The Dangers
written by
the Original Christians
in Universal Life
First Edition 1996
Published by:
© Universal Life
The Inner Religion
PO Box 3549, Woodbridge, CT 06525 / U S A
Licensed edition
translated and revised from the original
German title:
"Die Gefahren durch östliche Meister"
From the Universal Life Series
with the consent of
©
Verlag DAS WORT GmbH im Universellen Leben
Max-Braun-Str. 2, 97828
Marktheidenfeld, Altfeld / Germany
The German edition is the work of reference
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English
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ISBN 3-89201-017-X
Foreword
Who is like
God?
Who is
Christ?
Disillusioned
Christians seek in the East
Where do eastern masters lead to?
What do the paths
of the masters offer?
What
happens while practicing eastern meditation?
Masters work
via telepathy
The path of Christ
is a path of purification
Difficulties
on the Christian path because of eastern practices
The great
danger: Blocking our world of feelings and sensations
A master is not
easily dismissed
The indirect
and the direct guidance by God
Where is our
freedom in this?
On the
Christian path: The decision for
Christ
Eastern
practices in the churches
Bound over
many incarnations
Masters
often consider themselves to be God
The task of
masters is at an end
Closing the
points of access
The pupils,
too, show the fruits
No master can
take away our karma
Ignorance is
no protection against becoming bound
Where does
this leave our neighbor?
A subtle kind of
egotism instead of selfless love
The masters,
too, will have to acknowledge Christ
Christ, the
true Inner Master
So, why take
detours?
The Inner Path,
"Nearer, My God, to Thee"
It has been foretold that towards the end of
the materialistic age many "Christs" will appear who will announce false
teachings of salvation in His name. (Mt. 24:5) This is why, especially for our
time, the following words are so relevant: "Test the spirits" and "You will
recognize them by their fruits." But to test them, one needs clarity and the
power of discernment.
For some time now, the "Christian"
churches have been increasingly offering meditations and spiritual techniques
that are of eastern origin, of which one in particular is Zen meditation. Among
other things, it is claimed that by practicing these, the Christ-power in man is
developed.
But what really happens? Through the spiritual
paths offered by the eastern religions, many people are ultimately led to
masters and away from Christ. This is made possible by a lukewarm and
degenerated "Christianity" which has far removed itself from its origins as a
result of the teachings found in Catholicism and
Protestantism.
In this booklet, the Original Christians in
Universal Life point out the dangers to which one exposes oneself when we orient
ourselves to masters – that is, to people – instead of to God, our Creator, and
to Christ, who has been our Redeemer for 2000 years.
In his innermost being, every person, every
soul, is a creation of God. We are all children of the eternal
Father-Mother-God. Each one of us is divine in his innermost being, created by
our Father in His image.
Our status in creation is the
filiation of God. None of the creations of God is God. There is only the one
God, only He, the eternal Spirit. To accept the filiation of God is the task of
the created beings, and the desire to be God is a Fall-thought. It led to the
separation from God, to the Fall from the pure heavenly worlds and to the ever
increasing condensation of forms all the way to the Earth. The Earth is the
place of highest condensation and, at the same time, the point of return for the
Fall, the base from which to return home.
Those created
beings who have fallen are, figuratively speaking, the prodigal son, who, as
described in the parable, returns home to his father’s house. So we are on Earth
in order to become divine again. Thus, every human being is a wanderer on the
way back to his eternal home.
But where is the way?
Every fallen being thought he knew better
than God. And so each one pursued his own way to "happiness." But
a person who now recognizes that it was the wrong way, turns back and reaches
for the true path. So one could say that there are as many paths as there are
human beings, because each one has to find the way back to his true being from
where he stands on the wrong path he took. And yet, there is only one path, just
as all rivers flow into the one sea, each river, however, in its own way; for
the force of motion in every drop of water is the streaming Spirit, God. The
same Spirit flows through us, too, through every cell of our body, through every
particle of our soul: it is the Spirit of life.
Christ was
incarnated in Jesus of Nazareth in order to teach the eternal laws of God and to
live them as an example for mankind. Through His sacrifice on Golgotha, He
transferred to each soul and person a supplemental force, the redeemer-spark.
With this, He stopped the further degeneration of all created forms whose
dissolution was and is the goal of the beings of the Fall. At the same time,
this additional spiritual energy makes it possible for us – as for every soul –
to develop again spiritually and to find our way back to our eternal
home.
All of infinity is based on seven basic powers. They
are the four divine natures of God and the three powers of filiation. Together,
they form the primordial power, the Holy Spirit, God. God is the primordial
power, and Christ is the part-power of the primordial power. Christ is
omnipresent Spirit in the four basic powers of creation, the four divine
natures: Order, Will, Wisdom and Earnestness. And so, as Jesus, He professed,
"The Father and I are one" and "My Father is greater than I." (Jn. 10:13)
Our pure spirit body in the innermost part
of our soul consists of these seven basic powers of life. For this reason,
Christ dwells within, in each one of us. He is the Spirit; He is the life in us.
When as Jesus of Nazareth He said in the following sense, "I am the vine and you
are the branches," this image tells us that as omnipresent Spirit, Christ is the
tree of life, the life force, the life in us. This is why what He said holds
true, "I am the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father but
through Me." (Jn. 14:6)
Through our faulty human
attitudes, through our sins, we have suppressed for the most part the seven
basic powers of our soul which are, at the same time, the seven levels of the
law. But by leading a life according to the divine laws, we will again develop
these levels of Inner Life with the help of the power of the
redeemer-spark.
