Monastery Culture
मठसंस्कृतिः
Chapter 5
60 ¶Near the end of the Tretā Yuga, many devas were coming back up through the animal kingdom into human bodies, but with animal instinctive nerve systems. Some of us were still in the body brought through the original way. It is very difficult to bring anyone through now, so many of our bodies are thousands of years old. There are three kinds of beings on the Earth. Those of us in our original body, the devas in the human bodies and the animals. This creates for us a culture partly new and partly that which we brought with us when we came. We are in changing times. Some just go off by themselves to go deep within and try to stabilize the forces of the planet, working closely with the Gods. We found that being alone, which is new to us, for we are always with our kind, was very fruitful. Our elders developed this practice and taught many advanced souls how to live alone and polarize the changing forces of our time.§
Emergence of Individual Outlooks§
61 ¶The devas who emerged from the animal kingdom quickly learned the culture and religion of our times in our monasteries and temples, and then we sent some out on missions to teach it to others coming into human form. Small groups began to develop for the first time, and philosophies and individual outlooks emerged with the devas who lived in bodies with animal nerves, as they would sometimes call the teachings their own, which began to develop religions with different names. Our prophets tell us that one day everyone on our planet would have an animal nerve system in one degree or another. §
The Core Group in Original Bodies§
62 ¶In the monastery, of course, all had to be in our original body and receive initiation by our guru. The devas in human form came in to study, and some were allowed to stay on, but not many, for they became attached to us. The most important thing for them was to not be magnetically attached to other people. We have always watched to see that this does not happen, for it creates an inconvenient pull of forces, inhibiting us from doing our work in the service of the Deities. When they found they were attached to someone in the monastery, they would go to the one to whom they were attached, and they both would beg for release from the Deity. The Deity would cut the sticky substance binding them together psychically. This was the same substance the Deity would make his temporary body out of. If these attachments persisted—and it was always those in human bodies that responded in this way—it would finally pull so much on the senior group in the monastery that they would finally suggest that he do tapas by himself, then return to the monastery or pilgrimage to another monastery. Our guru always set the course of the tapas and gave his instructions through the senior group or directly to the deva. Our guru always administrated sādhana and tapas. §
Involvement In Inner Worlds§
63 ¶Our life was a life of involvement with the inner worlds. We would talk to the devas and among ourselves rather than those of us who lived in surrounding areas to the monasteries. For our main service was to provide the vibration to sustain the darshan and religion through the nerve systems of the people who surrounded the temple, also to write our inner perceptions, clarifying the philosophy during our changing times, and giving these writings to the elders of the external community to share among the population or record them in the ākāśic libraries. Sometimes we did both. We would also make golden jewelry and prepare medicinal herbs. But our monasteries were totally introverted during this period in time. It was the elder men of the surrounding community that did the formal teaching and talking to the people, not the monastics, with the exception of our speaking to these elders through the wall, as previously described, without allowing our personal identity to be known. §
Choosing Monks from The Community§
64 ¶Our guru would choose from the community those he felt would do well in serving in the monastery. The guru always did the choosing, and the training went according to what he wanted. The strands of inner lineage are still very clear. Our guru would know who was living in a certain body, and upon that he based his invitation or direction. The greatest austerity performed by those who entered the monastery from families was that of living away from home. The human families were very, very serene and peaceful. The entire atmosphere of the Earth at this time is lush, calm and sublime. It is easy to live, and family life was very close due to the animal quality of being attached to one another. So, when they come into the monastery, they suffer the breaking of this attachment, and then when it does break they feel alone. This feeling of aloneness is also from the animal world through the instinctive nerve system. But they know all about this animal nerve system, and this knowledge helped both the family and the monastic when these feelings emerged. §
A Joyous, Healthy Life§
65 ¶We take our nourishment once a day, when the sun is high. The nourishment is always the same. It is a complete chemistry for our bodies. Those who have animal nerve systems eat somewhat differently, and it takes them quite a while to become used to the monastery diet. Everyone was quite satisfied after a meal. They really enjoyed their food. We were always happy and laughing. Often two of us would catch one another’s thought and break out laughing. §
Everything that we do within these temples is founded with the principle of the elimination and annihilation of our personal identities. The monastery and the temple is one place so integrated in our daily living that there is no room for one of us to be more outstanding than another. §
No Room for Personal Identities§
66 ¶In our monasteries were great souls as well as some of the younger ones, but it was almost impossible to tell one from another, for the old souls helped the younger ones by outwardly appearing to be like them. If they had a strong darshan, they would always appear to have none at all and, in various subtle ways, deflect any attention drawn to them because of their unfoldment. Everything that we do within these temples is founded with the principle of the elimination and annihilation of our personal identities. The monastery and the temple is one place so integrated in our daily living that there is no room for one of us to be more outstanding than another. If one of the monastery-temples needed extra strength—perhaps because something in the surrounding area occurred and there was an excessive draw upon our darshan flow from the pedestal—our guru would send some great soul to us from another temple, one who had lived in it consistently for a long, long period of time. He would traditionally enter our monastery-temple as a guest and, unbeknownst to anyone, live and move around through our ranks and procedures while all the time working inwardly, filling the great need which he had come to fulfill. Because he entered as a beginner, his chores were light and his ego vanished, for he was in the process of qualifying himself to become a permanent part of our group. In this way, our guru worked silently, inwardly and unobtrusively. §
