According to the teachings of the mystic adepts, there are seven cosmic islands and nine immense divisions in our universe of universes. These divisions, "Mansions in the Father's House," may be conveniently divided into four Grand Divisions of the cosmic scheme of creation: 1. The purely spiritual region; 2. The spiritomaterial region; 3. The materio-spiritual region; 4. The material region.
The mystic adepts inform us that the exploration of the inner realms (consisting of the first three Grand Divisions) is the heritage of each soul, and if we do not go within and traverse these regions the fault is ours.
Kabir, the poet-saint of India, probably described these regions most completely in his writings, but they have also been described by Guru Nanak, the first guru of the Sikh religion, Swami Ji and Baba Jaimal Singh Ji, two supreme mystic adepts of the nineteenth century, and, in the present century, by Baba Sawan Singh Ji and his spiritual successor, Sant Kirpal Singh Ji Maharaj. The third and lowest inner region, the
materio-spiritual region, is the nearest Grand Division to that of the physical universe. The central power-source of this materiospiritual region is known in the oriental terminology as Sahans dal Kanwal (Lotus of a Thousand Petals), and it is from this power-source that the entire physical universe derives its motor energies. This third materio-spiritual region is also known as the "astral plane" in western occult literature and in theosophical writings. The time-scale in the astral region is shorter than that in the second spirito-material region, but it is in the Astral realms still much longer than that in the physical universe.
The astral realm, up to and including the region of "universal mind," goes into dissolution at the end of a lesser cosmic life-cycle, which lasts for many millions of years. The "heavens" of most of the world religions are located in this region. Here can be found the Heaven of Christianity, the Paradise of Islam, and the Swargas of Hinduism.
These "heavens" are very beautiful, but they themselves are subject to eventual dissolution.
The commencement of the mystical Path of Love, the way of return to our true home, takes place in the fourth and lowest division of creation, which comprises the entirety of our physical universe: all the planets, suns, stars, solar systems, galaxies and cosmic schemes known and unknown to modern astronomy. Matter in our physical universe is in its most coarse, most dense form, with a very limited admixture of spirit substance, just enough to vivify matter and maintain life. The physical structure of our universe is the lowest projection of a cosmic idea channeled through the medium of "universal mind." The entire physical universe, with its millions of galaxies, separated by immeasurable numbers of light-years, is as a speck of dust in comparison with the inner realms beyond it.
The beginning of the mystical Path of Love takes place within the human consciousness, when the aspirant has focused his attention at the third-eye center, between and behind the two eye-brows. The third eye possesses its own illumination, being vivified by the light of the soul, and thus is not dependent upon external forms of light as our physical eyes are. Through the grace of a mystic adept the aspirant has been given a simple technique to transcend body-consciousness and to rise into the inner realms. First, he closes his outer eyes and sees with the inner third eye. He also closes his outer ears and hears with the inner spiritual ear. When these things are achieved, the current of consciousness throughout the body will withdraw and become concentrated at the third-eye center. The body itself will become senseless, but the aspirant's awareness of his soul, his true self, will thereby be heightened. This is the initial stage of what the mystic adepts call turiya pad, the fourth state of existence, which is the state of transcendental or super consciousness.
The disciple of the mystic adept has previously been given a Simran (repetition practice) of five charged words as the first step for rising into the spiritual realms. He collects the entire current of consciousness - mind and soul - at the third-eye center, and the repetition of the five holy words mentally helps him to achieve the required result, and he finds his consciousness withdrawing from the physical world. His first view of the astral region may differ on occasions. He may behold a magnificent blue eye, a brilliantly lighted window, or a blaze of radiance before him. He passes through this way of light and sees a colored symmetry, with a bright astral point of light within its center. The initiate then meditates upon this glorious light and soon finds himself impelled into an azure blue sky that appears to his inner vision as a circular disc or a chakra.
Through the loving grace and protection of the mystic adept, the devotee may bypass the lower astral levels; although sometimes these are revealed to him for his own instruction. The lowest astral level is a place of unbridled desires, a true infernal region, where unregenerate and bestial people gravitate to after death. In these dark and terrible surroundings, evil entities reap the harvest of their wicked deeds on earth.
This is not the "eternal hell" of the scriptures [no "hell" is ever eternal, according to the Masters], but a place of correction and eventual release. There are other levels, gradually improving in environment, on this lower astral plane; some are extremely pleasant, with wonderful scenery and "inns of rest" for ordinary people who are awaiting reincarnation upon earth.
