizens [succubi and incubi] of the astral plane. ― Manly P. Hall, The Secret Teachings of All Ages

​Mixing Gnosis with Drugs 

All rituals have to do with blood and semen. Ritual is a double-edged sword that defends and gives life to the pure and virtuous, but hurts and destroys the impure and tenebrous. Ritual is more powerful than dynamite and the knife.
 
One deals with nuclear forces in a ritual. Atomic energy is a gift of God that can heal just as it can kill. Therefore, every temple within which the Holy Gnostic Unction is celebrated, is in fact and for this reason an atomic energy plant. ―Samael Aun Weor, The Perfect Matrimony

​Intelligence Resolves Problems, Not Drugs

You may have a tremendous and explosive experience through one of these drugs, but will the deep-rooted aggression, bestiality and sorrow of man disappear? If these drugs can solve the intricate and complex problems of relationship, then there is nothing more to be said, for then relationship, the demand for truth, the ending of sorrow, are all a very superficial affair to be resolved by taking a pinch of the new golden drug. Surely this is a false approach, isn't it? It is said that these drugs give an experience approximating to reality, therefore they give hope and encouragement. But the shadow is not the real; the symbol is never the fact. As is observed throughout the world, the symbol is worshipped and not the truth. So isn't it a phoney assertion to say that the result of these drugs is near the truth? No dynamic golden pill is ever going to solve our human problems. They can be solved only by bringing about a radical revolution in the mind and the heart of man. This demands hard, constant work, seeing and listening, and thus being highly sensitive. The highest form of sensitivity is the highest intelligence, and no drug ever invented by man will give this intelligence. ―Krishnamurti, The Only Revolution, Europe, Collected Works (Volume 13)

Everyone is being dragged down by negative emotions, and this is very grave. There is nothing more harmful for profound internal development than negative emotions... Everyone is being shaken up by negative emotions and nothing could be more contagious than these emotions...

A negative person can infect other negative people, and if this person dictates a lecture, then he infects thousands of people. They are more dangerous, thousand of times more dangerous, than viruses and bacteria...

If a person goes everywhere from instant to instant with negative emotions, this person infects the whole world. ―Samael Aun Weor, Alcyone and Negative Emotions

Spiritual Retreat

The Principles of Retreat

Khalwah, retreat, belongs to the purified, while uzlah, withdrawal from the world, marks the people of union. The seeker needs to withdraw from his own kind in the beginning stages. Then, in the last stages, he needs to retreat in order to confirm himself in intimacy with God. ―Al-Qushayri, Al-Risalah: Principles of Sufism

Intentions for Retreat

If the servant chooses to withdraw, his intention must be to separate himself from people so that they will be safe from his evil—he must not be looking to protect himself from their evil. For the first of these attitudes come from thinking little of one’s own ego, while the second comes from making oneself out to be better than other people. A person who thinks little of himself is humble, while a person who sees himself as better than anybody else is arrogant. ―Al-Qushayri, Al-Risalah: Principles of Sufism

Rules of Retreat

One of the rules of withdrawal is that whoever goes into seclusion must acquire the knowledge that makes his commitment to unity (tawhid) firm, so that satan (the "me, myself, and I," the animal ego) cannot seduce him through the (conditioned or negative) imagination (fantasy or delusional perceptions). Then he should acquire enough knowledge of the divine law (ethical conduct) that he is able to fulfill his religious duties so that his undertaking maybe built on definite and sure foundations. ―Al-Qushayri, Al-Risalah: Principles of Sufism

There is an organ in the body that, if it is righteous, ensures that the whole system will be righteous; and if it is corrupt, the whole body will become corrupt. This organ is the heart. There is a polish for everything that takes away rust; and the polish for the heart is dhikr, the remembrance of Allah. ―Prophet Muhammad, Hadith

Learn more about the principles of retreat:

A Recommended Schedule for Spiritual Retreat

Recommended Sources for Meditation and Spiritual Practices

​It is necessary to study much and acquire knowledge, but it is also urgent to develop the spiritual Being within us.

Knowledge without having the spiritual Being harmoniously well developed within us becomes the cause of that which is called “swindling.” Whereas, having the Being well developed within us, but without any type of intellectual knowledge, is the origin of stupid saints.

