Читать книгу The Spirit of the Tarot - Claudine Aegerter - Страница 22

The Pope holds the blessing of the primary religion, which is the knowledge that God is within us and not in rituals. He is not attached to any particular religion, therefore is not dressed in white as the tradi tional Pope would be. He is the fifth card and so concludes the first stage of the journey. His pure blessing is there for all, but it is only possible to receive it by making the choice to look up and so rise above the personal desires and dramas. The message is very simple and clear, reminding us to look beyond the outer form and see the energy of love and truth behind all things.

The Pope at Number 5, represents peace of mind, which is the state that is reached once the mind has explored all the experiences of the senses, all the sciences and all the philosophies. In this state it will perceive itself as wisdom, Active Intelligence and the obedi ent will. The higher mind it has become is falling in love with its reflection and it is that moment of deep peace that reveals the love aspect at its fullest. The understanding that we are all one great life is the ‘coming home’ feeling, where nothing else is needed; we are whole, we are blessed – so the giving out of the blessing can begin. Many numerologists will question this view of the 5, but this is the highest attainment that the mind of mankind can reach, just as the 12/3, The Hanged Man, is the highest expression of the Trinity in mankind.

Before the mind reaches this point, it will have to revisit every behaviour pattern that the experience of living has imprinted on an inquisitive human being, who seeks answers through knowl edge in the never ending record of mindsets. When these mindsets are seen as his lot and his weakness, the initiate seeks the trans forming inner path into wisdom. As he does this he is not even aware that this accumulated knowledge will play a big part in the personality’s proud resistance to the inner light. He has to give back to God the little light of his mind, for he does not own it but he is it and so he belongs to God. He is not any of the archetypes that his pride would have projected to keep him subject to. We can see the danger of the knowledge in the mind of man, when he recognises that he is his creative mind and still believes in his own importance.

In Number 4, The Emperor, we experience the conflict that the mind might encounter as it learns to harmonise the many diffi-culties of the task of realising the concept ‘as above, so below’. This is the role of mankind; what a responsibility! We have to watch out truthfully for these archetypes, from martyr to saviour, from servant to saint and so on. We need to find them in ourselves and dissolve their potent energies, thus releasing life from erro neous mindsets and structures. In the 4 we saw that the emotional, romantic aspect of love had to be transmuted into the cold light of reason, so that the action of mind on matter is for the greater good. What has to be done is for the best in the long term. We are all equal and brothers in the eyes of love/wisdom so we fight unfairness, but when we look at a situation we thought unfair and see the greater picture, we realise that it helped us to inter nalise and rise.

If you are a surgeon, there are times when it may be necessary to cut off a limb, so you would have to be completely insensitive to the pain that would be caused otherwise you couldn’t do it. If you have a bad tooth you go to the dentist and he pulls it out; he knows it hurts but it is his job and he is helping you. He won’t be thinking “Poor thing, I am going to hurt her, shall I do it?” he just does it. If we realise we have called somebody a name because we were cross, and understand that this came from our personality, not from Soul-Spirit, we have to have enough humility in us to forgive ourselves and know that the other person can do that as well, as can everybody else. If we are really hurt from the personality point of view, we bite back; then we can see and understand that reaction, so absolve and transmute it. That is fine and means that next time we might react from Soul with a similar effect, without even questioning it.

It is about being human in the best possible way and that means that boundaries and discipline are completely understood. The structure of a healthy, intelligent society is formulated to be good, for it stops complete degeneration and destruction. For an aver age human being to accept and follow the discipline of function ing within the boundaries of society is good, but at the same time Ancient Wisdom is teaching people to be able to see through the structure and recognise it. It is not brainwashing or persuading peo ple; in fact it is the complete opposite. It is putting another picture next to the standard one, so as to allow people to think for them selves and bridge the gap between their Heaven and Earth.

When we put our hand up in blessing that gives a spiritual/ Soul content to whatever we are in front of, whether it is plant, human or object. Then when we completely align the instrument, Soul and Spirit, we have only peace, love and truth in our hands so spiritual healing comes automatically. The harmonious vibra tion from the love/wisdom energy creates patterns that inspire a response within the receiver, so that a space for healing is cre ated. For example, just by smiling we will help others to smile. The problem is that society has given us norms of harmony and beauty that are so limited and deformed. In the eyes of the disci ple or would-be initiate the world is too small, mean, or just not good enough. He might ask “Am I dreaming? Is this really planet Earth? Is this really who I am?” This is the pain of the disciple. He has had his eyes full of starlight and gold dust, he has drunk the milk of Heaven and then comes back and denies himself every five minutes. He will have to relive the experiences with the full light of truth on to them, so that he doesn’t leave some dark corners of festering emotions in the cup. The peace of mind that he has to achieve will serve him when he is uncoiling the memories that are locked in the organic cells of his body.