Christ, the omnipresent Spirit in the four
basic powers of God, is also the Inner Master, the moving, transforming and
leading-back power in every human being and in every soul. He is the way. He
leads us back to the three filiation characteristics of God – Patience, Love and
Mercy – and when we have opened these again, our eternal Father can then take us
back into His Father-heart.
Externalized, denominational
pseudo-Christianity cannot show man the way to the Inner Master, Christ.
Spiritually hollow and without strength as it is, it cannot satisfy the longing
for spiritual nourishment, it cannot show the way back to the eternal
home.
For this reason, many seekers turn to the East, to
the eastern religions. The followers of older eastern religions are often less
intellectual; they pray; they are materially poorer but warmer in their heart;
they think less of war. So one can understand that God-seeking Christians who
are weary of Christianity sit up and take notice when an eastern teacher comes.
In many seekers there is a longing for a genuine spirituality, or at least for
meditation – or simply the wish to become still in order to develop the creative
powers in oneself. For spirituality and the true meditation that prepares one
for this has long since disappeared from the official Christian churches. Other
Christians, in turn, wish to activate the healing powers in themselves and to be
able to practice healing. The masters know about this, and also about the fact
that generally this wish is not selfless.
The teachers of the East let themselves be
called "master" or "guru." "Guru" means "spiritual teacher." The terms "master"
or "guru" express that such a teacher claims to be able to lead his pupils on
the path to God.
But the question is, where do these
eastern masters really lead to? For thousands of years self-redemption has been
taught in the eastern schools of thought. And it is so that the eastern teachers
still teach partial aspects of the path within. But what they lack is the
knowledge that since Golgotha, self-redemption does not exist any longer. Since
Golgotha, Christ is the Redeemer of all souls and men. This is why the eastern
teachings have not been valid for 2000 years now, insofar as they do not guide
one to Christ, to the only omnipresent master in the innermost part of one’s
soul. If the masters do not lead one to Christ, the only master, the master of
all masters – then where or what do they lead to? They lead to the hierarchies
of those masters who do not acknowledge Christ as Redeemer and Co-Regent of
creation, or who – as representatives of the satanic hierarchies – reject
Him.
Jesus of Nazareth said, "Do not be called ’Rabbi’,
for there is only one Teacher, and you are all brothers." (Mt. 23:8-9).
And so, since Golgotha, there is only one
master, and that is the Inner Master: Christ, the omnipresent Spirit in each one
of us.
Many of the eastern masters of the most differing
grades of development see Christ as a master among masters, as a so-called
Avatar. Avatars are high spirit beings from the absoluteness of God who
incarnate in order to teach human beings the path of truth. But Christ not only
taught the path as an Avatar does: He is the path Himself, because He is
the omnipresent Spirit, the Inner Master, in us. He Himself is the power that
brings about the transformation of low-vibrating negative human aspects in us
into higher, positive, divine energy. It is through this that the complete event
of the Fall will be led back into the pure Being.
The masters recruit their pupils today with
what seekers are looking for: peace, inner stillness, fulfillment, love, healing
powers, clairvoyance, levitation, enlightenment, pleasure, happiness; in
Sanskrit, they are called, satori, samadhi, and so on.
From the viewpoint of a master, how can a person attain these goals? Above all,
through eastern meditative techniques. "Meditation" means the same as "to go
within, to sink deep within." A meditation becomes a technique when the person
himself does not have to strive to put into daily practice what he affirms in
the meditation. One can also speak about a technique when a pupil thinks or
speaks into himself a mantra from without – not knowing where it comes from or
what effect it has, simply trusting in the promises of the master.
One refers to a mantra as a word or a combination of
words that normally stems from Sanskrit. There is an eastern meditation
technique where it is sufficient to meditate several times daily using a mantra,
in order to relax, to get rid of stress or to find enlightenment. "The one who
regularly meditates will realize that he always bears paradise with him in his
heart." (Yogananda, "Words of the Master" p. 90).
According to this, an examination of conscience, a day-by-day
striving to recognize one’s faults and weaknesses, and to clear these up with
the power of the Spirit and no longer commit them, does not seem to be a
requirement. These words of a master do not speak about the daily work on
oneself, nor about an alignment with Christ – both of which are necessary in
order to come to the Father. If there is talk about Christ in the eastern paths,
then it is mainly just words and given not in terms of a decision – essential
for one’s existence – for God in Christ, who is our life.
During the meditations, the law of "sending
and receiving"* holds true. By
repeating a mantra, via the sound stream that is created, the pupil tunes in, to
a certain transmitter from which he then receives.
The
masters work via telepathy, that is, by the transfer of thoughts. Telepathy is a
quickly effective force which can be received by any person who enters into the
frequency range – through a mantra, meditation or relevant physical exercises,
techniques or practices; through intense desire or just through his own will
power – of one who works with the corresponding energies. It is enough to
acquire the spiritual knowledge from books in order to produce a line of
communication. Through this alone, an unstable person can align his inner
antenna to certain frequency ranges.
