Three Ways to Acquire Compassion
In the previous two lectures we were talking about compassion. Compassion is the basic foundation or ground that all religions are based on. Every religion uses its own words to describe this profound quality. They talk about love. But in English, the word love does not convey anything of the reality of compassion. So, in the previous two lectures we outlined for you some of the most important facts about compassion that you need to understand if you really want to experience religion.
The word religion comes from Latin ‘religare’ which means something like ‘to reunite,’ ‘to restore,’ ‘to put back together.’ It implies the same meaning of the Sanskrit word ‘yoga,’ whose root is ‘yug’: ‘to unite,’ ‘to bind.’ But it isn’t to bind like “bondage.” It is to unite because of the force of love. So, religion, yoga, West, and East find at the very base of philosophy, religious philosophy, love – union. The union that is implied there is the union between ourselves and divinity.
This image of the Divine Mother and the Child of Gold, which in the West is called Christ, depicts the birth of compassion and the emergence of compassion, of love, into the world. The myth of the virgin, who gives birth to a child, conveys something spiritual, not literal or historical. Yes, Jesus was born to Mary 2,000 years ago. That happened. But the story written in the Bible, and the story told in modern times about the origins of Christianity, is not a literal history, it is a myth exactly like the myths of every other religion in the world. It is a teaching story that conveys an esoteric truth that the public does not perceive.
That virgin symbolizes something in us. It depicts a part of ourselves that is terrifically pure. We call that the Divine Mother. It is an aspect of divinity, and all of us have our own. She is the embodiment of love. She is not a person. She is not a robed figure walking around in the clouds. She is an intelligence, an energy, a power that resides within us, but in our current state is passive, inactive, static because we have not activated that force in ourselves. And because we have not activated that force of the Divine Mother, that Christ cannot be born. You see, the Divine Mother must first be active so that then she can play her role in the cosmic drama, which is to bring the birth of the Christ within the human soul.
Our role, in the very beginning of our spiritual work, is to activate the Divine Mother, to invoke that power, to bring that presence to life in us. And that is not through the worship of some imaginary figure. It is a work with substances. It is a work with physics, with chemistry, with our body, with our mind, with our heart, with everything about ourselves, because she, the Divine Mother that resides within each of us, is an entity, an intelligence, a power; latent, passive, but awaiting the moment of her awakening. She is a terrific force not to be trifled with. That’s why all the religions have symbolized her in such powerful ways – Athena, Hera, Durga, Kali, Tara, Amma. All the figures of the goddesses represent that power in us. She is the power of love. She is the power of creation. She is nature outside of us and inside of us. But in us, that power is passive, static.
When you first enter into any religion or spiritual tradition you are given certain rules to follow, certain procedures that you have to experiment with. The purpose of those is to modify your behavior so that through action and consequence you can provoke the awakening of that intelligence in yourself so the Divine Mother can become active. If you know mythology you know that all the great myths revolve around a hero who is empowered by the Divine Mother – always. It is the mother, symbolically speaking, who gives to the hero everything the hero needs in order to perform the heroic duty that they have. First, there needs to be the mother though.
In these lectures, we’ve been describing compassion as a force in nature. We used a Sanskrit word, bodhichitta, which is a very rich and deep word and its equivalent to compassion. As a polarity in nature, the opposite of that force is lust or passion. This axiom is the basis of everything. Everything in existence hinges upon the relationship between compassion, or pure selfless love, versus its opposite which is lust, passion, self-love, desire. As we explained in those lectures, all great religions are very clear about the great truth that lust, passion, desire is the cause of all suffering. That is the first of the Noble Truths taught by the Buddha Shakyamuni. It is the basis of Hinduism. It is the basis of Judaism. It is the basis of Christianity.
Understanding that axis in nature, all religions seek to help us curb, dominate, and eliminate desire, lust, passion, anger, envy, greed, etc. so that the consciousness, the soul, can become liberated and then embody love. This is quite simple to understand if you study mythology and religion. A pure soul, an angel, a buddha, a master has no lust, has no pride, no envy, no anger. They only reflect the divinity within them – purity. The chief virtue of that, the chief characteristic, is compassion.
