The Bud­dha — The Path of Enlight­en­ment, The Path of Love

It seems quite appar­ent to many if not most of us, that we are going through a time of great Polit­i­cal, Eco­nom­ic, and Cul­tur­al Cri­sis. The Warp and Weave of our world seems to be com­ing undone, and the pre­servers of our way of life, the very insti­tu­tions that we expect to embody and pro­tect our very lives and loves are buck­ling and bend­ing. There is a grow­ing cho­rus for some answer, some solu­tion that will secure a way out of these shad­ows and fears that grow longer every day, we yearn to find a path­way for­ward to a bet­ter time and place.

It is clear to most of us that the divi­sions with­in and the divides between var­i­ous indi­vid­u­als and groups is at the heart of all our “trou­bles”. The fun­da­men­tal cause of our fears and woes, is to be found in our seem­ing loss of com­mon­ly held mean­ings or truths by which to find our way out of these length­en­ing fear-filled shad­ows. We grow increas­ing­ly anx­ious and des­per­ate for the gift of ever­last­ing light, we long for truth and love to shine upon us once more, so that we might bind our wounds and bring us “togeth­er as one” once more.

Fun­da­men­tal­ly, we are (yet again) in a time of a great spir­i­tu­al cri­sis. We have been here before…and the great good news is that our ances­tors found their way through in their time of unrav­el­ling too. The answer to our woes does not lie “out there”. It is not to found in some polit­i­cal reform, or eco­nom­ic pro­gram, or as some mod­ernists may hope, in a tech­no­log­i­cal “deus ex machi­na”, that will pull us back from the deep­en­ing dark­ness and doom. The answer to our self-cast shad­ows of doubts and fears is not out­side of us at all.

No, the answer always lies with­in, in each and every human heart. What we require, as always, is a spir­i­tu­al return to “source”. We need to remem­ber: “from whence have we come, and why are we here, and where are we going”. We need to restore our­selves to our soul’s true pur­pose, to remem­ber our true spir­i­tu­al nature and so calm our minds and heal our hearts.

We can do this wher­ev­er and when­ev­er we need to, by a return to our spir­i­tu­al source found in the ever­last­ing waters of life, in the spir­i­tu­al heart found in every speck and mote of cre­ation, and so equal­ly in the heart of each and every one of us. These Liv­ing Truths are also beau­ti­ful­ly pre­served and passed down in the great teach­ings of the Mas­ters or Great Souls who peri­od­i­cal­ly come forth to remind us again of these immutable truths and of our true nature.

Yes, we need to remem­ber that the answers to all our trou­bles were revealed long ago. Many of these Seers and Teach­ers are unrec­og­nized and name­less to us, known by many appel­la­tions but per­haps the best for me is their title as “The Lone­ly Ones”. For they worked (and still work) “in the shad­ows”, qui­et­ly doing the work of Spir­it where it is need­ed most, ask­ing for noth­ing but to serve.

But some were des­tined to stand pub­licly in the Halls of His­to­ry as exem­plars, as pil­lars of Strength and Truth, and we hon­or and revere these Great Souls to this day: Con­fu­cius, Lao-Tzu, Zoroast­er, Pythago­ras, Christ, and the one we con­sid­er today, The Buddha.

The fun­da­men­tal spir­i­tu­al teach­ings that form the Ancient Wis­dom, are found in the life and work of each of these mes­sen­gers. All came to reaf­firm and restate the Ancient Truths. They did not come for or intend to “start” a reli­gion, that was left to less­er souls. They came not ask­ing for devo­tions or prayers to be offered up to them, for they need them not. They came to remind you that we are all on the same path of ful­fill­ment as they fol­lowed. Their life and work is a reminder to us that we are all here for one thing only…we must all, every one of us, we must each wake up and be ful­ly human too.

That is why you can and should both lis­ten to your own heart and fol­low their exam­ple too. You are to here to ful­fill your­self and help one anoth­er to cre­ate bet­ter lives that are formed and guid­ed by Spir­i­tu­al Truth. A tru­ly human life is guid­ed by Uncon­di­tion­al Love, by kind­ness­es and con­sid­er­a­tions, because it embraces the Liv­ing Faith that we are all the “ones of the One”.

We are the cre­ators of this World and of our­selves and for one anoth­er too, and it is our true pur­pose, duty and spir­i­tu­al ful­fill­ment to make life bet­ter for one and all. Because this is “The Teach­ing” that springs from your heart and from the Wis­est of the Wise: you are insep­a­ra­ble, you are all one, so that,

“What you do to the least of these, you do to me, the One”.

You are here quite sim­ply to Love one anoth­er. This sim­ple yet pro­found Spir­i­tu­al Truth is the Foun­tain-Source, the well­spring for all our Moral Imper­a­tives towards one anoth­er, and in fact to all of Cre­ation too.

