I have always sustained that the course the evolution of consciousness takes on this planet is easily discernible in a host of ordinary developments. That is, we can, when equipped with the proper keys of higher knowledge and trained to see in a new way, assess not only WHERE we are headed as a civilisation but also at which point we stand in this transitional period. This assessment can be made even by a simple perusal of the daily newspapers over a period of time.
But a word of caution should be given in this regard. Decades ago a reading room where newspapers were kept was opened in the Sri Aurobindo Ashram in Pondicherry for disciples, and the Mother was asked to give the room a name. It was her custom to name virtually everything that came into being in the Ashram as a means, it would seem, of putting a specific force into the object or enterprise which would render it thereafter a channel for that special force to operate, in the area indicated by the name itself. Since newspapers were kept in this particular reading room, the Mother named it ‘La Salle du Mensonge’, or ‘The Room of Falsehood’.
This may seem offensive to certain champions of the press. However, one need only assess the situation carefully to realise that our newspapers, while playing a necessary role, are also responsible for nailing the human being more firmly onto his cross of atavism. As a civilisation we are far from realising the dream of a society well informed but on the basis of unbiased and non-manipulative information; and which, at the same time, can serve society in its upward march to a higher expression. In general, newspapers cater to the baser instincts, claiming that ‘this is what the public wants to read’. At the same time, they are organs for various economic and political ideologies to spread their messages. This is often done in a camouflaged manner, to such an extent that indoctrination is carried out often entirely undetected by the reader. We are all aware of the fact that the news is manipulated and that this is done in such a way that it is impossible to perceive, making it therefore a very dangerous and potent tool.
Be this as it may, one can read the daily newspapers for an assessment of the condition of our transformative work and certain gains we have made. I have proven this point off and on by reproducing news items in Indian and foreign papers to demonstrate how these reports support our work by adding the precious qualities of actuality and realism which demonstrate how symbols can be the things symbolised, often in more powerful ways than we could come across in spiritual texts. And so, these ‘organs of falsehood’, like many other aspects of a dying world order, can also be used to reach the ultimate goal of a higher expression for the human being. The negative, at this point in the process, is seen to be ‘at the service of truth’.
Recently newspapers throughout the world have been carrying front page reports about the latest discovery on the energy front. In the context of our work this new development is perhaps the most exciting and important ‘symbol’ yet to materialise. In my view it is second only to the discovery of the newest triad of planets and the superb pattern their discoveries revealed (see The Gnostic Circle, Chapter 12). However, in the recent discovery we move from the planets to the Sun itself and hence the symbolism is something CENTRAL and not peripheral. We are moving steadily ever closer to the Source. We are dealing with Essence and the essential fibre of being, both in the individual and the collectivity. I refer to the discovery of cold fusion as the newest source of energy generation.
In Volume 1 of The New Way, I wrote that we could use energy sources as symbols in the shift humanity is making to a higher level. Until very recently all energy generation came through sources in the Earth itself, such as the various fossil fuels. Or else, power generated by elements the Earth supports in her atmosphere and on her body – wind, water, and so forth.
However, this has begun to change, and this change occurred, as usual, right on time – that is, in the just harmony of gnostic time. To illustrate, we may once again review the situation prevailing on the world stage as reported in our daily newspapers, but with the keys of knowledge the new way provides. We will see that certain crises we have experienced served to hasten or to force the shift I am describing.
Thus, in 1973 there was a severe global energy breakdown. It marked a devastating ‘before’ and ‘after’. The price of oil soared, and, what was worse, it became clear that certain nations possessing this precious commodity could hold other nations at ransom. The memory of the 1973 oil crunch is still vivid and the changes in lifestyle which it forced on people in different parts of the world still prevail. At the same time, it was this crisis that forced a more serious search for alternate energy sources. The discoveries made today have their origin in that 1973-4 breakdown.
My own yoga and work revealed that on the world scene one of the truest symbols of the new way and this great change that stands before us as a civilisation was a direct turn to the Sun as our energy provider, in more ways than one. Nuclear power is an expression of that turn. However, atomic energy was only one aspect of the story – the destructive part, or the facet of this symbolism which reveals how the old consciousness has contaminated this vital area. The true way had not yet surfaced. Nuclear power on the basis of fission has proven to be a tool of devastation and destruction. I am not merely referring to the weapons which have been born of this experience. These are perhaps minor aspects of the problem. There is another far more essential one, and it provides us with a superb example of the interconnection of things: fission is a tool of destruction because it engenders wastes which poison the planet beyond repair. The factor of accumulative poisonous wastes is the clearest indication of the inadequacy of fission as a solution to the world’s energy needs.