In order to be successful with their pupils,
masters – whether incarnated or not – often do the
following:
With the power of thoughts, they beam a ray to
the sixth or to the fourth consciousness center of a pupil, respectively, that
is, to the two strongly active consciousness areas that support the spiritual
circulation in a person. This energy supply, that is given from without via
telepathy, stimulates the spiritual circulation. Through this, all the
consciousness centers, including the physical body of the person, experience a
short but heightened state of vibration. As long as this "magical" irradiation
is maintained, it is quite possible that the person meditating perceives some
spiritual visions or takes in the thoughts of the master. But these visions are
not from God; they were stimulated by a master in order to tie his pupil to
himself. This is a form of black magic and is the influencing of a person’s free
will. Aside from this, it is an unlawful intrusion into his spiritual
circulation. Through such treatment by this type of a master, unstable people
can become mentally disturbed or even physically harmed.
The spiritual circulation is the law of the
Spirit. It can be stimulated in a lawful way only by the person himself, through
the fulfillment of the laws of God. When this happens, the increased activity of
the spiritual circulation takes place via the nucleus of the soul. This is the
lawful way, and contributes to true spiritual development as well as to
increased health of soul and body. Anything else is against the divine law and
conceals many dangers.
Many people fall into the hands of
this form of black magic through unscrupulous teachers who call themselves
masters, as well as through their own light-hearted credulity. With many, it
could be based on a wish to find an easy path to God – without the real effort
to conquer oneself – or as a way of fleeing from the difficulties of
life.
But there is no such thing as a comfortable path to
God. There is no "automatic" ascension to heaven. Even the Son of God did not
bring us such a path through His sacrifice on Golgotha. Even though the official
Christian churches teach redemption by passive faith – the power of Christ in us
first becomes active when a person takes the steps necessary to recognize and
clear up his faulty behavior.
The paths of the masters are
tempting with promises of inner visions and sensations and spiritual experiences
at the beginning of the path – and are often taken as a criteria by which one
can recognize a true master. But once the pupil is tied to the master, the
master then demands payment for the energy loaned. By aligning with a master,
the pupil became dependent on him and is now a supplier of energy for his "guru"
and for the interest groups of souls and corresponding energy fields behind
him.
But Jesus of Nazareth taught us something
else. He said the following: "Every one who hears these words of mine and does
them will be like a wise man who built his house upon the rock ..." (Mt.7:24)
And so, the path of Christ consists of the step-by-step actualization of the
divine commandments in our daily life – the Ten Commandments and the spiritual
laws of the Sermon on the Mount. This path consists of self-recognition, of
repentance, of forgiveness and of asking for forgiveness, and – most important –
of no longer committing the faults one has recognized, fulfilling instead, the
spiritual laws. This is what Jesus of Nazareth meant when He told us to look at
the beam in our own eye before trying to help our neighbor with the splinter in
his eye. (Mt.7:5)
And so, a person who is striving towards
God will – from the very beginning – not orient himself to other people but to
Christ alone, who is in his inner being. And since Christ is freedom, this means
that no binding takes place. Instead, by the step-by-step actualization and
fulfillment of the eternal laws, we attain a hold in Christ, the pure, selfless
power through which we gain freedom.
A person who had
practiced Zen for seven years reported the following: "I was always simply told,
let go of your thoughts. Become quiet and still. But during all those years no
one ever told me that I should clear something up, that I should feel
repentance, that I should forgive and ask for forgiveness and no longer commit
the fault I had recognized."
A Western Zen teacher said the following
about this eastern teaching: "To experience one’s being and to experience the
Being is one and the same thing. Thus, Zen is not the proclaiming of a
supernatural revelation that calls us – we who live in the "I" and its world –
to believe in a supernatural Redeemer. Zen is the expression of a supernatural
experience that opens the transcendental in us in which we become redeemed, and
in which, in a certain sense, we were never unredeemed. This transcendental in
us is called in Buddhism, the Buddha nature." (Baron Duerckheim, "Zen and We" p.
55)
And continuing: "The right way to be, in the true
sense of a personal presence, becomes reality when man maintains himself as the
mediator between the Being beyond time and existence in time and space. To be in
the world but coming from the viewpoint of the Being, that’s what it depends on,
and that’s what Zen teaches. The basic exercise for this is Zazen, to sit in
unmoving silence, totally alert, being there from within. The meaning of this
exercise? To be transparent for the transcendent." (Baron Duerckheim, "Zen and
We" p. 109)
There is no mention here of the daily
actualization of the Ten Commandments and the Sermon on the Mount, that is, of
doing. Transcendence appears to be the right thing in the search for a
spirituality that comes from the longing of men for their origin. But one needs
to ask, to where do we transcend? Are we opening ourselves for the
Christ-force, the power of selfless love, or for forces that are looking for
their own, which bind and then demand payment?
People who walk the Christian path can often get into difficulties if they have previously practiced other spiritual techniques or exercises for some time.
Whether it is Yoga in its most varied forms or the most differing paths of eastern meditation, for example, Zen meditation; whether it is Asian combat sports with a meditative or spiritual background – all these practices can bring about problems. The reason for this is that by practicing these spiritual techniques, the pupils enter into communication with a transmitting potential of the corresponding energy field. Such energy fields, whether of the various types of Yoga or Zen meditation and so on, continue to emit into the world of feelings and sensations of the person. This can go so far that his world of feelings is blocked. When this is the case, a student can grasp only with great difficulty what takes place in his own thoughts, sensations and feelings.