We review that for you because compassion, bodhichitta, as a virtue, as a way of behaving and a way of living, is simply a reflection or an embodiment of divinity itself. So, if you were to take all of the angels, archangels, cherubim and seraphim, buddhas, masters, archons, whatever names you want to use for the pure beings who reside in the heavenly realms, if you were to just synthesize them down to their core common element it would be bodhichitta, compassion.
In Sanskrit, in the Hindu and Buddhist, religions, they have a symbol for that, the mind of all the buddhas, the mind of all the angels; that symbol is what they call Avalokiteshvara, Vishnu, Kuan Yin, Chenrezig – some of the names in different traditions. That same symbol is here in the West, and we call it Christ.
It is not a person; rather, Christ a force in nature, an intelligence, love, if you want to put it that way. Yet, it is much deeper and more profound than what we think of as love. In English, we say ‘I love ice cream.’ That has nothing to do with bodhichitta. Or you may love some TV show. That has nothing to do with Christ. That’s just your attachment to enjoyment of sensations.
Power of Three as One
The top trinity of the Tree of Life symbolizes compassion or bodhichitta in action, engaged, manifested, working in the world. The Christians call that the trinity: Father, Son and Holy Spirit. In Greek, they are the three logoi: First Logos, Second Logos, and Third Logos. In Hebrew: Kether, Chokmah, and Binah. Sanskrit: Brahma, Visnu, and Shiva. Buddhism: Dharmakya, Nirmanakaya, and Sambhogakaya. Each of these symbolizes the exact same thing: three fundamental forces that are one, Christ. But it manifests as three because it is the law of three in nature that creates. Everything that is created is through the law of three, even all the way down here in the terrestrial world. Electricity: Positive, Negative, and Neutral. Very simple. You find that throughout all the regions of nature, all the realms of nature. You want a more immediate, direct, simple explanation of the power of creation as the law of three? Look to yourself. You have your physical body because of the law of three: your father, your mother, and sex. Three forces. You cannot remove one of those three if you want to create something. Those three are always present. Always. In all levels of creation.
That is why the Tree of Life is a series of trinities. The three adds to itself and becomes the six, and the twelve, and the twenty-four, and the forty-eight, and the ninety-six. The Tree of Life is made of layers and layers of laws all rooted in that fundamental power of three.
In esotericism, those three fundamental forces are called the Three Amens. If you know anything about Christianity or Judaism, you’ve heard the word Amen, but you’ve probably only thought of it as some word that you just use to conclude a prayer. It is actually a very profound word and we’re going to talk about it today.
That trinity of three forces is Christ itself. It is the energy of creation, the power that gives rise to everything that exists. That power is symbolized in every religion in the world in different ways. That trinity as Father, Son, Holy Spirit, etc. is embodied in the story of Jesus Christ. It’s the most commonly known myth of the Western culture. What people don’t realize is that the term Jesus Christ is not a proper name. It is not a name given by his parents, actually it is a title. It is derived from Hebrew and Greek. Jesus is from the Hebrew ‘Yeshua,’ which means ‘that which saves.’ Christ comes from Χριστός ‘Chrestos,’ which means ‘anointed.’
Christ is actually a title, not for a person, but a level of development and a force of nature. As that trinity, that creative power is the most profound manifested aspect of divinity. When a human being like one of us becomes perfect, when we have eliminated every defect, and we have zero pride, anger, envy, zro fear, a perfect human being can die and resurrect, to then incarnate that light called Christ and thereby become fully christified. They become Christ embodied. They become the highest manifestation of divinity expressing itself through a physical person. This is extraordinarily rare. That’s why it is so celebrated when it happens. The person that we call Jesus is such a person. Buddha is such a person. Krishna, Joan of Arc and many others, most of which are unknown to humanity because most of the time Christ works in anonymity without attention, simply out of compassion in order to aid others.
