The Idea of a Spiritual University

Elemental Beings and Science: In my experience, the four undines Franz
Bardon mentions in The Practice of Magical Evocation are flirtatious,
inviting, and astonishingly empathic.  At the same time, as intelligent
beings dwelling within the water element, the undines reflect something of
the mystery of divine love and omnipresence.  Let me say something more
about the elemental beings. 
   When I watch the weather report and see the satellite radar and
computer generated animation of weather systems, I think to myself that
this is a approximation of the knowledge sylphs possess of the atmosphere.
The images on TV show three dimension real time and accelerated movements
of weather systems.  They show images in color and infrared.  Computer
models look into the future with real ingenuity.  Our knowledge of
meteorology is gradually invading the sylphs' realms of  faery and their
knowledge of the energies underlying nature.  
   Actually decades ago, the United States and Russia years ago signed a
treaty not to engage in weather control as a military activity.  Now why
sign a treaty unless there is a real concern about being able to control
weather electronically?  You understand that Thialand, Indonesia, and
other countries in the far east are experiencing a difficult situation due
to haze and smoke clouding the sky.  Several weeks ago a Russian company
offered a free demonstration of their ability to create tornadoes to help
drive away the smoke.  You might call this a peaceful application of
military technology developed during the cold war. 
    In a similar way, when it comes to salamanders, I watch numerous
documentaries on volcanos.  Some of the scientists are not just seeking a
better understanding of teutonic planes, volcanic activity, and so froth
with the intent to be able to warn others about eruptions.  There are a
few scientists whose fascination with fire borders on obsession.  They
enter craters to gather samples of lava in tin cans while hot lava is
splashing the ground around them.  One volcanologist, before he was killed
in an eruption, spoke of his dream taking a metal canoe out into a stream
of molten lava.  They act like they are apprenticed to a salamander like
Pyrhum or Orudu.  
   With gnomes like Mentifil and Orova, I think there is a clear overlap
between our science and a gnome's approach to chemistry and physics.
Clearly, it is our intent to know all there is to know about physical
matter and its components.  I think also we are ahead of gnomes when it
comes to astrophysics and the origins of the universe and the subatomic
particles which originated with the Big Bang.  I do not think gnomes are
aware that a trillion neutrinos pass through their bodies in every second.
We set up procedures for measuring these things.  In fact, if you glance
into Steven Hawkin's mental body, (try that sometime),  you will find he
has a holographic picture of the universe inside his mind.  He meditates
on and inside of black holes and quasars.  His mental images resonate with
the universe.
   But the mind of the theorist and scientist lacks a gnomes meditative
stance and concentration.  A gnome's senses perceive directly with
multiple levels of feedback the molecular, atomic, and subatomic
vibrations of matter.  In this regard, our scientists are not even in
kindergarten.  Except for a few exceptions like Steven Hawkins, they have
not learned to view matter from the point of view of mathematical physics
and also, at the same time, from the gnome's perspective of placing your
mind directly within the vibration of what you are considering.
    Still, I think we are weakest when it comes to the undine's mode of
perception.  When you touch the body of an undine, you can sense all the
oceans of the earth--the waves breaking on the shores of islands on the
other side of the planet, the silent calmness of the ocean trench, and the
thrilling trill of ice cracking inside a glacier at the North Pole.  But
this is not all. 
    The undine's skill in love is an empathy bordering on divine
omnipresence.  Their treasures are not the power of fire to change and to
transform, the gnomes ability to comprehend and to shape matter and to
construct the philosopher's stone, nor the sylphs understanding of the
winds, weather, and the mind that is luminous and clear.  No, the undines,
through sensitivity and feeling, reveal the deepest needs and longings of
the heart and visions of how they may be fulfilled.  It is my impression
that if you study art, poetry, religion, philosophy, literature, and
mythology, the voice of undines in human history has been nearly silent.
I intend to do a book sometime on the Bardon undines.  
    Besides the elemental beings I include on this web page, the other
spirits are from the earthzone.  They dwell within the realm of akasha
which elemental beings can not enter on their own initiative.  Akasha is a
state of awareness penetrating through space and time.  Beings who dwell
here do not need a form or body in order to exist.  They do not need to
use thoughts in order to think or to communicate.  They do not need an
astral body or the four elements on the astral plane in order to feel.
They are highly intuitive and their will is such they can, on their
initiative, manifest freely on the mental, astral, or physical planes.  
   The three hundred and sixty spirits of the earthzone mentioned by
Bardon each have their own commission and each exerts, on a daily basis,
an influence over our entire planet. But what is most amazing about them
and what is every magician's obligation to accomplish for himself--they
each have a direct and intuitive connection to Divine Providence.  The One
Light which shines through the universe is present within their hearts and
it shapes all that they do.  The degree of the planets in your natal chart
may indicate which spirits of the earthzone you have a close connection
with.
     I have begun to think of these spirits are professors in a spiritual
university.  If you have sent a child to college, you know something about
requirements and financial disclosure. Colleges these days in the United
States want a parent to declare, under threat of criminal prosecution,
his bank account balances and the date of house purchase and amount of
debt on it.  The want a complete and accurate copy of your federal tax
return with all the attachments.  
