VIII. Man

[Ani]

VIII. MAN

 

Jesus therefore came out,

wearing the crown of thorns end

the purple garment.

And Pilate said unto them:

"Behold the man!"

 

Can people, when you go out in the world, say of you: "Behold the man!"
 
To be worthy of this name, one must possess four qualities: he must be rich, he must be strong, he must be wise, he must be good.
 
The rich man is only he who has a rich soul, a rich mind, a rich heart and a strong will. Only a man who serves God is, in the full sense of the word, rich.
 
The strong man is only the man of love, the man of truth. He who is strong is above all circumstances. I do not call strong the man who kills others. He is strong who turns his enemies into friends. For this reason he never defends himself. He does not fight for his rights. Only the weak man fights for his rights. And when the strong man, the hero, is nailed to the shameful cross because of Truth, he nobly endures the disgrace and the abuse, the malice and the accusation.
 
Behold the man! Behold Jesus!
 
In the original language in which that name was spoken, it means: the man who comes to earth, the brother of those who suffer. Therefore, in a broader sense, "Jesus" is everyone who suffers and who bears his suffering heroically. "Jesus" is every suffering human soul working out its salvation.
 
"Jesus" is one base of support to man. "Christ," the man who conquered and triumphed over death, who rose from the dead, who serves God and is ready to lay down his life for others, is the other base of support to man.
 
Man, like "Jesus",learns the profound meaning of suffering - the divine process by which he forms his character.
 
Man's most precious possession is his character. Man must necessarily pass through the fire of trials and only when he passes through that fire and endures his trials can he acquire a character which is valuable, steadfast, unflinching. Only then will he have an everlasting home where he can live.
 
Character, in the deepest sense of the word, is everything wise that the human spirit has inscribed and deeply engraved upon the human soul.
 
Character is a combination of virtues.
 
Remember one thing: the natural strength which can make man powerful is the strength of his virtues. Virtues are the great resources around which the powerful forces of Living Nature begin to circulate.
 
Therefore, "man" is understood to be the sum total of all virtues.
 
He who does not represent such a sum total of virtues cannot be called a real man.
 
Man of today has not yet attained the position of being a real man. The animal nature predominates more or less within him. The real man will be manifested from now on.
 
Man of today cannot, as yet, control himself. He still acts too brutally. All the crimes that man commits today are due to the animal nature within him. And he has to put forth much effort to free himself from the animal nature, to overcome it.
 
Man, however, is a combination of virtues and not of crimes.
 
Man, within himself, by his birth and by his nature, is something great.
 
God, by limiting Himself within Himself, created man. But with the creation of man, suffering appeared in the world, because where there is limitation there is also suffering.
 
Man is something great!
 
If you understood man, if you believed in him, not in his appearance, which manifests itself externally, you would see how great man is. Because what may be seen on the outside is only an expression of certain thoughts, feelings and deeds. Man is not what he is thought to be today. He is not simply a material being, who disappears with death. That which dies is not the man.
 
If man really did disappear with death, then what would be the use of so much philosophizing about him? In that case he would be only a thing, an object, an automaton which tomorrow would turn into dust. That man dies and disappears - this was the first lie introduced into the world.
 
There is something within man which does not die - neither in this world nor in the one beyond.
 
That which does not die, which does not decay, which does not disappear, that is man. It grows neither older nor younger.
 
When we speak of man, we mean the soul. If there is something divine in man, it is the radiant soul which thinks.
 
Take from man his intelligent, radiant soul, and he becomes an animal. He is not different from an animal - he eats, sleeps, and in short, has all the needs and weaknesses of an animal.
 
Man is a living soul, who has every potentiality for eternal, immortal life. This soul contains all capabilities, all procedures for work within itself, and it imparts them to the brain and to the whole body through which it manifests itself.
 
Therefore, we say: man possesses within himself every potentiality for an intelligent life. Man possesses within himself every potentiality for a life of Love. Man possesses within himself every potentiality for a life of Truth.
 
When man begins to realize all these capabilities, gradually he transforms himself; gradually he progresses from one condition into another. He climbs up step by step: from an ordinary man to a man of talent, then genius, after that a saint and at last a Master.
 