This image we’re looking at now about Christ shows in the center, of course, Jesus, who in the scriptures actually is called Aberamentho – if you look in the Coptic scriptures, that’s his actual name. To his side, here, on our left is Amitabha from Buddhism. It is very interesting that in Hebrew the light of Christ that comes out of the Absolute, which is above that trinity, creates that trinity and is called Ain Soph Aur, which means ‘limitless light.’ Ain Soph Aur. That is the light of divinity that emerges out of the emptiness, the nothingness, in order to become something and it does so out of love, out of compassion to help those who suffer. That’s in Hebrew; Ain Soph Aur.
That same symbol is in Buddhism, which is Amitabha, that buddha who looks red. The word Amitabha literally means ‘limitless light.’ It is exactly the same as the Hebrew Ain Soph Aur. If you go to any Buddhist temple you will find Amitabha is always in the highest position, because Amitabha represents the first emanation, the condensation, the collection of all the buddhas as one light – the emergent light that gives rise to all of them.
When that force, that light emerges, and that trinity is produced we find Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva. Kether, Chokmah, and Binah. Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, etc. In Hinduism you have that depicted here as Vishnu, the faces of all the gods. That is a symbol of Christ as well, how Christ, that light of divinity manifests itself as all the imaginable forms of divinity in order to help those who suffer like us. Christ is universal. Every religion talks about Christ, but each uses different words.
Christ is a Substance
In modern times, people do not understand that Christ is a substance, and depends upon substance. Christ does not care about belief. What is belief? It is just a concept. It is just a mental formation. It means nothing. It does not matter if you believe in light or disbelieve in light. It does not matter if you believe in the law or disbelieve in the law, the law still applies to you. You may not believe in eating food. You are free to not believe in it, but if you do not eat you will die. Christ is like that. Nature is like that. Spirituality is like that. God is like that. It makes no difference what you believe. What matters is what you do. In every level of nature, what matters is action: and action occurs in substances, not beliefs.
Christ as a force in nature, as that primordial light that wants to incarnate in a human soul like us, is a substance, an intelligence, a force, a living thing. It is not a person in the clouds. It is not just ‘Jesus.” Christ is a force within all living things that only within a human being can become fully manifested, developed, and then expressed so that human being can become something more than just a human being, can become christified.
Christ is symbolized as fire.
“…he [Christ] shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost, and [with] fire: Whose fan [is] in his hand, and he will thoroughly purge his floor, and gather his wheat into the garner; but he will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire." —Matthew 3:12, Luke 3:16
"I [Christ] am come to send fire on the earth..." —Luke 12:49
Jesus [Christ] said, "I [Christ] have cast fire upon the world, and see, I am guarding it until it blazes…
Jesus [Christ] said, "He who is near Me [Christ] is near the fire, and he who is far from Me is far from the Kingdom." —Gospel of Thomas
"If someone is near me [Christ], he will burn. I [Christ] am the fire that blazes. Whoever is near me is near fire; whoever is far from me is far from life." —Gospel of the Savior
"Now therefore if any one hath received the mysteries of Baptism, those mysteries become a great fire, exceeding strong, and wise, so as to burn up all the sins: and the Fire [Christ] entereth into the soul secretly, so that it may consume within it all the sins which the counterfeit of the spirit hath printed there." —Pistis Sophia
Christ is the fire of life in the Tree of Life. The Ain Soph Aur that emerges out of the emptiness, that is called Amitabha in Sanskrit and Ain Soph Aur in Hebrew, is a fire. It is a spiritual fire, an intelligent fire. It gives rise to life. We need to work with that substance. We need to receive that substance from divinity in order for us to fully develop ourselves.
An example of how that divinity uses substance to grow us can also be found in The Bible when the Israelites were escaping Egypt, being led by Moses through the wilderness, and they were suffering for forty years in the desert. At one point they were despondent and despairing and complaining and saying ‘Why did we come out in the desert just to die?’ So, this passage in The Bible says:
“Remember the entire path along which Jehovah Elohim led you these forty years in the desert. He sent hardship to test you, to determine what is in your heart, whether you would keep his commandments or not. He made life difficult for you, letting you go hungry, and then he fed you the מן manna, which neither you nor your ancestors had ever experienced. This was to teach you that it is not by bread alone that man lives, but by all that comes out of God’s mouth” (Deuteronomy 8:3).