But the Christian path is the path of purification of all our
human faulty behavior. And to clear these up self-recognition is necessary, and
self-recognition is possible only when we can get a hold of the thoughts and
feelings that are moving us at a particular moment. Only then can we clear these
up with Christ.
Why is it that a pupil of eastern techniques
can no longer get a hold of his thoughts and feelings?
The
main reason for this is that the eastern paths may very well speak of God and of
the expansion of one’s consciousness, but they do not basically require a
cleansing of the soul through a life based on the commandments of God.
The masters may guide a pupil to a certain
point within. But this happens only because they try to guide him by way of
techniques and practices to become quiet within, in order to lessen his
difficulties and problems, the tensions which life brings with it. At the same
time, they often try to give the pupil inner or spiritual experiences. This
should solidify the pupil’s trust in his master and in the path that he is being
taught.
With much spiritual knowledge, with meditations
that lack the actualization of the divine commandments, with the endless
repetition of mantras – since everything is energy – a layer is created in the
pupil which numbs his feelings and sensations. From this layer, one can very
well call up answers to life’s questions. But one’s own burdens which lie
underneath this layer can no longer be cleared up. And why not? Because our
deep-seated human faults and weaknesses show themselves in our world of feelings
and sensations. But if these are covered over by programming ourselves with
mantras or with imaginary images, then we can no longer recognize them. Another
consequence of this layer is that such a person considers himself to be positive
and spiritually advanced. He is convinced that he is on the way to enlightenment
and to God. If he should have any spiritual experiences, then he will see these
as a confirmation for the rightness of the path he has taken. He is then largely
immune to criticism or may even feel unjustly treated and react with open or
hidden aggression.
But how can such a person even begin to
recognize the thoughts or, above all, the feelings in his own subconscious? And
so, his soul remains burdened and shadowed, but the person cannot register this
anymore. His conscience no longer moves him, calling his attention to his faults
and weaknesses. He lives in a deceptive state of calmness which can easily turn
into lethargy and depression, since the power of God has not been developed in
him. What is lacking is the actualization of the laws of God in his daily
life.
Experience shows that once a person binds
himself to a master, then the master does not want to let him go. This means
that when he later wants to leave this path – even renouncing his master and for
years no longer practicing the master’s teaching – the binding that was created
remains in many cases and the influence of the master can hardly be
broken.
The master is unable to lead his pupil to God.
Instead, he wants to draw the pupil to himself, to his state of consciousness,
and through this – knowingly or not – to his community and, at the same time, to
the hierarchies that are behind it. But, why? The masters may emphasize that
they want to lead the pupil to God, but many write openly and say that the
master is more important for the pupil than God. This means that the pupil must
first go to the master in order to be able to find God, via the
master.
Thus,
for example, Yogananda states: "It becomes clear from this that the words of
Jesus (Mt. 21:23-32) are an assurance to all sinners and transgressors of the
divine laws, wanting to tell them that one can reach the kingdom of heaven
quickly when one follows a God-inspired guru and throws out all delusion – much
more quickly than if one were to insist self-gloriously on his own narrow-minded
moral conceptions, proud of his limited knowledge, thinking that without help,
one can enter into the cosmic consciousness." (Paramahansa Yogananda,
"Self-Actualization" 1986, p. 30)
The reasoning behind
this is simple: Man has sinned. He has lost the communication with God, and so
he needs a mediator, a master who already has the connection with God – this is
what is said; only when he has given himself over to the master and is thus
bound to him, can the master guide him to God.
Such a path
often binds a pupil for the rest of his life and beyond, because with physical
death the soul simply leaves the physical body. But the soul itself continues to
live in the worlds beyond unchanged. The ties to the hierarchy of the masters
continue.
When the soul of a person has become pure
for the most part, God’s guidance can become active in the inner part of his
soul. But as long as the Spirit of God cannot yet be effective through the
mostly purified soul of a person, then His guidance is indirect. This means that
the spiritual laws of the Ten Commandments and of the Sermon on the Mount, which
are excerpts from the eternal law of God, are available to the student as a
criteria for his life. God can also address a person through another one, so
that he can reach a free decision for himself. And the guardian spirit of a
person can also guide him through his conscience, as long as his feelings are
not blocked. A guardian spirit can influence a person by stimulating a question
in him: Is what I’m doing lawful, in the will of God? But the Spirit of God or
the guardian spirit will not give impulses into the soul or person that say, do
this or leave that, because the free will of a person must be
maintained.
On the other hand, the guiding technique of a
master is quite different: Via telepathy, he transmits certain inputs into the
brain, into the conscious mind of the unknowing pupil. In this way, the pupil is
tied to the master and cannot get away from him. He is completely convinced that
he has found the master who can truly lead him to God. Through this band
that was created by the master, the pupil can be influenced and controlled, and
energy can be drawn from him. Both of these things happen.
When former pupils try with all their
strength to cut loose from such a tie, they often have great difficulties. When
they turn away from a master, they often fall into such a lack of energy, into
such lethargy, that they are hardly able to master their own life. They may just
be able to do the least necessary for their life – but more is not possible. The
reason for this is that the pupil did not develop the divine source of energy in
him. He no longer follows the program for his own life, but instead establishes
a line of communication with a certain energy field. And if he now wants to cut
off this outside program, this stream of energy, then it can be likened to
cutting off the branch on which he is sitting.