There are degrees of man. By the word "man" we mean not only the being who lives on earth.
 
Man exists not only on earth, not only in the solar system. He inhabits the whole starry universe - all the suns and planets. The planets and suns are inhabited by beings of various degrees of intelligence. It is of no importance what type of bodies they have. They are intelligent beings and belong to the same human race. This race develops gradually. Many human beings in the other systems are far more advanced than men on earth, because they emerged earlier from the Great Primary Source of life. Their wisdom is so great that the culture of people on earth, compared to that of Sirius, for instance, is still in its swaddling clothes. People of today, compared with the beings of Sirius, are not even children yet.
 
Man is an eternal wayfarer. Earth has never been and will never be his only abode.
 
Earthly man, after completing his development on earth, will not go to "heaven". He will travel from system to system in the physical universe until he develops to his fullness. The next station in man's development will be Sirius.
 
The human spirit came to earth about two hundred and fifty billion years ago. Then he was not at the stage in which he is now. During those two hundred and fifty billion years, he has passed through many forms and many phases of development.
 
And the almost endless order of organic forms which Nature has created expresses the phases through which the human spirit has passed. They are a great school in which man has studied.
 
All the knowledge man acquired during those two hundred and fifty billion years is inscribed in his small head, on his brain.
 
From the point of view of more advanced beings - for instance, from the point of view of the angels - man is still a small child. Those two hundred and fifty billion years are, to them, only like two and a half years. From their viewpoint, man is a child two and a half years old.
 
Man still has much to learn! Therefore, he has passed, and will continue to pass, through innumerable forms and stages of life.
 
People who have a small conception of life think that once man is born, everything is finished.
 
No, birth is an eternal, uninterrupted process.
 
Man is born countless times, passing from one phase of development to another.
 
Keep this in mind: the question of birth and rebirth is a subject for the enlightened human spirit, for the enlightened human soul, for the enlightened human mind - it is not a question for ordinary minds.
 
Man studies simultaneously in three schools. The body is tutored on earth. All the cells of the body perform a particular service, and at the same time they learn.
 
The soul is instructed in the spiritual world, and the spirit is instructed in the Divine world.
 
Therefore, man's ideal is to understand himself, to understand the angels who manifest themselves within him as bright and pure thoughts and at last to understand God, who is Love.
 
Because man is connected with the angels, who created thought, he is called a being of thought - "manas." The intellect is a gift to man from the angels. And that which distinguishes him from the animals, and which caused him to stand upright on two feet, is his intellect.
 
But I say unto you, man is more than one who thinks. The sublime in the world cannot be completely defined.
 
Remember: the first quality of the real man is love. Love is the divine in man. Without love man reverts to an animal. Without love he is subject only to sin and crime.
 
He who has not come to love God is not as yet a true man. He does not yet have the image and likeness of God.
 
Man today does not have the "image and likeness of God." And indeed he who can rob you, who can abuse you - is he a man? Is he a man who in the beginning is your friend and later slanders you?
 
Hence, when we speak of man as an image and likeness of God, we mean man in his primal manifestation, the so called Cosmic Man. Each man, each human soul, is a primal element of the great Cosmic Man.
 
As such he occupies a definite place in living Nature and plays his assigned role. Without him, the universe cannot manifest itself in the fullness of its harmony.
 
Therefore, every man here on earth has a definite role to play. Life cannot go on without him. The appearance of so many millions of souls in the world is not accidental.
 
Therefore, keep this thought constantly in mind:
 
Man is the greatest creation on earth.
 
Rejoice that you bear the name of man.
 
Strive to be worthy of that name!
 
Do not forget that as a spirit, as a soul, as a mind, as a heart - you are an important element in the universe: without you it cannot manifest itself in the fullness of its harmony.
 
You are still ignorant of what you are.
 
Within man are still dormant powers, and he must work to waken them and to use them correctly.
 
When man unites himself with God, all of the dormant powers and capabilities within him are awakened.
 
How can we know when a man is united with God? By his readiness to sacrifice everything for Him.
 
He who wishes to be worthy of the name of man must be absolutely honest, absolutely good, absolutely intelligent and wise, absolutely noble.
 
Only the man who can rejoice in the prosperity of others as in his own is honest and noble.
 
