MYSTIC CHRISTIANITY
YOGI RAMACHARAKA
THE SIXTH LESSON
THE WORK OF ORGANIZATION
Leaving Capernaum behind
Him, with its crowds of invalids seeking healing, and
fighting off the demands that would have rendered Him a
professional healer instead of a Teacher and preacher of the
Message of Truth, Jesus passed on to other parts of the
land, taking with Him the band of disciples and faithful
followers who now traveled with Him.
But He did not altogether relinquish His healing work. He
merely made it an incident of His ministry, and did not
allow it to interfere with His preaching and teaching. The
Gospel narratives show a number of remarkable cures made by
Him at this time, and the few recorded cases are, of course,
merely occasional incidents that stand out in the minds of
the people among hundreds of less noticeable cases.
The cure of the leper is one of such remarkable cases.
Leprosy was a foul disease much dreaded by the people of
Oriental countries. And the unfortunate person afflicted by
it became an outcast and pariah from whom all others fled as
from an unclean and impure thing.
There was a leper in the part of the country in which Jesus
was traveling and teaching. He heard of the wonderful gift
of healing
accredited to the young preacher, and he determined to get
into His presence and beg His aid. How the leper managed to
get through the crowds and into the presence of Jesus is not
known, but it must have required great strategy on his part,
for such people were not permitted to pass in and among
crowds of other people. But in some way the leper contrived
to come face to face with Jesus as the latter walked alone
in meditation, away from his followers.
The loathsome creature raised its repulsive form, the
picture of human misery and woe, and confronting the Master,
demanded from Him the exercise of the Gift of Healing. No
doubt of His power was in the leper's mind--his face shone
with faith and expectation. Jesus gazed earnestly into the
distorted features that shone with the fire of a fervent
faith such as is rarely seen on the face of man, and touched
with this testimony to His power and motives, He moved
toward the leper, defying the laws of the country, which
forbade the same. Not only this, but He even laid His hands
upon the unclean flesh, defying all the laws of reason in so
doing, and fearlessly passed His hand over the leper's face,
crying aloud, "Be thou clean!"
The leper felt a strange thrill running through his veins
and over his nerves, and every atom of his body seemed to be
tingling with a peculiar burning and smarting sensation.
Even as he looked he saw the color of his flesh changing and
taking on the hue of the flesh of the healthy person. The
numbness departed from the affected portion of his body, and
he could actually feel the thrill and tingle of the life
currents that were at work with incredible speed building up
new cells, tissue and muscle. And still Jesus held His hands
against the flesh of the leper, allowing the life current of
highly vitalized _prana_ to pour from His organism into that
of the leper, just as a storage battery of great power
replenishes and recharges an electrical appliance. And back
of it all was the most potent, trained Will of the Master
Occultist directing the work.
And then He bade the healed man depart and comply with the
laws regarding purification and change of garments,
including the
appearance before the priests to receive a certificate of
cleanliness. And He also bade him that nothing should be
said regarding the nature or particulars of the cure. For
some good reason He wished to escape the notoriety or fame
that the report of such a wonderful cure would be sure to
excite.
But alas! this was asking too much of human nature, and the
healed leper, running with great leaps and bounds, began
shouting and crying aloud the glad tidings of his marvelous
cure, that all men might know what a great blessing had come
to him. In spite of the injunction laid upon him, he began
to sing aloud the praises of the Master who had manifested
such an unheard-of power over the foul disease that had held
him in its grasp until a few hours before. With wild
gestures and gleaming eyes he told the story again and
again, and it was taken up and repeated from person to
person, until the whole town and countryside were familiar
with the great news. Imagine such an event occurring in a
small country town in our own land today, and you will
realize what an excitement must have been occasioned in that
home place of the leper.
And then occurred that which Jesus had doubtless seen when
He forbade the leper to repeat the news of the cure. The
whole region became excited and immense crowds gathered
around Him and His disciples, crying aloud for new wonders
and miracles. The curious sensation-seekers were there in
full force, crowding out those whom He wished to reach by
His teachings. And more than this, great numbers of sick and
crippled people crowded around Him crying for aid and cure.
The scenes of Capernaum were repeated. Even the lepers began
flocking in, in defiance of law and custom, and the
authorities were beside themselves with anger and annoyance.
Not only the temporal authorities and the priests were
arrayed against Him, as of old, but now He managed to arouse
the opposition of the physicians of those days, who saw
their practice ruined by this man whom they called a
charlatan and deceiver threatening and destroying the health
of the people, whose physical welfare was safe only in their
(the physicians') hands and keeping.
