GLIMPSES OF TRUTH PART TWO is INITIATION
James Wyly
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vPoo2JSjUmE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7nCz-M9IRqM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iefEwScI67w&t=11s
there began an intense, almost unbearable
itching and in the very center of my solar
INITIATION
"Why is this knowledge
so carefully concealed?"
"'What leads you to ask
this question?'
"Certain things which
I had the opportunity
of learning in the
course of my acquaintance
with occult literature.
"'As far as I can judge,'
said Mr Gurdjieff, 'you
are refering to the question
of so-called "INITIATION."
Yes, or no?' I replied in
the affirmative, and Mr
Gurdjieff went on:
"'Yes. The fact of the
matter is that in occult
literature much that has
been said is superfluous
and untrue. You had better
forget all this. All your
researches in this area
were a good exercise for
your mind: therein lies
their great value, but
only there. They have
not given you knowledge,
as you yourself confessed.
Judge everything from the
point of view of your
common sense. Become
the possessor of your
own sound ideas, and don't
accept anything on faith;
and when you, yourself, by
way of sound reasoning and
argument, come to an
unshakable persuasion,
to a full understanding
of something, you will have
achieved a certain degree
of initiation. Think it
over more deeply . . .
For instance, today I
had a conversation with
you. Remember this
conversation. Think,
and you will agree with
me that in essence I have
told you nothing new. You
knew it all before. THE ONLY
THING I DID WAS TO BRING ORDER
INTO YOUR KNOWLEDGE. I
systematized it, but you
had it before you saw me.
You owe it to the efforts
you had already made in this
field. It was easy for me to
speak to you, thanks to him'--
and he pointed to Mr A--'because
he had learned to understand me,
and because he knew you. From
his account, I knew you and
your knowledge, as well as
how it was obtained, before
you came to me. But in spite
of all these favorable conditions,
I may confidently say that you
have not mastered even a
hundredth part of what I
said. However, I have
given you a clue
pointing to the
possibility of
a new point of
view, from which
you can illuminate
and bring together
your former knowledge.
And thanks to this work,
to your own work, you will
be able to reach a much
deeper understanding of
what I have said. You
will "initiate"
yourself.
"'In a year's time we may
say the same things, but
you will not wait during
this year in the hope
that roast pigeons will
fly into your mouth. You
will work, and your understanding
will change--you will be more
"initiated." It is impossible
to give a man anything that
could become his inalienable
property without work on his
part. Such an initiation cannot
exist, BUT UNFORTUNATELY PEOPLE
OFTEN THINK SO. There is only
"SELF-INITIATION." One can
show and direct, but not
"initiate." The things
which you came across
in occult literature
with regard to this
question had been
written by people
who had lost the key
to what they transmitted
on, without any verification,
from the words of others.
"'Every medal has its reverse.
The study of occultism offers
much, as training for the mind,
but often, unfortunately very
often, people infected with
the POISON OF MYSTERY, and
aiming at practical results,
but not possessing a full
knowledge of what must be
done or how, do themselves
irreparable harm. Harmony
is violated. It is a hundred
times better not to do anything
than to act without knowledge.
You said that knowledge is
concealed. That is not so.
IT IS NOT CONCEALED, BUT
PEOPLE ARE INCAPABLE OF
UNDERSTANDING IT. If you
begin a conversation about
higher mathematical ideas with
a man who did not know mathematics,
what good would it be? He simply
would not understand you. And
here the matter is more
complicated. I personally
should be very glad if I could
speak now to somebody, without
trying to adapt myself to his
understanding, on those subjects
which are of interest to me. But
if I began to speak to YOU in this
way, for instance, you would take
me for a madman or worse.
"'People have too few words with
which to express certain ideas. But
THERE, where words do not matter,
but their source and the meaning
behind them, it should be possible
to speak simply. In the absence of
understanding it is impossible. You
had the opportunity of proving this
to yourself today. I should not speak
to another person in the same way that
I spoke to you, because he would not
understand me. You have initiated
yourself already to a certain
degree. And before speaking
one must know and see how
much the man understands.
Understanding comes only
with work.
"'So what you call 'concealment'
is in fact the impossibility of
giving, otherwise everything
would be quite different. If,
in spite of this, those who
know begin to speak, it is
useless and quite
unproductive. They
speak only when they
know that the listener
understands.
"'So then, if, for instance,
I wanted to tell somebody what
I have learned from you today,
would you object?'
"'You see,' replied Mr Gurdjieff,
'from the very beginning of our
conversation, I foresaw the
possibility of continuing
it. Therefore I told you
things which I would not
tell you were the contrary
the case. I said them in
advance, knowing that you
are not prepared for them
now, but with the intention
of giving a certain direction
to your reflections on these
questions. On closer
examination you will
be convinced that it
is really so. You will
understand precisely what
I am speaking about. If you
reach this conclusion it will
only be to the advantage of the
person with whom you speak; you
may say as much as you like.