We need to depersonalise what we see as ourselves. The sensa tions of pleasure, guilt, or pain are so addictive that we keep going for more drama or disgust. The perception has to shift from “This is me” to “This is the job that I, the Soul, have to do”. We need to see it in the context of the process of life and keep witnessing with com passion, for we are here to help people. Artistically, if we can bring something higher out of the dilemma of being human by using the senses at a higher level than self-gratification and then express what we feel, we are doing just right. This is what most people don’t do enough. They would express the first thought of what they feel, but if the will to be completely honest is not there, they don’t go to what is important behind the thought; for ninety-nine percent of the time that first thought is an intellectual cover-up.

We have to use the senses, so we are being fed excitement and it is important to go on expressing it outwardly so as to show other people the effect; then eventually it sublimates itself. We should give out everything that we are, until we feel there is nothing else to give; this applies to all the services and the sciences. While we feel we have more to express, then we should do it. We are the expres sion of the God we live in and we have to bring out truth from the depths of our feeling and be moved. It is a ‘good citizen’ syndrome to be afraid of being moved and afraid of saying “Look I’m weak”. If we are moving in the waters, whether it is the deep subconscious waters or the higher waters, or the ones in between, that is what we have to express. When we are silent we are learning to discrimin ate inside and are checking our own honesty. After that it is a crime against humanity if we don’t express our own humanity, for we have to demonstrate to others that it is possible to be at peace with it. How is an aspirant even going to be able to start taking a pen to draw a circle if we haven’t expressed ours in many ways before?

The primary religion is about knowing that God is within us. Once we have understood that, all the other gods are elementals even if they are cosmic. The one having the experience is the God of the system in us and on behalf of that inner God we are expressing the Solar System. We cultivate endurance through pain, until one day we smile and say “What is next?” for the spiritual uplift is mov ing us on. If we do the experience of our addiction (and we are all addicted to life otherwise we would not be here), then it passes, it goes. If we do it humbly, with love in our hearts then we are doing well, but it is not a recipe for doing it forever, it must move on. We all carry our potential as a higher consciousness within us and also the action-reaction of our personal karmic biology.

The Pope is simple and beautiful. In Number 5, the five-pointed star is a symbol of the Christ. He is the true human, the biological being who is completely responding to and is at the service of the God within; that is what The Pope represents and in the card he’s not meant to be the head of the Roman Catholic Church. The Tarot at its peak was drawn during the middle Ages, when the powerful in the land were the kings, Popes and emperors, so this is why those names are in the Tarot. The name that represents the highest possible authority on Earth of a spiritual order is The Pope, depicted in the fifth card.

The Pope of the Tarot, like Christ or Krishna, is the highest possible achievement of light and matter coming together in the service of God towards humanity. This quality of mind gives rise to wisdom, which is then made perfect in action. This is a description of a human being that has done everything and who comes back completely denuded of personal intent. The only thing that they come back for is to try and save the ones that are lost; this is the Christ or the Bodhisattva. It takes very little for us to be lost and in humanity today we are at a point of crisis, so a lot of people are lost. We need the courage to represent the life that is within. Some of us will have to go beyond recognised ideas and systems to remove some worn out veils of corruption, so that the new understanding can actually reveal a simpler truth.

The flow of energy through the Tarot has arrived at Number 5, which is half-way through to the perfect 10. However, even to reach the perfection of the 5 we have to go all the way to 22 and back, many, many times. The Pope concludes the first five cards, coming just at that time when the true birth of the Christ within can take place; the higher mind of the soul and the love wisdom of the heart fuse. The Tarot describes the journey of the Soul on its initiatic path. From the beginning we are presented with the tools, the goal and the qualities of mind required to complete the journey. The Pope and the Hanged Man represent an achieved state, like grace or humility. We can’t work at becoming a Pope; it is a state we arrive at, just as we can’t work at becoming humble. To be as near as possible to that state is what is required, so that we can carry on through the next seventeen cards. So far in the first five cards all the qualities and attributes to aspire to, have been pointed out. We are not perfect, so there is a need to be vigilant all the time, because in the next seventeen cards there is always the possibility of losing ourselves. We need to check our equipment as we would do before climbing the Himalayas, by seeing that our back-pack is prepared for the job. In this way we are ready to go on to the next part of the journey, which is coming into life itself. Up to now we have been flying high with the concept.