And so Jesus was compelled to close His ministry at this
place and move on to another village.
Another case which attracted much attention was that which
occurred in Galilee when He was preaching in a house. In the
midst of His discourse both He and His audience were
startled by the sight of a figure on a bed being lowered
down among the crowd of listeners from the roof surrounding
the open court in the center of the house. It was a poor
paralyzed man whom friends had contrived to hoist up and
then lower down before Jesus in such a manner as could not
escape the attention of the Master. It is related that the
piteous appeal of the sufferer, and the faith which had
inspired such great energy on the part of his friends,
attracted the interest and sympathy of Jesus, and He paused
in His discourse and made another of those instantaneous
cures which are possible only to the most advanced adepts in
the science of spiritual healing.
Then came the scene of the Wells of Bethesda--a region
abounding in "healing waters" to which the sick and
afflicted came to regain their health. The crowds of sick
were being carried to the springs by friends or paid
attendants, who pushed aside the weaker ones and fought
their way to the wells. Jesus walked among the crowds, and
at last His attention was attracted toward a poor fellow who
lay upon his cot away off from the waters. He had no friends
to carry him nearer, nor money for paid attendants. And he
had not strength enough to crawl there himself. He filled
the air with his moans and cries and bewailings of his
unfortunate lot. Jesus walked up to him, and holding his
attention by a firm look of authority and power, cried to
him suddenly in a voice that demanded obedience, "Take up
thy bed and walk!" The man, startled into obedience, did as
directed, and much to
his surprise, and that of the crowd gathered around, found
that he was able to move about freely--a well man.
This cure also aroused not only the greatest interest but
also the antagonism of the ecclesiastical authorities. It
appears that the cure had been made on the Sabbath day, and
that it was against the ecclesiastical law to heal the sick
in any way upon that day; and also that the patient had
performed manual work on the Sabbath in carrying his bed
upon the orders of the Healer. And the good pious folk,
urged on by the priests, began to abuse and condemn the
Healer and patient, after the manner of the formal pietists
of all lands and times, even of our own. Clinging to the
letter of the law, these people overlook its spirit--bound
by the forms, they fail to see the meaning lying back of all
forms and ceremonies.
Braving the storm that was arising around Him, Jesus boldly
walked to the Temple. He was plunged in a sea of conflicting
opinions and voices. On the one hand was the healed man and
those who sympathized with him, in earnest argument
concerning the righteousness of the deed. But arrayed
against these few were the good folk of the place who loudly
denounced the Sabbath-breaker and demanded His punishment.
Were the ancient laws of Moses to be thus defied by this
presumptuous
Nazarene, whose religious ideas were sadly lacking in
orthodoxy? Surely not! Punish the upstart! And again
Jesus was in actual peril of bodily hurt, or perhaps even
death, owing to the religious bigotry of the orthodox
people.
Jesus was ever a foe to the stupid formalism and ignorant
fanaticism regarding "holy days," which is ever a
characteristic of certain classes of mind among people. On
the above occasion, as well as upon other occasions, and
notably upon the occasion of the Sabbath when He directed
His hungry disciples to pick corn to satisfy their hunger,
Jesus opposed the strict, ironclad law of Sabbath
observance. He was ever filled with the idea that the
"Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath."
There was nothing Puritanical about the Master, and in view
of His attitude regarding this matter it is surprising to
witness the attitude of some in our own time who, wearing
His livery, oppose these teachings of His in theory and
practice.
And so, driven out once more by the intolerance and bigotry
of the public, Jesus returned again to Galilee, His land of
retreat and rest, and the scene of much of His best work.
Galilee was filled with His many followers and admirers, and
He was less in danger of disturbance and persecution there
than in the neighborhood of Jerusalem. Large congregations
attended His ministry there, and His converts were numbered
by the thousand. The village contained many persons healed
by His power, and His name was a household word.
And upon His return He entered into a new stage of His work.
He had decided to divide His ministry among His twelve most
advanced disciples, as it had now reached proportions beyond
His ability to personally control. And, as was customary to
Him upon all great occasions, He sought the solitudes for
meditation and spiritual strength before finally investing
His twelve Apostles with the high authority of their
mission. He spent the night on one of the hills near
Capernaum, from which He descended the following morning,
wearied in body from want of rest, but strong in soul and
spirit.
Then He gathered the Twelve around Him, and in a secret
meeting divulged to them certain deep truths and secrets,
adding certain instructions regarding healing work, and
calling upon them for the highest allegiance to Him and His
work.
