The Voice of the Silence

A Christic Commentary on Blavatsky's Theosophical Text

Helena Petrovna Blavatsky, great spiritual master and founder of the Theosophical Society, inscribed selected fragments from the Book of the Golden Precepts in what has become known as The Voice of the Silence, an ancient esoteric text whose brevity encloses the entire path of the Self-realization of the Being. This scripture has been studied by numerous students and disciples throughout the world, for its beauty, power, and lyricism penetrate the innermost depth of the soul.
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As will be explained in this course, The Voice of the Silence is kabbalistic, alchemical, and psychological, embodying the three principal sciences at the heart of Christic and Buddhist esotericism. This teaching has been known in the East as the path of the Bodhisattva and in the West through the Birth, Life, Passion, Death, Resurrection, and Ascension of Christ. This course is an exegesis of this seminal scripture through the Gnostic writings of Samael Aun Weor, whose lucid and concise prose can aid students in comprehending the symbiotic nature of this text: the beautiful synthesis of Buddhism and Christianity.

Related Books: Alchemy and Kabbalah in the Tarot, The Aquarian Message, The Major Mysteries, The Narrow Way, The Perfect Matrimony, The Secret Doctrine of Anahuac, Secret Teachings of Moses, Tarot and Kabbalah

Initiation

"The voice of him that crieth in the wilderness (בַּמִּדְבָּר be'midbar), Prepare ye the way of יְהֹוָה (Iod-Chavah, Jehovah), make straight in the desert a highway for our God (אֱלֹהִים Elohim). Every valley shall be exalted, and every mountain and hill shall be made low: and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough places plain: And the glory of יְהֹוָה shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together: for the mouth of יְהֹוָה hath spoken it."  ―Isaiah 40:3-5

What is the Voice of the Silence according to the kabbalistic teachings? It is the Christ, Logos, or Word (דָבָר dabar), our profound, innermost divinity who can be accessed through the path of meditation and initiation. Learn how to experience the Word (דָבָר dabar) through traversing the wilderness (בַּמִּדְבָּר be'midbar) of life. By transforming our daily sufferings through the path of initiation, we can in turn enter into the development and experience of the truth within our consciousness, becoming true, enlightened human beings endowed with cognizance, insight, and divine love. This lecture explains the kabbalistic, alchemical, and psychological contexts for interpreting The Voice of the Silence, especially through the writings of Friedrich Nietzsche and Samael Aun Weor.

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The Three Halls

"Three Halls, O weary pilgrim, lead to the end of toils. Three Halls, O conqueror of Mara, will bring thee through three states into the fourth and thence into the seven worlds, the worlds of Rest Eternal. If thou would'st learn their names, then hearken, and remember." ―The Voice of the Silence

Enclosed within the opening stanzas of The Voice of the Silence is a profound teaching on the four states of consciousness within gnostic psychology. Learn the fundamental make-up of cognizant experience: the ephemeral states of conditioned, sleeping consciousness, as well as the awakened state of alert perception and its unification with the Innermost, our divine being.

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The Stages of Meditation

“The pupil must regain the child-state he has lost ere the first sound can fall upon his ear. The light from the ONE Master, the one unfading golden light of Spirit, shoots its effulgent beams on the disciple from the very first. It’s rays thread through the thick dark clouds of matter. Now here, now there, these rays illumine it, like sun-sparks light the earth through the thick foliage of the jungle growth. But, O Disciple, unless the flesh is passive, head cool, the soul as firm and pure as flaming diamond, the radiance will not reach the chamber, its sunlight will not warm the heart, nor will the mystic sounds of the Akasic heights reach the ear, however eager, at the initial stage.” —The Voice of the Silence

This sacred scripture provides a didactic teaching on the essence of spiritual practice: dharana (concentration), dhyana (meditation), and samadhi (comprehension, ecstasy), which was practiced within the most ancient schools of mysteries and presently within gnostic institutions founded by Samael Aun Weor. Learn how to initiate, sustain, and perfect the stages of meditation, so as to experience the highest reality and end the psychological causes of suffering.

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The Seven Sounds

"Before thou set'st thy foot upon the ladder's upper rung, the ladder of the mystic sounds, thou hast to hear the voice of thy inner GOD in seven manners.

"The first is like the nightingale's sweet voice chanting a song of parting to its mate. The second comes as the sound of a silver cymbal of the Dhyanis, awakening the twinkling stars. The next is as the plaint melodious of the ocean-sprite imprisoned in its shell. And this is followed by the chant of Vina. The fifth like sound of bamboo-flute shrills in thine ear. It changes next into a trumpet-blast. The last vibrates like the dull rumbling of a thunder-cloud.