This statement of course is read literally by modern people. They think that literally Jews were in the desert somewhere outside of Egypt and that God manifested some kind of bread for them to eat. That is not the meaning. This is a myth that conveys a spiritual truth, something esoteric. Something mystical. What the story represents is the process through which we as a soul are working towards being ready to incarnate Christ itself. To understand that, we need to understand some of the symbols of this story.
Firstly, the word Egypt is not written in The Bible. In English it says Egypt but in Hebrew it does not say Egypt, it says מצרים Matzarim, Mitsrayim, or Mitzriyim, which means ‘the place between the waters.’ This is a symbol.
Secondly, the “people of Israel” described there are not those who call themselves Jews in the physical world. Instead, “people of Israel” symbolizes something within ourselves. We can break the word Israel into its components, Is-Ra-El. Where were the supposed Israelites? They were in Egypt. Who were the gods of Egypt? Isis and Ra, god and goddess, Father and Mother. El is Hebrew for God. So the people of Is-Ra-El are the offspring of the god and goddess: our consciousness, trapped in slavery, suffering. The people of Is-Ra-El is a symbol depicting those parts of divinity that are within us, but that are trapped in the bondage of our mind. The people of God, the people of Israel, represents our consciousness, our soul – that part of divinity that is within us, but that is in bondage, in slavery, in “Egypt.”
The pharaoh who pursues them symbolizes our ego, the arrogant ruler, passion, lust, desire, pride, the cause of our suffering.
Mitzriyim, or so called Egypt, represents our subconsciousness, the shadow of the Tree of Life. It represents our submerged mind, and we as a soul, as the people of Is-Ra-El, are trapped in that. To get out of that we need Moses.
The word Moses is also a symbol. Moses was a person. Moses was a master. But Moses symbolizes something in us. In Hebrew the word Moses is written like this: Mem, Shen, Heh. Mosheh. Moses. These Hebrew letters are not just letters like English letters. They are symbols. The letter Mem, which is also here, is one of the mother letters of Hebrew. Mem symbolizes water. Shen, which you can see is a trinity. What does that look like? Fire? It represents fire. Mem is water. Shen is fire. Shen is a trinity. The Heh represents a womb. The word Mosheh, Moses, literally says ‘womb, born of fire and water.’ Now that fire, that trinity of Shen, represents that upper trinity in the Tree of Life, which is spirit, divinity.
If you know Christianity, you know that Jesus said to Nicodemus that if you want to enter heaven you must be born again of water and spirit. He was pointing at the symbol of Moses. We need Moses to enter heaven. Mem, Shen, Heh. Water, fire, womb. That all points at something spiritual in us that must develop. Moses, as a myth, as a symbol represents the sephirah Tiphereth on the Tree of Life, which is our consciousness. We can call it soul, the human soul. Its chief characteristic, Tiphereth, is willpower. Who is going to lead our suffering soul out of bondage? It is our willpower, Moses, our human soul, our conscious, Mosheh, who must be born again of water and fire.
That’s when this story happens with the מן manna. The people of Israel, our own mind, are complaining; ‘Oh, the spiritual path is too hard. Why can’t God be easier on me? Why did I take on this path if all I’m going to do is just suffer?’ When you take the spiritual path, you do suffer. You know why? Because you have lust, pride, envy, and anger and you cannot be free of them until you see them, understand them, and eliminate them. How are you going to do that in your current state? Right now, in our current state, we do not want to see any of that. We only want people to tell us how good we are. We do not want to hear the truth about the contents of our submerged mind. But to be free of suffering, you have to deal with that. We are trapped in suffering. We are trapped in hell right now. So, divinity puts in us situations that brings our egos out so we can see them: thus, we suffer from seeing them, yet we need that in order to become free.
We need Moses to lead the people of Israel out of Egypt, bondage. This is happening in us. For that we learn the teachings, we study the doctrine, we learn ethics, we learn how to behave better so that we stop creating suffering. We learn how to behave in a superior way so we start creating happiness.