The Gospel narratives have but very little to say regarding
Jesus' work in the instruction of the Twelve for their
future mission. And the average student of the narratives
goes on without thinking of the marvelous mental and
spiritual development that must have been manifested by the
Apostles during their transition from humble fishermen, and
men of similar vocations, to highly developed teachers of
advanced spiritual truths. To the occultist especially this
ordinary view seems astounding, for he realizes the many
arduous steps necessary to be trodden by the feet of the
Neophyte before he becomes an Initiate, and the higher steps
awaiting the Initiate before he may become a Master. And
such a one realizes the mighty task that Jesus performed in
developing and unfolding the spiritual natures of such a
body of men until they become worthy to be His chosen
representatives and teachers. The occult traditions have it
that Jesus had pursued a systematic course of instruction of
His chosen disciples, bringing
them up rapidly through degree after degree of mystic
attainment and occult knowledge, until finally they were
ready for the finishing touches at His hands. And the
occasion that we are now considering was the time when the
final degrees were imparted to them.
It must be remembered that the Apostles were endowed with
the mastery of the occult forces of nature which enabled
them to perform the "miracles" of healing similar to those
of Jesus. And it must not be supposed for a moment that an
occult Master of so high a degree of attainment as that
reached by Jesus would have allowed His disciples to use
such mighty power without also instructing them fully in the
nature of the forces they were using, and of the best
methods of employing the same. And such knowledge could not
be imparted without the fundamental truths of nature being
understood by them, which understanding was possible only to
those who had grasped the great Basic Truths of the Science
of Being.
In short, the traditions are that the Twelve Apostles were
gradually initiated into the great degrees of the Occult
Brotherhoods of which and in which Jesus was a Master. He
gathered together a great store of occult information and
mystic lore, and condensing the same into a plain,
practical, simple system, He imparted it fully and
thoroughly to those whom He had elected to be His chief
co-workers and His successors after His death, which He knew
full well was not far off.
These facts must be fully understood by the student of
Mystic Christianity who wishes to grasp the secret of the
early Christian
Church after the death of Christ. The wonderful headway
manifested by the movement could not have been given by mere
followers and believers in the Master. It usually follows
that when the great head of an organization dies the
movement disintegrates or loses power unless he has been
able to "communicate his spirit" to some chosen followers.
And this Jesus did. And it was only to men who thoroughly
grasped the fundamental truths and principles of His
teachings that such "spirit" could have been imparted.
There was an exoteric teaching for the multitude, and an
esoteric teaching for the Twelve. There are many Scriptural
passages which go to show this fact, which was well known to
the early Fathers of the Church. And upon the occasion which
we have mentioned the last great Basic Truths were explained
to the Twelve, and from that time henceforward they were
regarded and treated as Masters by Jesus, and not as mere
students, as had been the case before that time. And arising
from that final instruction came the Sermon of the Mount.
The Sermon of the Mount, that most wonderful and complete of
any of the public utterances of Jesus, was delivered almost
immediately after the Choosing of the Twelve Apostles. And
it was intended even more for them than for the multitudes
gathered around to hear His preaching. He knew that the
Twelve could interpret it by reason of the Inner Teachings
that they had received from Him. And almost forgetting the
congregation gathered around and about Him, He elucidated
the Inner teachings for the benefit of the Chosen Few.
The Sermon of the Mount can be understood only by means of
the Master Key of the Inner Teachings, which opens the door
of the mind to an understanding of the hard sayings and
veiled mystic import of many of His precepts. We shall
devote considerable space in one of our later lessons of
this series to a consideration of the Inner Meaning of this
great sermon and teaching, and therefore shall not go into
details regarding it in the present lesson, deeming it
better to proceed with the story of the Master's Work.
A few days after the delivery of the Sermon of the Mount,
the Master left Capernaum and traveled from town to town
visiting His various centers of teaching, as was His custom.
On the journey Jesus performed a feat of occult power that
proved Him to be one of the Highest Adepts of the Occult
Brotherhoods, for to none other would such a manifestation
have been possible. Even some of the highest Oriental
Masters would have refused to undertake the task that He set
before Himself to do.
The company was leisurely proceeding on its way, when
nearing a small town they met a funeral procession coming in
their direction. Preceded by the band of women chanting the
mournful dirges according to the Galileean custom, the
cortege slowly wended its way. The etiquette of the land
required strangers to join in the mourning when they came in
contact with a funeral procession, and the company assumed a
mournful and respectful demeanor, and many joined in the
dirge which was being
chanted by the procession.
