Reflection N° 47 - Order of Readings

By e-mail, Mr Luis Chávez asks the following questions, “Dear Sirs: Two substantial questions. First, An advice about order of first readings to someone who begins to read the Master’s Teachings. Second, To learn how to meditate, What order of readings do you advise?”. As this significant matter has been posed before, we are going to devote this Reflection to give a short explanation about what may be the best sequence to read the Teachings, particularly those dealing with Meditation.

In the beginning you should apply to the course “Spiritual Development” (Book I), the first to be written down, in 1937, for use of disciples, who would receive Teachings and spiritual guide during weekly meetings led by Master Santiago. In this course his philosophy and his way to think are devised as a premonition. It is like a syncretistic resume anticipating several subjects, which are explained and linked throughout the collection. To persevere on the Teaching “Hidrochosa” –three luminous pages– and often to meditate on them, is to grasp in depth the gist of Renunciation doctrine, which the new Aquarian civilization will develop. Rather, it should be known by heart, as they did in old days, by reciting it mentally, like a prayer, in times of disappointment, in order to strengthen spiritual ideals. The complete course should remain available as a way to insist on capital matters at any moment. Some persons keep it on their bedside table and read a Teaching every night, before falling asleep; one’s subconscious works by itself and, on the following morning, we can see clarifying results.

The Teaching is one and permanent, but expressed to the human understanding through variability and sometimes through contradiction of pairs of opposites. So, the spiritual student should have a studying method which enables him to conciliate them in his own soul; with time and experience, he will bring about more proper sequences. Meanwhile, here we suggest some priorities to those who begin to study them. After “Spiritual Development” –which acts as an introduction to complete works– we suggest to peruse “The Becoming” (Book VII). In this course, the Master gives an explanation about life as a unified reality, which a human being travels through by transmutation on diverse natural and supernatural planes, from inner life of Earth to subtlest planes of the astral world. The ever-hard passage from a dimension to another, made by a soul during his becoming, is what we call death and reincarnation –inevitable and necessary stages, which as they progress, become liberating stages. Master Santiago made astrally the journey inside Earth, and in the Teaching he narrates what he saw. Likewise, what he says about the Grotto of Ras, Astral World, and so on, is what he would see directly and at will, for he was a seer on all planes. So, we recommend this easy-reading course, since it offers the student a clear picture about his collective and individual position in Cosmos, by knowing forces which give life to the Planet, while discovering himself internally. This is a significant point to approach the rest of the study. Otherwise he could get lost on a diversity of courses, over and above, in developing Meditation, by lack of certain steady and balanced position in face of basic realities of life.

Third, we recommend the course “The Way of Renunciation” (Book XVIII). In the beginning, this course was a long retirement for a week, with lessons and lectures, in the morning and by evening, for Ordained Women of the Community, in Embalse, 1955; it was taken down in shorthand, and later written as it appears now. It is the gist of the Renunciation Doctrine and there you can find an explanation about hardest and obscure concepts related to the Way: mystical death in holocaust, Ired, Reversibility, mystique of ashes, his premonitions about destruction of superpowers, atomic bomb, Redeemer Maitreya, and so on. The reading of this book is inexhaustible, for his pages contain values of Humanity for the time to come, in the Hidrochosa-American Age. A reading of his Teachings, as the rest of courses, should not be made horizontally, one beside others, but in depth. Like any other holy message, they contain seven meanings to unveil one by one, eventually in search of harmonious ideas/forces. A true apprenticeship does not consist in accumulating concepts and information, but in transmuting the soul toward higher states of the existence.

All the Teachings are wise and contain a seed of fundamental truth about Renunciation, but we feel that these recommended Teachings are a steady foundation to face any other Teaching of the Collection, without any risk of getting lost on the Way.

Meditation is also a Teaching; it is written on our soul –a holy place where we have to enter in order to know it and to learn how to live rightly. There are many types of Meditation –ancient and modern, Eastern and Western– but the best one is Meditation adjusted to the temperament of each meditator, like a made-to-measure glove. Mechanical, rigid and dogmatic exercises of Meditation –like body gymnastics– do not offer positive results and, shortly after this, the meditator is not interested in it. Meditation should not be a forced exercise of the will –it must be illumination, free flow of inner sensibility, so that our soul may spontaneously be such as it is, telling what our soul has to tell.

The Work written by Master Santiago offers several types of Meditation, namely, Affective, Discursive, Sensitive, with variations and modes, active and passive, exercises of Concentration and Contemplation, and even many examples. But before, you need to know a general doctrinal frame not to get lost in fancies and divagation. The meditator should act on a scenery which consists in “Archaic Symbolism”, its emblems, meaning of its figures, and aims, and covers a long journey and various landscapes (Book III). It offers seven pictures and its respective effects, which will be as a guide to achieve your purposes:
1st. The Black Lady: Abhorrence.
2nd. The Abyss. Effect: Desolation.
3rd. The Two Ways. Effect: Detachment.
4th. The Standard. Effect: Choice.
5th. The Golden Temple. Effect: Consolation.
6th. The Veil of Ahehia. Effect: Bliss.
7th. The Resurrection of Hes. Effect: Rapture.

The study of these symbols and its relations, along with diverse spiritual states, enables you to practice properly and rightly the exercise of Meditation, without confused or scattered ideas. You can enlarge the meaning of this symbolic subject matter by considering “Affective Meditation” (Book XV), and five steps of this type of Meditation, and even seven symbolic stages on the journey of the soul ascending to perfect life.

Three are the most proper courses for beginners on the practice of Meditation exercises, and you can find them at the end of the Collection:
Book XLV, “Exercises and Examples of Meditation”.
Book XLVI, “Comments on Meditation”.
Book XLVII, “Methods of Meditation”.
These three courses constitute the summit of Santiago Bovisio’s Spiritual Mastership, with modern, didactic and clear exercises and examples, through three modes: Discursive Meditation, Affective Meditation and Sensitive Meditation. These three types should be known and usually practiced, so that eventually the meditator may find the most proper mode, which can make the things easier to approach Meditation itself.

Master Santiago many times emphasized this: instead of being Meditation, exercise is an inner discipline to reach it; even he gave certain time to practice the exercise –generally speaking, no more than a year, during which the student must spontaneously enter the state of Meditation. One hinders the soul when we repeat certain exercise and do not reach the meditation state; we need to change and try to find a fitter exercise, perhaps simpler and in tune with our own characteristics. There are many types, from Simple Meditation to Home Meditation, already recommended on a precedent Reflection. Each soul has a way to Meditate, and we speak of them on many courses here offered. Even there are types of Meditation not offered here, but that are valuable and perhaps what one is looking for.

Prayer is soul strength, and each being has it own strength; the student must discover and cultivate it. The one who says, “I cannot meditate” or “I don’t know how to meditate”, is mistaken; it is like being unable to know his own identity, or to see his face on a mirror, or to know how to breathe. When a being, stirred by suffering, disease or elation, looks at himself and asks, “What is happening to me”, he starts meditating. The continuity of this question is Meditation of the beginner.

José González Muñoz
May 2004