Love In Action

1999-11-12 10:40:00

Samu, good to see you posting again. I was just thinking about you. Welcome aboard Fe. Transmuted is indeed a better word than transference in describing the shift of energies from the solar plexus to the heart. It is nice to have another astute student of the ancient wisdom with us. Great post John, but I think you need a few more Loves in there.

I've been reading the various postings on love yet feel very little love behind the posts. This is not a criticism or a negative judgment on those postings as in your real life experiences you may be bubbling over with this rarified substance. I may write about and define love myself, but this also does not produce love. Instead I make the point that just talking about love, defining love, proclaiming love, mystifying love, magnifying love, writing of love, romancing love, idealizing love etc does not hold a candle to one real act of love. One act of helping another in true need creates more love that all the metaphysical proclaiming in the world.

Jesus gave a great example of this in the parable of the Good Samaritan. Let me quote:

Luke 10:25 And, behold, a certain lawyer stood up, and tempted him, saying, Master, what shall I do to inherit eternal life? Luke 10:26-27 He said unto him, What is written in the law? How readest thou? And he answering said, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind; and thy neighbour as thyself. Luke 10:28 and he said unto him, Thou hast answered right: this do, and thou shalt live. Luke 10:29 But he, willing to justify himself, said unto Jesus, And who is my neighbour? Luke 10:30 And Jesus answering said, A certain man went down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell among thieves, which stripped him of his raiment, and wounded him, and departed, leaving him half dead. 10:31 And by chance there came down a certain priest that way: and when he saw him, he passed by on the other side. Luke 10:32 And likewise a Levite, when he was at the place, came and looked on him, and passed by on the other side. Luke 10:33 But a certain Samaritan, as he journeyed, came where he was: and when he saw him, he had compassion on him, Luke 10:34 And went to him, and bound up his wounds, pouring in oil and wine, and set him on his own beast, and brought him to an inn, and took care of him. Luke 10:35-36 And on the morrow when he departed, he took out two pence, and gave them to the host, and said unto him, Take care of him; and whatsoever thou spendest more, when I come again, I will repay thee. Which now of these three, thinkest thou, was neighbour unto him that fell among the thieves? Luke 10:37 And he said, He that shewed mercy on him. Then said Jesus unto him, Go, and do thou likewise.

Because Jesus was teaching love in this context His question could have been worded: "Which now of these three, thinkest thou, showed love unto him that fell among the thieves?"

Three people here had an opportunity to show love to the wounded man. The first two were a Priest and a Levite, both religious leaders among the Jews at that period. I'm sure these two religious leaders taught their people about love and compassion. As they taught their students in the synagogues perhaps they used this same L word over and over. Perhaps they preached again and again about loving God and your neighbor as was given them in their scriptures.

Then the time came to demonstrate this love in the real world and they closed their eyes to the opportunity. They were probably in a hurry to get home to their flock to preach about love.

Then the third guy came, the most unlikely of the three to help because he was a Samaritan. The Samaritans were looked upon by the Jews as half-breeds and heretics and not worthy of sharing in the pure religion. Some Jews viewed them as mortal enemies. Nevertheless, this half-breed saw this man (who would probably spit on him if he were conscious) and saved his life and spent his own money to insure he was nourished back to health. The love manifested when the injured Jew realized who had saved his life is a thing one cannot manufacture by teaching or writing. It can only happen by doing.

Notice that the Samaritan never mentioned the word love. When love is truly demonstrated, it does not have to be mentioned. All of us may not have soul contact, but all of us know what love is when we feel it and when we feel it we do not need anyone to explain to us what it is.

I'll take as my companion one like the Samaritan who can show love in action over a thousand who merely proclaim the words.

DK through Alice A. Bailey gives some interesting elaboration on some items of our conversations:

2. Personalities who are integrated, coordinated men and women, but who are not yet under the influence of the soul. Their "self-will and self-love" is such a powerful factor in their lives that they exert a determining influence upon their environment.

a. Those with no soul contact of any kind. Those people are urged forward to their destiny by a sense of power, by self-love, by exalted ambition, by a superiority complex, and by a determination to reach the top of their particular tree.

DK talks about the person who receives the second Ray energy indirectly through the first. Such will be into self-love. Here is his description: "Only indirectly does the second Ray of Love-Wisdom and its subsidiary line of energies appear and, therefore, love and wisdom are often noticeably lacking in the person born in this sign. Such a man will have much self-love, self-esteem, self-respect and a good deal of selfish centralization or personality focus. He will be intelligent but not wise; aspirational but at the same time stubborn and set so that his aspiration does not take him very far very rapidly. He will move spasmodically and in wild rushes; steady measured progress upon the Way is very hard for him. He finds it difficult to apply practically the knowledge gained. It is apt to remain a mental acquisition and not a practical experience. He will be almost painfully conscious of duality but, instead of its producing a struggle for unity, it produces often a set and static depression."

When love for all beings, irrespective of who they may be, is beginning to be a realized fact in the heart of a disciple, and yet nevertheless love for himself exists not, then comes the indication that he is nearing the Portal of Initiation, and may make the necessary preliminary pledges. These are necessitated before his Master hands in his name as a candidate for initiation. If he cares not for the suffering and pain of the lower self, if it is immaterial to him whether happiness comes his way or not, if the sole purpose of his life is to serve and save the world, and if his brother's need is for him of greater moment than his own, then is the fire of love irradiating his being, and the world can warm itself at his feet. This love has to be a practical, tested manifestation, and not just a theory, nor simply an impractical ideal and a pleasing sentiment. It is something that has grown in the trials and tests of life, so that the primary impulse of the life is towards self-sacrifice and the immolation of the lower nature.

What, therefore, is Initiation?

Initiation might be defined in two ways. It is first of all the entering into a new and wider dimensional world by the expansion of a man's consciousness so that he can include and encompass that which he now excludes, and from which he normally separates himself in his thinking and acts. It is, secondly, the entering into man of those energies which are distinctive of the soul and of the soul alone - the forces of intelligent love and of spiritual will. These are dynamic energies, and they actuate all who are liberated souls. This process of entering into and of being entered into should be a simultaneous and synthetic process, an event of the first importance. Where it is sequential or alternating, it indicates an uneven unfoldment and an unbalanced condition. There is frequently the theory of unfoldment, and a mental grasp anent the facts of the initiatory process before they are practiced experimentally in the daily life and thus psychologically integrated into the practical expression of the living process on the physical plane. Herein lays much danger and difficulty, and also much loss of time. The mental grasp of the individual is oft times much greater than his power to express the knowledge, and we have consequently those outstanding failures and those difficult situations which have brought the whole question of initiation into disrepute. Many people are regarded as initiates who are only endeavoring to be an initiate. They are not, however, real initiates. They are those well-meaning people whose mental understanding outruns the power of their personalities to practice. They are those who are in touch with forces which they are not yet able to handle and control. They have done a great deal of the needed work of inner contact, but have not yet whipped the lower nature into shape. They are, therefore, unable to express that which they inwardly understand and somewhat realize. They are those disciples who talk too much and too soon and too self-centeredly, and who present to the world an ideal toward which they are indeed working, but which they are as yet unable to materialize, owing to the inadequacy of their equipment. They affirm their belief in terms of accomplished fact and cause much stumbling among the little ones. But at the same time, they are working towards the goal. They are mentally in touch with the ideal and with the Plan. They are aware of forces and energies utterly unknown to the majority. Their only mistake is in the realm of time, for they affirm prematurely that which some day they will be.

Hope to make more comments on your comments tomorrow.

JJ