In 1977, while discussing the applied symbolism of energy sources – that is, energy as a symbol of mass movements of consciousness within the evolutionary framework – I wrote in Volume 1 of The New Way that prior to any breakthrough in the physical dimension there has to be a breakthrough in the realm of consciousness and the spirit. And, conversely, that science was pushing spirituality toward these breakthroughs by its accelerated pace in the discovery of new technologies. It was clear to me then, and it became even clearer with the passage of time, that the real cause of our distress can be traced to the spirituality the world has known. Unless a breakthrough occurred there, I wrote, science could not be held responsible for its misuse of knowledge. And I described the breakthroughs Sri Aurobindo and the Mother had made to permit this advance. On pages 8 and 9 of Volume 1, I wrote:
‘In this way we see that when there was an initial breakthrough in the field of spiritual research in the 1920s, a plunge into the hidden body of the Supramental Sun, carrying the very physical body along with the intent to expose even the cells of our bodies and the atoms of our Earth’s atmosphere to the highest pitch of solar power attainable at that point of time, Science followed shortly after and in the third and fourth decades of this century breakthroughs occurred in physical research which brought the secrets of the material energy naked before the eye of the scientist. The true knowledge of the Sun is no longer confined to the occult experience of a few; rather science begins to bring forth the knowledge of its source of power to the entire humanity.
‘In our own days we see that events in the world are forcing the planet’s races to turn more fully in this direction. The energy crisis of recent times [1973] is bringing man to realise the imperative need to solve the current great enigma, that of an economical, practical and safe utilisation of solar fusion power, and thus to satisfy the needs of the planet in this matter…’
The time has come for this breakthrough. In the context of the new cosmology, nuclear energy comes under the rule of Pluto. This year, 1989, of 9 power (1+9+8+9=27=2+7=9), corresponds to the 9th planet of the solar system, Pluto. But this is no ordinary 9-power year of the rule of Pluto. Each 9 year introduces a new ennead, or cycle of 9 years; but the difference now is that this enneateric cycle from 1989 to 1998 comprises the decade of the 90s which is the period in this century of the culmination of Pluto’s influence and power. In other words, matters belonging to the domain of the 9th planet will come to the fore and essential issues will be resolved, or at least set on their definitive way to a final and lasting solution.
Thus, 1989 is, according to the harmony of gnostic time, the correct moment for a breakthrough in fusion to occur. In addition, this breakthrough was announced at the March equinox, another felicitous timing. However, the exact day the news broke – 23.3.1989 – was an 8-power day; consequently, we know that something else must transpire before the discovery can be consolidated. The inconclusiveness of the announcement and the brouhaha it is engendering in the world of science may be a part of that working-out process the 8 demands in order to clear the way for the 9. We may therefore expect this situation to continue throughout the remainder of the year.
Another interesting point is the reaction produced by the announcement of this ‘economical, practical and safe utilisation of…fusion power’, for it highlights the hold the old consciousness has over humanity. Two branches of science are presently set at severe odds against each other – chemistry and physics. The physicists are finding it difficult to accept that this breakthrough could have occurred outside a domain which they consider to be their exclusive property. The statements one reads in the newspapers in this regard indicate a rather vicious outburst which makes us question whether or not physicists actually have the good of humanity at heart. Their concern seems to be more for the fact that they have been excluded, rather than the truth or not of the breakthrough. But there is something else to consider, of more serious consequences.
In the portion of The New Way cited above, I wrote of an ‘economical’ usage. It is immensely interesting to note that the potential breakthrough filled this qualification beyond all expectation. And this seems to be a factor that has provoked a number of research institutions to criticise the new discovery with undue severity.
Nearly two months have passed since the announcement and in this period dozens of researchers have sought to verify the claims put forth. One reads headlines such as this, from the New York Times: SCRUTINY OF FUSION EXPERIMENT PRODUCES FEW BELIEVERS AMONG PHYSICISTS (April 16, 1989). Or else this more recent one from the Indian paper, The Hindu: STEADY RESULTS FROM COLD FUSION TESTS (May 8, 1989). It seems this is becoming like the elusive AIDS virus! In this case it is the ‘elusive neutron!’. But perhaps the inability to reach firm conclusions stems from an unwillingness to accept exclusion from the achievement, and by consequence two decades of wasteful expenditure.
Taxpayers in the West have waited patiently for a breakthrough in fusion as their governments pour billions of dollars into research. The taxpayer has funded extravagantly costly research which can only serve to make the end product equally costly. But in the new discovery, provided it does produce the energy claimed by its discoverers, the question of an inexpensive source of energy is perfectly fulfilled. Interestingly, this fact more than any other, it would seem, has engendered disproportionate hostility from those quarters into which billions have been channeled for what may prove to have been a useless and impractical enterprise.