But Jesus invaded the privacy of the procession in a manner
shocking to those who held closely to the familiar forms and
customs. Stepping up to the bier, He stood in front of it
and bade the carriers halt and set it down. A murmur of
indignation ran through the ranks of the mourners, and some
strode forward to rebuke the presumptuous stranger who dared
to violate the dignity of the funeral in this way. But
something in His face held them back. Then a strange feeling
passed over the crowd. Jesus was known to a number of the
mourners, and some of those who had witnessed some of His
wonder-workings began to whisper that strange things were
about to happen, and the ranks were broken as the people
flocked around the Master at the bier.
The corpse was that of a young man, and his widowed mother
stood beside the pale figure stretched upon the bier, and
spreading her arms in front of it, she seemed to ward off
the profaning touch of the strange man who confronted it.
But the stranger looked upon her with a look of transcendent
love, and in a voice vibrant with the tenderest feeling said
unto her, "Mother, weep not--cease thy mourning." Amazed,
but impressed, she turned an appealing gaze to Him who had
thus bidden her. Her mother love and instinct caught a new
expression in His eyes, and her heart bounded with a
wonderful hope of something, she knew not
what. What did the Nazarene mean? Her boy was dead, and even
God Himself never disturbed the slumber of the body from
which the spirit had flown. But still what meant that
expression--why that leap and throbbing of her heart?
Then with a gesture of authority the Master caused the crowd
to draw back from the bier, until at last there remained
only the corpse, the mother and Himself in a cleared space
in the center. Then a strange and wonderful scene began.
With His gaze fixed upon the face of the corpse, and in an
attitude that indicated a supreme effort of His will, the
Master was seen to be making some mighty effort which called
into play the highest forces at His command. The Apostles,
having been instructed by Him in Occult power, recognized
the nature of the manifestation, and their faces paled, for
they knew that He was not only pouring out His vital force
into the body in order to recharge it with _prana_, but that
He was also essaying one of the highest and most difficult
of occult feats--that of summoning back from the Astral
Plane the higher vehicles and the Astral Body--the very soul
of the youth--and forcing it once more into its mortal
frame, which He had recharged with vital energy and
strength. They knew that He, by the mightiest effort of His
will, was reversing the process of death. And with a full
appreciation of the real nature of the wonder that was being
worked before them, their limbs trembled beneath them and
their breath came from them in gasps.
Then cried the people, "What saith this man to the corpse?"
"Arise, youth! Open thine eyes! Breathe freely! Arise, I say
unto
thee--arise!" Did this stranger dare to defy God's own
decree?
The corpse opened its eyes and stared around in wild amaze,
the glare not fully faded away! Its chest heaved in great
agonizing gasps as if fighting again for life! Then its arms
were lifted up--then its legs began to move--now it raised
itself upright and began to babble meaningless words--now
the look of recognition came into its eyes, and its arms
clasped themselves around the mother's neck, while sob after
sob broke from its lips! The dead lived--the corpse had come
to life.
The people fell back overcome with the awful terror of the
sight, and the funeral procession scattered in all
directions, until only the sobbing mother and the youth
remained, weeping in their mutual love and joy, and
forgetting even the Master and His followers in their great
flood of affection.
And, leaving them thus, Jesus and His followers passed away
on their pilgrimage. But the fame of the miracle spread from
town to town, even up to the great capital, Jerusalem. And
men wondered or doubted, according to their natures, while
the temporal and ecclesiastical authorities began to again
ask themselves and each other whether this man were not a
dangerous person and an enemy to established custom and
order.
In one of His journeys Jesus found Himself invited to the
house of a leading citizen of the town in which He was
preaching. This citizen was one of the class known as
Pharisees, whose characteristics were an extreme devotion
and adherence to forms and ceremonies and a bigoted
insistence upon the observance of the letter of the law. The
Pharisees were the ultra-orthodox center of an orthodox
people. They were the straight-laced brethren who walked so
erect that they leaned backward. They were the people who
thanked God that they were not like unto other men. They
were the "uncommonly good" members of church and society.
The very name stands even unto this day as a synonym for
"pious sham."
Just why this Pharisee had invited the Master to dine with
him is not easily understood. It is likely that it was a
combination of curiosity and a desire to entrap his guest
into statements and admissions that might be used against
him. At any rate, the invitation was given and accepted.