The aspirant, having quickly transcended these lower levels, finds himself travelling through a truly "astral" region, studded with stars and glowing suns. He hears the Sound Current as an unending melody and, ascending through the stellar sky, he passes through a Sun and Moon, which appear to dissolve or shatter as he passes through them. These stellar bodies are not like the physical stars, planets and satellites with which we are familiar in our physical universe, but spheres that are far more luminous and refulgent than our physical luminaries.
The aspirant now hears the melody of a celestial bell and becomes absorbed in its sonorous tones; then he hears the melody of a conch and becomes saturated with its music.
As he progresses onwards and upwards the aspiring soul becomes increasingly aware of the Sound Current, or Audible Life Stream, the unstruck and unfathomable Word that underpins all creation from the realm of pure spirit to the plane of matter. As the river of life this "God-in-expression" power exists in a fluid state, altering its tonal nature from level to level, yet always remaining the same in its primal essence. The practice of linking with this ineffable Word is a prerequisite of ascending the mystical Path of Love, as Guru Nanak has stated:
By practice of the Word, one speeds
on to the Higher Spiritual Planes
unhindered;
By practice of the Word, one gets
into the spiritual planes openly
and honorably;
By practice of the Ward, one escapes
the bypaths of Yama, the
king of Death;
By practice of the Word, one gets in
close touch with the Truth.
O, great is the Power of the Word,
But few there be that know it.
— THE JAP JI
As the aspirant ascends further into the astral realms he is confronted by three paths. The path on the left hand side is a dark forbidding region, where strange rishis, yogis and adepts of a lower order abound. This left-hand path is the abode of Kal, the Negative Power, lord of the realms of mind and matter. Kal is also known as Brahm in some of the oriental teachings, and he is the ruler of the Fourth Division and lower levels of the Third Division of creation.
However, while Kal has dominion over the lower levels of creation, he still works under the divine laws of the Supreme Lord Himself.
Modern theosophy and other mystical schools of the present day affirm that there is an "inner government" of the world, and that its primary task is to control the stream of evolutionary influence among all races and nations, while also serving the cause of world betterment.
This occult government comes under the jurisdiction of Kal.
The term Kal literally means "time " and Kal thus comprises within his being the past, the present and future, as commonly understood by human beings. However, it is impossible to fix a cosmic date for the origin of Kal, or to predict when he will come to an end. Beginnings and endings are unreal concepts, created by man's outgoing senses, which see an apparent commencement and an apparent termination to everything that transpires in his environment. From a viewpoint of higher awareness, that which can be seen as the beginning of an event
in the physical world has previously been occurring invisibly as an idea in the mental-astral realms; and beyond these realms are regions which transcend time (or Kal) itself. Nevertheless, it may be said that the "duration" of Kal extends from one major cycle to another, during which the composite universe of mind and matter remains in its manifest form until its dissolution.
It is the primary duty of Kal, as the Negative Power of creation, to bind humanity to the Wheel of Birth and Death, and mankind's long upward struggle against the force of the Negative Power is designed by the Supreme Lord to purge us of our sins and impurities and to make us ready for our journey to our True Home, the Abode of all love and all bliss. Once man's evolution through the Wheel of Rebirth is achieved, his work in the physical universe should be completed; but the downward flowing pull of the Negative holds the soul of man in material thraldom.
Kal is the author of the laws of nature, which all must obey while living in physical incarnation. As the creator of the lower worlds, he is known as "God" to most of the social religions. He is served faithfully by the hierarchical agents of the lower mental, the astral and the physical levels of life. Only the mystic adepts and their disciples know of a higher God than Kal, and yet the Negative Power is worshiped by millions as the supreme Lord of creation. In comparison with the perfection of the true Supreme Lord of Love (known as Sat Purusha in the oriental terminology) Kal is only a subordinate in the hierarchy of the cosmic universe, and as such a subordinate he is not entirely free from imperfections. However, compared with the majority of mankind, Kal is an exalted being, an embodiment of light, wisdom and power.
The hierarchical representatives of Kal, known in the East as "incarnations of Brahm," are the avatars and prophets, whose mission it is to incarnate themselves in every age in order to root out unrighteousness and evil, to protect the good and punish the evil doers, and to establish righteousness in the world. These incarnations thus bring the promise of redemption to the righteous; but such redemption is still bound by the time-scale of the lower worlds and thus is not lasting. The current of Kal, or "time," is endless in its course for humanity, but souls with the help of a mystic adept of the highest order may transcend time and space and ascend into the timeless realm of the Supreme Lord of Love. Such a mystic adept is not part of Kal's inner government, although he has a deference for all who play their roles in the ordering of creation. But the mystic adept is an emissary from the Supreme Lord, and is commissioned to save souls and escort them to their True Home.