Thus, we come to another aspect of the old consciousness in contrast to the new: the old ‘creates’ but in such a manner that it produces ‘wastes’; and to such a degree that the benefits are ultimately cancelled out when a certain threshold is crossed. This critical threshold has been reached and as a civilisation we must come to terms with its implications.
The Gnostic Circle and the Evolutionary Mechanism
The phrase that best indicates the nature of this threshold is ‘creation or destruction’. In past articles I have emphasised the distinction that must now be made in the light of new attainments in the Yoga. It is the difference between DESTRUCTION and DISSOLUTION. I would like to discuss this to some extent, but the focus of the present article is rather the actual mechanism which distinguishes the old from the new in its cosmic and evolutionary workings.
To illustrate, I shall give a brief presentation of the manner in which the new cosmos operates. And once again we shall investigate the BINARY nature of the old creation in order to comprehend better the essential differences between the two and the changes that must come about before the new creation can truly become a reality on Earth. Thus, one essential ingredient in a new cosmos based on an integral creation is that it must have a single ‘centre’, like the Sun in our solar system. This centre/sun maintains the system or cosmos not by feeding off its orbiting, peripheral bodies, but simply by its presence or being. It is Being, as a result of IMMOBILITY which holds the cosmos together. This is the definition of an ‘axis’, in this cosmology.
Another distinction must be made at this point. Immobility in terms of an individual’s realisation is not to be confused with equanimity. The latter is largely a psychological condition, whereas immobility is a condition of being. When through the Yoga the new alignment is brought about in one’s consciousness-being, this axis is forged and the realisation of Immobility is achieved.
This condition produces a situation in which there is no collapse, no caving in. In the core of a sun we find this condition and hence it supports the play of its orbiting bodies, creates ORDER and HARMONY and a truly CREATIVE manifestation. Energy in the core comes about by alignment, or a special convergence of ‘orbits’ or ‘directions’, as I have called them. What this superior alignment produces is a self-contained, self-replenishing source of power, hence the Centre does not feed off any other body in its system; or rather, to explain the process more accurately: it does not feed off its own body.
Fusion – the news of the day – produces energy similar to what is believed to transpire in the core of the Sun. This means a process of increase based on union, a joining of elements to create something else, rather than a shattering or a splitting of particles, the method employed in fission.
Let us use the Gnostic Circle to provide a visual image of the different processes, because the Gnostic Circle not only describes essential differences between the two but it relates them to the individual in his or her expansion of consciousness. What I am discussing is not only a global issue or a cosmic phenomenon. In our new creation, where all things are seen to be one, where oneness is the woof and warp of our perception and existence, it is imperative that the difference between fusion and fission be perceived as descriptive of the condition of each individual on the planet. Indeed, because the individual is what he or she is, the world is what it is and the old boundaries we need to exceed are what they have been.
Thus, in the innermost skeleton of the Gnostic Circle – which I have called the Sacred Triangle – there are two ‘points’ that describe fusion and fission and everything that is taking place on the individual and collective level concerning these forms of energy generation. Below, I have made a diagram of the Sacred Triangle, the heart of the Gnostic Circle’s time measure, or the 360º of the circle divided into 9 parts. (Its division into 12 parts is the space measure.) Thus the Sacred Triangle provides the Gnostic Circle with its main foundation, its ‘balancing points’ in time.
The Zero plays a prominent role in the structure. Indeed, without it there could be no Gnostic Circle, or no Golden Rod harmonising time and space directions. In the diagram the 0 corresponds to the Sun as the System’s CENTRE. One does not need to make great leaps of imagination or reasoning to appreciate that the centre of a system must in some way stand apart in the measure of the whole, but at the same time it must provide the focus of the system as well as its supportive power source. The Zero in the new cosmology answers these needs perfectly.
Thus convergence at the apex of the Sacred Triangle of the 9 and the 0 describes fusion. The way this plays itself out in the Circle is that as time moves on and an individual completes any one of the enneateric periods in his/her life, the 0 is met in the return to the 9 Point. That is, a child is born and that moment is the newborn’s 0 Point. Thereafter the infant lives the time experience on this planet and after 9 years, or the completion of the first ennead of life, there is a return to the same point. However, at 9-years old an INCREASE has occurred. One brings to that point the materialised energy which time has consolidated in the growth of the Zero/Seed; or, to convey the action more clearly: the Zero/Seed’s extension in time. Time draws the seeds of itself – contained in the 0 – into manifestation. It extends those seeds into the space of our material universe, forming ‘webs’ therein, or ‘lines’, which are tremendous potential sources of energy. By this simple process the Unmanifest is made manifest, the Absolute objectivises Itself in this act of creation, this ‘unfolding vision’ of the Supreme Consciousness.
