A
Theological Analysis of the New Age Movement
CHAPTER III
CURRENT
TRENDS
The Utopian New Age Future
Popular
books and magazines, television, movies, fantasy games, and children’s toys
are informing the world that the New Age of higher consciousness, of one globe
and one people under one God, is emerging out of the old outmoded ways of
thinking and doing. The Rainbow
Bridge states: “The present
world crisis, resulting from the changeover from the Piscean to the Aquarian
Age, presents a tremendous opportunity for progress.”
David Spangler writes of this progress into the New Age in his book Emergence:
The Rebirth of the Sacred. In
the influential book, Emergence of the Mystical, Henry C. Clausen, 33º,
Sovereign Grand Commander of the Supreme Council, 33º, of the Ancient and
Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry, Mother Jurisdiction of the World, in a
chapter entitled “New Era Beckons,” writes:
Today
we are at the threshold of a new era. All
signs point to this fact. Despite
the forebodings, we find ourselves at a rare and climactic turning point in our
wobbly world’s history. Those
with a visionary, apocalyptic, prophetic or intuitive frame of mind seem to feel
we are in a period of days and hours before dawn.
There is a stir in the air, a change coming of large dimensions, such as
arose among the Jews before the birth of Christ. We look toward a transformation into a new age using,
however, the insights and wisdom of the ancient mystics. . . .
This
new world view is emerging because there has been a recent correlation between
modern physics and the mysticism of Eastern religions.
Regarding
this emergence into the New Age, author John Naisbitt writes in his best seller Megatrends:
As
a society, we have been moving from the old to the new. And we are still
in motion. Caught between eras, we experience turbulence. Yet, amid
the sometimes painful and uncertain present, the restructuring of America
proceeds unrelentingly.
This
book is about a new American society that is not yet fully evolved.
Nevertheless, the restructuring of America is already changing our inner and
outer lives. . . . No longer do we have the luxury of operating within an
isolated, self-sufficient, national economic system; we must now acknowledge
that we are part of a global economy. . . .
We
are living in the time of the parenthesis, the time between eras. It is as
though we have bracketed off the present from both the past and the future, for
we are neither here nor there. We have not quite left behind the either/or
America of the past. . ..
But
we have not embraced the future either. We have done the human thing:
We are clinging to the known past in fear of the unknown future. . . The
parenthesis is a time of change and questioning.
The
new age of John Naisbitt is synonymous with the New Age of Marilyn Ferguson, of
senator and presidential candidate, Gary Hart, and of Alvin Toffler.
In 1982 Naisbitt named Gary Hart a “. . .new-age Colorado politician. .
. .”
Hart states on the cover of Megatrends:
“Megatrends is an insightful analysis of the political,
societal, and economic currents that will shape our future.
It will be welcomed by all who care about today’s—and
tomorrow’s—society.”
Returning
to Hart, the 1984 presidential contender, this politician was reported to be a
“’. . .new generation of leadership’ and . . .a charter member of a loose
coalition of House and Senate Democrats known variously as ‘Atari
Democrats,’ ‘neoliberals,’ or ‘New Wave’ Democrats.”
“New Wave” is used as a synonym for “New Age.”
Gary Hart is also reported to have some involvement with Indian Spirit
worship
which is a popular concept among the New Age elite with their Gnostic-like
spirits or “aeons” or Ascended Masters of Wisdom.
Another
endorsement on the cover of Megatrends is written by key New Age writer,
Alvin Toffler. Toffler believes,
“John Naisbitt is one of the shrewdest observers of the changes sweeping
America today. . .”
Writer Emily Yoffe of Harper’s Magazine does not agree with
Naisbitt’s endorsers, but she does state:
Naisbitt’s
vision of a cheerful, painless, glittering future endears him both to Fortune
500 capitalists and California meditators.
With hints to both groups that they will be the creators of the future,
he is seen simultaneously as a New Age prophet and a take-charge executive. . .
.
Naisbitt
will. . .be exercising his evangelical side on the lecture circuit:
“I really think the great, if not the only hope for world peace is the
global economy. . . . I want to make speeches about world peace through world
trade. . . .”
“I’ve
become a more spiritual person recently,” he says.
“I’ve seen the powerful relationships between mind, spirit, and body.
You can’t deal with these things compartmentally.
We know everything is related to everything else.
The trick is to see the whole. When
I start to learn too much about something I back off.
I want to know a little about a lot.”
If
that trend continues, he’ll eventually know nothing about everything.
Naisbitt
calls New Age evangelist Marilyn Ferguson, “. . .the center of perhaps the
most extensive network of new-age contacts and organizations.
In fact, as she says in The Aquarian Conspiracy, much of the
information for the book was gathered through her role as a human clearinghouse
for new-age ideas.”
Marilyn
Ferguson considers Naisbitt to be among the inner elite of the New Age futurists
and, on the cover of Megatrends, states:
“In such turbulent times, we prize those among us who see clearly.