A stupid saint has his spiritual Being very well developed, however, since he does not have intellectual knowledge, he cannot do anything because he does not know how.  Yes, a stupid saint has the power of doing, but he cannot do because he does not know how.

Intellectual knowledge without the spiritual Being very well developed produces intellectual confusion, perversity, pride, etc. ―Samael Aun Weor, Fundamentals of Gnostic Education: "Wisdom and Love"

Balancing Intellectual Study

With practice, the experience or the direct living of any of the works that I have delivered to humanity, the practitioner will obviously achieve psychological emancipation.

There exist people who speak marvels about reincarnation, Atlantis, alchemy, the ego, astral projection, etc. However, they are experts on these matters only in the external world because they are only being informed intellectually. Deep down, these people do not know anything, and at the hour of death these expositors remain with nothing but knowledge stored in their memory. In the beyond, this does not serve any purpose because they continue with their consciousness asleep.

We have wasted our time miserably if we are imprisoned only in theories, if we have not carried out anything practical, if we have not become conscious about what I have taught in my books, or if we leave the teachings in the memory.

Memory is the formative principle of the Intellectual Center. When a person aspires for something more, looking through the limitations of his subconsciousness, seeing what he has deposited in his memory, analyzing and meditating upon the last occurrence or teachings of an esoteric book, only then will those values move to the emotional phase of the same Intellectual Center.

When one wants to know the deep meaning of certain teachings and surrenders in full to meditation, such teachings obviously move on to the Emotional Center and then they come to be felt in the depth of the soul.

When one has purely experienced these teachings (the cognizable values of the essence), then at last they remain deposited in the consciousness and are never again lost. The essence becomes enriched with the same cognizable values.

Now we comprehend the way to become conscious of the Gnostic teachings that I have delivered through my previously written books, as well as through this one.

Meditation is formidable in order to make us conscious of the Gnostic teachings, but let us not commit the error of leaving the teachings exclusively in theories or in the memory. If we proceed in this manner we will never achieve the dominion of the mind. ―Samael Aun Weor, The Revolution of the Dialectic: "Practice"

Meditation: Developing Comprehension and the Emotional Brain

Energy Work and Selfless Service

Exercises for Awakening Spiritual Energy

The Synthesis of Spiritual Balance and Practice

What does it profit, my brethren, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can faith save him? If a brother or sister is naked and destitute of daily food, and one of you says to them, 'Depart in peace, be warmed and filled,' but you do not give them the things which are needed for the body, what does it profit? Thus also faith by itself,  if it does not have works, is dead. ―James 2:14-17

Here we think a note on faith should be of interest. Initiates say its meaning has been misunderstood. Faith, as the world uses it, possesses no spiritual nature; though in the secondary system it means power and energy applied to action. All success in Yoga comes from this application; for the true quality of faith is a Solar force that illumines the mind and attracts to it atoms of power and energy. More human wrecks have resulted from the misconception of this quality than man realises. ―M., The Dayspring of Youth

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In the beginning, the esotericist does not know where to start. He feels the necessity of working on himself but is completely disoriented. Yet, if we take advantage of the critical moments, of the more unpleasant situations, the most adverse instances, we shall then discover, if we are alert, our outstanding defects, the “I’s” that we must urgently disintegrate. —​Samael Aun Weor, Treatise of Revolutionary Psychology

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Gnosis is lived upon facts, withers away in abstractions, and is difficult to find even in the noblest of thoughts. ―Samael Aun Weor, The Revolution of the Dialectic

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Lectures on Meditation

Explanations of Spiritual Practices

Our Gnostic Church is the Transcended Church. This church is found in the Superior Worlds. We also have many temples in the physical world. In addition, we have opened thousands of Gnostic Lumisials where holy rituals are celebrated and the secret doctrine of the Beloved Savior of the world is studied. We must not forget that our Gnostic Movement has both a school and a religion. It has already been decisively confirmed that Jesus the Christ was Gnostic. The Savior of the World was an active member of the cast of Essenes, mystics who never cut their hair or their beards. The Gnostic Church is the authentic primeval Christian Church whose first Pope was the Gnostic initiate called Peter. ―​Samael Aun Weor, The Perfect Matrimony

But we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, even the hidden wisdom, which God ordained before the world unto our glory:

Which none of the princes of this world knew: for had they known it, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. —1 Corinthians 2:7-8

There naturally sprang up a keen rivalry between the two types of Christians; those who had accepted the teaching of Our Lord without any previous Mystery-training depended entirely upon spiritual intuition and good works; those who were already accustomed to the methods of the Mysteries sought to express the Christian truths in the language of the esoteric philosophy of their day. The first chapter of the Gospel according to John is an excellent example of the process whereby men already highly trained in mystical knowledge correlated the new teaching with that which was already familiar to them.  In this Gospel we see the influence of the Greek Schools of initiation, but in the Apocalypse we see the influence of Qabalistic thought.