Every return to the 9 Point provides the individual with the possibility of an increase, of tapping his or her self-contained Sun-Source of energy, insofar as the 0 and the 9 are one. The 9 is simply the extension of the 0. Thus, the 0/9 convergence in time provides increase and a constant renewal. One taps a source that is inexhaustible, provided, however, that an alignment exists which allows for this regeneration. In the new creation this is the secret to eternal renewal and immortal being.
The Function of the 4.5 Orbit
The opposite to the 0/9 Point in the Gnostic Circle is the 4.5 Orbit as the following diagram indicates. Thus, added to the Sun and Pluto at the 0/9 Point, we have the Asteroid Belt at the 4.5 Orbit.
It can be observed that this 4.5 Orbit, or the Asteroid Belt between Mars and Jupiter, is not designated by any ‘point’ or angle of the Sacred Triangle, or any other angle of the full Gnostic Circle. It is truly a ‘void’. And it is rendered more so by virtue of the fact that all the lines of the enneagram (which form the 9/Time measure of the Gnostic Circle) seem to converge or indicate this Orbit. The diagram’s structure is such that it draws attention to this spot which, in terms of the visual impact the diagram produces, is a void, having no angle of the Circle’s geometry to ‘fill’ it.
Therefore this Orbit, containing millions of shattered particles and standing as it does in direct opposition to the 0/9 Point of the Sun and Pluto, provides us with a perfect description of fission. It cannot be simpler: the Asteroid Belt falls at this precise position in the Gnostic Circle, and that Orbit is characterised by an infinitude of ‘split particles’, just like the process of fission to generate energy.
We may expect therefore that passage over this Point in a person’s life has the potential of engendering similar ‘toxic wastes’ like the fission splitting of particles engenders. And this reflection carries us to the heart of the matter. The 4.5 Orbit does not indicate INCREASE. Rather, its purpose in the wheel is to produce a collapse or breakdown, a caving in, a shattering. However, this action in a new cosmos, perfectly aligned and balanced on the integral, fourfold foundation of Truth, which is the creation the Gnostic Circle indicates, is restricted to the periphery of the system and specifically those elements which might obstruct the experience proper to the 0/9 Point: acceleration of consciousness-being. Thus, in a new creation, the 4.5 Orbit holds the key to the shift from destruction to dissolution. I shall go deeply into this matter because it provides the secrets of the new world, or this emerging cosmos in which the supramental Sun is central, the inexhaustible fount of pure truth-conscious power and light.
The problem with the old creation was simply its incompleteness. In the lived experience of the race, both physically and spiritually, Whole Time was never known. The conscious experience never reached the 0/9. It was halted at the 6 and the sign Scorpio, the sign of Death. This was the measure of our solar system and it was therefore the measure of the boundaries of the individualised consciousness-being in evolution on this planet, or the blueprint of the present human species. Nothing further could be expected given the limitations of the species’ matrix.
Our times have seen an expansion of that measure, an increase to 9. The problem we face as a civilisation is the effort to live this inexorable expansion. This explains the transition we are in with all its travails.
The area in the Gnostic Circle which described the old creation’s spiritual attainments and goals was the 0º Libra Point, or the 4.5 Orbit. It was the Void with its accompanying Nothingness – a dissolving of the individualised consciousness in the static Peace of the Beyond, a dissolution reminiscent of the shattered particles in the Asteroid Belt, in those airy Libran heights. An undoing of the Self or in the Self was the key and the way. In other words, the 4.5 Orbit was the escape, the elegant exit, the ‘slit’ through which one could pass and experience a disconnection from the temporal and spatial boundaries of our world.
In The Magical Carousel the children, Val and Pom-pom, those explorers of a ‘new way’, enter the sign-land Libra in a magical elevator, which swings to and fro until a certain ‘balance’ is reached. The shaft that holds this elevator suspended in those lofty, airy heights represents the element that keeps them connected to a creation in matter, that keeps them rooted in a material universe in spite of their rise to an apparent Beyond, above the turmoil of the experience they have left below. However, The Magical Carousel describes a voyage of the new creative consciousness with its extended Measure. But in the old world, having attained that dissolution or disconnection from the temporal and the spatial, those boundaries could easily be regarded as illusory, as devoid of any intrinsic reality. Nothingness was the highest truth of the old creation. In India, as in the rest of the world, this situation drove the spiritual seeker onto the path of otherworldliness. I repeat, it was the INCOMPLETENESS of that creation which accounted for this development.
We are now in the 9th Manifestation, an era which began in 234BC and extends for 6480 years thereafter. As in the human gestation, the 9 in this cosmic/planetary sense also indicates a completed process or gestation. Hence it is only in this Manifestation that we may come to know and to live the COMPLETE wheel. Thus, the position in the Gnostic Circle which describes the greater boundary or goal for the new creation living in Whole Time is the 0 [degree] Capricorn Point. It is with the addition of the final quarter of the circle, as a lived experience, that the void is filled.