The inner domain of Kal, then, is the left-hand path of three paths that the aspirant beholds on his upward journey through the astral realms. In this domain, thousands upon thousands of holy men, enthralled by the wiles and blandishments of the Negative Power, are to be found absorbed in deep meditation. Embodiments of lower spiritual powers, known in the oriental terminology as riddhis and siddhis (miraculous powers), are the guardians of this lefthand region. These embodiments are concrete and visible and are endowed with advanced consciousness. Standing as implacable sentinels of these regions, in order to obstruct the further ascent of the soul, they will offer the aspirant great knowledge and psychic power; but they cannot stand before the Simran of the five holy names, given by the mystic adept, and they will dissolve before the uttering of these names.
People who have wandered into these astral regions without the guidance of a competent mystic adept have often been grossly misled by these supernatural powers; and many of the occult cults that have mushroomed in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries derive their inspiration from the riddhis and siddhis.
There are also millions of prophets, of greater and lesser degrees, together with incarnations of minor deities and spiritual hermits, who are stranded in these regions.
Until they are released from the bondage of Kal by a mystic adept of the highest order, they will be unable to proceed to the regions of pure spirituality. No soul who has traveled this way without the assistance of a mystic adept has ever reached the spiritual planes of pure love, which are far beyond the materio-spiritual planes. However, for the aspirant who has been initiated by a competent mystic adept, the way of ascent lies free of any obstruction.
The path on the right, facing the aspirant, provides ingress to far higher universes; but the true high road of the mystic adepts is the central path, an immeasurable luminous way which leads ultimately to the realm of the Supreme Lord. The aspirant ascends this bright way until he eventually arrives at the region of the Bankanal, which is the vestibule of the mental or causal regions. It is at the high level of Sahans dal Kanwal, in the upper regions of the astral realm, that the aspirant beholds the radiant spiritual form of the mystic adept, and this is his first inner revelation as to the true nature of his spiritual guide, whom he has hitherto only seen in the covering of a physical body.
Tulsi Sahib, a mystic adept of the highest degree, declared that in the inner realms: "Blinding light flashed forth from the nails of the Master's feet and illumines the very soul of the devotee." Maulana Rumi spoke of the experience of seeing the luminous form of the mystic adept thus: "As the light of the Master dawns in the soul, one gets to know the secrets of both worlds." Guru Arjan stated: "The Blessed Form of the Master is in my forehead. Whenever I peep within I see Him there." And Khawaja Moeen-ud-Din Chisti spoke of this inner contact with the mystic adept in these poetic words: "O Master! the sun cannot stand the resplendence of Thy face. The moon also has covered herself with cloud to escape Thy dazzling light.... In the very Person of the Nabi (Prophet), the Light of God has taken up a material form, just as the light of the sun does in the body of the moon." The Christian scriptures have also described the experience of seeing the luminous form of the mystic adept in graphic detail:
And I turned to see the Voice that
spake with me and found One like
unto the Son of Man, clothed with
a garment down to the feet and girt
about the paps with a golden girdle.
His head and hairs were white like
wool, as white as snow, and his
eyes were a flame of fire.
And his feet like unto fine brass,
as if they burned in a furnace,
and his Voice as the sound of many waters.
— REVELATION I: 12-15
The luminous form of the mystic adept now reveals the highest levels of the astral plane to the gaze of the aspirant; and, in the company of the mystic adept, the aspirant finds himself in the region of Sahans dal Kanwal, the thousandpetaled lotus of cosmic energy, powerhouse of both the astral and physical universes. Sahans dal Kanwal is a glorious pulsating cosmos in itself, and this radiant region is illuminated by a central flame of the most intense radiance in all the astral realms. Countless melodies and harmonies of ravishing beauty proceed from this great flame, and those who dwell in this region truly believe that they are in the highest heaven. And yet they are only on the first step of the great ascending highway of the mystic adepts of the holy Shabd, for it is from this plane that the real journey of the soul, in the company of the mystic adept, truly commences.
On arriving at the region of Sahans dal Kanwal, the human mind awakens to the awareness that it has truly slumbered for countless incarnations, and it is now consciously awakened to the reality of the higher realms of the inner cosmos.
Sahans dal Kanwal is the final and highest plane reached by even the most advanced yogis, for the life-currents, termed pranas by eastern mystics, which are necessary in yogic practice, cannot reach beyond here. This high astral level is incredibly vast and awe-inspiring, and the holy ones who dwell here cannot comprehend that countless more beautiful and far higher spiritual realms lie beyond Sahans dal Kanwal. But the disciple of a mystic adept must ascend much higher in order to gain true spiritual liberation.