Among these “Great Souls”, the Bud­dha is held to be most spe­cial. He is said to have been “the first” of our human type to find the path to self-illu­mi­na­tion. He came and showed us how we can free our­selves from the illu­sion of mat­ter and form. He lived his life and shared the wis­dom that Life is Spir­it, and Spir­it is Life.

The fun­da­men­tal core of the Buddha’s teach­ing in the Ancient Wis­dom is this: The essence of Spir­it is to become, to evolve or real­ly to release from with­in the divine nature behind the form. Thus, the first fact of exis­tence is Change, or as the Bud­dha stat­ed, the “Law of Impermanence”.

Every­thing that exists, from the build­ing blocks of atoms, to the atoms them­selves, to ele­ments and mol­e­cules, to min­er­als, plants, ani­mals, humans, plan­ets and stars, in fact all of Cre­ation, all of these pass through the same cycle of exis­tence: Begin­ning or Birth, growth, decline and the death of that form…and then Rebirth into the next form.

This is the essen­tial eso­teric mean­ing of the Scor­pio Full Moon; it is the dynam­ic inter­play or Jour­ney of Ever­last­ing Val­ue or Spir­it-Life (Tau­rus) evolv­ing cease­less­ly through the hier­ar­chy of Mor­tal Forms (Scor­pio). It is the old sto­ry of Spir­it “falling into” mat­ter and striv­ing to return to its home with the One; yet equal­ly this is the Jour­ney of Spir­it mov­ing through all these forms of Mat­ter which lifts or evolves those mor­tal ves­sels into ever more ethe­re­al­ized forms.

This is the Dance of Spir­it; this is the Song of Life. Spir­it is One and Undi­vid­ed; Life is the Eter­nal mov­ing through ever more rar­efied forms. Though there are many, many forms, there is only one Spir­it. Mat­ter cre­ates the Illu­sion of Diver­si­ty and Separation.

Awak­en­ing-Enlight­en­ment shat­ters the divi­sion between the Know­er and the known. The indi­vid­ual dew­drop or spark of the Divine rejoic­es in Cos­mic Con­scious­ness, swim­ming through the Ocean of Life-Spirit-Consciousness.

You are on the path of Immor­tal­i­ty; mov­ing through count­less worlds, forms and lives.

Cel­e­brate tonight, as you watch the Sun set and your Moon rise; this is the dance of spir­it, this is your dance too.

Know that Spir­it is Beau­ty, and Beau­ty is Truth; that these are Eter­nal, as is the spark of the Divine that is the true heart of you.

The Les­son of the Bud­dha is to flow, to not hold or attach one­self to any par­tic­u­lar form of your­self, for these forms are not you.

Yes, live life as it is…Flowing, Grow­ing and ever Awakening.

Whether you are with a friend for one sub­lime after­noon, or with your love for many, many heart-filled years, your time togeth­er is pre­cious and so you should give of your­self to one anoth­er, share all that you can…because you know this, this is part of the bar­gain you made in mov­ing into mor­tal realms, you must also part from one anoth­er too.

But your love will hold you, keep you for one anoth­er, to the end of time. Your love will hold you to one anoth­er for Eter­ni­ty. So, when you must you will smile, and just say to one anoth­er, “fare thee well my love, until next time”.

The promise of the Full Moon of Scor­pio is the Age­less Wis­dom, it is your Free­dom from fear. For death has no hold over we Immortals:

We are ones of the One, and we are made by love.

We are ones of the One, and we are here for love.

We are ones of the One, and we are here to love.

Remem­ber, when­ev­er you are in need, or you have some doubt or feel you may even suc­cumb to fear, remem­ber always, that you are nev­er alone and have noth­ing to fear.

With­in you is the One, your high­er self, and you are equal­ly held by the love of the Wise Ones, the Lone­ly Ones and by all with whom you journey.

Cel­e­brate a fel­low one, who showed you the way, let us give thanks to the Buddha!

Remem­ber, you are on the path, be not afraid.

Have Faith, give of your­self and remain Cen­tered in the Truth that is Love.

Give thanks, and with all the Wise Ones tonight, repeat the Great Invocation:

THE GREAT INVOCATION

From the point of light with­in the Mind of God

Let Light stream forth into our minds

Let LIGHT descend on Earth.

From the point of love with­in the Heart of God

Let Love stream forth into our hearts

May LOVE increase on Earth.

From the cen­ter where the Will of God is known

Let pur­pose guide our wills

The PURPOSE which the mas­ters know and serve.

From the cen­ter which we call Humanity

Let the Plan of Love and Light work out

And may it seal the door

where evil dwells.

Let Light and Love and Pow­er restore the Plan on Earth.