Another description of the 4.5 action is to become relieved of ‘excess baggage’ during its time period. This is an accumulation which the individual experiences because in the present imperfect alignment of the species, one does not live in Simultaneous Time, as I have called it. Therefore a residue is accumulated as one lives the time experience on Earth and this creates inertia which impedes acceleration. At the 4.5 passage in an ideal condition, a mechanism is set in motion to dissolve these residues.
While on the subject of the 4.5 Orbit, there has been another of those unusual synchronisations in this regard which has so characterised our work. In this context, let me point out that on the very day of the announcement of the fusion breakthrough (real or unreal – this has yet to be established), another happening occurred as if to lend confirmation to the connection I am making between the Asteroid Belt and its relation to the 0/9 and the experience of fission/fusion. On 23 March 1989 a hitherto undetected asteroid made a very close approach to the Earth (astronomically speaking), to such an extent that it made front-page news. This asteroid thus crossed the Earth’s orbit on the day of the fusion announcement; and I must point out that the Gnostic Circle is essentially a description of orbit interrelation and harmony.
In The Magical Carousel, Chapter 10, and its companion volume Commentaries, I have described the Capricorn experience of Simultaneous Time which leaves no residue. In light of the above, those who have read the story can better appreciate the symbolism involved in the Time-Spirit’s rise into the chamber of self-discovery and soul realisation, thus FILLING the empty space in the centre of the floor. I quote here this portion of the tale:
‘…At the moment they feel it all coming to a climax they are thrust into a solitary, isolated chamber of bare walls. Left to themselves in total silence, they tightly hold hands in a frantic need to feel they are not completely alone. But the sense of abandon is strong and almost too much for them. Val and Pom-pom are at a point of utter despair when an insistent, continuous ticking is heard through the heavy silence. The sound increases and increases, becoming louder with each tick until it is right upon them and apparently in their very presence. They begin running round and round the room, passing their hands along the bare walls to make sure there are no secret doors and are soon at the point of exhaustion and collapse on the ground.
‘Lying there in complete stillness they become aware of a hole in the middle of the room, which seems to have been there all the while. The children crawl up to it, peer over the rim and down below they see an old, old man with flowing beard and long white hair, seated at a table with a huge book open before him. Behind him stands a great clock, unusual and unique for there are only three symbols drawn on its face: a minus to the left, a plus to the right and a circle in the middle. But there are no hands pointing anywhere as one would normally expect. The ticking is loud and strong now for it comes from this very clock.
‘As they gaze at the scene below, the old gentleman, table and clock slowly rise into the centre of the room through the hole…’ (p.109).
These symbols explain cosmic processes as well as the individual’s own lived experience in the evolution of consciousness on the planet. Indeed, what is the culmination of Val and Pom-pom’s passage through the Capricorn mountain? The experience they live after the ‘birth that fills the void’ is the immobility I have mentioned earlier as the realisation that sustains the new cosmos. After meeting the Time-Spirit, the children reach the mountaintop, and…
‘A woman sits before them.
‘She is clothed in robes that blend in colour with the mountain, in fact she herself appears to be a continuation of the mountain itself. She sits on the ground with legs crossed and covered by the robes, immobile and breathing ever so slightly, in a manner which makes one feel the physical life in her is suspended. Her face is not old but rather ancient, and her half-closed eyes reveal an understanding that is of the nature of the mountain over which she presides. Omanisol is cloaked in an aura of serenity and strength, of timelessness and intensity, which become a part of the children merely by being in her presence. In the same still attitude, a unicorn sits by her side.
‘The mountain peak is enveloped in the rays of the brightest midday sun, which, however, Val and Pom-pom cannot locate in the sky. This vivid light makes it possible to see over an enormous distance, an unending stretch of land on all sides, revealing every type of landscape – dominated by the abode of Omanisol. As they face this majestic sight and become evermore immersed in the atmosphere of the place, a swell of iridescent, multicoloured smoke appears on the far-off horizon. It moves in their direction, coming with great force, always closer toward the commanding peak on which the children stand. If it were not for Omanisol Val and Pom-pom would surely flee, for the smoke, approaching closer, reveals itself to be a tornado, whirling with mighty power. She gives a maternal feeling of protection, a sort of mother-of-the-spirit, because it seems the state she is in could never be harmed by any outside force, being herself the essence of the rocky mountain…’ (pp.111-12).
The ‘immobility’ Omanisol symbolises is what the ancients sought to convey in the mythological Mt Meru, the ‘axis of the world’. Or what I have called the Stable Constant in relation to the Mother’s rendition of the new Axis – the Inner Chamber of her Temple.