So where is
his freedom in this?
The pupil gave up his freedom. The
freedom that God, his Father, gave to him, he turned over to a master; and this
master will not give it back to him, because above all he needs his pupil as a
supplier of energy, an energy source. The more people a master ties to himself,
the more energy he can draw from this group of people aligned with him. The
master can then use this energy for his own purposes, or shift it about to gain
further goals.
In addition, many eastern teachings and
masters teach the dissolution of God’s creatures and of all creation. They say
that the soul and all created forms will dissolve into the flowing, not manifest
Spirit, into the Being, as it was before the beginning of creation. At the same
time, this is glorified as the goal of life and as a state of highest bliss. The
dissolution of the divine creation and the formation of a new creation is a part
of the Fall-thought and is still the teaching today of many
masters.
Every person who wants to walk the Christian
path is faced with having to decide clearly and implicitly for
Christ.
If a person has tied himself to a master and after
this decides to walk the Christian path, then there is only one way for him: To
actualize the laws of God from the very beginning in a consequent and
disciplined way day-by-day, especially the Ten Commandments and the spiritual
laws of the Sermon on the Mount. He cannot afford to give any leeway at all to
the teachings and instructions of his previous master – otherwise they will
continue to influence him.
If the person who has decided
for the Christian path becomes negligent or complacent on it, he can be sure
that he will not reach his goal on his path to God. Because then, he will not be
able to free himself from the binding to the master and from the master’s
manipulations. Those who have never been confronted by such a situation may
think it has to be simple to cut oneself off from a master; it may even appear
to be so. But often, after 10 or 15 years, the influence can still be clearly
detected.
People who have left an eastern path and taken
the Christian path have expressed the following: We never realized what we had
gotten ourselves into; because we did not know about the spiritual law of
"sending and receiving" or how it functions.
Especially in the externalized Christianity of the official churches, one can often find the teachings of eastern practices today – under the guise of "Christ." In reality, it has to do with, for example, Zen Buddhist meditation, Hindu Yoga techniques or other eastern paths. For example, on "Church Day" several years ago in Frankfurt (this is a major Protestant event in Germany), one could learn about and try out many eastern teachings, practices and techniques – all of this described as "Christian."
Yoga courses are offered in many local night
schools and associations. Some Yoga instructors do not even bother anymore to
say that their course has to do with Yoga. They simply offer physical movements,
relaxation and methods for harmonizing oneself. Often, the whole thing is
dressed up as "Christian," by more or less saying the following: "There is only
one power. We all have only one Father, and it is the same whether we go this or
that path to God. Christ, too, was a good man; He, too, was a master." By mixing
the eastern with the Christian, they lead those seeking God into error. And so,
the people are not told what really happens in their inner being – perhaps
because the instructors do not know themselves.
To most
people it isn’t clear what it means to tie oneself to a human master or to an
institution or group, thus giving up one’s own freedom. Many times one is under
the illusion that the one doesn’t exclude the other, that both can be linked
together. But this is an error that is often first recognized when it is too
late.
A binding to a master can last for several
incarnations. It is difficult to say how long it can take in individual cases,
because the master does not receive the energy for his teachings and activities
from God. He merely shifts about the energies which he gets from people and
says, "I have given you energy; now you have to pay it back." And then it is
possible that the soul of his pupil will have to incarnate again in order to pay
back the master living in the purification planes of the beyond. And so, it may
be that they have to incarnate with a mission for the beings who are against
God.
Some masters say of themselves that the guru
is God and God is the guru – and in such a case, the master makes of himself
God. But on the other hand, Christ said of Himself, "The Father and I are one"
and "The Father is greater than I." If we pray to the Father, then we also are
speaking to Christ, because the Father and Christ are one.
But the master says, "The master is God and God is the master." Pope Boniface
VIII said a similar thing, "What am I other than God,
Himself?"
Many think that there are a few masters who
teach in secrecy and are one with God. One of our friends believed this, having
read travel reports about such encounters with masters. He then travelled two
years in the Himalayan region in order to encounter such legendary masters and
attain through them the highest guidance. After a long search he admitted,
"Neither in Europe nor in the Himalayas, nor in India did I find such a living
master who is one with God. Always when I was told about such a one, I would
travel to meet him – but it was never him." This was his experience.
Since through His deed of redemption almost
2000 years ago, Christ placed His spirit power, the part-power of the primordial
power, into every soul as support and leading-back power (the redeemer-spark),
the task of the true masters is over. In the time before Jesus of Nazareth,
there were true masters on the Earth. They were incarnated heavenly messengers
of light, who were active on Earth.
But since the deed of
redemption of Christ, the part-power of the primordial power, Christ, is the
only master. Since the redeemer-deed of Christ, the hierarchies of the masters
that continue to be active are leading all people and souls into the hierarchies
of the adversary forces that are against God, into the hierarchies of the
satanic. These are the beings of the Fall who are not willing to turn back, who
continue to strive for the dissolution of creation. They do not recognize Christ
as their Redeemer and Co-Regent of creation. Even though the Inner Master,
Christ, has been the only master of mankind for 2000 years now, the adversary
forces still teach through the hierarchies of souls and men, which – remembering
the true masters from the times before Jesus of Nazareth – still call themselves
masters, even today. They are the masters that live and work out of the
different hierarchies.