Then you will be convinced
that something intelligible
and clear to you is
unintelligible to
those who hear.
From this point
of view such
considerations
will be useful.'
"'And what is your attitude
toward enlarging the circle
with whom relations might
begin, by giving them
some indication that
could help in their
work?' I asked.
"'I have too little free
time to be able to sacrifice
it without being certain that
it will be of use. Time is of
value to me, and I need it for
my work; therefore I cannot and
do not wish to spend it
unproductively. But I
have already told you
about that.'
"'No, it was not with the
idea of your making new
acquaintances that I
asked, but in the sense
that indications might be
given through the press. I
think it would take less
time than personal
conversations.'
"'In other words you wish
to know whether the ideas
could be set forth gradually,
in a series of outlines, perhaps?'
"'Yes,' I replied, 'but I
certainly do not think it
would be possible to clarify
everything, though it seems
to me that it might be
possible to indicate a
direction leading nearer
to the goal.'
"'You have raised a very
interesting question,' said
Mr Gurdjieff. 'I have often
discussed it with some of
those with whom I speak.
It is not worthwhile
repeating now the
considerations
which were
expressed
by them
and by me.
I can only
say that we
decided in the
affirmative, as
long ago as last
summer. I did not
refuse to take part
in this experiment,
but we were prevented
from making it on
account of the
war.'
"During the short conversation
which followed on this subject,
the idea came into my head that
if Mr Gurdjieff did not object
to making known to the public
at large certain views and
methods, it was also possible
that the ballet THE STRUGGLE
OF THE MAGICIANS might contain
a hidden meaning, representing
not only a work of imagination
but a mystery. I asked him a
question about it in this
sense, mentioning that
Mr A had told me the
contents of the
scenario.
"'My ballet is not a mystery,'
replied Mr Gurdjieff. 'The purpose
of it is to present an interesting
and beautiful spectacle. Of course,
under the visible forms a certain
sense is hidden, but I did not
aim at demonstrating or
emphasizing it. The
chief position in this
ballet is occupied by certain
dances. I will explain this to
you briefly. Imagine that in
studying the laws of movement
of the celestial bodies, let
us say the planets of the solar
system, you have constructed a
special mechanism for the
representation and
recording of these
laws. In this mechanism
every planet is represented
by a sphere of appropriate
size and is placed at a
strictly determined
distance from the
central sphere,
which stands for
the sun. You set
the mechanism in
motion, and all the
spheres begin to turn
and move in definite paths,
reproducing in a lifelike
way the laws which govern
their movements. This
mechanism reminds you
of your knowledge.
"'In the same way, in the
rhythm of certain dances,
in the precise movements
and combinations of the
dancers, certain laws
are vividly recalled.
Such dances are called
sacred. During my journeys
in the East, I often saw
dances of this kind executed
during the performance of sacred
rites in some of the ancient temples.
These ceremonies are inaccessible,
and unknown to Europeans. Some of
these dances are reproduced in
THE STRUGGLE OF THE MAGICIANS.
Further, I may tell you that
at the basis of THE STRUGGLE
OF THE MAGICIANS lie three
thoughts; but, as I have
no hope that they will
be understood by the
public if I present
the ballet alone, I
call it simply a
spectacle.' Mr Gurdjieff
spoke a little more about
the ballet and the dances
and then went on:
"'Such is the origin of the
dances, their significance,
in the distant past. I will
ask you now, has anything in
this branch of contemporary art
been preserved that could recall,
however remotely, its former
great meaning and aim? What
is to be found here but
triviality?' After a
short silence, as
though waiting
for my reply,
and gazing sadly
and thoughtfully
before him, he
continued:
"'Contemporary art as
a whole has nothing in
common with the ancient
sacred art . . . Perhaps
you have thought about it?
What is your opinion?'
"I explained to him that
the question of art, which
amongst others interested me,
occupied an important place.
To be precise, I was interested
not so much in the works, that is,
in the results of art, but in its
role and significance in the life
of humanity. I had often discussed
this question with those who
seemed to be more versed in
these matters than I--musicians,
painters, and sculptors, artists
and men of letters, and also with
those simply interested in
studying art. I happened to
hear a great deal of opinion
of many kinds, often contradictory.
Some, it is true they were few,
called art an amusement of those
who lacked occupation; but the
majority agreed that art is
sacred and that its creation
bears in itself the seal of
divine inspiration. I had
formed no opinion which
I could call my firm
conviction, and this
question had remained
open until now. I expressed
all this to Mr Gurdjieff as
clearly as possible;
he listened to my
explanation with
attention, and
said:
"'You are right in saying that
there are many contradictory
opinions on this subject.
