A LARGE number of writers in both ancient and modern times have affirmed that spiritual wisdom and a practical philosophy of life have always been available to mankind and that, however deeply hidden, they are to be found in the Scriptures of the great World Faiths. Man, they state, has but to remove the concealing veils of allegory, parable and symbol to discover a knowledge which can bestow serenity of mind and heart and lead to spiritual illumination.
Mere folk tales and primitive superstitions apart, the Scriptures and mythologies of ancient peoples may, it is claimed, be similarly approached. At least two views exist, however, concerning their origin. According to one of these, world myths gradually developed as explanations of the phenomena of Nature. Primitive races, who possessed little or no scientific knowledge, personified the forces of Nature and dramatized their interactions. Such tales may be thought of as folk myths in contra-distinction to those based upon historical, or presumedly historical, foundations.
The second view is that many of these ancient stories were given deep cosmogonical, religious, psychological and moral significance by poets, seers and prophets who later arose within the nations. Aeschylus, for example, thus relied upon Greek myth and legend for many of his plots, as also did Sophocles and Euripides, amongst others. In this way many archaic legends were both preserved and vitalised, having become imbued with religious or philosophic meanings. Initiates of the various occult schools and the Mystery Religions of the older civilisations are also said to have deliberately refashion-ed the stories into vehicles for the transmission to later races of their knowledge of cosmogony, cyclic involution and evolutions, and the true nature and destiny of man. Modern scientists have also found in ancient myths appropriate symbols for the subtle mental pro-cesses they study and attempt to elucidate. Freud, for example, used the phrase "Oedipus complex", whilst the term "Achilles' Heel" is sometimes employed to indicate vulnerability. Jung, in his turn, found in the ancient stories’ symbolic archetypes of human responses.
In these various ways the religions and philosophies of the ancients prove profitable to the modern student, whilst those possessed of knowledge of the Sacred Language and the keys of interpretation recognise ideas which are found to be common to all World Faiths, exoteric and esoteric. The universal use of symbols with which to portray those ideas makes them readily available; for the meaning of the symbols used are found to be constant, as constant also are the doctrines which they reveal. Thus, whilst ancient superstitions and magical practices, and the instinctive personification and dramatization of natural phenomena by primitive peoples, are recognised, World Scriptures and mythologies may legitimately be regarded as rich mines of the Ageless Wisdom. On occasion throughout this work, therefore, parallels are drawn between Biblical statements and the same ideas appearing in different forms in other sacred writings.
The value of this approach to World Scriptures becomes evident when the keys of interpretation are applied to the Bible. Success has, however, been rendered difficult by at least three prevalent practices. The first of these is to mistake the veils for the truths which they both conceal and reveal. The second is to require the acceptance as fact of much that is purely allegorical and, indeed, in some cases incredible. The third is the insistence by some Chris-tian denominations upon unquestioning belief in dogmas, based upon a literal reading of certain passages of the Bible, as essential to the salvation of man here and hereafter. Unfortunately, this is carried to still greater lengths by ex-cathedra pronouncements that failure to affirm implicit belief in stated dogmas may lead to excommunication, and even to eternal damnation.
These trends observable in orthodox Christianity may be regarded as particularly harmful at the present period in world history; for as a result of them the attention of Christians is diverted from eternal verities. These especially include the supreme importance of the search for and discovery of the Divine Presence within man, "Christ in you, the hope of glory," and of the fact that the Divinity in all men is one and the same. When the spiritual unity between all members of the human Race is fully recognised aggressive competition, organised crime and wars of conquest become impossibilities. The spiritually darkened, war-threatened and competitively divided condition of humanity today may well be amongst the tragic consequences of the long continued imposition by the spiritual Heads of the Christian Faith doubtless with the highest motives and out of consideration for the spiritual welfare of the people of dogmas based upon the literal reading of Biblical allegories; for when accepted and applied to life such dogmas inevitably affect international, national and personal relationships. They may be partly responsible for the divided condition of Christianity and even of humanity itself.
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