Man has Religion in his Blood

    It is said that great spiritual forces control the development of humanity. Modern esotericism speaks of important beings of an exceptional spiritual power who, guiding and directing certain peoples in all their undertakings, in turn, undergo their own development. This was known in antiquity, and this knowledge was expressed in a positive faith: each nation has its own god and conforms to his (alleged) demands and commandments. This also happened in Mexico. The Popol Vuh, about which more is written elsewhere in this issue, tells this story.

Regrettably, we as modern people are strongly focused on the exterior, thus finding ourselves deprived of the direct inspiration of those spiritual forces. What we experience inwardly -- if we experience anything inwardly at all -- is usually a reaction to our environment.

   Very little comes from within, because all our senses are focused on absorbing our surroundings, and because the power ‘to give’, to radiate, is still dormant. Hence, the wellspring of benevolence and true help still remains closed.

   There is only one, very rare impulse that, independent of its environment, wells up from the innermost being of the modern human being. There is only one ‘voice’ that, very rarely, reaches him from a pure atmosphere of peace, and touches his consciousness with unknown impressions of freedom and harmony.

Development is not always progress

    Nowadays, the current theory is that people who worship a god, and by their very religion have strong mutual relationships, are more primitive. The teachings of the Christian religions have significantly contributed to this. The western human being may have a religion, but experiences his church or his faith in another way. It is more secondary; quite often, it is not an inner need and sometimes springs from the wish to maintain civilised appearances, proper cultural habits or cherished forms. In the west, the personality, and above all someone’s personal development, is dominant. 

What does this development bring? At best, it brings good education and hence thinking power, intelligence and reasonable social behaviour. Friendship and culture are important. You show this to the outside world, as this is what people would like to see; on the other hand, showing worries or moaning is not appreciated. It is preferably denied, but on an unconscious level, it is there and plays an important role.

    Everything is developing and this is encouraging for the future. Yet, we are not dreamers. Development, yes, but progress? How much inner progress has humanity achieved? Have ‘feelings and affections’ changed through the ages, or even millennia? Have they perhaps become nobler, more selfless, more charitable? Does the ear hear the unspoken sigh of his neighbour in the undertones of a conversation? Does the eye see the suffering -- not the suffering of discomfort, but of the denial of the human being?

    Since time immemorial, none of the many emotions and feelings a human being alternately, but ceaselessly, experiences, has disappeared. They are only alternately confronting the consciousness in an active, compelling and demanding way, and the human being experiences them. Or is this way of expressing it too passive? A strong emotion appears, usually in a flash of a second. The blood seethes, the emotion grows until it is satisfied. Then it disappears into the background of our consciousness and something else presents itself. 

Some emotions arrive as if on a cloud and are mild. Others are like a thunderstorm or a hurricane. And just like the fields, the landscape of the human soul waits until it has passed. However, the soul does not escape its consequences. The nerve fluid must quiet down again; the blood must assimilate new energies. This continues until the end, until the power of regeneration of the soul is exhausted, and life must be returned to the great life, from which it has received life. How does this benefit a human being?

Blood is magical

    Everyone understands and experiences these individual affections, as they are anchored in the blood. This is why it is said: the blood is the soul, or the soul can be found in, or lives in, the blood. The loss of two and a half litres of blood is all that is necessary to lose our life as we know it; the whole human being lives in five to six litres. Human life and blood are almost inseparably linked. Through this ‘special juice’, the properties of the parents and ancestors return to life; but the character and past history of a human being are also expressed in it in the form of talents and limitations. He who wants to positively influence his life and wants to develop spiritually, will have to change all the way down to the blood. 

This may be easy to say, but it isn’t easily done, because the blood is a mirror that reflects the world into the human consciousness. We see how both the inner and the outside world are reflected in the human blood. The outside world corresponds, after all, with that which stems from within a human being. That’s how it is. When the voice of the primordial energy speaks in it, the activity of the blood reinforces this energy. It only depends on what a human being is focused on. If he is focused on the primordial energy, all divine properties can be expressed in the blood again! In addition to all its physical functions, the blood also has a magical aspect: it assimilates positive, spiritual energy and negative energy, and transforms them into either beneficial or detrimental impulses in human beings.

