White Dragon

“Compared with what we ought to be, we are only half awake. We are making use of only a small part of our mental and physical resources. Stating the thing broadly, the human individual thus lives usually far within his limits; he possesses powers of various sorts which he habitually fails to use” – William James

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According to Glorian, the publisher of Samael An Weor’s books. The term consciousness is derived primarily from the Latin word conscius, “knowing, aware.” Thus, consciousness is the basic factor of perception and understanding. Consciousness exists in every level of nature. Any given atom, any given particle, has three aspects: matter, energy, consciousness.

From that point of view we understand that all of nature is alive. All of nature has consciousness, but in levels. Samael Aun Weor stated in his book The Perfect Matrimony, “that there are three types of consciousness. First, simple consciousness, second, individual self-consciousness, and third, cosmic consciousness. The animals have the first, the intellectual animal called a human being, the second. The gods have the third.” Furthermore, in his book The Great Rebellion he stated that “Light and consciousness are two aspects of the same thing. Where there is light, there is consciousness.” (White Dragon Consciousness).

Shifting focus here, we will come back to Weor’s teachings momentarily. In his book Lectures on Ancient Philosophy Manly P. Hall had the following to say in chapter three tilted Illumined Mind, The Universal Savior.

Man’s status in cosmos is determined, by the quality of his thinking. Quality, as applied to mental processes, is not necessarily intensity but rather refinement and delicacy. The trained scientist may reach a very high degree of intellectuality. Yet he may lack that beautifying element which is indispensable to true understanding. Unless the inner nature transcends the limitations of both the flesh and the mind, the self can never attain to a full measure of expression.

Whether a man be a beast or a god does not depend upon his outward appearance. But rather upon the clarity of his inner perceptions. Many of the most respected citizens of every community are actually ravaging beasts concealing their primitive instincts under a thin veer of culture. On the other hand, some whom the world regards as failures posses an innate beauty which elevates them far above the level of their fellows.

The gods may be defined as those in whom the state of knowing has reached a degree of relative perfection. And beasts those creatures in whom the state of knowing is asleep. Between these two extremes is man. Who wanders about in a state of partial knowing, united to the bestial creation by his ignorance and to the higher orders of divinities by his dawning rationality.

Between the states of knowing and not-knowing the Greeks postulated the middle distance. A point where consciousness and unconsciousness are blended in semi-consciousness. Between the light of spirit above and the darkness of matter below there is the twilight zone which is the proper sphere of mind and where creatures endowed with minds seek to read the book of their destiny by the all-too-insufficient light.

In the secret teachings it is written that mind itself is the Savior-God. Mind is the martyr of the ages, the eternal and universal Prometheus sacrificed upon the alter of human necessity. Mind is the willing sufferer upon the tree. Mind must destroy itself so that which is greater than mind may endure.

According to the Mysteries, there comes that time in the quest of consciousness when man discovers the mind to be the slayer of the Real. Then as he sloughs off his evil nature. He must slough off his mind that his consciousness may be disintangled from the infinite complex of the mental web. The mind is incapable of ascending to the state of consciousness.

The mind can never completely annihilate the sense of separateness. For it depends upon comparison for its function and differentiation for its very existence. Consequently, though the mind is ever the link between consciousness and unconsciousness. It too must be ultimately be sacrificed in order that the Great Work be accomplished.

By the death of the mind consciousness is released to complete perfection. But woe unto him who slays the mind without that understanding which must be given out of the Mysteries. The mind must not die until its won. Work has been completed and its function has reached the highest possible degree of perfection.

As the mind increases in power and rationality, it grows gradually to realize that there is something beyond thought. The mind is capable of realizing this power but is never able actually to contact it. There is a super-mental state which is synonymous to a certain extent with the casual sphere.

The Buddhist sees consciousness as a universal sea. Consciousness is therefore something that is moved only by a divine ebb and flow, by realization of self. This universal, all-penetrating sea is the true substance of everything, for consciousness (or self) was before the beginning and consciousness (or Self) is after the end.

