TEACHING

(excerpts from the teachings of the Master Djwhal Kul) (1) Initiates receive instruction directly from the Masters or from some of the great devas or angels. These teachings are usually imparted at night in small classes, or individually (should the occasion warrant) in the Master's private study. The above applies to initiates in incarnation or on the inner planes. If on causal levels, they receive instruction at any time deemed advisable, direct from the Master to the Ego on causal levels. Disciples are taught in groups in the Master's Ashram, or classroom, at night, if in incarnation. Apart from these regular gatherings, in order to receive direct teaching from the Master, a disciple (for some specific reason) may be called to the Master's study for a private interview. This occurs when a Master wishes to see a disciple for commendation, warning, or to decide if initiation is desirable. The major part of a disciple's tuition is left in the hands of some initiate or more advanced disciple, who watches over his younger brother, and is responsible to the Master for his progress, handing in regular reports. Karma is largely the arbiter of this relation. (2) All teachers, who have taken pupils in hand for training, and who seek to use them in world service, follow the method of imparting a fact (oft veiled in words and blinded by symbol) and then of leaving the pupil to follow his own deductions. Discrimination is thereby developed, and discrimination is the main method whereby the Spirit effects its liberation from the trammels of matter, and discerns between illusion and that which is veiled by it. (3) Teachers on the inner planes have much to contend with owing to the slowness of the mental processes of

students in physical bodies . . . Aspirants to this difficult work must watch themselves with infinite care, and keep the inner serenity and peace and a mental pliability that will tend to make them of some use in the guarding and guidance of humanity. (4) Lack of calm in the daily life prevent the teachers on egoic levels from reaching you. Endeavour, therefore, to remain quiescent as life unrolls; work, toil, strive, aspire, and hold the inner calm. Withdraw steadily into interior work and so cultivate a responsiveness with the higher planes. A perfect steadiness of inner poise is what the Masters need in those whom They seek to use. (5) The group of Teachers with whom the average aspirants and probationary disciples may be in touch on the mental plane, are but men of like passions, but with a longer experience upon the path and a wiser control of themselves. They do not work with aspirants because They personally like or care for them, but because the need is great and They seek those whom They can train. The attitude of mind that They look for, is that of teachableness and the ability to record and refrain from questioning until more is known. Then the aspirant is urged to question everything. (6) When one lesson has, in this way, been mastered, a further one is set, and when a pupil has learnt a particular series of lessons, he graduates and passes an initiation. The whole group he teaches is benefited by his step forward, for every disciple carries those he instructs along with him in a curious indefinable sense. The benefit to the unit reacts upon the whole. A Master carries His disciples on and up with Him in a similar manner. (7) In the light of your own intuition and illumined mind (developed and brought to usefulness through meditation), take that aspect of the teaching which suits and aids you, and interpret it in the light of your own need and growth.

The days of personality contact, of personality attention and of personal messages are over, and have been over for quite a while, save in the vale of illusion, on the astral plane. This is a hard message, but no true disciple will misunderstand. From the depths of his own experience and struggle, he knows it to be so. It is the group of Masters, the Hierarchy as a whole, that is of moment, and its interaction with humanity. (8) Many will proclaim themselves as esoteric schools, and will communicate nothing of a truly esoteric nature. They will but attract to themselves the gullible and the foolish. There are many such functioning in this manner today. Others may refrain from all outer indication of esoteric and occult training, and yet convey the needed teaching. . . . The Science of Meditation and the conscious building of the antahkarana will be the first two preliminary stages in the esoteric curriculum. Today, the true teaching of meditation and the construction of the bridge of light between the Triad and the personality, are the most advanced teaching given anywhere. Humanity is, however, ready for exceedingly rapid development, and this readiness will demonstrate increasingly in the postwar period, and for it the disciples of the world must make ready. Two factors will bring this about: the first is the tremendous stimulation which the war, its demands and its consequences, have given to the human consciousness and, secondly, the coming in of very advanced souls ever since the year 1925. These souls will be ready to give the needed training and instruction when the right time comes, having brought it over with them when they came into incarnation, and knowing normally and naturally what the modern esoteric student is struggling to grasp and understand. (9) All esoteric training has to be self-applied; this is as true of the Christ as it is of the humblest aspirant.

(10) The true teacher must deal in truth and in sincerity with all seekers. His time (in so far as he is held by the time equation on the physical plane) is too valuable to waste in social politeness or in refraining from making critical comment where a good purpose would be served. He must depend thoroughly upon the sincerity of those whom he teaches. Nevertheless, criticism and the pointing out of faults and errors does not always prove helpful; it may but increase responsibility, evoke antagonism or unbelief, or produce depression - three of the most undesirable results of the use of the critical faculty . . . Those upon the teaching ray will learn to teach by teaching. There is no surer method, provided it is accompanied by a deep love, personal yet at the same time impersonal, for those who are to be taught. Above everything else, I would enjoin upon you the inculcation of the group spirit, for that is the first expression of true love. (11) Information anent the Hierarchy should take the following lines: 1. Emphasis should be laid on the evolution of humanity, with peculiar attention to its goal, perfection. This is not the idealistic perfection of the visionary mystic, but the control of the instrument, man in incarnation, by the indwelling and overshadowing soul. The constitution of man should be increasingly taught. 2. The relation of the individual soul to all souls should be taught, and with it the recognition that the longawaited kingdom of God is imply the appearance of soul-controlled men on earth in everyday life and at all stages of that control. 3. From a recognition of this relationship, the fact of the spiritual Hierarchy can then be deduced and the normality of its existence emphasised. The fact will appear that the Kingdom has always been present, but

has remained unrecognised, owing to the relatively few people who express, as yet, its quality. 4. When this recognition has become general, the idea (by this time permanently present in the human consciousness everywhere) and good sense also will testify to the fact of the presence of Those Who have achieved the goal; Their demonstration of divinity will be regarded as normal, as constituting a universal objective, and as the guarantee of humanity's future achievement; degrees of this divine expression can then be pointed out, ranging from that of the probationary disciple, through disciples, to Those Who have achieved mastery, and up to and inclusive of the Christ. 5. Thus gradually the idea or concept of the existence in bodily presence, of the Masters will be inculcated and steadily accepted; a new attitude to the Christ will be developed, which will be inclusive of all the best that the past has given us, but which will integrate men into a more sane and acceptable approach to the entire problem. 6. The time will come when the fact of the presence on earth of the Christ as Head of the Hierarchy and the Director of the Kingdom of God, will be accepted; men will also realise the truth of the present revolutionary statement that at no time has He ever left the earth. 7. Emphasis will also increasingly be laid upon the unfolding Plan, and men will be brought to its recognition through a study of the evolution of the human family, through a close consideration of historical processes, and through a comparative analysis of ancient and modern civilisations and cultures. The thread of purpose will be noted and followed through, century after century, integrating not only history into one complete story of the revelation of divine qualities through the medium of humanity, but integrating with it and into it all world philosophies, the central theme of all creative art, the symbolism of architecture, and the conclusions of science.

(12) Humanity has never really lived up to the teaching given to it. Spiritual impression, whether conveyed by the Christ, by Krishna or by Buddha (and passed on to the masses by Their disciples) has not yet been expressed as it was hoped. Men do not live up to what they already know; they fail to make practical their information; they short-circuit the light; they do not discipline themselves; greedy desire and unlawful ambition control, and not the inner knowledge).