​The Gnostic Schools were the Christian Mysteries, made by initiates of other Mystery Schools who had become converted to Christianity and sought to establish within the Christian dispensation the methods to which they were accustomed.

In the struggle between the two types of Christians, the initiates and the non-initiates, the latter eventually gained the day, and forthwith the order for persecution and abolition went forth against the Mysteries of Jesus. The orthodox element then gradually developed, as was inevitable, something of a Mystery System of their own in the sacraments, which are ritual magic pure and simple, as is agreed even by such an authority as Evelyn Underhill.

But with the development of the sacramental system did not, unfortunately, go the metaphysical interpretation thereof. Superstition has been defined as the use of a form whose significance has been forgotten. The sacraments, instead of being the symbol-systems of the Mysteries of Jesus, approach perilously near to vain observance in the hands of those who regard them with superstitious awe rather than an understanding of their psychological and esoteric significance.

Consequently there is an unbridged gulf in our modern Christianity between the mysticism of its deep spiritual truths and the symbolic and magical ceremonial of its ritual. This gulf it is the task of the modern Mystery Schools to bridge. These, however, have in many cases re-illumined their fires at an Eastern altar, so that the bridge they build does not lead to the Christian contacts of the West. Those of their followers who seek initiation, instead of having revealed to them the deeper issues of their own faith, have to change their religion and follow other Masters.

How are we of the West, therefore, to bridge this gulf? We must do what the original gnostics did: seek to express in the metaphysical language of the Mysteries the teachings of Our Lord, and thereby establish an esoteric Christian School—the Initiation of the West. The Gnostics drew their inspiration from two main sources: the Mysteries of Greece and the Mysticism of Israel, the Qabalah, with which Our Lord was obviously very familiar. These are the sources wherein we shall find the mental and magical interpretation of our religion which shall supply the missing keys.

The elements which were discarded from Christianity must be replaced if it is to become a true Wisdom Religion, and unless it can answer to the needs of the intellect as well as of the heart, those who need the food of the intellect rather than the heart will seek it elsewhere, and we cannot blame them. —Dion Fortune, The Training and Work of an Initiate

The Church of our Lord Jesus Christ is not of this world; he himself said it, “My kingdom is not of this world.” In the mountain of the living God, there is a church, invisible to the eyes of the flesh, but visible to the eyes of the soul and the spirit. That is the primeval Gnostic Church, to which Christ and the prophets belong.

That church has its bishops, archbishops, deacons, subdeacons, and priests who officiate at the altar of the living God. The patriarch of that invisible church is Jesus Christ.

All Christians can go in soul and spirit (through astral projection) to that church. 

In chapters four and five of this book we teach the secret to consciously exit the body and thus visit any distant land on the Earth.

All humans can also visit the Gnostic Church during sleep (in the astral plane, the fifth dimension). There in that holy church, we see the Virgin of Carmel together with her holy angels.

All the great saints of the church of God visit the Gnostic Church. Fridays and Sundays in the aurora there are masses and communions. By following the teachings given in chapters four and five of this book, all Christians can attend these masses and receive the communion of bread and wine. 

In that church, all the devotees will be taught to prophesize.

In the Gnostic Church, we see Christ seated on his throne, and all the Gnostics can converse with him personally.

All the sufferings of Mary occurred when she married Joseph, the priest.

Mary was initiated in the mysteries of Egypt.

In the Gnostic Church, Christians learn how to prophesize.

What is important is to follow the path of perfect sanctity and chastity.

In our books entitled The Perfect Matrimony and The Revolution of Beelzebub, we thoroughly study the great mysteries of sex. In those books, we teach the greatest secrets of the universe.

May peace be to all human beings. ―Samael Aun Weor, Christ and the Virgin: The Virgin of Carmel ​

Sacraments of the Gnostic Church