On numerous occasions I have explained how the Mother’s original plan of the inner chamber provides us with all the keys of knowledge required to make the transition a conscious participation. The aspect of conscious participation, I have emphasised, is the essential feature, distinguishing the old species from the new. The chamber Val and Pom-pom enter is the Mother’s chamber, and it contains the same keys of knowledge. It is also their initiation into the experience of conscious participation, for in their meeting with the Time-Spirit, he asks them:
‘“Who are you?’ the man asks.
‘”Val. Pom-pom,” they reply.
‘“I ask: who are you?” he insists.
‘”But we told you,” says Val.
‘”That is not your identity.”’ (p.110)
And then the Time-Spirit proceeds to reveal their ‘identity’ by consulting the Book of Life in which the destiny of each soul is written. With this knowledge of the truth of who they are, the children can then continue their journey and return to Earth to fulfil their mission.
Val and Pom-pom enter the chamber by a rise through the floor; similarly, we find in the Mother’s original plan of her Chamber that entrance was intended by her to be through the floor, by a rise (unlike the modified version in Auroville). And there is a ‘descent’ – the ladder with its numerous rungs representing gradations, levels of consciousness, planes. It permits the children to reach Omanisol’s mountaintop realm and is equivalent to the descending solar Ray in the Mother’s chamber (‘…the symbol of the future realisation…’). Likewise, the Chamber’s Ray permits the ascent to the immobile Omanisol in that it is the measure of the year, equally with its many ‘levels’ (of time), for the Rig Veda tells us that those realms or states of consciousness or planes are ‘opened’ to us by the months and the years. Using Time as an ally now – meaning the conscious participation in the evolutionary process – the passage of the year provides us with the FUEL and the FIELD for our Yoga, when we are able to make this passage CONSCIOUSLY on the backdrop of the Gnostic Circle.
The Core which ‘fills the void’ describes the new centre in the gnostic being, by virtue of which he or she can know immortal being. The Core is the inner mechanism of the superior species which will one day fully populate the Earth. The Globe is the new and luminous centre, while the four-cornered Pedestal is the new and perfect alignment which supports the newly unveiled Centre/Globe. Hence there is no collapse, no possibility of any caving in or seepage of energy. It is because of this Knowledge, so central to the new creation, that I sought fruitlessly for a number of years to have the alignment corrected in the Matrimandir in Auroville, not to speak of the hole in the centre of the room which stands as a superb symbol of the old ‘void’ into which energy collapses. A different and superior alignment is the only way for the new species to come into existence. This is the method to bring into being a CREATIVE manifestation and to emerge once and for all from the boundaries of the old world, founded on the principle of Destruction.
The ‘Power’ of Cult Figures or Objects of Devotion
In the old creation, in the binary system, the method for survival and continuity was actually usurpation of energy. The dark sun drew the energy to itself and ‘hoarded’ it. This was and is the secret of its power. Therefore in the old way devotion was necessary, or projection onto an external object of veneration.
But the Mother understood the coming change and that her plan of the inner chamber represented a higher state. Hence, she commanded that there should be no photographs of herself and Sri Aurobindo in the room. On the other hand, all cult figures in the world thrive on this mechanism of usurpation, no doubt as an unconscious condition. For how can they know? To understand this mechanism is to become immediately an instrument for the great change, a position very few objects of worship are willing to assume. For the power in the Bhakta is drawn in to increase the object’s power. And this is ‘hoarded’, simply because it goes into the void ultimately; it is not used to INCREASE. This makes the cult figure truly powerful, and most are impressed with this power. But there is no means to extend that power through the system at crucial moments so as to prevent collapse – that is, decay, destruction, death. There are too many gaps in the old system. Indeed, to put it bluntly, there is no system at all, no ‘cosmos’, in the real sense of the word.
By consequence, a projection onto a symbol of worship was and is necessary in such a creation. But it has solved nothing permanently in our collapsing world. It has served simply to assuage the human being for a time.
These paths, cults, religions, could survive in the old creation for as long as the Time-Spirit allowed. That is, until the real and final collapse of the old world. This is happening now. The mechanism is clear, the process based on a negative intake into a void, as part of a binary system, continuously drained the system seeking to replenish its energy. The gaps – because the system had no complete fourfold foundation or base – permitted seepages. All our systems of energy generation reflect this situation. The environmental collapse reflects this: we deplete faster than what we replace; we pollute and destroy our atmosphere faster than we can repair it; we create poisons in greater quantities than we can effectively dispose of. A threshold is reached in this final ennead and then the collapse is total and irrevocable.
This means that the periphery of the system is drained of energy which is plunged into the void. There is no replenishing because of the binary structure. While there might be a light sun in the system, the dark sun balances it out and serves to limit the effect it might have. The energy in the periphery that goes to sustain the light sun (because this is the process in the old creation) is usurped by the dark Companion and then precipitated into the void.