How a Newcomer Is Evaluated§
67 ¶A newcomer in our midst would humbly beg admittance in asking permission to live nearby the temple. He would work inwardly to strengthen our vibration. Even if he were a younger soul, he would be expected to do this. We would watch him silently and inwardly as the moon became full and waned and became full again, until about two-thirds of us came to know him. Our new visitor seeking admittance would always be found standing by the wall that surrounded each temple-monastery, either on the outside of the wall if he were just entering, or on the inside of the wall while fulfilling his period of blending his vibration with the total vibration that existed. Sometimes we have many, many standing on the outside of the wall for long periods of time before they are invited in, one or two at a time. §
Limitations Imposed on Newcomers§
68 ¶Newcomers would never attend any of our activities unless invited. They lived in small shelters close to the wall and did some useful service to occupy their time when they were not involved in trance. During the day, they would walk around close to the wall, the circumference of it, talking with monastics who would come and visit with them. They would tell of their travel, both inwardly and outwardly, and about themselves. If they appeared to be on tapas, nothing would be given to them to do, and they would be allowed to fulfill their intended practice. For upon entering, they would clearly explain the nature of the austerity, and the intended purpose to be accomplished by performing it, to the one representative of all of us who was responsible for initially visiting them and admitting them. §
We would be given to carve a statue half as tall as any of us, and during the course of its completion, certain chants and meditative practices were performed. §
Mystic Skills, Sacred Disciplines §
69 ¶Sometimes we were given by our guru disciplines to strengthen our powers of concentration. Especially the younger souls performed these practices, but occasionally the older souls did as well. We would be given to carve a statue half as tall as any of us, and during the course of its completion, certain chants and meditative practices were performed. When it was completed, our guru would inspect it and the one of us who created it. If the inner change that he expected did not exist, brought forth from the carving, the chanting and the disciplines within meditation, he would order it destroyed and begun again. When finally the inner attainment had been made simultaneous with the creation of the statue, the next phase of discipline and carving upon the same statue commenced, and that would be to continue carving on the statue, always keeping it in a perfect state of completion, until it began to become smaller and smaller. As this was being done, other kinds of meditations given by the guru were performed, as well as chanting and frequent visits from the Deity and devas. It took a long, long time, ten or fifteen years or more, before the statue, which began half the size of one of us, was in its perfect state of completion, small enough to hold in the palm of one’s hand. §
Utilizing the Power of Such Projects§
70 ¶The dust from this constant working on the statue was considered sacred and used in some of our ceremonies, and the last remaining dust, after the statue had become so small it disappeared, was ceremoniously given to our guru as a symbol the discipline had been completed. Some of these statues were never completed, as during the course of working with the discipline, the monastic became so refined himself, he fulfilled his purpose on the planet and disappeared from here—back to the planet we all came from—in a shimmering subtle body. These statues were considered most sacred and hidden away in mountain caves, sealed in. In this way we take an entire mountain and infuse it with the darshan by placing here and there within it these emanators of darshan. Some of these mountains and the darshan coming from them will persist through the next four yugas. §
Writing Books, Conveying Information§
71 ¶We also write books, and after a book is finished, it is burned at a ceremony that causes it to be imprinted in the inner ether, and old and young souls alike in other temple-monasteries can read it. News is also conveyed in this way. The inner and the outer are one. Our prophets tell us that toward the end of the Dvāpara Yuga, as the Kali Yuga begins to be felt, we will make a strong distinction between the inner and the outer. But now, through thought transference, it is easy to communicate with beings on the planet that we came from, those around us and in distant places on the Earth. It is difficult to conceive how it will be possible for us in the next yuga to refrain from doing what is so natural for us to do now. We experience the total mind. §
Use of Thought Projection§
72 ¶Through the projection of our thought, we are able to make ourselves appear temporarily in other temples and talk with different ones within them. This art is reserved for the older souls, mature in their practice. We also could make ourselves appear in the minds of another and convey to them the news. During certain ceremonies when fire was used, the Deity or a great deva would take the smoke and create a temporary body and talk with us. As smoke faded, they would fade. Most of us knew everything to be known on a current basis. They tell us that through the darker yugas communication will become most difficult, knowledge limited, and we find this difficult to understand as it seems so natural to us now. §
The Special Functions of A Monastery§
73 ¶We have a tremendous force of power that flows from temple to temple and can be directed where needed. But, they say—those who see ahead—that the surface of the Earth will change, and the divine energies that we work with will have to be stored away in mountains, to be brought out and used again when the next Sat and Tretā Yuga come to this planet. Each monastery-temple had its own kind of activity within it, depending much upon the location. Some wrote books for the ākāśic libraries. Other monasteries worked in gold. Still others were masters in the carving of stone. §