The Bible says very clearly that in the process of that testing we face difficulties, ordeals, and problems. It says here in the scripture that “it is not by bread alone that man lives, but by all that comes out of God’s mouth.” Studying scripture by itself and believing in scripture by itself does not save you. That is the bread, lechem in Hebrew. That is the bread of knowledge, the bread of wisdom. I am giving you bread right now, teaching you about the real meanings of religion. That is bread but that alone cannot save you because it is just intellectual. It is just concepts. What saves you is your actions in combination with a substance that you need in order to change yourself chemically, not just physically, but psychologically. That is what is written here: “He made life difficult for you, letting you go hungry” – in other words, he gives you a lot of tests and ordeals – “and then he fed you the מן manna” – sustenance from above, that’s what that word means in Hebrew, spelled Mem, Nun. Sustenance from above.
Manna מן
Most Christians and Jews think that is actually just some kind of bread thing that they found on the ground in the desert and that they ate that and they were saved. That is not the meaning. This is a myth, not a literal history. Manna is an alchemical symbol, a chemical symbol. It is a substance, but it is not bread outside of your body. It is something much more profound than that. This word manna is made of מן Mem, Nun. I have already told you that the Mem means water. It is interesting in The Bible that the manna when it is created by God, it arrives overnight and it collects on the ground as a result of the dew falling. Let us contemplate that beautiful symbol for a moment. The dew from heaven gently floats down from God and rests on the Earth and then it gradually forms something that is called manna, the substance from above, sustenance from above.
Firstly, let me point that we were made from the Earth. We ourselves are Adam, a man, a human being. Not man, masculine, but a person. Adam means a person, whether male or female. It does not matter. That Adam was created from Adamah, which is the ground, the Earth.
“And יהוה אלהים [Jehovah Elohim] formed האדם ha-adam [the person] of האדמה [the dust of the ground]...” —Genesis 2:7
What is that dew that drifts down from heaven? If we study the Tree of Life and we see that we are the receptacle, Malkuth, the body receiving all these forces from divinity here in our bodies, that dew is the substance of God, the substances that trickle through the Tree of Life as the Ray of Creation and that give us life. It is at its base a symbol of that; the force of life that comes from divinity. But it is something more specific because the Mem is water but the letter Nun is a fish. Do you see the symbol? What is the synthesis of yourself, everything about you, everything about all of your ancestors, your entire history, and everything about divinity in you? It is all crystallized in a fish in yourself; the sperm and the ovum. Fish that swim in the waters of life in your body. Manna. Sexual power. Sustenance from above. It is a very profound potential energy or force that is crystallizing in us every day like dew, drifting down, every day. The sexual energy in us is renewing itself daily. It is a condensation, a crystallization, of everything that we eat and drink and breath and think and see and do. It is our signature in physical matter. That single sperm, that single egg, creates physically, obviously. What we don’t realize is that it also creates spiritually. That is why all religions begin with the conservation of that energy, to keep it and transform it, to make it into something superior.
Remember Jesus said to Nicodemus, “That which is born of flesh is flesh but that which is born of spirit is spirit” (John 3:6). If we want Moses, our human soul, to take the spirit, the people of God out, that letter Shen, and come out of Egypt, we need that. We need that manna. That substance is what can bring us liberation.
You see, in the previous lecture we explained this. Everything, even God, depends on matter. Everything in nature, in its own level, has three aspects: consciousness, energy, and matter. For God to unfold creation, God needs consciousness, energy, and matter. Three forces. For us to have a child, we need three forces. Consciousness, energy, and matter. You can not have children without matter or energy or consciousness – impossible. Likewise, if you want to create the soul, if you want to be liberated from suffering, if you want to incarnate Christ, if you simply want to be a good person and embody compassion you need to work with consciousness, energy, and matter. Not just beliefs, but the matter of your body, the energy in your body, and the consciousness that guides it.
That manna is all three: consciousness, energy, and matter. It is a divine substance provided by divinity for those who are working on the path. Manna is something special, something earned. It is not achieved by the average person. It is not found by the average person. It is found by the Israelites who are suffering in the desert. In other words, the initiates who are working to repay their karma, working to redeem themselves of their defects, and in turn God helps them. Divinity gives them sustenance in the form of manna. That is help that comes through consciousness, energy, and matter.