The true man never fights outwardly to restore his honor. He knows that, according to the great moral order of the world, honor is not restored from without.
 
No court, no society, no religion can restore the honor of man: only he himself can do this.
 
What distinguishes the reasoning man? He does not occupy himself with the past, nor with the future. He works in the present. By present, I mean the eternal Divine.
 
The reasoning man does not think about whatever occurs to his mind, but rather about what is right. Only the ignorant man thinks about whatever comes to his mind.
 
The reasoning man has a special disposition of soul. He thinks evil of no one. He thinks good of all people, and he never seeks revenge.
 
This is because he knows that man cannot be absolutely intelligent if he is not absolutely moral.
 
He knows that morality is a foundation, the base of support from which reason is projected into the world.
 
The reasoning man always relies on his own mind. He values it as a great gift given to him by the angels as a support for life. And he knows that only the true reasoning man can be free.
 
Reason, in the deepest sense of the word, is a quality of the saint, of the man of genius. Therefore, remember: only the virtuous man can be wise.
 
And all men of virtue are humble - in that sense in which Christ understands this word - and they are the greatest and strongest people.
 
In my opinion the greatest quality that a man can possess is humility. It is not a weakness.
 
The humble person is the most flexible, the most adaptable man in the world. He can endure everything - sickness and poverty and even death. In fact, none of these exist for the humble person - whatever happens, he is quiet and calm. He says: "God, who lives within me, does not die. God, who lives within me is not poor."
 
The weak, faint-hearted man is not humble. Only the virtuous man is humble. And he is the truly strong man. The humble person, in the true sense of the word, is a man with a mighty spirit.
 
You ask why you have come to earth. I reply:
 
To manifest Divine Love.
 
To manifest Divine Wisdom.
 
To manifest Divine Truth.
 
To manifest Divine Righteousness.
 
To manifest Divine Virtue.
 
You have come to manifest all these virtues, to manifest all that has been implanted in your souls from eternity.
 
And remember: great is the destiny of man.
 
Man is born to govern all beings, to regulate all elements, to organize the earth. He must become a good master. And he can become such a master only when he comprehends what God has implanted within him. He has to learn about his bodies, which are his garments. He has to learn about the primary matter in which his thought functions.
 
He must master all elements. He must master the earth, the air, the water, the heat, the light. He must control all "evil spirits." And he can control them only when he masters their weaknesses.
 
At the present time Christ needs the help of men who know how to build according to the rules of the divine science, men in whose minds the good of the "Kingdom of God"is uppermost.
 
The life of greatness requires men who have been "born anew," who have seen the "Kingdom of God."
 
Do not forget that he who wants to see the Kingdom of God must have pure eyes. Pure eyes imply a pure heart. A pure heart implies an enlightened mind. An enlightened mind implies a noble soul. A noble soul implies a loving spirit who has come forth from the Eternal God.
 
He who has been "born anew" is connected with all the higher worlds, with all the beings of the higher hierarchies.
 
He is as truthful as Truth itself, as wise as Wisdom itself, as loving as Love itself.
 
Of this man, of the man "born of God," it is written in the Scripture that he "commits no sin".
 
Indeed, he who is born of God has such love within his soul, such a great fountain of love pouring forth from him, that no contradictions exist for him.
 
Have you ever been in the presence of such a man to see what peace, what quietness, what joy reign in him?
 
The heart, the mind, the soul and the spirit of such a man are in full harmony with God.
 
Viewed deeply, such a man is a totality of many intelligent souls of genius.
 
The same applies to the great poets, musicians and painters. Thousands of intelligent souls of genius must be united so that a great poet, a great musician or a great painter may appear.
 
In this way, from a "son of thought," man becomes the "beloved son of Love."
 
Thus he becomes a Son of God.
 
The highest position a man can have in relation to God is to be a Son of God.
 
To be a Son of God, a servant to the Great Being who created all things means to feel the pulse of the whole universe, to see all of its beauty, to hear its magnificent harmony.
 
You, who aspire to become a Son of God, hold as your ideal:

 

A heart pure as crystal.

 

A mind bright as the sun.

 

A soul boundless as the universe.

 

A spirit mighty as God and one with God.