the struggle for spiritual illumination

By Rubaphilos © 2010
(Re-edited june 2012)

Spiritual Illumination is not a commodity. 
In fact we could say, with a certain degree of confidence, that the mindset that causes anyone to believe Spiritual Illumination is something they can control "at a price" is the same mindset that pretty much eliminates them from being in a position to receive what they want. Spiritual Illumination is a product of nature ... that is, of natural law. A product available to every sincere student through nature's agent ... the experienced, initiated, teacher. No matter what other conditions may attend the reception of true initiation, its transmission cannot be effected successfully other than by nature's will, through the agent of an initiated teacher, to a student who has developed to a state where he is ready for its reception. Neither the student nor the teacher can force the situation. It is entirely in the hands of nature as to who is ready to receive initiation. Then once such an individual is ready, the opportunity for effective tuition will arrive naturally and automatically in his life.

Once the student is ready, and the teacher appears, then the conditions under which initiation takes place are also defined by nature. Neither the teacher nor the student can demand the process unfold under any conditions other than those which are defined as absolutely necessary by nature. Nature operates according to law. It is that law, that natural law, which demands that initiation be carried out under specific conditions. In this way the process of initiation does not conform to the dictates of the student's demands, but, instead, the student's attitude and behaviour must bend to conform to the dictates of the process of initiation. Any student who is unwilling to accept this fact will discover that his approach is in conflict with the process.

If the student were in a position to dictate the conditions under which initiation should take place, then the student himself would have to be fully aware of that which the process itself requires. If the student could know that much then he would not need a teacher, for he would already have access to the most intimate requirements of the work. 

For this situation to be a necessary requirement of initiation, a great deal of trust must be established between the student and the teacher. For it is the teacher's task to lead the student away from 'normality' in to a state of existence which is outside of average human experience.

It is also a common attitude that the average spiritual aspirant sees Illumination as being simply a state of having access to, or possessing, special information; somewhat like owning a book. He owns the book and can look in it for information, but fundamentally he is still himself. This view, though, does not apply to initiation, and to the attainment of Illumination. In order to become Illumined one must change fundamentally. We cannot remain the same as we were when we started the journey, with the same views, beliefs and behaviours, and also be Illumined. 

A view of the journey towards Illumination as being a process of recognising or realising certain ideas and concepts (information) is certainly part of the process, but it is only a small part. Consider, if Illumination was merely the ability to grasp certain ideas, then the process of attaining Illumination would, in most cases, require nothing more from us than to read about those concepts as written by someone who had experience of them, and was Adept at describing them. Initiation would, therefore, be little more than an intellectual exercise which could be accomplished by book-learning alone. I labour this point because it is a common mistake, to confuse the mere attainment of information with what is in reality an actual state of being.

One of the comforting things about that view of the journey toward Illumination (the view that it is an intellectualism) is that we secretly believe we can accumulate ideas in our mind without actually accepting or rejecting them, or acting on them, but simply owning them. In that way, if that were the crux of being Illuminated, we could attain that state without (theoretically) changing, or being changed. But Illumination is something that 'happens' to us ... it is an event ... or rather the result of a series of self-changing events. It is a change from darkness (relative ignorance) to light (Illumination). In order, therefore, to 'be' Illuminated, we must be changed. An Illuminated Adept is, by the ancient and traditional definition, someone who has begun his journey as an average person, and, after special training with an experienced and accomplished teacher, has eventually become something far removed from the average human. An Illuminated Adept is not someone who simply possesses some information other normal people do not. He actually 'is' something other people are not.

It is a common mistake made by many students of the occult that they will enter serious esoteric training, be initiated (in the true meaning of that word), but that largely they will remain the same person. One must ask oneself, what would be the point in seeking Spiritual Illumination if the end result was that we would remain the same common person we started out as? The entire point in the Great Work is change. Change away from the dysfunctional condition we call 'normality' into a vastly more functional condition we refer to as Illuminated Adeptship. That kind of change should be taken for granted, since it is generally taken for granted that seeking Illumination is preferable to being in a common human condition, because somehow Illumination is a vastly 'better' state of being. Simple reason would therefore dictate that being 'normal' is a vastly 'worse' state of being.

So how exactly might we define Illumination? To begin, we should understand that real hermetic initiation is the process whereby an expert hermetic teacher guides a willing and capable student to a state of Illumination. Initiation is therefore any system of training, applied, which results in a state of Illumination. Because Illumination is a natural state, in potential, initiation is a process which must conform to natural law. We can't just make-up a process of initiation from scratch and have it be whatever we want. The process must contain certain specific techniques which deal with specific issues in human belief, behaviour and physical condition.

Illumination itself, contrary to popular opinion, is a very specific condition. The average human lives in a state where part of who he is is hidden from him. We commonly refer to this hidden part as the 'unconscious' mind. Unconscious because we normally have no conscious access to what is contained in that side of ourselves, and what is going on there. Ancient hermetists not only discovered methods to unveil that side of ourselves, but also that when we unveiled that part of ourselves it contained knowledge and mechanisms which gave us profound understanding of, and control over, ourselves and our environment. They referred to this unveiling of the unconscious as ... bringing the light of conscious awarenes in to the darkness of unconsciousness. That is ... the Illumination of the spiritual (unconscious) part of ourselves.

One of the problems with any attempt at unveiling the unconscious, in this way, is that nature has created us with part of ourselves hidden from our awareness for a reason. Therefore this is our natural (and so-called healthy) state ... to be partly aware, and part unaware. In order to unveil the unconscious we must apply esoteric techniques to ourselves which gio against our natural instincts. At the same time, because applying these practical techniques pushes us in to the unconscious, which is basically 'unknown' territory, our natural reaction to this action is fear. Because initiation promotes unnatural practices, which push us in to unknown territory, which we naturally fear to do, everything is working against our attempt at succeeding in this process. This is why it is necessary to have a guide; a teacher who not only knows the territory, but also understands what we need to do in order to overcome our natural aversion to the method of initiation.