     In effect, colleges want to know all sources of income, total assets,
liabilities, trust funds, inheritances, and even the balance in your IRA
along with your retirement plans.  And they want to know who outside of
the immediate family might contribute to your child's education costs.  In
other words, colleges do not just look at a student and his
qualifications.  They look at who is offering him support and how much
they can contribute.  
     I would like to think a student is admitted based on his
qualifications but even so many students now come out of college with tens
of thousands of dollars of debt from college loans.  There is no doubt
about it. College education in the United States involves taking financial
risks in order to access greater opportunities. 
    In regard to the earthzone spirits, the equivalent of financial
support as well as education from elementary school through high school is
covered in Bardon's first book, Initiation into Hermetics.  In this book,
you work intensively on your physical, astral, and mental bodies.  You
learn to increase the vitality in any part of your body as well as
strengthen your health.  You are introduced to the four elements and learn
how to accumulate and dissolve them at will.  And you develop your mind.
You learn to concentrate on any and all of the five senses.  You learn to
control and also to stop thoughts.  
    Towards the end of the first book, you apply your concentration to a
greater extent in bringing about changes in your life.  Depending on your
skill, the mind is able to impress on the energy it has created a thought
or picture which then accelerates or actually manifests a specific change
you wish to bring about.  Energy is like money.  Controlling energy takes
a highly trained mind.  If you add to these things experience, then you
get a magician. 
    Following my analogy, the level of training in Bardon's first book is
high school.  You have met the requirements necessary to go to college or,
in this case, to work with the spirits on the inner planes.  Each of the
earthzone spirits, however, sets forth its own course requirements.   Each
examines your academic (that is, your magical training) as well as your
extracurricular activities.  Your record tells them something about your
character.  What they will share with you depends on your qualifications
and motivation.  Each evocation is, in a sense, an oral examine with a
dean of admissions and the chairmen of a department in the college of
universal wisdom: 
    Do you have a brilliant mind but a low level of emotional integration?
Have you demonstrated mastery of a particular religious, cultural, or
magical system of training but remain deficient in originality and lack
genuine curiosity?  Are you obsessed with theories and esoteric histories
or are you motivated by wonder and beauty?  Do you desire honor and
recognition so that you hoard as a competitive advantage the knowledge you
now possess?  Or, do you have initiative, independence, and can you
determine for yourself your own direction free of craving for attention?
Are you after something for nothing and want to avoid paying your karmic
debts or have you demonstrated leadership and shown you can handle
responsibility?  These questions relate to how comfortable you will be
when it comes to entering akasha and working with the earthzone spirits. 
   Now any good high school in the United States offers advanced placement
classes.  These are usually in physics, chemistry, English, and calculus.
Doing well in these classes enables you to get credit for college level
classes even though you are still in high school.  Working with elemental
beings--sylphs, undines, gnomes, and salamanders--is like taking an
advanced placement class.  Franz Bardon lists the sigils for and describes
briefly twenty-four of the most powerful elemental beings on earth.  .  
   Elemental beings specialize in nature and the energies of the astral
and etheric planes.  They also possess incredible levels of concentration
relating to their specific elements.  Nature conceals a path that leads
between matter and spirit.  As magicians, we provide the astral and
etheric energies which our ideals require in order to manifest in our
world.  The elemental beings, in this sense, are guardians of treasures
from another evolution who wait for us to learn their secrets.   Very few
religions initiate their practitioners into methods for working with the
elemental beings.  Very few religions or spiritual training systems bother
to teach you exercises which develop equally your physical, astral, and
mental bodies so they take on universal qualities. 
      Now as a high school student, I can also walk into Standford
University or the University of Michigan and sit down in a classroom.  As
long as I roughly resemble a student no one will bother me.  I can listen
to lectures given by some of the brightest professors in the world.  They
are great poets, physicists, psychologists, and literary critics.  Most of
them do no care if a curious high school student is there or not.  Their
job is to teach.  
   One famous philosopher at the University of Chicago knew I was not a
student at his university but told his teaching assistant that it was ok
for me to sit in as many of his classes as I wanted.  I sat in all of his
classes for two years. What did Paul Ricoeur care?  Wisdom for him is like
the air.  It is no one's possession. 
    The same is true of the earthzone spirits.  You can see them, feel
their aura, and talk to them without having completed the basic training.
It is not a big deal.  Their primary job is to teach and they love
enthusiasm in a student.  Like any teacher, their greatest hope is that
one day they will be permitted the honor of guiding another to learn all
that they know.   They would bestow on others all the power they possess
because, being inspired, they would give freely even as power and wisdom
has been freely given to them.  Still, if you want to do real work and not
just satisfy your curiosity, it helps to master the basics so your
exposure to the curriculum leads to professional work and creative
activity.
   It is my genuine hope that one day a great many of the spirits of the
earthzone will be known by and become the personal guides of our
diplomats, scientists, businessmen, medical doctors, philosophers,
psychologists, and poets/artists/musicians.  It is my desire that beauty,
wonder, and the sacred might inspire every heart and that love might be
known through direct experience to be without beginning or end.  There is
a great price to be paid for such a vision--one life time of commitment is
not enough.  Opening the gates to the earthzone so universal and cosmic
wisdom might be freely shared on earth is not the work of one individual
but of an entire community of magicians who serve not themselves but
Divine Providence.