The World Is Damaged

I claimed in my last post that the world was perfect and I am not going to backtrack on that in this one because I do maintain that this world is primarily framed as a spiritual training ground, and that the purpose of life here is educational which means there must be trial, difficulty and even suffering. So, from that perspective, the imperfections of the world make it a suitable arena for spiritual evolution.

However, it often seems that, even with those aims to it, the world need not be as bad as it sometimes is and that suffering need not be as terrible as it occasionally turns out to be. Something else appears to be going on. What might that be?

A materialist would say there is no need to look for an explanation. The world is as it is because there is no meaning, no purpose to it and therefore we can expect what we see which is a mixture of what to us seems good and bad, but really there is no good and bad unless we make it so. But this is a superficial explanation which disregards vast chunks of our experience and ignores intuition not to mention revelation and the spiritual insights of millions of people. It might provide some kind of rationale for evil and suffering as we experience them but at the expense of dismissing so much else that is just as significant in our lives from love to the sense of beauty to the yearning for truth and so on.

So where else can we look for an understanding of the prevalence of suffering in the world?

Perhaps, first of all, we should look to the teaching of the Fall in which human disobedience to spiritual truth was the initial cause of suffering and death. In some sense, we turned away from the good and decided to place ourselves at the centre of life instead of God. By rejecting God (which we did if he was no longer central) we created an environment in which suffering and death became possible.

But I don't think that is sufficient explanation. It does explain much of what we experience but not everything. Not the depth of evil in the world. To get a fuller picture I believe we have to accept that there are spiritual forces that seek our ill. These forces work against God and they have sufficient power to damage God's plan for humanity, in the short term anyway. Now God could eradicate these forces in an instant if he chose but that would probably mean bringing his experiment with humanity to an end because this experiment requires the existence and exercise of free will.

These dark forces do have power but it is a limited sort of power and I don't think they can affect us on an individual level unless we allow them into our aura, if I can put it like that, through manifesting negative energy, otherwise known as sin, ourselves. They are the fallen angels and those human souls that have allowed themselves to be corrupted by them. They are combatted by God's angels on a spiritual level using that word to mean the non-material realms between the heavenly planes (to which they cannot gain access due to the darkness in their being, like attracting like on these levels) and the physical world. But we must also counter their attacks in our hearts and minds.

The dark forces have damaged the world and made of it a worse place than it might have been but God allows their existence because the purpose of creation is free will and he has renounced some of his supreme power to allow the exercise of free will. If he overrode our freedom he would effectively have to destroy the world. Perhaps the myth of the Flood provides an example of that. 

At the same time, I do believe that the power of the demons is relatively weak in that if we did not respond to their temptations to sin they would be ineffectual. The Masters frequently warned me about attack from evil forces but said that if I did not react to them (in thought) they would go away. They have no power if one does not allow oneself to descend to their level.

In conclusion, I would say that all spiritual teachings worthy of the name recognise that this world is a battleground between good and evil which is permitted to take place because of the need for free will. God has forfeited some of his power to make his creation free. But evil will never be allowed to go too far even if it does not necessarily always feel like that to our restricted view. We have the Flood to remind us of that. God may have promised not to use that particular method again (so the story goes) but no doubt there are other possibilities.

A final thought. A propos of whether God knows how humanity will turn out, people sometimes ask whether he can see the future before it happens and, if he can, where does that leave free will? This is based on a confusion of levels. God is above time and he can see the future now. He sees all time now. Past, present and future are all now to him. So there is no conflict between free will and the fact that God knows the future. He does not know it before it happens because to him it is happening now. So he sees it but does not determine it. He can also bring good from evil and even if the dark forces have attempted to sabotage his plan, they cannot prevent it and its eventual glorious fruition.

The World is Perfect

You might think this a strange to claim to make but I think a case can be established for its truth, though we have to look at things in a slightly different way to usual. 

At first glance our material world is clearly very far from perfect. There is suffering, there is pain, there is death. And yet a closer look can start to make sense of these negative aspects of our experience here. Let's take that look.

If the world exists in and for itself then it is not perfect at all. I think most of us would agree that it is more good than bad but there is still quite a lot of bad. No wonder babies cry when they are born! However, what if the world does not exist on its own terms but is part of a much larger purpose? I submit that the part of reality we perceive as the physical world is but a small aspect of the whole and one, moreover, that, for all intents and purposes, is the most restricted and limited part of that whole. Here material conditions enclose us and curtail our freedom. They are a permanent weight on our well-being, restricting us not only physically but also mentally. The mind can work far better when it doesn't have to do so through the brain. It is more alert, more aware and better able to communicate its perceptions.