As stated, in the youthful stages of a creation – human or otherwise – this process goes undetected because there is an exuberance of energy. There is a surplus. Hence there is no compulsion either to see the true process or to rectify it. It passes undetected. It is only in times like our own when critical thresholds are reached that we are compelled to look at the position we find ourselves in as a race and a civilisation and seek to understand. When a creation reaches maturity introspection becomes imperative. This denotes a coming of age.
In the evolution of consciousness on Earth we have reached such a threshold. People everywhere and in all fields are seeking to know how we can arrest the imminent collapse. But the problem is none know the mechanism. By consequence, they neither know what is truly responsible for the collapse nor the means to arrest it.
Everything undergoes a radical change in the new cosmos. There a central Sun stands alone in a unitary system. Thus there is no dark sun feeding off its binary companion. Depletion does not exist in the new cosmos. The mechanism is constantly CREATIVE, never destructive. The sole reason is that there is no void at the centre. There is an upholding POINT.
What this signifies is that the Centre does not need to draw energy from the system, from ITS BODY, to feed itself; as, for example, if the human being stops all intake of food the body consumes itself until it perishes. Rather, the Centre’s function is merely to uphold the play and to provide the divine and binding Purpose; while its immobile poise allows each thing to find its true place. (‘…Who are you? The Time-Spirit asks…’). The result is no gaps, no drain, no seepage. Nothing falls into the Void.
Thus, in such a creation one issue above all others assumes primary importance: each thing in its place. That is, ORDER, COSMOS.
The system contains an abundant supply of power to maintain itself. This power is ever present. It is the play of forces in the system which the Centre does not require for ‘food’, and then to experience collapse. The unitary system has a Sun that holds it together by an entirely different mechanism. Truly it is a new world that is born: it is self-supportive. It generates energy within itself and does not require any outer source; and by virtue of the formula – each thing in its place – those energies are rightly utilised to create, never to destroy. It has a CORE, and in that Core the process of fusion provides it with a limitless source and no poisonous wastes. But it is a core proper to each particle or element in the creation. Each individual member of such a society has a ‘core’, a perennially replenishing inner source.
The 4.5, or the ‘Hidden Manna’
To return to the Gnostic Circle’s formulation, the 4.5 Orbit depicted the goal of the mental species; and indeed it is the threshold to the third quarter of the wheel, the mental (Libra, Scorpio, Sagittarius). This incompletion, this arresting of the movement of consciousness at the halfway mark with its consequent shattering and ultimate collapse, engendered poisonous wastes, similar to the fission process of energy generation. In other words, proceeding along these lines it is inevitable that we reach the critical threshold and those poisons overtake, overwhelm and finally destroy the creation which has provided the field for this inferior experience. In other words, it is in the process of energy generation that poisons and toxins come about. We must bear this in mind because, as I shall demonstrate, the 4.5 which now stands as an insatiable void, must be remade into our source of unending ‘fuel’.
Our civilisation reflects this destructive principle. The human race itself, with its decay and death and, above all, its atavism which lies at the root of the problem of overpopulation, is an expression of the inferior alignment and incompletion of the old creation. In overpopulation we see the same process: the act of procreation has become another tool of destruction. We see that a more conscious process must replace the present method of continuity of the species – failing which, overpopulation will lay waste all our attempts to improve the living conditions of this great mass of human beings.
On the environmental front we seek to educate society, explaining that to continue destroying our forests, polluting our seas and the water we drink and destroying the atmosphere in hitherto unimaginable ways spells the extinction of the human race. However, no amount of education seems to have any effect on the situation. The critical threshold is reached in this area, as in all others. All things are connected and do find their ultimate convergence in time. We wonder, therefore, if it will be possible to prevent the collapse we know lies just around time’s corner.
The point is, is there another possibility and sufficient time for it to overtake the movement of collapse? Is it possible for the human species to transcend its present ego-pivoted limitation and bring into being right now a higher species, truly centred?
The reason why passage through the 4.5 Orbit in the past engendered poisonous wastes which produced decay and ultimate death is that there was no Core in the species, as described in the Mother’s chamber. Therefore there was nothing to hold the consciousness-being together during the phase of acceleration, which is essential for the emergence of a higher species. Consciousness is speeded up; at the same time the material substance of our physical bodies is proportionately accelerated. On this basis regeneration is engendered and collapse is avoided. But without a core – or a centre in perfect alignment, or resulting from a perfect alignment – this process cannot be lived on the planet. Everything is too dense, too heavy, too slow. Inertia holds the movement in check to the point where when the threshold is reached time is swallowed up by various layers of our physical beings and the resultant gaps are the areas of collapse. For this reason I have written earlier that the web time weaves in our lives holds in its lines tremendous energy. It is this power which we must liberate so that it can be our fuel in the acceleration of consciousness-being. The Gnostic Circle is a map of this precious play of energy which is the birthright of every individual born on this planet. The Gnostic Circle explains the method for releasing that energy.