With The Magician, we had to be full of spiritual will to come into the world of illusion; this is the will to be able to see and push through, without being taken in. We need the will to acquire the deepest wis dom there is and to go into every single corner of the subconscious so that the veil can be lifted in Number 2, The High Priestess, who asks us to have pure thought, (which means not looking through our own personal glasses) and then reclaim the mind as Active Intelligence, to name and create the world in Number 3, The Empress. She can weave, she has understood the pattern and she can express it. When the idea, net or canvas is firmly there, The Emperor brings that blue print into crystallisation, saying “Nothing will deter me from bring ing the plan on Earth”. Then after the pity and compassion of The Emperor, we have the blessing in Number 5, The Pope.

Nothing of what has been done or will be done is judged by the measure of manmade justice, only by love and truth. This kind of judgment is a blessing. If we have been a thief and what made us one is understood through love and compassion, then we do not need to be a thief any more. As long as what we have done has been lived, understood and completely seen, right to the root of what being a thief is, then we can stop being one. Everything has a root and a source and there is nothing more that nature wants than to make one with that source, which is God. To be moved by genuine compassion rather than self protection is glorious, to be in the drama of being human is also glorious, but wouldn’t it be much simpler to stop being in the drama? Anything that is not moved by the spontaneity of the Spirit/Soul connection is self-gratification, including spiritual or philosophical pursuits.

The Pope is coming back with a clear heart and a pure mind and he is going to do his job. The Tarot is a book of man’s esoteric life and makes a complete story. If we understand the first ten cards, we understand what our inner spiritual world is made of, but if we understand the whole twenty-two, we have understood what being an initiate is and we are at work; it is not just studying.

Life is energy organising itself and manifesting as systems. These systems can be seen as archetypes, but in reality all the systems are one and any system is a by-product, like the virtual life where the experiment of life takes place.

The first two cards indicate to the initiate all he will need to achieve to dissolve the black sphinx of misunderstandings. Once he has understood that he is responsible to Soul, he can’t stop the process of transformation because the past mistakes keep present ing themselves for purification. If we stop asking questions because we feel we have come to a point or level where love and peace reigns in our lives, we have to watch it, because we might be kidding our selves with some sensory experience that feels good, when in reality it is an illusionary state created by pride. On the other hand, we don’t have to go and break a leg because we think we are too happy; we just need to be honest. The personality learns to align its desires, wants and hopes, to survive and succeed in the everyday world, but eventually when the alignment to Soul begins, these driving aspira tions have to be directed towards others welfare.

Religions are right to bring hope to humanity; they are useful mindsets to help us be good citizens, because there is no work that Spirit can achieve if there isn’t good citizenship. Even if at some time we have to confront our neighbours, good citizenship has got to be there. The essence within us pushes us towards more work, more truth and more love; not for self, but as service. Keep on being vigilant to see whether in us there is still some hope for salvation that remains from being afraid of Hell, or from pride and wanting to be first at the gate of Heaven.

The expression of the God we live in is inside us, but hope, salva tion and pride have no place in us, when we are filled with the qual ity of love and wisdom. Certainty replaces hope, service is habitual and humility is our state. It is the ongoing, incessant journey of bringing Spirit down to Earth. Rather than hope it is certainty, for we know we are fulfilling our task; we can’t stop doing it and there is nothing else we can do. To be truly able to do it, we have to get rid of all the hopes, because while we are hoping there is something in it for us or something in it for humanity. If there is something in it for humanity and we want to help our brother in that way, then think, “Why do I want to help my brother, what is the matter with me?” We’ve got a problem. We can feel our brother’s pain, but we all know really that we can’t do a thing for our brother, so we stop hop ing. All we can do is carry on. People come for healing and we give ‘hope’, for humanity has got to hope and it gives us the opportunity to learn through what we are hoping for.

We will start to realise that there is something else in the world besides ourselves and that we have been taking ourselves too seri ously. Look at what the world is going through; our suffering is pea nuts! There is a lot of breaking down going on. The fact that we have the privilege of breaking our hearts over a peanut helps us to go to the very heart of our wants, so that we can de-crystallise them. We see that the journey is going to be coloured by what we want. The only requirement is to be completely true to what is happen ing in our lives at the time; this is the greatest pain of all. We may have done nothing more than squash a bee when we didn’t want to and we are devastated. We can ask ourselves if we have ever expe rienced deep pain about something like that. See it, because these are the feelings that will eventually give us the white gloves of pure intent. We can ask “What is the fuss about and why is it so difficult to accept ourselves as we are?”