But here we are. We are in the world and it's makes sense to assume that here is where we are meant to be. For the moment anyway. We have a task to accomplish that we could not accomplish in one of the freer planes of existence. It is precisely that restriction that works to our benefit here because it forces us in certain directions. By making things harder for us, it requires us to push. By pushing we stretch ourselves and grow.

Therefore, I say that this world is perfect for what it is intended to be or what we are intended to achieve in it. It is not a holiday resort but a training ground. You might almost think of it as a kind of assault course. It certainly has that aspect to it. If everything was easy for us and we never encountered difficulty or hardship or suffering we might become like those spoilt children of wealthy parents who take everything for granted and assume that what they want they can always have. They don't grow unless they are made of very good stuff to begin with, and even then their growth will be limited for without struggle you really don't have much incentive to change or grow.

So, when I say that the world is perfect, I am not saying that is good or could not be better. But I do say that, for its purpose, it is right. It provides the right environment for spiritual growth because here we have to confront difficulty. Here we are faced with good and evil and have to choose. Here we are not given direct evidence of God but have to find that ourselves and, in finding, we make it our own. It becomes part of our inner being not just something we see out there like the sun. We all believe in the sun but that doesn't make us give light or warmth. When you build the belief of God into yourself by your own volition, then you start to become God. It's a long process but you really do start to do just that. 

And so this world with all its many imperfections is perfect as a school for evolving consciousness. Indeed, it is the imperfections that make it perfect. Suffering teaches us to overcome suffering in ourselves and respond to it in others. The possibility of sin helps us to identify tendencies to sin within ourselves and therefore be able to root them out. 

The Resurrection

If the supernatural elements of Christianity are not regarded as absolutely primary it is effectively rendered sterile. A consideration of the meaning of the resurrection on Albion Awakening.

Being Alone

The serious spiritual seeker of today will often find himself or herself alone in the world. Not necessarily literally so as in the case of a recluse or hermit, but in terms of companionship or finding something in common with associates and even family then, yes, alone.

This is for various reasons. To begin with, there just aren't that many people who really are serious about spiritual things so the pool to draw upon is not large. Note that I am not talking about people who are merely religious in an external sense or even those who might be interested in spiritual things but still lead a normal life which actually reflects more of what they are. In this context, I am referring to people who understand that this world is not the true home of man, and who seek to deepen that awareness. This is the most important thing, if not the only important thing, in their lives. These people know themselves to be something more than the earthbound personality here below and that knowledge rules their life. This very fact separates them from others for whom, even if religious or spiritually inclined, the personality, the familiar self of name and form, is who they identify themselves with. Its aims, fears, likes and dislikes are what motivates them. For the true disciple, these are secondary to the burning desire to know God.

Those whose inner awareness is awakening to the higher worlds tend to isolate themselves on that very account. Or rather it is the fact of their awareness that isolates them from others who are not so awakened. Obviously, their awareness separates them from materialists and atheists with whom it is difficult to find common ground but, as we have just seen, so it does from religious and spiritual people who still see their being in terms of how it is conceived to be by the conventions of this world. If someone identifies himself with his natural self, that is, with the self as it appears to be in this world, it is difficult for someone else who is beginning to realise that he is the spiritual soul, and not merely the threefold lower self, to form a relationship with that person. This is not a question of pride or superiority. It is simply an inevitable result of awakening to higher consciousness. It can turn to pride, of course, because we may be awakening to the higher state but are still immersed in the material self but, if it does, that is because we are reacting to the higher state from within the mentality of the lower one.

So, we separate ourselves from the mass of humanity by virtue of the fact that we perceive reality differently. Our goals and aspirations are different in that they are not focused on this world. But very often we are also separated from our fellow men and women by God as he seeks to bring us nearer to himself. For it is a fact that we can only really begin to know God when our hearts are fixed on nothing in this world. Sometimes we detach ourselves, at others we are detached. We might be isolated for the purposes of our own spiritual development because it can be hard to grow spiritually when surrounded by the distractions of this world. Being alone can also constitute a test of one's seriousness and spiritual integrity and, by forcing oneself back on one's own resources, it helps one to become spiritually self-reliant which is the aim for all disciples, especially in this modern age.

Loneliness can be a hard burden to bear but it is often the precursor to initiation of some kind. Not in the sense of dramatic expansions of consciousness but in that of moving on to a deeper understanding of life and a more mature spiritual outlook. If it comes to you, think of it as a gift. It means you are starting to rise above this world and being prepared for entry to the higher ones. It is a betwixt and between condition representing the passage from one state of being and knowing to another and thus, as uncomfortable as it may be while it lasts, it should be seen as something temporary that is the preparation for fuller knowledge of spiritual life.