Because of their fully developed
consciousness, the true masters from the time before Jesus of Nazareth
who had continued to teach in the worlds beyond recognized on their own the
meaning of the event of redemption on Golgotha. Since then, they serve Christ in
His mission of redemption; they lead others to Christ, to the Inner Master in
every soul and in every person. And so, they teach and work as true spiritual
teachers.
Because the eastern religions, for example,
Hinduism and Buddhism, are without Christ – having become outdated since
Golgotha – they have weakened during the last two thousand years. They still
live and teach, but only out of their recollections or from their book knowledge
about the Absoluteness of the eternal Being. They think that what was before the
deed of redemption of Christ is still reality today, namely, the possibility to
lead people into the Absoluteness of the eternal Being through a human master.
And so, instead of the former true masters who were able to do this, what we
have now are the masters who in any case can guide their pupils into the
purification spheres of the worlds of the beyond or into the planes of
preparation for the Absoluteness, but never into the Absoluteness itself. And
this, for the simple reason that they do not accept the supporting and
leading-back part-power of the primordial power of the Christ-of-God. And so,
they do not accept Christ as the way, the truth and the life.
If a person has walked an eastern path and
now comes to the Christian path, he has to walk it diligently and consistently,
aligning with Christ alone, daily anew. This is especially important because
otherwise, he will not be able to break away from the influence of his former
master and the energy fields behind him.
Also, it is not
enough to personally take one’s leave of a master. In addition, it is necessary
to break off all lines of communication to him and to the traditions that lie
behind him. But this means to no longer send any thoughts in that direction, so
that the points of access through which the influencing can take place are
closed. These can even be such things as "wonderful" memories, longings,
desires, books and pictures. The person who is now striving towards Christ
should not think about these any longer, because every thought is a magnet
through which telepathic contact can be made with masters from the beyond or
even with human masters.
Books, objects and mementos from
that time should be removed if they remind the student of his world of thoughts
or of how he lived then. This is because through every single thought in that
direction the old lines of communication are established again – even if
unconsciously – through the principle of "sending and
receiving."
But the person who knows that he is the temple
of the Holy Spirit himself, that the Spirit of the Christ-of-God dwells in his
innermost being, also knows that he has to go daily in prayer to the One who
dwells in him. The one who does this, who intensively asks for the inner
guidance and daily fulfils the laws of God more and more cannot be touched by
books or anything else. But as soon as one starts to vacillate or become
negligent, it is possible that the previous master’s pupil will be grasped by
his earlier world of thoughts and be influenced by it again.
A pupil can examine the quality of the teaching of a so-called master by his fruits. He only needs to look at the pupils of a particular "spiritual teacher" who have gone the master’s path for a long time. Often, these people are lethargic, without energy. The reason for this is that behind every such spiritual teacher are strong energy fields, this means souls in the worlds beyond that have an interest in drawing the energy from the human master’s pupils. The person who has followed the practices of such a master for some time is, for this reason, often passive and hardly able to work.
A true spiritual teacher is one who has
developed aspects from the kingdom of divine wisdom, that is, who is on the path
to becoming a truly wise one. He is able to give and explain the divine laws as
well as the spiritual principles of inner life, insofar as he has developed
these in himself.
Very enticing is the promise of so-called masters who say, "I’ll do everything for you; I will take your karma and transform it for you." The impression is thus given to the pupil that the master can take the pupil’s soul burden, his karma, from him without his having to put any effort into it. This is why very often there are people making pilgrimages to the East who are looking for a quick "enlightenment." They themselves do not want to put the effort into living according to the laws of God which would bring their soul into its original frequency of vibration, thus making a life in the eternal Being possible. Thus, they trust the literature that has spread in the East and the West, including travel reports. They believe in the promises of their "spiritual teachers" because – lacking the means for testing them – they assume their spiritual perfection.
And to say that the pupil has to make his
own effort to approach God in his inner being through the fulfillment of the
divine commandments in one’s daily life is something that these "spiritual
teachers" mention only lightly or not at all. Instead, they instruct in the
conscientious exercise of their own tasks and techniques. And so, one can read
in the glossary of one of Yogananda’s books, the following: "Yoga: literally the
unification of a person with his creator through the practice of scientific
techniques that lead to self-realization...; Yogi: One who practices Yoga. ...
the mark of a Yogi is that he daily practices scientific techniques
conscientiously, techniques which lead him to the recognition of God."
(Yogananda, "Words of a Master" p. 122)
The unknowing
pupil likes only too well to believe in such statements. Often, such "spiritual
teachers" themselves believe in the perfection of their own teaching, because
the energy fields that are active behind what they teach do not offer a higher
spiritual knowledge.
However, no master can take the karma of a
pupil from him. Neither can a master forgive the pupil his sins. Only God,
through Christ, His Son and our Redeemer, can forgive sins. This is why it is
written, "No one comes to the Father but through Me." It is only the power of
Christ in us that is able to transform our soul burdens into positive power. But
this transformation is possible only when the student has recognized his faults
beforehand, has repented of them, asked for forgiveness, has been forgiven, has
made amends as far as this was possible and, above all, if he no longer commits
the faults he has recognized, practicing instead a law-abiding behavior. Only
when this is taking place, does Christ transform the negative which the student
has given over to Him into positive power.
