“To know, to Will, to Dare and to be Silent.”
It
might be of value briefly to enumerate some of the reasons why secrecy is
enjoined upon all Initiates, and why therefore all disciples have to cultivate
the quality of silence, preparatory to learning the nature of “Occult
Reticence.”
It
is at this time very necessary for the balancing faculty of silence to be
emphasized.But to enjoin silence is, in these days of lower manasic
development, of little use and but serves to give opportunity for the hearers
of the injunction to believe either that the silence veils ignorance or is but
the imposition of an arbitrary command.Hence my purpose somewhat to elucidate
the problem and to show why it is necessary that those who are affiliated with
the Hierarchy,—either as aspirants or pledged initiates—should develop this
occult restraint.
1.
It is little realised by the unobservant or uninitiated thinker what is the
effect of the spoken word, and what the effect of the attractive power of
speech.As a man speaks he magnetically attracts substance in his immediate aura
and he affects (whether he wills to do so or not) responsive life units in the
bodies, subtle or dense, of his fellow men.When therefore he announces to the
listening pupils that he is an Initiate or a disciple, doing so with positive
assertion and thereby attracting attention to his personality, he inevitably
works upon the negative, atomic aspects in his own bodies, and upon the
responsive negative lives or aspects in those of his brothers.His words are not
in line with the occult “I am THAT” which produces identification with the
central group life and therefore with the central spark of positive force in
all the group units but the statement, being
a Personality claim, has its
reaction upon the personalities of all his brothers, working through the negatiye
aspect.It is the imposition (oft unconsciously) of his force or will-power upon
theirs and the effects of such imposition cannot fail in achieving dire
results.It stimulates that which is undesirable, and develops negative
responsive reactions, such as devotion to and willingness to be guided by the
speaker or the enunciator of personal hierarchical standing, or else it
repulses, thus causing separation, and separation engenders hatred and strife.
It
is for this reason amongst others that disciples are taught both to belittle
their personality standing whilst exalting the nature of the Inner God which is
identical in all men, and to refrain from speech unless it serves group purpose.Group purposes are best
served by the stimulating of the highest aspect in every man.
How
is it then that the Masters have let it be known that They are Adepts?
Though
the Masters have allowed to be known (through
Their disciples) Their
service, knowledge and power to help and that They have transcended the three
worlds of human endeavor I would have you note that such admissions as They have made
through word or letter have been made to Their pledged disciples on whom rests
the karma of passing the information to the general public.And on their
shoulders lies the responsibility of working out either the good or evil
results.It is a fact in occult development that the nearer a disciple is to the
Master and to the goal, the more reticent he is and the less he seeks to
attract attention to the Master (as an individual) or to himself as an agent for that
Master.The work to be done can be more easily accomplished where there are
less thought-forms to be transmuted.
Are
we then not to pass on information about the Masters to the general public?
It
is necessary for the public to be informed as to the nature and work of the
Masters, for the time is ripe; but this is a definitely different thing to the
problem under consideration, that of personal claim of attachment to a Master
or to the Hierarchy.
Therefore
disciples and Initiates protect the work through the wall of
personality-silence which they maintain.It should be borne in mind also (and
this is little realised though of considerable bearing upon the case) that the
bodies of manifestation through which the Adepts work upon the physical plane
are definitely constructed for specific ends; they are composed of matter of
the highest subplane of each of the three planes and the impression is from
Their own levels, via the buddhic and manasic permanent atoms, direct to the
physical brain; there is for Them no mental unit or permanent atoms in the
three worlds.They have passed out of the domination of the Lunar Fathers and
e'en of the Solar Angel, and are pure spiritual essences.Therefore They can
only influence the spirit aspect in man, though They control the subhuman
forces if They so desire.This is the occult fact behind the idea that the
Masters can only work with human beings when they have “entered Their world” or
have raised themselves to such a state of consciousness that they are in touch
with their own spiritual aspect, at first with the middle principle, the Ego
and later the Monad. Therefore the injunction goes forth for man to find his own
inner God, the Initiator, and to awaken and become responsive to the egoic
vibration.Then the Masters
can and do work at strengthening that impression until the definite conscious link is made at the First
Initiation and the man is on the WAY to “see his God.”When this is so the
Initiate cannot speak of it and it should be remembered that after a similar
process in the life of his brother there will be no need to speak for the
recognition will be mutual though not based on words, and that prior to such a
linking up statements such as ‘I am an Initiate’ but lead to mischievous
results.