The Master noted that certain little ceremonies usually
extended by the Hebrews to a guest of equal standing were
omitted by His host. His head was not anointed with the
ceremonial oil, as was the custom in houses of this
character when the guest was honored as an equal or
desirable addition to the family gathering. Clearly He was
regarded as a curiosity or "freak" rather than as a friend,
and had been invited in such a spirit. But He said nothing,
and passed over the slight. And the meal passed along
smoothly up to a certain point.
The host and his guests were reclining easily, after the
Oriental fashion, discussing various topics, when a woman
pressed her way into the banquet hall. Her dress proclaimed
her to be one of the women of easy virtue abounding in all
Oriental towns. She was clad in showy apparel and her hair
fell loosely over her shoulders after the custom of the
women of her kind in that land. She fixed her eyes upon the
Master and moved slowly toward him, much to the annoyance of
the host, who feared a scene, for the Master would most
likely administer a rebuke to the woman for presuming to
intrude upon the presence of Him, a spiritual teacher.
But the woman still pressed forward toward Him, and at last,
bending down low, her head touching His feet, she burst into
tears. She had heard the Master preach some time before, and
the seeds of His teaching had taken root and had now
blossomed within her heart; and she had come to acknowledge
her allegiance and to render an offering to Him whom she
revered. The coming into His presence was her token of a
spiritual regeneration and a desire to begin a new life. Her
tears flowed over His feet, and she dried them off with her
long hair. Then she kissed His feet, as a token of her
allegiance and worship.
From her neck hung a chain holding a little box filled with
precious perfumed oil, which she esteemed highly, as did all
the people of her race. The oil was of the nature of attar
of roses and was the essential oil extracted from fragrant
blossoms. She broke the seal and poured the fragrant oil
over the hands and feet of the Master, who rebuked her not,
but who accepted the tribute even from such a source. The
host began to indulge in thoughts not flattering to the
intelligence of his guest, and a scarcely concealed sneer
appeared on his lips.
Then Jesus turned to His host and with a smile said to him:
"Simon, in thy mind thou thinkest these words: 'If this man
be indeed a prophet, would he not know what manner of woman
this be who toucheth him, and would he not rebuke her and
drive her from him?'" And the Pharisee was sorely confused,
for the Master had read his thought word for word by the
method known to occultists as telepathy. And then in gentle
raillery the Master called his host's attention to the fact
that the woman had performed the service which he, the host,
had neglected to observe. Had she not bathed and dried His
feet, as the Pharisee would
have done had his guest been deemed worthy of honor? Had she
not anointed Him with precious oil, as the host would have
anointed an honored guest? Had she not impressed upon even
His feet the kiss that etiquette required the host to
impress upon the cheek of the esteemed visitor to his house?
And as for the character of the woman, it had been fully
recognized and forgiven. "Much hath been forgiven her, for
she hath loved greatly." And, turning to the woman, He
added, "Go in peace, for thy sins are forgiven thee." And
the woman departed with a new expression on her face and a
firm resolve in her heart, for the Master had forgiven and
blessed her.
But by this act Jesus brought upon His head the hatred of
the Pharisee and his friends. He had dared rebuke the host
in his own palace, and had moreover arrogated to Himself the
sacred rite to pronounce remission of sins, a right vested
solely in the high-priest of the Temple, upon the
performance of certain ceremonies and sacrifices upon the
altar. He had flung defiance at vested ecclesiastical right
and functions, even in the house of one of the staunchest
adherents of formalism and authority--a Pharisee.
In this incident was shown not only the broadness of Jesus'
views and the universality of His love, as well as His
courage in defying the hated formalism, even in the palace
of its stanchest advocates, but also His attitude toward
women. The Jews as a race held women in but scant esteem.
They were not deemed worthy to sit with the men in the
synagogue. It was deemed unworthy of a man to mention his
female relations in general company. They were regarded as
inferior in every way to men, and were treated as almost
unclean in their most sacred natural functions.
Toward fallen women especially Jesus was ever considerate.
He saw their temptation and the social cruelty of their
position. He resented "the double standard" of virtue which
allowed a man to commit certain offenses and still be
respected, while the woman who committed the same offense
was damned socially, reviled and treated as a shameful
outcast. He was ever ready to voice a defense for women of
this kind, and seemed to be ever actuated by the sense of
injustice in the attitude of men toward them, which finally
voiced itself on a notable occasion when called upon to pass
judgment upon the woman taken in adultery: "Let him among ye
who is without sin cast the first stone." No wonder that the
outcast woman kissed His feet and poured out the
precious ointment upon Him. He was the Friend to such as
she.