During an autogenic training workshop, the leader said that he had access to the souls of the participants of the course. Such a statement means that the students had opened themselves to the influence of this teacher, so that he could "program" them with instructions. In such a case, one is faced with the same problem as with the eastern masters. But of course, it depends on who is leading the autogenic training and how intensively the student participated. But here, too, the dangers should not be underestimated, including the danger of becoming influenced by souls in the worlds beyond who are behind such workshops or their instructors.
Here is another example: A woman merely read
a few books on the subject and called intensively on souls only once. The
result was that she could no longer get rid of these souls. One single time of
transmitting was enough to establish a line of communication with
souls.
Occasionally Yoga is offered simply as a type of
"gymnastics." A woman learned such Yoga exercises in a health club. She had
never had anything to do with the spiritual teachings of Yoga, just simply
seeing these exercises as gymnastics. After these exercises took place, there
were some courses then offered in the health club. At one of these week-end
sessions, a teacher just "simply" opened one of the spiritual centers of her
fine-material body. The result for the woman is that still today, after many
years, she sees pictures, beings and grotesque faces all around her.
We know that everything that we think, feel,
speak or do is communication. Every one has experienced that his body posture
influences his mood and his thoughts. Every movement – and thus, every Yoga
exercise – is the same as a transmission. Every repeated or rhythmic movement
activates certain feelings, sensations, thoughts or actions. Through this, we
begin to emit and, in accordance with this vibrational frequency, we also
receive – either from this world or from the spheres beyond. And so, through
Yoga exercises, a student connects with certain energy fields.
Some scribes asked Jesus of Nazareth, "Master, which commandment of the laws is the greatest?" Jesus answered him, "You shall love the Lord thy God with all your heart, with all your soul and with all your might. This is the greatest and the first commandment; the second is like the first: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. The whole of the law and all of the prophets depend on these two commandments." (Mt. 22:36-40)
On the Christian path we experience that
this commandment is not the easiest. The love for God and for our neighbor are
our main tasks. This is where we confront our daily tests and
trials.
If we merely bow a thousand times a day or think
or speak out mantras several hundred times during the day as spiritual
exercises, where does this leave our fellow man, our neighbor, who is directly
at our side? Such a path is oriented solely towards the person who is practicing
it, towards the force-field of the human ego. But where does this leave his
neighbor?
God is the unity of all Being, and our
neighbor, too, belongs to this unity, to the great totality. If a person
striving for spirituality turns his back on his neighbor, then that can never be
the path of unity for all people and beings which the Spirit of the
Christ-of-God teaches. It may very well be the path of a master and the
hierarchies from the soul realms behind him that are active through him, but not
– even if so claimed by a master – the path to God; for God is unity and the
link to all Being.
A woman who followed an eastern path of
self-realization for many years explains why she left this
path:
"One day I asked the master: ‘Master, what do you
say to the love of one’s neighbor? Shouldn’t we love one another?’ And this was
his answer: ‘Better to just let it be. We only need to look at the last 2000
years to see what the commandment of Christ – to love one another – has led to.
Better to just let it be. Let’s love God in us, and in this way we will
actualize the highest wisdom that I have taught you. To love one’s neighbor
brings nothing, we should love God. Each one of us loves his God in himself, and
that is everything.’
I then asked myself if it was at all
possible to love God in me without going via my neighbor. I suddenly realized
that this was the greatest egotism that can ever be, to want to force – via
techniques – the experience of love, of peace and of unity with God who is in
me, in order to have it for me, so that things go well for me, so
that I can have peace. And what about the other person? ‘Let it be,’ said
the master, ‘they, too, have their God in themselves.’"
This experience shows so clearly why the eastern masters say so little about the
universal law of selfless love. The masters may speak about love, that
God is love, that we should love our neighbor. But that the way to God can lead
only through our neighbor, because our neighbor is in our innermost being, in
our pure being, that he is a part of us – nothing is said about
that.
If we want to reach unity with God who is the love,
then the pure being of our neighbor has to be awakened in us and belong to our
life in a conscious way. This is the unity in God; this is the family of God.
And so, when I want to enter into God, into the all-encompassing selfless love
again, then I have to first become this love again, to attain the highest
vibration in the universe, to become a conscious child of
God.
The path to God leads solely via the selfless deed of
love for our neighbor. This is the path that Jesus of Nazareth taught us in the
Sermon on the Mount and which He again teaches and deepens today as the
Christ-of-God.
Even the individual masters – no matter what
their tradition is – will have to acknowledge the filiation of God in order to
become conscious sons and daughters of God again. Every master will have to
acknowledge the order of creation, with Christ – the part-power of the
primordial power – as the Co-Regent of infinity. Only then will he be able to
step through the wall of light of the heavens in order to return to the eternal
Being.
A master may have all the spiritual knowledge he
wants; he may have actualized certain divine laws; he may have developed a
certain humbleness, and yet, ever since the deed of redemption on Golgotha, none
will reach God, the Eternal, except through Christ. For Christ is not only the
manifested spirit being, He is at the same time, as the part-power of the
primordial power, omnipresent in the four basic powers of creation as well as in
the very bottom of the soul of every single person. However, none of the true
masters working on Earth during the time before Golgotha was omnipresent
power.