2.
Silence is likewise enjoined in the occult life, as is well known, owing to the
danger of handing on knowledge to the unwary, the curious, the unscrupulous and
the unready.Unless therefore, a disciple shows a wise discrimination in the use
of the gradually imparted occult facts, he delays the initiatory process
wherein is communicated to him the formulae words and keys.It is not idly
therefore that we are taught the occult aphorism that “silence is golden and
speech is silver” for gold is the symbol of the transmuted soul who works with
the positive electric force whereas speech is silver and concerns the negative
lives and the man who uses speech, as it is ordinarily understood, is as yet
under the dominance of the involutionary lives.Speech applies to the Gods; sound
to God.You have the idea brought out in the Word of the Logos which is
succeeded by the “army of the voice.”From the standpoint of the inner God or
Ego in this manifesting cycle, speech is a characteristic of the personality,
(the Gods in triple manifestation) and sound the nature of the Ego itself on
the abstract levels.The Initiate works on the mental plane through the use of
universal words; men work on the lower planes through speech or the multitude
of words and sounds.The method for the Initiate in training, for the disciple
under discipline, as for the Adept in liberated work is ever the
same—meditation, realisation, visualisation and sound, and the one who
meditates remains ever he who consciously employs these four.The method for man
on his own plane is ever the conclusions of lower mind, imagination,
desire-forms and inchoate speech and the man identifies himself unconsciously
with the forms he creates and with the immature thought-forms which he
visualises. Therefore until a man is free or being liberated rapidly upon the
Path he cannot be trusted with the knowledge of the energies which direct and
manipulate the forces of involution or the substance aspect.He has first to
learn the methods of occult silence.
3.
Conscious silence is enjoined upon a disciple also for the following reasons:
a.
Silence develops in him knowledge of motives through the considerations of the
reasons for speech and the need for reticence.
b. Silence develops in him the quality of interior meditation and the capacity
to hear its voice.
c. Silence serves to teach him the process of the conservation of energy and
the storing up of force for the service of man-kind.
d. Silence engenders in him the ability to preserve equilibrium and enables him
to cultivate the realisation of conscious alignment with the Ego, his own Inner
Divinity.
4.
Another potent reason for the cultivation of silence is that speech engenders karma and the spoken word ever produces
results which will need to be worked out if such words concern or are based
upon personality.The disciple or Initiate should be in process of diminishing
karma and working it off with a view to liberation.At the same time the
speaking of the word of Brotherhood and the utilisation of speech in order to
help or teach men the WAY engenders no karma.
When
a man makes claims and calls attention to himself either as an Initiate or a
disciple, he links to him, either favourably or unfavourably, other human units
and he must work out with them the effects of his using of such speech and liberate
himself in time from their thought-forms of devotion or dislike, of ardent
attraction or scornful repudiation, and he will have to “stand by” in the
occult sense of the term until he has undone, as far as may be, the bad effects
of his ill judged words.This is a potent reason for silence
The
Masters work with those who come to Them, having wrestled their way into
Their presence and found the entrance into Their world through similarity of
vibration.They send not out proclamations to all and sundry for They know the
law and Their words are spoken to those who come to Them and who have sought
Them out through very need.They speak to Their own people, to those who know
through individual recognition, and Their words are for them and to enable them
to be their agents on the physical plane for the working out of the Plans.
-Alice Bailey, Beacon Magazine(March 1926)