Does not that alone prove
that people do not know
the truth? Where truth
is, there cannot be many
different opinions. In
antiquity that which is
now called art served the
aim of objective knowledge.
And as we said a moment ago,
speaking of dances, works of
art represented an exposition
and a record of the eternal laws
of the structure of the universe.
Those who devoted themselves to
research and thus acquired a
knowledge of important laws,
embodied them in works of
art, just as is done in
books today.'
"At this point Mr Gurdjieff
mentioned some names which
were mostly unknown to me
and which I have forgotten.
Then he went on:
"'This art did not pursue the
aim either of "beauty" or of
producing a likeness of
something or somebody.
For instance, an ancient
statue created by such an
artist is neither a copy of
the form of a person nor the
expression of a subjective
sensation; it is either the
expression of the laws of
knowledge, in terms of the
human body, or a means of
objective transmission of
a state of mind. The form
and action, indeed the whole
expression, is according to
law.'
"After a short silence,
in which he appeared to
be pondering something,
Mr Gurdjieff went on:
"'As we have touched upon
art, I will tell you of an
episode which happened
recently which will
clarify some points
in our conversation.
"'Among my acquaintances here
in Moscow there is a companion
of my early childhood, a famous
sculptor. When visiting him I
noticed in his library a number
of books on Hindu philosophy and
occultism. In the course of con-
versation I found that he was
seriously interested in these
matters. Seeing how helpless
he was in making any independent
examination of these related
questions, and not wishing to
show my own acquaintance with
them, I asked a man who had
often talked with me on
these subjects, a certain
"P.", to interest himself
in this sculptor. One day
P. told me that the sculptor's
interest in these questions was
clearly speculative, that his essence
was not touched by them and that he
saw little use in these discussions.
I advised him to turn the conversation
toward some subject of closer concern
to the sculptor. In the course of
what seemed a purely casual talk
at which I was present, P.
directed the conversation
to the question of art and
creation, whereupon the sculptor
explained that he "felt" the rightness
of sculptural forms and asked, "Do you
know why the statue of the poet Gogol
in the Arbat Place has an excessively
long nose?" And he related how, on
looking at this statue sideways, he
felt that "the soft flow of the
profile," as he put it, was
violated at the top of the
nose.
"'Wishing to test the
correctness of this feeling,
he decided to search for Gogol's
death mask, which he found, after
a long search, in private hands.
He studied the mask, and paid
special attention to the nose.
The examination revealed that
probably, when the mask was
taken, a small bubble was
formed just where the soft
flow of the profile seemed
to be violated. The mask maker
had filled in the bubble with
an unskilled hand, changing
the form of the writer's
nose. Thus the designer
of the monument, not
doubting the correctness
of the mask, had furnished
Gogol with a nose that was
not his.
"'What can be said of
this incident? Is it not
evident that such a thing
could only happen in the
absence of real knowledge?
"'While one man uses the
mask, fully believing in
its correctness, the other,
"feeling" the incorrectness
of its execution, looks for
a confirmation of his
suspicions. Neither is
better off than the other.
"'But with a knowledge of
the laws of proportion in
the human body, not only
could the end of Gogol's
nose have been reconstructed
from the mask but the whole
of his body could have been
built up exactly as it had
been from the nose alone.
Let us go into this in
more detail to make
clear exactly what
I want to express.
"'Today I briefly examined
the law of the octave. You
saw that with knowledge of
this law the place of everything
is known and, vice versa, if the
place is known, one knows what
exists there and its quality.
Everything can be calculated,
only one must know how to
calculate the passage from
one octave to another. The
human body, like everything
else that is a whole, bears
in itself this regularity of
measurement. In accordance with
the number of notes of the octave
and with the intervals, the human
body has nine principal measurements
expressed in definite numbers. For
individual persons these numbers
vary very much--of course within
certain limits. The nine
principal measurements, giving
an entire octave of the first
order, are transmuted into the
subordinate octaves which, by
a wide extension of this
subordinate system, give
all the measurements of
any part of the human
body. Every note of an
octave is itself a whole
octave. Consequently it is
necessary to know the rules
of correlation and combination,
and of transition from one scale
to another. Everything is
combined by an indissoluble,
unchangeable regularity of law.
It is as though, around every
point, nine more subordinate
points were grouped, and so
on to the atoms of the atom.
"'Knowing the laws of
descent, man also knows
the laws of ascent, and
consequently not only can
pass from principal octaves
to subordinate ones, but also
vice versa. Not only can the
nose be reconstructed from the
face alone, but also from the
nose the entire face and body
of a man can be reconstructed
inexorably and exactly. There
is no search for beauty or
resemblance. A creation
can be nothing other
than what it is . . .