The Stone of Jacob
We also explained in the previous lecture about Yakob, or Jacob as we call him, who saw the vision of the angels ascending and descending on the ladder to heaven. That latter is the Tree of Life. Jacob saw how the soul, the consciousness, can rise and fall. Angels rise and angels fall. They always rise and fall based on the exact same cause: action. And the most profound action is always sexual, how they use their sexual energy. That is in the root of the symbol.
“After Jacob had the vision, he rose early in the morning and took the אבן stone that he had put for his pillows and set it up for a pillar and poured שמן shemen upon the top of it and he called the name of that place Bethel. This אבן stone which I have set for a pillar shall be God’s house...” —Genesis 28:18-19
Yakob raised up a stone as a pillar. That is a phallic symbol but it is also a symbol of the spinal column. You see, this Tree of Life also represents the temple of God that we must build and that temple is ourselves. The physical body, the pillar that holds the temple up, is our spinal column. It connects sex and brain. Brain is Adam and sex is Eve, symbolically speaking. When that pillar is raised, Yakob pours shemen upon the top of it. We explained previously this is just like how the Greeks and other traditions would anoint phallic pillars, like the djed of the Egyptians, that symbolize the phallus and also the spine. That pouring of oil symbolizes the transmutation of the sexual energy, its preservation, and its elevation. That’s evident in the Hebrew word for oil: שמן ‘shemen’ – Shen, Mem, Nun. That letter ש Shen can be pronounced ‘sh’ or ‘s’. So if you pronounce Shen-Mem-Nun with just the ‘s’ sound it is semen, which in the Egyptian, Arabic, and Hebrew languages all mean oil but obviously in English it means ‘seed,’ the sexual energy.
Oil is always a symbol of sexual energy. But you see, in this word שמן ‘shemen,’ that first letter. Doesn’t that look like Moses? It is the same two letters. Shen and Mem. Fire and water. Think about that just for a moment. When you feel sexual heat, sexual enthusiasm, what is activated in you? The sexual waters and the fire that fills your blood, that raises your temperature. That’s fire. And it brings up the sexual waters, the sexual humidity. What is stimulated and activated in the midst of that energy that is flowing is the letter Nun, the fish. Fire, water, fish. The sexual force, whether in men or women.
Now, there is something very interesting going on in this passage because the word for stone is אבן ‘eben’: Aleph, Beth, Nun. In that previous passage, it says “Man cannot live by bread alone but must depend on everything that emerges from the mouth of God.” What is it that passes through our mouth? א Air, the breath. That is the other mother letter of Hebrew. Aleph. See this symbol here? Air. Beth is the second letter. This is the first letter in Hebrew, and is also the number one. Beth is the second letter, it means the number two, and also means ‘house.’ The letter Nun is the fish. Beth and Nun בן together means ‘son.’ So the word אבן stone is also “one son” or “first son.” Who is the son of God? Christ. Who is the cornerstone of the temple in Christianity? The cornerstone of the temple that we must build is Christ. This אבן stone that Yakob raised up is the א בן “first son.”
The pouring of the oil is the key point here. We need to study that word שמן ‘shemen.’ This is it right in the middle: Shen, Mem, Nun. Fire, water, fish. Shemen: oil or sexual energy, same thing.
First Way to Acquire Compassion: Transmutation
In the previous lecture, we talked about the substance of love being the sexual energy. We explained this from a Tantric point of view, from the view of Tantra how that substance is called bodhichitta. Through the process of restraining the sexual energy and transforming it, that substance chemically enlivens the body, the glands, the endocrine system, the soul, the spirit, and the consciousness and it awakens our latent powers. Ultimately it brings the Divine Mother to a state of activity in us. That is what this fire is. This fire as an active force in the body of the initiate is the Divine Mother itself, activated. In Sanskrit it is called Kundalini. In Tibetan Buddhism it is called Kandali. In Christianity it is called Pentecost. In Hebrew, in Kabbalah, it is called Shekinah. All of these names describe this fire, made active in us, which gives us spiritual abilities.