Beginning and the End are illusions, but self is eternal. Consciousness is therefore union with self. Consciousness knows no separateness. (White Dragon Consciousness). As long as me and thee exist, consciousness is not perfected. Life and death, good and evil, light and shadow – these are the illusions of mind. But in consciousness diversity is totally annihilated and all things are one in reality and in essence.

The bond of brotherhood is proved by the mind to be good, but the realization of brotherhood is not consciousness. The bond of friendship is demonstrated by the intellect to be necessary, but friendship is less than consciousness. There is no consciousness until the “I” in each is one and indivisible from the “I” in all.

Until we are everything that we in our ignorance believe surrounds us, there is no complete consciousness. We may study the star intellectually, but we have never attained consciousness until we are the star, the stone, the heavens, and the earth.

When our consciousness is perfect we extend from the heights of height to the depths of depth; we permeate the whole nature of existence; we are in everything, we are through everything, we are the whole nature of everything.

The difference between intellect and consciousness is therefore the difference between a mental concept of an object and an actual mingling of our consciousness with the consciousness of the object itself. This latter state is realization. The intellectual concept, however, must to a certain degree precede the consciousness.

As the mind is higher than the body, and the body must ultimately accept the thinking organism as its master, so consciousness is higher than mind, and the mind must ultimately give way to it. The mind is a bridge connecting consciousness and unconsciousness, but having crossed the bridge, it is left behind, its usefulness past.

As a bridge, however, the mind is a vital necessity. He who depreciates it is as false as he who permits himself to become the servant of its whims. The Buddhist priest entering into Nirvana, and the Brahman bridging the chasm between mortal consciousness and samadhi. Both cast aside mind as a snare and a delusion. Yet without it the very principles upon which they work would be incomprehensible to them.

The Eastern mind, endeavoring to annihilate the unreal and mingle itself with the Real, depends first upon the intellect to reveal the processes of illumination (White Dragon Consciousness is illumination) and the reasonableness of their abstract conceptions.

The Western schools of philosophy differ from the Eastern in that they teach the perfection of the mind before its rejection, whereas the Eastern schools are prone to regard the mind as a hindrance, to be discarded at the very beginning of spiritual growth.

Thus the Eastern mystic with his own nature slays the mind, while the Western philosopher, by elevating the mind to a realization of its own insufficiency, causes the intellect voluntarily to offer itself as a willing sacrifice upon the alter spirit.

The ability to feel with rather than for is the essential difference between consciousness and emotion. When we feel for things we are emotionally moved. Pity, sympathy, and kindred feeling stir us. Yet they seldom give any definite impulse that is of value in the adjustment of any chain of circumstances.

When we feel with things we are so much a part of them that we understand the innermost elements of their being. Thus understanding comes with consciousness, and knowledge with intellectual comprehension.

According to the ancient doctrines, perfect consciousness – the ability to feel with everything as part of everything – was regarded as the ultimate state of so-called human unfoldment, and he who had achieved this had attained to godhood in his own right. The gods are simply emblematic of varying degrees of consciousness in that vast interval between ignorance and realization.

At present humanity is semi-conscious – conscious over the area of the known and unconscious over the area of the unknown. We have reached a degree of consciousness that enables us to study the exoteric, or outer constitution of things. We will never know the urges, however, that cause the diversified phenomena of existence until we are united with the inner nature that animates the outer body.

Consciousness is gauged, therefore, by our ability to unite ourselves with the soul urges of those creatures that surround us. True greatness is measured by the power to come en rapport with the causes of objective manifestation.

“If you are absolutely without mind, just pure consciousness, time stops completely, disappears, leaving no trace behind” – Osho

In his introduction to book one of G.R.S Mead’s Echoes from the Gnosis, The Gnosis of the Mind, Stephan A. Hoeller stated the following. Consciousness (nous, as it was often called in Greek) might be envisioned in Hermetic terms as the psychological link joining the personal soul (psyche) with the ontological and transcendental Self (pneuma, or spirit).

Mead tells that the Religion of the Mind addresses itself to this highest consciousness in the human being. Which is identical in its essence with the ultimate consciousness, or spirit – the One of many names, the One who is All and Nothing. We can detect a similarity here with Hindu teaching declaring the atman (individual spirit) to be identical in essence with the Brahman (universal deity).