"The seventh swallows all the other sounds. They die, and then are heard no more." ―The Voice of the Silence

Discover the kabbalistic significance of the seven mystical sounds, which symbolize how the soul or consciousness ascends, through the initiatic path, up the famous kabbalistic Tree of Life, specifically the seven inferior Sephiroth: Malkuth (physicality), Yesod (vitality), Hod (emotions), Netzach (mind), Tiphereth (willpower), Geburah (divine consciousness), and Chesed (Innermost Spirit, Atman). This lecture explains the relationship of the seven mystical sounds with the crucifixion of the Intimate Christ, whose seven esoteric utterances resound within the initiate dying to psychological impurity upon the sacrificial cross of alchemy.

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The Heart Doctrine

"False learning is rejected by the Wise, and scattered to the Winds by the good Law. Its wheel revolves for all, the humble and the proud. The "Doctrine of the Eye" is for the crowd, the "Doctrine of the Heart," for the elect. The first repeat in pride: "Behold, I know," the last, they who in humbleness have garnered, low confess, "thus have I heard.”

"The Dharma of the "Eye" is the embodiment of the external, and the non-existing. The Dharma of the "Heart" is the embodiment of Bodhi, the Permanent and Everlasting." ―The Voice of the Silence

True spiritual knowledge, the Heart Doctrine, is gained from direct experience, not from books, lectures, scriptures, scholasticism, intellectualism, or debates. Discover how true wisdom and understanding of Dharma, the divine law, is based upon our living experiences of the truth, denominated in the East as bodhi: the light, perception, and wisdom of Christ. This lecture explains the nature of the Heart Doctrine and the essence of bodhichitta, the wisdom-mind, mind-heart, or heart of compassion within esoteric Buddhism and the Christic path of initiation. Real wisdom is gained through selfless service, for in order to attain complete liberation of the psyche, compassion and sacrifice for others is necessary.

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Liberation and Renunciation

"The PATH is one, Disciple, yet in the end, twofold. Marked are its stages by four and seven Portals. At one end — bliss immediate, and at the other — bliss deferred. Both are of merit the reward: the choice is thine. The One becomes the two, the Open and the Secret. The first one leadeth to the goal, the second, to Self-Immolation.

"When to the Permanent is sacrificed the Mutable, the prize is thine: the drop returneth whence it came. The Open PATH leads to the changeless change — Nirvana, the glorious state of Absoluteness, the Bliss past human thought.

"Thus, the first Path is LIBERATION. But Path the Second is — RENUNCIATION, and therefore called the "Path of Woe."

"That Secret Path leads the Arhan to mental woe unspeakable; woe for the living Dead, and helpless pity for the men of Karmic sorrow, the fruit of Karma Sages dare not still." ―The Voice of the Silence

Upon entering the heavenly regions of Nirvana or the superior dimensions of nature, two paths open before the initiate: the spiral path of liberation or selfish bliss, or the straight path of sacrifice and renunciation. Learn about the secret, straight path of the bodhisattva: "the essence or incarnation of wisdom / Christ" that leads the practitioner towards the absolute heights of divine attainment, known in the Hebraic Kabbalah as the Ain, Ain Soph, and Ain Soph Aur: the Absolute.

​This path has been taken by all of humanity's greatest sages, prophets, and luminaries, especially Jesus of Nazareth, who demonstrated with his revolutionary life the way of selfless service and boundless compassion. Through sacrificing oneself for numerous humanities, the bodhisattva of the straight path may be granted entrance into the highest degrees of enlightened experience.

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The Great Perfections

Learn the principles, laws, or qualities of the soul as explained within Christic Buddhism:

1. DANA, the key of charity and love immortal.

2. SHILA, the key of Harmony in word and act, the key that counterbalances the cause and the effect, and leaves no further room for Karmic action.

3. KSHANTI, patience sweet, that nought can ruffle.

4. VIRAG, indifference to pleasure and to pain, illusion conquered, truth alone perceived.

5. VIRYA, the dauntless energy that fights its way to the supernal TRUTH, out of the mire of lies terrestrial.

6. DHYANA, whose golden gate once opened leads the Narjol toward the realm of Sat eternal and its ceaseless contemplation.

7. PRAJNA, the key to which makes of a man a god, creating him a Bodhisattva, son of the Dhyanis. ―The Voice of the Silence

The final lecture of this course explains the Paramitas or Perfections of Mahayana Buddhism in relation to the Christic teachings: the fundamental principles in which a bodhisattva of compassion develops. Through the paramitas, the master sacrifices him or herself for humanity while developing bodhichitta: compassion for humanity and insight into the abstract nature of reality: the profound and limitless emptiness of the Absolute within Hebraic Kabbalah.