Christ, the master in our innermost being,
is the only one who can guide us into our innermost being, to God. As long as we
are not aware of this, we will always be seeking. And as long as we are seeking
for something that we can concretely grasp hold of, we will look to men and bind
ourselves wherever possible to masters.
Christ is able to
truly guide us to our innermost being, to our true being, because He is
omnipresent in our innermost being. Whoever is not in the innermost being may be
able to give certain instructions or indications that lead us some steps within,
but since Golgotha no master can guide us into our innermost being, into the
unity with God.
A spiritual teacher can teach from his
tradition; he may be able to teach the divine laws which he himself has
actualized. But only we can walk within to the divine that is in us, and we can
do this only through the actualization of the divine laws of God. There may be
many ways and as many masters – but none of them can guide us into unity with
the divine in us. There is only one way that leads to the Eternal in us:
It is the step by step actualization of the Ten Commandments, of the
commandments of the Sermon on the Mount, it is the actualization of the eternal
laws – all under the guidance of the redeeming power in us, the power of the
Christ-of-God.
Why do we seek? Is it not our soul that is
seeking? But a person who wants to attain everything quickly thinks that he may
be able to progress more quickly and perhaps become "someone" in a spiritual
sense, if he were to tie himself to people, to spiritual leaders and their
hierarchies wherever possible.
However, it is
fundamentally important for us to recognize that there are only two
possibilities in our lives. Either we orient ourselves directly to the source of
power, God, and let ourselves be guided via the redeeming power of Christ in us
to our Father in the eternal Being – or we take other paths and sources. In all
of infinity, since Golgotha, there are only these two possibilities: either
through Christ to the Eternal in us – or through the alignment with
people, that is, with created beings, whether these people now call
themselves "master" or "spiritual teacher." They, too, are children of God, who
bear the redeemer-spark, the Christ-power, in them, and for this reason will –
at some point in time – acknowledge Christ as their Redeemer and the Co-Regent
of creation.
Christ is the law, and the law is the law of freedom. And so, the person who is aligned with Christ is and remains free on his path to perfection. This means that he does not tie himself to anything on this path. Freely, he turns back to the eternal source, to God in the innermost part of his soul, to his true being. God is freedom, and so He also gave His children freedom, their free will. All other pathways, especially those that are oriented towards a human master, invariably lead to becoming bound to that particular person and to the corresponding hierarchy of souls in the beyond, for which this master lives and works on Earth.
So why take detours through human
soul-guides when we have the direct way: Christ in us!
Through His prophetic word today, the Spirit of the Christ-of-God teaches us the Christian mystical path in all its levels and details. With this, He is making true what He promised: "I still have much to tell you, but you would not be able to understand it. However, when the Spirit of truth comes, He will lead you into all truth." (Jn. 16:12) This Inner Path in Universal Life consists of the step-by-step actualization of the divine commandments in one’s daily life – the Ten Commandments and the spiritual laws of the Sermon on the Mount including the Absolute Law of God, which the Spirit of the Christ-of-God has revealed today anew.
On this path of Christian mystical schooling
we turn to Christ in our innermost being. We develop our spiritual heritage
through self-recognition, that is, the recognition of our faults and weaknesses
and clearing up what we recognize and, at the same time, through the
step-by-step actualization and fulfilment of the commandments of God. Every
person who seeks God can examine this schooling path of the inner being
beforehand – it is printed and available for every person.
The student on the Inner Path is prepared by way of the Original Christian
Course for the Development of Consciousness. When a decision is made for this
course, this means that a decision for Christ has already been made. In this
Original Christian Course for the Development of Consciousness, we affirm
aspects of our inner being and at the same time strive earnestly to fulfill
these. For example, if we say the words, "I am peaceful" into our inner being,
then this positive energy will activate those aspects in us that still have no
peace. Through this, we can recognize them and clear them up, so that we will
gradually become peaceful as is in accordance with the divine laws.
If a pilgrim on the path within has walked an eastern path and now comes to the original Christian Inner Path, he certainly can participate in the preparatory course for the path within. But a certain time period should have already passed since practicing the previous path. This course of preparation is to help the student align with God and Christ in the innermost part of his soul. If the student now begins to walk the Inner Path, then he has to walk it consistently and diligently, aligned only with Christ in his inner being. Otherwise, he will not be able to break away from the energy field of his previous master and the forces behind him, because especially then – as we have read above – this energy field will try to influence him in a very strong way, so that it continues to receive energy from him. But by aligning with Christ alone, who is in him, no binding takes place since Christ is the freedom. By the step-by-step actualization and fulfilment of the eternal laws, we attain a hold in the divine in us, a hold in Christ, the pure, selfless power. This is the real security, which means freedom.
This path comprises seven levels: Order, Will, Wisdom, Earnestness, Patience, Love and Mercy. The actualization and fulfillment of the aspects of the law of God that are taught on the levels one through four lead to a degree of purity and development of soul and person, so that the Inner Master, Christ, can take over the direct guidance of the student on the further levels five to seven: the guidance all the way to the conscious unity with God, the Eternal, in the conscious unity with all Being, in the selfless work as a human being for the good of all.
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