By aspiring and attaining to this union of individual and universal consciousness. The Hermetic Gnostic reaches a state where divine knowledge enters his being through body, soul, and mind and where the ineffable teacher instructs the disciple through all the incidents of life.

Hermes, the archetypal guide and teacher, is the Logos, the articulated thought of the divine Mind, by whose instruction human beings have been guided and illuminated throughout history. The key concept and term within this process of enlightenment is Gnosis. Gnosis cannot be achieved till the white dragon consciousness is activated.

Mead correctly identifies the experience of Gnosis as knowledge. But not of the discursive or intellectual kind, which he disdainfully refers to as a “noise of words.” Gnosis has nothing to do with mundane knowledge, relating to he data of the physical sciences and cosmology as well as to the theories of philosophy and the ideologies of politics.

Gnosis has to do with extraordinary rather than ordinary knowledge. The knowledge that Hermeticists as well as Gnostics sought has nothing to do with an accumulation of information or data. The Greeks distinguished between theoretical or factual knowledge on the one hand and knowledge gained through direct experience on the other. The latter is Gnosis, and typically a person oriented to this knowledge is a Gnostic.

Elaine Pagles, in her book The Gnostic Gospels, indicates that one could translate Gnosis as “insight,” for by this term is meant an intuitive process that encompasses both self-knowledge and knowledge of transcendental, divine realities. Mead was well aware of the saying attributed to Thoth (Hermes): “He who knows himself knows the All.”

One of Mead’s useful recognitions is that Gnosis involved the unification of opposites within human nature, which he refers to as the Sacred Marriage. After his time, it was not until the discovery and translation of the Nag Hammadi Gnostic treaties – particularly the twenty-second Logion of the Gospel of Thomas – that this truth was publicized. No doubt it was recognitions of this sort that made our author exclaim with fervor: “There is no Christian Gnosis and Trismegistic Gnosis; there is but one Gnosis.”

In his Gnosis and Its Echoes section of G.R.S Mead’s Echoes from the Gnosis, Stephan A. Hoeller further stated. Perhaps one of the most significant implications of Gnosis is that to know oneself, at the most intense and profound level, is simultaneously to know the Divine. Human Gnosis and Divine Gnosis are thus closely related. What Gnosis truly is we may only know if we have partaken of its extraordinary state of consciousness.

Modern writers have at times come close to indicating what this experience might be like. Harold Bloom in his work Omens of Millennium indicates that Gnosis is available to people today. He writes that it is a varied phenomenon that may come to us under various conditions, in solitude or in company, by gazing outward or by turning inward. In either case, consciousness is significantly altered, thus transporting the knower to hitherto unknown realities.

Another contemporary writer, Dan Merkur, who has devoted much research to extraordinary states of consciousness, suggest that in Gnosis two interrelated experiences are involved. One of these experiences is primarily visionary, manifest in imagery that often has a relationship to the psychic constitution of the person having the experience.

The other form of the experience, says Merkur, is of the nature of Mystical union, and is characterized by intense feelings and expansions of consciousness.

In his G.R.S. Mead and the Gnosis section of Echoes from the Gnosis, Robert A. Gilbert stated that Gnosis, however is a deceptively simple word. In its essence it means simply “knowledge”; but what kind of knowledge? It does not refer to the accumulation of facts by means of observation, experiment, and deduction, for it is not concerned at all with the empirical world.

For the Greek philosophers, Gnosis was a “higher knowledge,” a “deeper wisdom,” acquired not by sense experience but by inner illumination. The followers of the Mystery religions and of the Christian sects labeled Gnostic saw it in a subtly different light; for them Gnosis was a secret knowledge of the way in which the true believer can attain salvation.

Such knowledge comprised both a revelation, giving an immediate vision of truth, and an interpretation of the vision, leading it himself from an earlier teacher as part of ancient and secret tradition.

For Mead, the basic nature of Gnosis was spiritual science or wisdom, the lack of which was spiritual ignorance, “the root of all bondage with which man is bound”. However, it is in the nature of human beings to seek escape from such ignorance. Always they are seeking the way eternal, and it is this quest that distinguishes mankind from the rest of creation. Mead wrote:

“That quest is final and complete; when found it is the beginning and end of all things for man. It pertains to the depths and not to the surfaces of things, to life and not to death, to the eternal and not to the temporal.

