01:AriesWelcome. I am happy to invite you andwelcome you to the beginning of our courseon Gnostic Astrology. To begin, it is alwayshelpful to understand the context of ourstudies. As you know, we will be discussingthe science of Gnosis, and as many of youknow, this term gnosis is Greek and refersto knowledge. It is the root of many wordsthat we use in common, everydaylanguage, such as diagnosis. The termgnosis does not refer to a simpleintellectual form of knowledge or any kindof cultural or traditionally inheritedknowledge, but instead it refers to aperceptible, experiential form of knowledge,something that is individual, some thingthat is unique. Real Gnosis is nottheoretical: it is one's own experience, it isone's own reality, it is the truth.We all have Gnosis to some level, to somedegree, because we have some degree of consciousness, and in truth, Gnosis is theScience of Consciousness. To understandwhat Gnosis is, we must recognize what theconsciousness is, and to work with thescience of Gnosis is to work with one's own consciousness.From another point of view, we can say there are two doctrines that exist in the world: thedoctrine of the eye and the doctrine of the heart. The doctrine of the eye, related to the physical eye, is that collection of theories,collection of ideas, it is all the beliefs and traditions, all of the varying interpretations of spiritual knowledge. And as you know as an investigator of spirituality, the theories are asvaried as the human beings themselves, and one theory will contradict another, and it isdifficult to find any real truth.But in the doctrine of the heart we find the experiential knowledge, the doctrine of Gnosis, the doctrine that one grasps through one's own effort. This type of doctrine, thedoctrine of the heart, is not a cultural, it is not found in a book, it is not found in anyschool, nor in any religion. The doctrine of the heart exists within yourself, within yourown heart. Residing in the depths of your own heart is a spiritual flame, a spark, which inWestern traditions is called the Atom Nous. It is called an "atom" because of its relativesize, not because it is a physical atom. The Atom Nous is a sort of architect, a kind of intelligence that resides in the heart of every humanoid, and it is from this atom withinthe heart that the Doctrine of the Heart can be discovered and learned.When we approach the study of Gnosis, we have to bear in mind that if we limit ourselvesto merely a theoretical analysis we will never grasp it, we will never find it. We will findonly complication and contradiction, because theories always contradict other theories,and in this physical formation that people call "Gnosis" there are contradictions, but thosecontradictions are a matter of appearances: they are a matter that has to becomprehended in the consciousness. And the reason behind that is that the HeartDoctrine - or true Gnosis - is individualized as the Christ becomes individualized, as theKrestos, that Divine Intelligence, becomes individualized, and in that individualization theknowledge applies to the level of that aspirant, of that initiate. What is appropriate andgood for an aspirant or an initiate at a certain level has to be abandoned by one at a
higher level. Therefore, the one who limits his study to the intellect will perceive twocontradictory instructions that apply to two different levels of development, and they willenter into conflict. The synthesis or the answer to that is to discover Gnosis inside of oneself, for oneself.Gnosis demands exactly what the Buddha taught:As the wise test gold by burning, cutting and rubbing it, So, bhikshus, should you acceptmy words -- after testing them, and not merely out of respect. You have to live these teachings, you have to apply them in your moment to momentexistence, otherwise they have no purpose.We can say that Gnosis, this doctrine of the heart, is directed towards the expansion of our self-knowledge. To "know oneself" is to gather Gnosis of the truth of life and death of reality. This is not something to be taken lightly; the fact is that death awaits everyone of us. None of us know when the moment of our death will arrive; it could be today, it couldbe in the next matter of hours, and that comprehension, that recognition, is importantbecause it provides a foundation for us to manage our attention, to manage our will, tonot be distracted. Some traditions in the West have this phrase "Momento Morte,""remember death." The purpose behind that is to always be mindful of the presentmoment, and when we are mindful and present and observant of ourselves, we arestanding in the door of Gnosis.Gnosis as a Science and as an Art does not exist in the past, nor does it exist in thefuture. The only way to enter into and access Gnosis, or experiential knowledge, is in thepresent moment, and to do that, to acquire that, requires discipline, it requires effort, butmost of all it requires consciousness, to be conscious, to be attentive, to be aware. This refers to one of the foundational teachings in this doctrine of the heart, which saysthat there are two lines that exist in life. There is the horizontal line that moves from birththrough all the experiences we can have in life, to death. That line moves steadily inaccordance with our Karma, in accordance with our karmic values, positive and negative,which are within us. Most of humanity remains on this line in ignorance, in confusion, indarkness, and this is because there are in truth four levels, roughly speaking, to thecapacities of human consciousness.If you can imagine a building that has four floors, most human beings (what we call"human beings") live the entirety of their time within a physical body on the bottom twofloors and have no idea about the other two. The first level, the bottommost level, is what we commonly call "sleep," but in this casewe would say this really refers to the sleep of the physical body. And this state is when weneed to rest and we lie down; the physical body goes to sleep and the consciousnessleaves the physical body and we begin to dream. In our own experience as an individualperson, as one humanoid entity, what is our own experience of dreaming? This is a keyfactor of great importance in your life because it indicates your own conscious capacities.Most people do not remember their dreams or if they do, the dreams are very vague orsporadic and the ones they remember obscure, incoherent, and this is because theconsciousness is weak, conditioned, trapped. The second state of consciousness is what we call the "vigil state" and it is when ourphysical body is active, moving around, doing things, but, according to the heart doctrine,according to Gnosis, this is really just another level of sleep. And all of the great mastersand prophets, teachers have said so. Jesus repeatedly emphasized that we are asleep, sodid Buddha, so did Moses, so did Quetzlcoatl. All these great teachers point out to us thatour consciousness is asleep. We think we are awake and this is the problem. We believethat we are awake because we perceive and act and we think that is equivalent to beingawake, but it is not.
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