    The Spiritual School of the Rosycross speaks of a mysterious power. The terminology of the early Christians speaks of ‘the blood of Christ that cleanses’, because a human being, who was deeply linked with it, exemplified a life of wisdom and help, focused on the kingdom of heaven. It is the human being who, symbolically, accepted the ultimate consequences of the power that inspired and drove him; he gave his life to be able to follow that power. Ever since, every human being can partake of a free, inner life. To the extent that the new power works in his blood, he will let go of possible impediments, even to the extent that their negative repercussions will disappear from his blood.

    Even from the mutilated teachings of the New Testament that have been handed down to us, we may conclude that ‘the freedom of the gospel’ was propagated. And look at what later centuries have made of it. Despite the fact that the power of liberation is linked with the earth through the symbolic blood sacrifice of Jesus, we are told that we are essentially depraved and that the ungodly must have faith in their own power -- we who, as ‘small worlds’, have been created in God’s image!

    When this spiritual essence came into the atmosphere in the Middle East, there was a similar impulse in Central America, concentrated on the heart and the blood of the people. Many thousands of years ago, the memory of the great emissaries of the Atlantean period was still alive in the original peoples of South America. They had given humanity a positive religion of the heart. Lift up your hearts to the divine world; try to continuously stand in the inspiration and the example of the great ones; do not only plunge into earthly life, but learn how your heart can grow and develop by assimilating the divine energies in the blood.

    In addition, the ancient priesthoods propagated that food for the gods was provided through this cooperation, because the radiating power of the blood formed the main source of nourishment; the gods lived on all human expressions of life, feelings and emotions. But the original divine energies moved far into the background due to the decline and manipulation of the priests. Their aim degenerated into pure self-maintenance, with all the ensuing striving for power.

    Perhaps the sacrifice of human hearts, blood, children, slaves and prisoners of war, of which the Spanish records speak, originated from this. If all these awful practices truly occurred, they form the sinister opposite of what happened on Golgotha in a symbolic way.

    Of some more recent priesthoods -- even now, albeit in a different form -- it is said that they, in a deliberate and well-considered way, turned around the essence of the mystery of Golgotha: ‘We, continuations of the gods, take your heart, literally if necessary, and sacrifice it.’

Transformation of the blood

    The symbolic self-sacrifice of a human being makes all this earth-binding magic totally superfluous.

    This self-sacrifice of a human being cleanses the life atmosphere and activates ever more pure Christ power.

    Gradually, the earth is changing again: the new spiritual impulse in the atmosphere that is linked with the Christ, will always continue to work. There may come a time in which his name is forgotten, and people no longer know what happened during his time. Yet, the atmospheric change has begun again. The human being has become enabled to inner freedom, and hence will obtain it.

    There is no true change if the blood, the basis of our consciousness, does not change. But the quality and the properties of the blood, of the character, of the life soul of a human being, do not easily change. An initial impulse is needed, which can, as yeast in bread, bring about a transformation. This impulse does not stem from this nature. If that were the case, humanity would have accomplished its soul development long ago. This is what original gnostic Christianity knew and preserved as the secret of the Christ mystery. The blood of the Christ has positively changed the heart of the earth, and hence humanity, forever. This is expressed all over the world. The human being who focuses his attention on this, is absolutely going to partake of the universal life, which is, after all, always associated with him, the Christ.

    It is like a pure impulse from the realms of the original life that irradiates the blood with spiritual life. This impulse is diametrically opposed to the nature of self-maintenance; this principle cannot do otherwise than spread light and love. This is why we often speak of a shock when a human being experiences this power for the first time!

    But if he reacts, an interesting process begins. This is sometimes called ‘the fundamental reversal’. It is clear that this change is not associated with external or social circumstances. It rather concerns an inner transformation, a change in the human heart blood.

‘Becoming gnostically conscious means attaining the pure unity of the reborn soul with the Spirit. That is the true, central idea. It is necessary that you begin to live from this blood, the blood of Jesus Christ. This blood has to be absorbed by the liver. This blood has to be inhaled by you. This blood needs to be the source of your life and existence. This blood is the Gnosis calling you. It is called blood because it is drunk by the heart as a light force that causes the blood to change.

 This blood, this light force, must begin to replace the central principle of life so that a totally new human being can rise up from this blood force in the field of resurrection.’

 Catharose de Petri, The Living Word, [p. 92]

 © Lectorium Rosicrucianum 2006.

Article from Pentagram No 2, 2006: MEXICO