No matter what route of research is traversed, no matter how many steps along the innumerous paths of the ever becoming, the final result is in no way affected; for it is something “more” something “greater,” something “other” than the product or total of any series.

This one quest is the search or call of the soul for That alone which can completely satisfy the whole man, and make him self-initiative and self-creative”.

“He who is coming unto himself, who from the unconscious and the dead is beginning to return to consciousness and rise into life, self-consecrates his every act for ever deeper realization of the mystery of his divine nature” – G.R.S Mead

Samael Aun Weor in his book The Perfect Matrimony listed the four states of consciousness. The first state of consciousness is called Eikasia. The second state of consciousness is Pistis. The third state of consciousness is Dianoia. The fourth state of consciousness is Nous (Gnosis).

Eikasia is ignorance, human cruelty, barbarism, exceedingly profound sleep, a brutal and instinctive world, an infrahuman state.

Pistis is the world of opinions and beliefs. Pistis is belief, prejudices, sectarianism, fanaticism, theories in which there is no type of direct perception of the truth. It is that level of consciousness of the common humanity.

Dianoia is the intellectual revision of beliefs, analysis, conceptual synthesis, cultural-intellectual consciousness, scientific thought etc. Dianoetic thought studies phenomena and establishes laws. Dianoetic thought studies the inductive and deductive systems with the purpose of using them profoundly and clealy.

Nous is perfect awakened consciousness. Nous is the state of Turiya: profound perfect inner illumination. It is legitimate objective clairvoyance. It is intuition. Nous is the world of the divine archetypes. Noetic thought is synthetic, clear, objective, illuminated.

Whosoever reaches the heights of Noetic thought totally awakens consciousness and becomes a Turiya. The lowest part of man is irrational and subjective and is related with the five ordinary senses.

The highest part of man is the World of Intuition and objective spiritual consciousness. In the World of Intuition, the archetypes of all things in nature develop.

Only those who have penetrated into the World of Objective Intuition, only those who have reached the solemn heights of Noetic thought, are truly awakened and illuminated.

A true Turiya cannot dream. The Turiya who has reached the heights of Noetic thought never goes about saying so, never presumes to be wise; he is extremely simple and humble, pure and perfect.

It is necessary to know that a Turiya is neither a medium, nor a pseudo-clairvoyant, nor a pseudo-mystic, unlike those who nowadays abound like weeds in all schools of spiritual, hermetic, occultist studies, etc.

The state of Turiya is most sublime and is only reached by those who work in the flaming forge of Vulcan all of their lives. Only the Kundalini can elevate us to the state of Turiya.

Supra-consciousness Weor states, is an attribute of the Innermost (the spirit). The faculty of supra-consciousness is intuition. It becomes necessary to compel our supra-consciousness to work for intuition to become powerful.

Let us remember that an organ that is not used becomes atrophied. The intuition of people who do not work with their supra-consciousness is atrophied. Polyvoyance is intuitive clairvoyance. It is divine omniscience.

This eye is found in the pineal gland. The lotus of a thousand petals resides there. Supra-consciousness resides there. The pineal gland is located in the upper part of the brain.

Whosoever wants the development of the supra-consciousness must practice internal meditation. You must concentrate on the Kundalini who resides in the depths of your being. Meditate daily. With meditation you will develop supra-consciousness.

Furthermore, Samael Aun Weor stated in his book The Great Rebellion, when we come into this world, all of us have three percent of our consciousness free. The other ninety-seven percent is divided into the subconsciousness, the infraconsciousness, and the unconsciousness.

It is not possible to increase consciousness by exclusively physical or mechanical procedures. Undoubtedly, the consciousness can only awaken through conscious work and voluntary suffering.

Within us there are various types of energy that we must understand: First, mechanical energy; Second, vital energy; Third, energy of the psyche; Fourth, mental energy; Fifth, energy of the will; Sixth, energy of consciousness; Seventh, energy of pure spirit.