Society is the support of the body of humanity; it is a structure, so let’s not kick the body of humanity by kicking society. Let’s try to see whether we can put in more light, more soap, a better diet and all the other things it needs. Society is the expression of what humanity at the time can work out, just as our bodies are an expression of how we lived our lives yesterday. If we think of society like that, we can see how initiates will work within it by bringing more compassion and light into the structure of the house of humanity, so that event ually society can be completely bathed in the Sun. The change will not happen in our lifetimes, but that is no reason not to act.

Truth is not the firework display of suddenly seeing the Solar System in its full glory, it is homely and small. How can Spirit make atomic light happen in the heart of wisdom, if it doesn’t go into the small atomic memory of our everyday life? That is the truth with love/wisdom. It is a road to Damascus experience when we let the understanding drop into the heart and the heart allows the fire to fuse with the light. The flashing light is suddenly saying, “My God, it is that simple!” There is no other truth, except when the light of Spirit in our little unit can reach yet another depth in the core of our wisdom. The Empress is the idea and the high spirituality and then The Pope is the divine flash in the mind of mankind’s heart, because the truth of the human condition is perceived with love in the blessings given.

After 1 and 2 we have a goal, which is to aim for the wisdom on our journey and then 3 and 4 represent aspects of the skill of mind. Have we got the higher intelligence in place and the skill to imple ment the vision? Numerologically the 1 2 & 3 are the cosmic karmic mirror in which the initiate is asking the question, “What am I made of?” It is an energetic world and when consciousness comes in, then the space is going to allow the light to tear the veil so that it can say “Oh yes! I can see, I’ve got the map, I’ve got the plan”. That is The Magician, The High Priestess and The Empress. Light comes in, needs to see and asks “What do I measure?” “What am I made of?” “What do I feel?” The High Priestess gives the answer and corner by corner darkness is lifted gradually, as consciousness overtakes the blind cleverness of nature.

By the fourth level with The Emperor, we are going to find a way to humanise. We become our own ruler. Only when we have found the wisdom and have no personal intent can we guide, but in this case we are talking about more than guidance. The word is ‘regu late’, which has the same root as ‘regal’, or kingly. Rules and regula tion all come from the same idea of the Spirit being in charge.

As we look at The Pope in the card, we see that he is an old man with a white beard and a red green-lined coat with a blue habit underneath it. He’s holding a cross with his left hand, is giving a blessing with his right hand and he wears a Triple Crown. We can only see the top of his chair in the card and there are two clerics in front of him. He’s gentle and it is a very simple card. We are not look ing at this Pope as the religious, symbolic head of the church, but as the summit of achievement in spiritual religious authority. Religion comes from linking and bind ing things together just as we bind a book; this is symbolic of linking or re-linking with God.

The fifth card is a continuation of The Emperor, so we have the same levels of consciousness with two very different expressions. The Pope and The Emperor are two sides of the one coin. They are the manifestation of the religious power in life and the social-cultural everyday power; these two have always been fighting each other. Even in the days when the priests and the kings were one, there would have been an internal conflict. We know from the very first stories of the opposing brothers, whether it is Lucifer and Christ, or Cain and Abel, that there has always been a conflict within the psyche of mankind about how to apply the rule of God, as we try it this or that way.

The initiatic way, which is the inner way, has been vilified because the power of the social organising structure had to win over the inner way to begin with. What we regard as the truth in most reli gions is the exoteric or outer structure, like the ten commandments, which say: “Don’t do it”, rather than “I know I’m free, I’ve under stood I lie every day, but I can see it and I know why I am doing it, so I will learn not to lie”. The ancient Egyptian commandment was, “I haven’t lied, I haven’t killed, I haven’t refused to help my brother”. The difference between these two ways is that “I haven’t”, has been turned into the structured exoteric “Don’t do it”. For the initiate, however mean he has been, as long as he sees it and as long as he turns it into honesty and love one day, it is okay. However, the people had to be given a structure, so the religions had to tell them what not to do, otherwise they would never be aware of what they were doing. The battle of social versus religion, meaning outer ver sus inner has been going on from the beginning of awareness. How do we now apply the truth of God as we see it?

It is all to do with power and will. When will first comes in, it is force. Then when it reorganises and regulates itself, it becomes the power of the land or the power of the spiritual mind; power is the force that is able to find a way to regulate. When the social side or the structure of civilisation is stronger than the inner life, then it is Caesar the Emperor, for example, who wins over the religion of the land, which represents the inner life. All the highest aspirations are there in the idea of the perfect town, the perfect country and the unification of the world, so that we can be at peace. The greater life is there; it doesn’t die, but it becomes extremely materialistic and superficial because we are only talking about the building or struc ture; religion then becomes a tool to reinforce the social order.