John Naisbitt offers a dramatic, convincing view on the changes already
under way. This is a book for
everyone who wants a sense of the near future.”
The Occultic Bent of
the New Age Future
Three
of the four endorsers of the cover of Megatrends are known as New Age
apologists. The cover of this
world-class best seller is also significant as it displays three major symbols
of this movement—the rainbow (representing to some the seven colors of the
seven levels or rays of initiation into the occult), the point of white or
yellow light (representing Lucifer, the bearer of light), and the triple six
swirls (one of the sacred numbers in the complicated numerology system of the
occult). Toffler (The Third
Force), Gail Sheehy (Passages, Pathfinders) and Mark Satin (New
Age Politics) also use the rainbow effect on the coverlets of their books as
does the Bantam “New Age Books” logo.
The
rainbow is being popularized on everything from children’s toys and games
(c.f. Rainbow Brite ™ toys by Mattel) to stationery, stickers and clothes
labels. It should not be confused
with the true rainbow given by Yahweh Elohim as a sign of His promise never
again to flood the entire earth (Gen. 9:9-17).
Also popular with youth is the unicorn.
Since 1975 when the New Age movement went public, many varieties of
unicorns have saturated the marketplace. The
unicorn’s roots lie in pagan idolatry; it is known as the god of knowledge in the inner spheres of
occultism.
Unicorn
is a god. He demands servitude and
sacrifice. He stands out of reach,
as fixed and brilliant as the stars. . . .
Hail,
Unicorn! God of knowledge; a dark
ghost on the fringes of man’s consciousness. . . .
The
unicorn stands alone, still as frost. It
keeps watch down corridors of time. The
past and the future meet in the presence of the unicorn: The darkness and light become one.
The
occult literature supports the view that the Bible teaches the existence of
unicorns in such passages as Psalm 22:21 in the King James version.
The Hebrew word translated by the King James version as “unicorns”
quite literally means “wild oxen.”
The Hebrew word translated “horns” in this passage is a technical
Hebrew plural form called a “dual” plural, which means that the horns came
in pairs as would be expected on oxen in contrast to the single horn of the
unicorn. It must be concluded that
the Bible does not teach the existence and significance of unicorns!
The Bible does speak loudly against idolatry, however, as in Exodus
20:1-5.
Then
God spoke all these words, saying, “I am the Lord your God, who brought you
out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.
“You
shall have no other gods before Me.
“You
shall not make for yourself an idol, or any likeness of what is in heaven above
or on the earth beneath or in the water under the earth.
“You
shall not worship them or serve them;. . .”
Two
leading propaganda magazines for New Age thought are Omni and Science
Digest. These magazines
frequently display symbols adopted by the New Age such as rays and the point of
light. The sphere or point of light
in occultism represents enlightenment, realization and true understanding.
It contains all other possible colors so incorporates the “All is
One” concept. Behind the
symbolism is the Light of this World, Lucifer.
Other common symbols are rainbows and rainbow effects, crystal balls, the
“third-eye,” pyramids, and symbolic triple sixes.
At least one of these symbols has occurred on every Omni cover in
1983-1984.
The
“third-eye” or “All-seeing-eye” of Hindu mysticism, the New Age occultic
core and Free Masonry appears with regularity (c.f. Omni of April, May,
June 1984, January 1985, and Science Digest of March 1981, December 1983
and December 1984). This third eye,
inner eye, or centering point is purported to be the seat of all knowing and
wisdom. Of this Alice Bailey says:
. . .the energy of the soul works through the
highest head center and is brought into activity through meditation. . . .
The energy of the integrated personality is focused through the ajna
center, between the eyes. . .
The
inner eye, the single eye of the spiritual man.
This is the true eye of vision and involves the idea of duality (of the
see-er and that which is seen). It
is the divine eye. It is that
through which the soul looks forth into the world of men. . . .
Centering and Holy
Mantras
The
Eastern (and pagan) religious practice of “centering” (or tapping into the
god-power within every man) has been gradually integrated into the Western world
as a result of an ongoing media effort. This
concept is kept before the public not only through magazine covers but also
through television programs and their commercials, movie stars who espouse this
belief and through the vehicle of the Olympic games of 1984. One of the most popular questions that the media asked the
athletes was, “How do you handle the stress?”
The most common answer of the athletes was that they meditated and found
their centering point. This concept
is now popularly accepted by the general public, but is also being incorporated
into church programs in the name of “relevancy.” Yoga classes are held in churches and YMCA’s as are
exercise programs designed around the religiously significant (though pagan)
yoga positions. This infiltration
into the church occurs as men and women take stress reduction and
self-improvement courses, based on yoga concepts, est seminars, Silva Mind
Control, Biofeedback and hypnosis at their jobs; or exercise classes based on
yoga positions or the religiously oriented martial arts; and then, when these
systems are experienced as valid, they are carried back into the church
and incorporated into Christianity.