No matter how much we might increase our strictly mechanical energy, we will never awaken consciousness. No matter how much we might increase the vital forces within our own organism, we will never awaken consciousness. Many psychological processes take place within us without any intervention from the consciousness.

However great the disciplines of the mind might be, mental energy can never achieve the awakening of the diverse functions of the consciousness. Even if our willpower is multiplied infinitely, it can never bring about the awakening of the consciousness.

All these types of energy are graded into different levels and dimensions, which have nothing to do with the consciousness.

Consciousness can only be awakened through conscious work and upright efforts.

The minute percentage of consciousness that humanity possesses – instead of being increased – is usually wasted in life in a futile manner.

It is obvious that when we identify with all the events of our existence we are pointlessly squandering the energy of the consciousness.

We must view life as a film, without identifying ourselves with any comedy, drama, or tragedy, thus saving energy of the consciousness.

Consciousness itself is a type of energy with a very high frequency vibration.

We must not confuse consciousness with memory, which are as different from each other as are the headlights of a car from the road upon which we drive.

Many actions take place within us with no participation whatsoever of that which is called consciousness. Many adjustments and readjustments take place within our organism without the participation of the consciousness.

Consciousness is the light that the unconscious does not perceive.

We need to open ourselves so that the light consciousness can penetrate the terrible darkness of the me, myself, the “I”.

Now we can better understand the meaning of John’s words when he said in the Gospel:

“And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not.” – John 1:5

But it would be impossible for the light of consciousness to penetrate within the darkness of the me, the myself if we have not previously used the marvelous sense of psychological self-observation.

We need to clear a path for the light to illuminate the terrible depths of the psychological “I”. We would never observe ourselves if we were not interested in changing. To be interested in changing is possible only when we truly love esoteric teachings.

Awakened consciousness allows us to experience reality directly.

Unfortunately, the intellectual animal called human being- fascinated by the formulating power of dialectical logic, has forgotten about the dialectic of the consciousness. Unquestionably, the power to formulate logical concepts certainly becomes terribly poor.

From thesis we go on to antithesis, and through discussion to synthesis, but the latter remains in itself an intellectual concept that can never coincide with reality.

The dialectic of consciousness is more direct, permitting us to experience the reality of any phenomenon in and of itself. Natural phenomena never coincide exactly with concepts formulated by the mind.

When we try to infer concepts on observing this or that natural phenomenon, we in fact stop perceiving the reality of the phenomena. We only see in that phenomena the reflection of theories and stale concepts that have nothing at all to with observed fact.

Intellectual delusion is fascinating and we want to force all natural phenomena to coincide with our dialectical logic.

The dialectic of consciousness is based on true life experiences and not on mere subjective rationalism.

All of nature’s laws exist within us, and if we do not discover them within, we will never discover them without. The human being is contained in the universe, and the universe is contained in the human being.

That which we experience within us is real. Only the consciousness can experience realtiy.

The language of the consciousness is symbolic, intimate, and profoundly significant. Only those who are awakened can understand.

Those who want to awaken consciousness must eliminate from within themselves all the undesirable elements that constitute the ego – the “I,” the me, myself – within which the Essence is trapped.

In conclusion, from our direct experience on this path, we believe there are multiple requirements to activate the white dragon consciousness. Everything we are presenting as the serpent’s way must be incorporated into one’s life. Internal cultivation is a must. One must put the needs of the soul before both the flesh and the mind. Daily mediation must be practiced as many times per day as one’s time will warrant. Morning and evening mediation is preferable. One must quiet the mind and bring death to the ego. The most powerful way to disintegrate the ego along with it’s multiple “I’s” leaving within us is by the power of kundalini awakening. As Samael Aun Weor stated, only she can reduce the ego and all of it’s personality defects to ashes.

“If you want to attain the Tao (pure consciousness), you must train and discipline yourself. You must be steadfast like stone and iron, and you must not waiver. Do not crave riches. Do not crave sexual pleasure. You must not be daunted by threats and fear. Your will must be centered, or you will abandon the path along the way. You must isolate your body from fame, fortune, possessive love, liquor, sexual pleasure, and emotions. You must cut them off with a sharp knife. You must cultivate yourself within. Then you receive the Tao” – Eva Wong

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