The ones who should apply divine justice and say, “I know my son, I love you, but don’t do it again”, are the judges and the police men. They don’t apply divine justice, instead they protect the state and the good citizens by giving out punishment. “We will call you a scum and make you into a scum”; this is the ‘eye for an eye’ type of morality, which is the old interpretation of the old fear of God mentality, rather than spirituality.

The role of religion is to surpass and rise above the social order, not to maintain the artificial hierarchy based on personal interest. Initiates are representatives of the true inner religion; every piece of love and truth in the initiate, however small it is, is there to create a reaction; this truly makes them act as a stirrer or devil’s advocate. But we shouldn’t make ourselves into stirrers, because the artificial stirrer is the worst possible aspect of the desire to be important. We can only be a devil’s advocate if we are the brightest of the bright, having gone through all the love, compassion and blessings. These great sparks from Soul are the true devil’s advocates and are the ones who come and push on the wheels of Job. They are the ones who are bright and faithful and so much into God, that they don’t mind coming in to hurt one or two of us just to wake us up. If that isn’t The Pope, what is? Can you see how much love there has to be for truth, for the God we live in and for humanity, to be able and come down and say, “Hold on mate, you are doing it for yourself’. With the temptation in the desert, Jesus’ brightest, most honest side came up and asked “Do you think you are that pure? Well, I am going to put you in front of yourself”. We should beware of the false devil’s advocate. They either do it because they have understood some part of the mysteries and they are trying to play a role that isn’t theirs, or they have seen the role from afar and their pride takes over, so that they sabotage themselves and everybody around them. Remember it is not so much about which lies we tell to others, it is always more about whether we are lying to ourselves.

With Caesar it is all about structure, therefore it has to be fixed and stable. There’s nothing more difficult for a well-established society than to welcome change, because change represents instability and trouble. However, social change cannot happen without instability. In a culture it will take several generations to change, because the social structure will always resist change. The true nature of Spirit is to move, so the mystical life moves and its very nature is a continual evolution, so if we follow the warning of Buddha we don’t go for pictures and crystallisation. When the mystical life or religion domi nates, then it can become dogma, as we can see in religious funda mentalists through the ages where religion is applied with force.

There can be no social application or practical interest behind the spiritual base of faith in its truest sense of ‘faith, hope and charity’. If faith is what rules the religious content of a country, it is still very much the spiritual trying to find a way to build a structure. It is not the job of religion to do that, it is The Emperor’s job. That is why the Tarot has been wise and made two cards out of that power, for it is the same power but with different interpretations. The Emperor is the power that regulates the vision and what is to come. The Pope represents the natural peace of mind, that through its direct connec tion with the realised higher intelligence of the Soul offers blessings to those who are ready to receive them; then they can naturally obey the rule of The Emperor. There is no way The Emperor is going to bring Heaven on Earth in one day and it is not the job of those with a religious inner vision to become Emperors. The Pope will act in everyday life, but his light and authority will only be recognised by those who seek innocence. We understand that eventually the initi ate functions with both aspects at once; the right side of the brain has a spatial intelligence, the left a data information function. When they work together we have a more universal intelligence.

All religions will have the fear of hell, karma and the idea of eter nity in them. There isn’t a system that does not have an appreciation of yesterday, today and tomorrow. The minute we put one single practical interest into our spiritual work, we are bartering, making conditions and exchanging; for example by saying “I won’t do that because it will be bad karma and I will end up in hell for being a bad girl/boy”. Are we at peace, or are we still bartering our life with the beliefs around us? We all have the bartering aspect in us, but we are talking here about going beyond ourselves. We cannot barter with God, because God doesn’t want anything in exchange. God is the great energetic life. What we get is what comes back to us today from previous needs and thought forms that we have pro jected yesterday.

We are clinging so strongly to the material mother, but in truth there is only a flow of love, life and possibilities of manifestation. What we call love is the satisfaction of meeting and being with another person and life being unthinkable without them. That has the beginning of the understanding of true faithfulness and service to a God that doesn’t require anything. True love is not preoccupied at all with whether it is going to get something back, or whether it is going to avoid something. Can you imagine the life we live in, which sustains absolutely everything, thinking “Is he going to love me back?” We are not allowing the flow of God through us and so we stop God ‘becoming’ by putting ourselves in the middle all the time and by being so obsessed by our own ‘rabbit-hood’. What arro gant creatures we are! We are so self-obsessed with our long ears and our small fluffy tails and all the rest! Nothing is really of value that doesn’t allow fusion of our lives with the greater life and we spend our lives protecting ourselves from more understanding, love and compassion (the true ‘other’), because of our own blueprint of mindsets and desires.