There is another word similar word in Hebrew written next to it. If this is שמן ‘shemen,’ oil, or sexual energy, this is אמן ‘amen’ – Aleph, Mem, Nun. Amen. Notice that both words have the מן manna, the substance that God gives to those who are working in the path. But the difference between them is these first letters. Shemen has the ש Shen, fire. Amen has the א Aleph, air. Both point towards the upper trinity of the Tree of Life. The Aleph is a trinity with three parts. The Shen is also a trinity with three parts. Amen is the trinity as air. Shemen is the trinity as fire. Both have water and fish, the manna, that substance. The אמן amen is the breath of God, the air that comes from the mouth of God. The שמן shemen is the fire. Think about fire for a moment in terms of physics. What does fire need? Air. If there is no air there is no fire. The word ‘amen’ indicates the upper trinity and air. We need Shen, fire, to burn impurities, to create life. Christ is that fire and that light of Christ comes from the fire that is the Divine Mother, the Kundalini. Both of those fires depend on air to exist. That air is the Aleph, the breath that moves through the Tree of Life in all the levels of nature.
In the previous lecture, we taught how to use breathing exercises, which in Sanskrit are called Pranayama. We did one today before the class, in which we relaxed, drew in the breath, held the breath, without thought, and then we exhaled the breath and repeated that cycle. There is a very intimate relationship between your breathing and your sexual energy. You know that’s true if your sexual energy has ever been activated because your breath changes. Your heart changes. Your blood flow changes. Everything physically in you is changed when that air becomes fire. The same fundamental truth exists spiritually in us on a whole other octave. If in the physical sexual act, the stimulation of the sexual energy changes your breathing and brings fire into your body, the same thing happens in your consciousness when that energy is preserved. The breath and the fire are stimulated into activity. That is why we do practices called Pranayama.
The first form of invoking compassion, bodhichitta, and the first way that you can begin to work with it for yourself and experience it is step one – transmutation. Simply put: conserve your sexual energy and transform it daily. Reject lust. Set it aside. Instead learn what chastity is; sexual energy that is pure, that belongs to divinity. When you reject lustfulness, you instead dedicate your sexual energy to God, to taking yourself out of suffering. That is transmutation. That is not just belief. It must be put into action, daily. For someone who is single, it is through these breathing practices, pranayama. That is what depicted here. There are many variations of the pranayama, but their common element is the conservation of sexual energy and its transmutation through relaxation, concentration, and breathing. Like we did today, you relax, you concentrate on your breath, and you just breath deeply. There are more variations. There are mantras and visualizations, but simple deep breathing is sufficient to stimulate the movement of the air and the fire in you.
The conservation of that energy and its transformation means you are knocking on the door to divinity. That is why Jesus says, “Knock and it shall be opened” (Matthew 7:7). That door is in your sexual glands. The door to the path begins with the transmutation of the sexual energy. If you are not transmuting your sexual energy, your spiritual life is just a dream. If you want to experience the reality of awakening consciousness, seeing divinity, and seeing and experiencing the internal worlds for yourself, conserve the energy that makes it happen.
In this image, the initiate is transforming the sexual energy, raising it up his spinal column to the brain, saturating the pineal and pituitary glands, and enlivening them, which gives him visions. Without that energy, there are no visions. Most people have never experienced divinity because they only have beliefs. They are not working with the substance, the manna.
Second Way to Acquire Compassion: Transformation
The second practical tool that you can use to invoke compassion and experience it for yourself is to use mantras. The word mantra is Sanskrit and it means ‘mind protection.’
‘Om mani padme hum’ is a very profound mantra, written in Tibetan. You will find innumerable variations amongst the way that is pronounced, depending on the tradition and the region it is coming from. It is a six-syllable mantra. There are volumes and volumes written about its profundity. The sounds of that phrase are a vibration of energy in nature that directly connect with the trinity of the Tree of Life. It encompasses all the elements of creation and in the combination of sounds directly invokes the presence of what we call Christ in the West and what Tibetans call Avalokiteshvara or Chenrezig, which is what is depicted here.
