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Genesis,
where we are told that at the time of the first man a mist went up
from the
earth, "for it had not yet rained." This condition evidently
continued un-
til the Flood, when the moisture finally descended and left the
atmosphere
clear so that the rainbow was seen for the first time, the darkness
was dis-
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pelled, and the age of alternation, day and night, summer and
winter, com-
menced.
By a study of the cosmology and the pictorial account of evolution
given
in the Northern Eddas, treasured among the sages of Scandinavia
before the
Christian Era, we may learn more of this period in the earth's
history and
the bearing which it has upon our subject. As we teach our
children, by
means of stories and pictures, truths that hey could not
intellectually
grasp, so the divine leaders of mankind were wont to teach the
infant souls
in their charge by pictures and allegories, and through these
prepare them
for a higher and nobler teaching of a later day. The great epic
poem which
is called "The Lay of the Niebelung," gives us the story of which we
are in
search, the cosmic origin of the rite of Baptism and why it is
necessarily
the preliminary step in the spiritual unfoldment of the Christian
Mystic.
The cosmogony of the Eddas is similar to that of the Bible is
some re-
spects, and in others gives points which bear out the theory of
Laplace. We
quote from the poetical version of Oehlenschlaeger:
[PAGE 80] ANCIENT AND MODERN
INITIATION
"In the Being's earliest Dawn
All was one dark abyss,
Nor heaven nor earth was known.
Chill noxious fogs and ice,
North from murk Niflheim's hole,
Piled up in mountains lay;
From Muspel's radiant pole,
Southwards fire held the sway.
"Then after ages passed,
Mid in the chaos met
A warm breath, Niflheim's blast,
Cold with prolific heat.
Hence pregnant drops were formed,
Which by the parent air
From Muspel's region warmed,
Produced great Aurgelmer."
Thus by the action of heat and cold Aurgelmer, or as he is also
called,
the Giant Ymer, was first formed. This was the pregnant seed ground
whence
came the spiritual Hierarchies, the spirits of the earth, air, and
water,
and finally man. At the same time the All-Father created the Cow
Audumla,
from whose four teats issued four streams of milk, which nourished
all be-
ings. These are the four ethers, one of which now sustains
mineral, two
feed the plant, three the animal, and all four the human kingdom.
In the
Bible they are the four rivers which went forth out of Eden.
[PAGE 80A] ANCIENT AND MODERN
INITIATION
.
ILLUSTRATION:
THE SPIRAL PATH OF ORDINARY HUMANITY
AND
THE WAY OF INITIATION
[PAGE 81] THE MYSTIC RITE OF
BAPTISM
Eventually, as postulated by science, a crust must have been
formed by
the continued boiling of the water, and from this drying crust a
mist must
have ascended as taught in the second chapter of Genesis. By
degrees the
mist must have cooled and condensed, shutting out the light of the
sun, so
that it would have been impossible for early mankind to perceive
the body
even had they possessed the physical vision. But under such
conditions they
had no more need of eyes that a mole which burrows in the ground.
They were
not blind, however, for we re told that "THEY SAW GOD"; and as
"spiritual
things (and beings) are spiritually perceived," they must have been
gifted
with spiritual sight. In the spiritual worlds there is a different
standard
of reality than here, which is the basis of myths.
Under these conditions there could be no clashing of interests,
and hu-
manity regarded itself as the children of one great Father while they
lived
under the water of ancient Atlantis. Egoism did not come into the
world un-
til the mist had condensed and they had left the watery
atmosphere of
Atlantis. When their eyes had been opened so that they could
perceive the
physical world and the things therein, when each saw himself or
herself as
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separate and apart from all others, the consciousness of "me and
mine, thee
and thine," took shape in the nascent minds, and a grasping greed
replaced
the fellow feeling which obtained under the waters of early Atlantis.
From
that time to the present stage of egoism has been considered the
legitimate
attitude, and even in our boasted civilization altruism remains a
Utopian
[PAGE 82] ANCIENT AND MODERN
INITIATION
dream not to be indulged in by practical people.
Had mankind been allowed to travel the path of egoism without let
or hin-
drance, it is difficult to see where it all would have ended. But
under the
immutable Law of Consequence every cause must produce an adequate
effect;
the principle of suffering was born from sin for the benevolent
purpose of
guiding us back to the path of virtue. It takes much suffering
and many
lives to accomplish this purpose, but finally when we have become
men of
sorrows and acquainted with grief, when we have cultivated that
keen and
ready sympathy which feels all the woe of the world, when the
Christ has
been born within, there comes to the Christian Mystic that ardent
aspiration
to seek and to save those who are lost and show them the way to
everlasting
light and peace.
But to show the way, we must know the way; without a true
understanding
of the CAUSE OF SORROW we cannot teach others to obtain permanent
peace. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
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