"'This is more exact than
mathematics, because here
you do not meet with
probabilities, and
it is achieved not
by study of mathematics
but by a study of a far
deeper and broader kind.
IT IS UNDERSTANDING WHICH
IS NEEDED. In a conversation
without understanding, it is
possible to talk for decades
on the simplest questions
without coming to any
result.
"'A simple question can reveal
that a man has not the required
attitude of thought, and even
with the desire to elucidate
the question, the lack of
preparation and understanding
in the hearer nullifies the
words of the speaker. Such
"literal understanding" is
very common.
"'This episode yet again
confirmed what I had long
since known and had proved
a thousand times. Recently
in Petersburg I spoke with
a well-known composer. From
this conversation I clearly
saw how poor his knowledge
in the domain of true music
was, and how deep the abyss
of his ignorance. Remember
Orpheus, who taught knowledge
by means of music, and you will
understand what I call true or
sacred music.'
"Mr Gurdjieff went on:
"'For such music special
conditions will be needed,
and then THE STRUGGLE OF
THE MAGICIANS would not
be a mere spectacle. As
it is now there will only
be fragments of the music
I heard in certain temples,
and even such true music
would convey nothing to
the hearers because the
keys to it are lost and
perhaps have never been
known in the West. The
keys to all the ancient
arts are lost, were lost
many centuries ago. And
therefore there is no
longer a sacred art
embodying laws of the
Great Knowledge, and
so serving to influence
the instincts of the
multitude.
"'There are no creators
today. The contemporary
priests of art do not
create but imitate.
They run after beauty
and likeness or what is
called originality, without
possessing even the necessary
knowledge. Not knowing, and
not being able to do anything,
since they are groping in the
dark, they are praised by the
crowd, which places them on a
pedestal. Sacred art vanished
and left behind only the halo
which surrounded its servants.
All the current words about
the divine spark, talent,
genius, creation, sacred
art, have no solid basis--
they are anachronisms. What
are these talents? We will
talk about them on some
suitable occasion.
"'Either the shoemaker's
craft must be called art,
or all contemporary art
must be called craft. In
what way is a shoemaker
sewing fashionable custom
shoes of beautiful design
inferior to an artist who
pursues the aim of imitation
or originality? WITH KNOWLEDGE,
THE SEWING OF SHOES MAY BE SACRED
ART TOO, BUT WITHOUT IT, A PRIEST
OF CONTEMPORARY ART IS WORSE THAN
A COBBLER.' The last words were
full of emphasis. Mr Gurdjieff
became silent."
--Views from the Real World
"On Friday, the day devoted to sculpture,
the learned beings belonging to this group
brought and exhibited minia-images, or
models, made from a material called
'clay.'
"Those minia-images, or models, which
they brought for exhibition represented,
as a rule, beings like themselves, singly
or in groups, or beings of all sorts of
other exterior forms breeding on their
planet.
"Among these works were also various
'allegorical beings,' represented with
the head of a being of one form, the
body of another, the limbs of a
third, and so on.
LAW OF PROPORTIONS
"The learned beings of this group
indicated all that was necessary by
the introduction of lawful inexactitudes
in connection with what was then called
the 'law of proportions.'
"You should know that all the three-
brained beings of the Earth, and especially
of course the sculptors of that period,
already knew that, in accordance with the
great Law of Sevenfoldness, the dimensions
of any specific part of any whole being
derive from the seven dimensions of
other, secondary parts, which in
their turn derive from seven
tertiary parts, and so on and
so forth.
"Therefore, the dimensions of each large
or small part of the whole planetary body
of a being are larger or smaller in exact
proportion to the dimensions of the other
parts.
"For a clear understanding of what I
have just said, the face of any three-
brained being can serve as a good
example.
"The facial dimensions of every three-
centered being in general, as also the
facial dimensions of the three-centered
beings of the planet Earth, are the result
of the dimensions of the seven fundamental
parts of the whole body, and the dimensions
of each separate part of the face are the
result of seven different dimensions of the
whole face. For example, the dimensions of
the nose of any being are determined by the
dimensions of the other parts of the face,
and this nose in its turn has seven
definite what are called 'surfaces,'
and these surfaces also have seven
lawful dimensions, down to the atom
itself of this face of theirs, which
is one of the seven independent
dimensions of the whole
planetary body.
"Now it was in the deviations from
these lawful dimensions that the
learned sculptors among the members
of the club of the Adherents of
Legomonism indicated all kinds of
useful information and fragments
of knowledge that they intended
to transmit to beings of remote
generations."
--Gurdjieff
--ch 30, art
--Beelzebub's Tales to His Grandson