This image shows, like Vishnu, how that force of compassion always manifests through millions of ways to help those who suffer, hence the many heads and arms. They represent all the different ways that divinity is reaching out to help those who suffer. When you chant this mantra, you are calling for that help. This mantra should be used consciously, with prayer, emotion, deep awareness, and seriousness. If you just repeat it mechanically, non-stop, it is meaningless. It must be said with full awareness. ‘Om mani padme hum.’ We gave a lecture detailing this called The Mantra of Christ, which may be read on the website.
Look at the first three letters of this mantra. The first one is Aum. That letter, in Tibetan, looks like the Aleph and the Shen from Hebrew. The second letter, Ma, looks like the Mem from Hebrew. The third letter, Ni, looks like the Nun from Hebrew. You see? In their roots, all religions are the same.
If you want to experience the awakening of compassion in yourself, the presence of divinity in yourself, step one is, as I explained, conserve the energy and transform it. Step two would be this: use a mantra like this all the time. Sing it in your mind. Instead of wasting your time thinking, fantasizing, and day-dreaming all day about really useless things, give your mind this task. Chant this prayer, this invocation for divinity, repeating it, repeating it. If you are not comfortable with the Sanskrit ‘Om mani padme hum,’ then just chant ‘Amen.’ It is not as complete, but the root is the same. Repeat it mentally while you’re working, while you’re walking, while you’re washing, while you’re sleeping, invoking divinity, praying, and rejecting the habits of your stale, tired way of thinking and instead trying to adopt a new way of being – transmutation.
In this effort, you’re taking that preserved energy and putting it to activity in yourself to bring the presence of divinity into your body, heart, and mind to give you insight, guidance and health and to feel that presence. If you seriously work with that mantra, you will be changed. There is no doubt.
Third Way to Acquire Compassion: Transubstantiation
In the West, we call this Eucharist or Communion. In Asia, they call it tsog. In the Bible it says,
“Melchizedek, King of Salem, brought forth bread and wine. He was a priest to God, the most high...” —Genesis 14:18
The first appearance of the communion, or taking of bread and wine, is not in the New Testament. It is not with Jesus. It is with Melchizedek. Jesus was a priest after the order of Melchizedek. Melchizedek is a very high master, who gave to humanity the gift of blessed food and wine. Bread and wine, the body and blood of Christ called Eucharist or Communion. In the New Testament it says,
“For every high priest taken from among men is ordained for men in things pertaining to God, that he may offer both gifts and sacrifices for sins: Who can have compassion on the ignorant, and on them that are out of the way; for that he himself also is compassed with infirmity...So also Christ glorified not himself to be made an high priest; but he that said unto him, Thou art my Son, to day have I begotten thee. As he saith also in another place, Thou art a priest for ever after the order of Melchizedek.” —Hebrews 5:1-6
In synthesis, you can, just like Jesus and Melchizedek, through the use of ritual, invoke the aid of divinity through blessed bread and wine; not alcoholic wine, symbolic wine.
This image shows that this blessed element, a symbol of blood and a symbol of body, nourishes the heart. It delivers a substance into us that is greater than physical bread.
These three ways are how we receive from the mouth of God something greater than bread. We take the substance, the manna, physically through the sexual energy, chemically though the transmutation, and spiritually through the transubstantiation of blessed drink and food.
In this third step, if you really need the help of divinity, and you really want to conquer the defects that afflict you, and you need strength for the work you are doing, you can perform the Eucharist yourself, at home. Jesus gave instructions of how to do that in accordance with how he was taught by Melchizedek, and it is very simple. You get grape juice and a whole grain bread, and you bless them with the sign of the cross and you pray and ask divinity to fill that substance with the substance of Christ so that you can be strengthened for the work that you need. Then, with a prayerful attitude, you eat and drink. You can do that every day.
Learn more about blessed food and drink.
These three methods embody the law of three to create something new within you. By working with these three practical methods, you can acquire the substance of Christ — compassion.
