Meeting The Masters in The Hall of Wisdom

A painting of B.P. Wadia by Sanjay Chapolkar

The following are extracts from letters written to several associates of the United Lodge of Theosophists by B.P. Wadia (1881-1958) and published in the August 1965 issue of “The Theosophical Movement” magazine as part of an ongoing series titled “Extracts from Unpublished Letters.”

To clearly comprehend what is referred to in these particular extracts, it will be necessary to have some familiarity with the book “The Voice of the Silence,” which was translated by H.P. Blavatsky from the Book of the Golden Precepts.

From p. 6-9 (Theosophy Company edition) it speaks of the Three Halls – the Hall of Ignorance, the Hall of Learning, and the Hall of Wisdom – which correspond to the Avastha-Traya of Jagrat, Svapna, and Sushupti, which are the states of consciousness known in English as waking, dreaming, and dreamless sleep or deep sleep. In these three states, the soul – the inner man – is functioning on the physical plane, the astral or psychic plane, and the spiritual plane, respectively.

The title page of “The Voice of the Silence” states that it has been translated “FOR THE DAILY USE OF LANOOS (DISCIPLES).” That book, like these words from Mr Wadia, will not mean or appeal much to any except those who already carry in their hearts the fire of devotion and consecrated service to the Work of the true Masters of Wisdom. Several pages further on, therefore, is a page which simply says “DEDICATED TO THE FEW.”

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“We are asked in the Voice to look for our Guru in the Hall of Wisdom; in other words, in Sushupti. Read the paragraph which follows and note that there is something in us which is also in that Hall; we are called upon to blend the two. When your Higher Self and your Guru-Teacher, H.P.B., are constantly in your consciousness, when your body sleeps that consciousness, plunging into Sushupti, carries the work one step forward, without undesirable interference from the five senses and the organs, or from the desires and the feelings. It is the spiritual Heart, and that alone which can function in the Hall of Wisdom. If that does not function, we plunge into Sushupti and emerge rested and refreshed but not energized and enlightened. This Sushupti-preparation exercise is of vital importance. Of course the Master will appear when the disciple is ready – but how shall he become ready? The Master can be met only in the Hall of Wisdom; how to ascend to that Hall to see Him, to hear Him, has to be considered and preparation made.”

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“So now comes your proposition: How shall we know Them? There is only one way of knowing Them. By our own silent development. And how shall we develop ourselves? H.P.B. has shown the method directly and indirectly in The Voice of the Silence. She has indicated that we must contact the Master on the spiritual plane by rising to that level and not by dragging the Master down to our level. This level is really speaking Sushupti. When our consciousness is freed from the body and its senses and from the kamic nature which works even in the Swapna condition, we so to speak rise to a plane where our Monadic Triad functions in what is called the causal body by H.P.B., or Anandamayakosa in the Vedantic classification. Mr. Judge speaks of it as the ethereal vesture. We function there in Sushupti that way, but not being accustomed to the subtle vibrations of that state we naturally go to sleep and fall into subjectivity. All the same we begin to absorb whatever is there in that state of consciousness for us. Please turn to The Voice of the Silence and note that it is said that there abides in that hall something that is uncreate and it also abides in the disciple’s heart. And therefore there is a kind of a consubstantiality between the Hall of Wisdom and the person who rises to the plane of that Hall. Ordinary people return without any experience of any kind, but those who know of the Masters, who are aspiring to be chelas, become, by certain practices on the physical plane, more and more aware of the activities of that which is uncreate in the Sushupti level.

“Two great ideas are known to be the most powerful awakeners of human consciousness in that Sushupti subjectivity. One is study and meditation on the nature and character of the Monadic Triad, Atma-Buddhi-Manas. Therefore study and meditation on this subject is an important link, but is not altogether sufficient. Our Higher Self is far away, and there are many links forged by various hierarchies of intelligences between our physical-plane consciousness and the consciousness of the spiritual Triad. The link which helps most is that of the real Teachers or Gurus. It is necessary for us to take note that a study of the nature and powers of the Masters is recommended both by H.P.B. and by Mr. Judge. This enables us once again to open a more intimate layer of our subjective consciousness in Sushupti. The Masters teach their chelas first in that spiritual state of consciousness. And for long years the chelas do not even remember what they are learning and assimilating, because on their return journey they are caught up once again in the swapna state, and finally in bodily sense-life. But as we continue to study and meditate on these two subjects we begin to build up a new centre of consciousness in ourselves at the back of the ordinary normal sense consciousness, and we bring the two centres of consciousness closer and closer by a repeated endeavour and by giving ourselves wholly up to a contemplation of these two subjects.”

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“You also ask about the functions of intuition in relation to the Masters. Intuition, as H.P.B. points out in the Glossary, comes to us directly in the Sushupti condition. She says, “Buddhi, the Spiritual Soul, is the direct cause of the Sushupti condition.” Sushupti is entirely subjective for most people because Buddhi is passive in them. Intuition or Buddhi has to be activated, says The Voice of the Silence in an important footnote. How? By the application of the principles of correspondence and analogy. That is one of the ways in which intuition on the subject of the Higher Self and the Masters has to be viewed.”