At this point in evolution we bear encumbrances which are the tools of Inertia to check our ‘speed’, to keep us within the boundaries of the human mental species. They impede us from living the experience of Whole Time, or the conscious passage through the final quarter of the Gnostic Circle, starting with the sign Capricorn. In The New Way, Volume 2, page 495, I have presented a fascinating diagram the Mother drew for a disciple: a circle divided into 9 parts which she indicated contained real occult power and knowledge. Apart from the fact that the 9 division of the Circle has been our major key of knowledge, the subtle details of her drawing explicitly confirm just what I am describing in these pages: at the 4.5 the true experience brings release of this tremendous Energy, the fuel for the acceleration which carries us to new frontiers.
I am presenting here a replica of the diagram. The shaded area is the 4.5 Orbit, and it stretches up to the 0/9 Point. Thus the Mother, in this simplest of fashions, disclosed or brought into the open what the Enneagram hinted at but left to the seeker to discover: that is, the true ‘gold’ lies in this area, but seen in connection to the apex of 0/9, just as the Mother has indicated. The question is, How do we release that energy?
In addition, as a further confirmation, the Mother gave colours to the 9 petals in the design. The circumscribing 8 were all silver; only the 4.5 area up to the apex was gold (the shaded area in the sketch). And in this way I have shown once again how the legacy the Mother left us by way of diagrams, plans, symbols, etc, indisputably confirms the knowledge of this New Way.
The world we know is a product of the limitations Inertia imposes. Therefore, no amount of education will arrest the destruction set in motion thousands of years ago. The only way to counteract the collapse of our planet and the extinction of the species is to introduce the higher one, by realignment of our consciousness-being so that a core comes into existence which can keep the consciousness centred and ‘held together’ during the acceleration time is producing.
This is the true nature of the critical threshold we face. The present human structure cannot sustain the influx, the increase of energies which the extended boundaries of our solar system is FORCING upon us. When those increases or influxes occur they serve to hasten the collapse rather than bring salvation by virtue of acceleration. At the same time, for those who bear the Core within, and for the new creation at whose heart there stands that Core/Centre, the increase, though initially hard to bear and negative in appearance, must serve the Core and fulfil its inherent divine Purpose.
The immobile Axis of the Capricorn realisation opens the way to the final quarter of the Circle. It is the area of the ‘extended boundaries’ of our consciousness-being, both individually and collectively, without which the Energy released at the 4.5 Orbit would have no enlarged field for its play. The cramped condition of our species’ structure is the reason why the release of the 4.5 does not produce acceleration but rather a turn back upon itself. It is as if in the forward thrust it were to meet an iron wall.
This helps us to understand why the collapse gains momentum when we come to the critical threshold of time: the increase – which is proportionate to the extension of the system’s boundaries – thrusts great quantities of ‘fuel’ into the system. But if the boundaries are not effectively extended that acceleration creates a tremendous impact. There is a heightening of calamitous happenings. Thus just before the new Dawn actually manifests there is perforce an appearance of a more intense darkening of the light. We have the impression not only that no new gains have been made but that we stand to lose the little from the past that we manage to carry over into the time of transition.
In The Magical Carousel and the sign-land Aquarius, following Capricorn, the two children experience the condition of civilisation in the time of transition. They are swept up from Omanisol’s mountain-top by a terrific force and thrust into the centre of what appears to be a huge tornado:
‘…Whipping around at tremendous speed, it forms a vast array of iridescent colours and vibrations creating the most beautiful musical sounds. And what is more, myriads of objects swirl around them on all sides, in fact, everything that goes to make up cities and civilisations: entire buildings, motor vehicles, everything down to the smallest objects. It looks as though the ferocious tornado had destroyed the entire land it passed through. From where has this force arisen and where is it taking them?’ (p.113)
Thereafter they are swept down with all the debris into a huge container, and there they come into contact with the consciousness of a dying world:
‘…A very frightening noise and uproar begins, making the whole vat resound and almost shattering them by the vibrations that penetrate their little bodies. It appears to come from all the ruins of the buildings, houses, etc., that inhabit the container along with them. Soon it develops into a whining, pitiful drone and then the children understand they are listening to the anguished cries of all humanity that had been swept away by the destructive current.
‘What can they do? How can they help these people? And in fact, where are they – for no one can be seen?…’ (p.115)
And the tale continues with the description of the way in which Val and Pom-pom are passed through an ‘accelerator’ and then sent on their way to fulfil their Earthly mission, while the Water Carrier chants through the cosmos…
‘Flow, waters of the spirit,
flow through the ether to our brothers of the universe,
awaken the hearts of mankind, for the
NEW ERA has dawned!’