According
to D.K., the Master Jesus should be working within the Catholic Church by about
the year 1980, if things go according to the plan.”
A possible example of this is the Catholic Church sanctioned “Advanced
Centering Prayer Workshops” given by Abbot Thomas Keating of St. Joseph’s
abbey, Spencer, Maine.
An
introduction to the Centering Prayer by Father Basil Pennington appeared in the Review
for Religious in September, 1976. His
book on the same subject, Daily We Touch Him, was published by Doubleday
in March, 1977. . . .
Centering
prayer is a renewal of the traditional prayer of the church leading to
contemplation. It is an attempt to
present it in an up-to-date format. . . . It
centers one’s attention on God’s presence within and moves on to discover
his presence everywhere else. . . .
To
do this systematically, take up a position that will enable you to sit still.
Close your eyes. . . . Then
slow down the normal flow of thoughts by thinking just one thought.
Choose a sacred word of one or two syllables with which you feel
comfortable. It will be the sign of
your intention to open yourself interiorly to the mystery of God’s enveloping
presence. Keep thinking this sacred
word. When you become aware that
you are off on some other thought, gently return to this word. As you go into a deeper level of reality, you begin to pick
up vibrations that were there all the time but not perceived.
This broadened perspective gives you a chance to know both yourself and
God in a new way. . .
To
know God in this way is to perceive a new dimension to all reality. . . .
In this prayer we are asking, “Who are you?”—and waiting for the
answer.
The
key concept in the transfer of these New Age mystical practices into the church
is experiential validity. If
something “works” it must be good, and if something is good it must be
Christian, whether or not it is a part of biblical truth.
Christianity
is a relationship with the personal, living God of the Bible.
Since He tells mankind in His Word, the Bible, that Christianity is a
walk of faith within the framework of His revealed Word, opening oneself “. .
.interiorly to the mystery of God’s enveloping presence” is spiritually
quite dangerous and may even be opening oneself up to demonic influence.
Abbot Keating continues:
This
method of prayer is a training in self-surrender. . . .
Any
form of meditation or prayer that transcends thinking sets off the dynamic of
interior purification. . . . Generally
thoughts which are the result of this process arise in the mind when one is most
at peace, without one’s knowing where they come from or why.
They may introduce themselves with a certain force or even with an
emotional charge. . . .
Take
everything that happens during periods of Centering Prayer peacefully and
gratefully, without putting a judgment on anything. . . .
This is fulfilling the Gospel precept to watch and pray.
The
Christian is not to surrender himself to the depths of thoughtless meditation in
an attitude of non-judgmental acceptance, but he is to fix his mind on Christ
and His righteousness and to take every thought captive to the obedience of
Christ. (2 Cor. 10:5) Abbot Keating
is deceptively teaching Japa (or Raja or Agni) yoga as taught by Maharishi
Mahesh Yogi in Transcendental Meditation. This
Catholic theologian’s technique of “centering prayer” is nothing less than
Transcendental Meditation and his “sacred word” is used as a “mantra.”
Hindu meditation techniques have penetrated Catholicism.
The Maharishi wants to control more than Christian minds—his goal is to
help set up the one world government of the New Age that is to guarantee world
peace. He proclaimed this intention
in a series of full-page ads in the Wall Street Journal
and Time magazine.
Peace:
the Global Enticement
Other
full-page ads in the media blitz focusing on global peace and the New Age are
appearing. An advertisement in Time
lists Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Confucianism, Buddhism and Judaism and
states: “Our one prayer to our
one Father this Christmas: Peace,
give us Peace.”
Peace is the global rallying point of the mainstream New Age movement,
but there will be no lasting peace until the Prince of Peace, the Lord Jesus
Christ, returns to set up His kingdom—and He is violently rejected as the
creator and savior by the New Agers. Emmet
Fox, a liberal churchman echoes the occultic tradition as he explains:
The
true idea of God is individualized in man. . . .
Once mankind has grasped this true concept of God, most of the evils of
the present day will be swept into the discard, into obscurity, never to be seen
again. . . .
The
Christ is not Jesus. The Christ is
the active Presence of God—the incarnation of God—in living men and women.
This is the Christ and it is eternal.
In the history of all races the Cosmic Christ has incarnated in
man—Buddha, Moses, Elijah, and in many other leaders and teachers. . . .
However, in this New Age, the Cosmic Christ will come into millions of
men and women who are ready to receive it.
This will be the second coming of Christ for them.
So
the New Agers are deceived by the lies of their Father, Lucifer, of whom Jesus,
the true savior, said: “Whenever
he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own nature;
for he is a liar, and the father of lies” (John 8:44b).
The
Solar Logos, the God of this World, has been heralded in a full-page ad in Newsweek:
The
scale of the dawning world movement is far beyond our narrow intellect and
imagination. . . .
At
this very moment, our world is undergoing an enormous change comparable to the
dawning of the day itself. We are
facing the reality of a gigantic Force of Life such as humankind has never
experienced before, which is called “the coming of the spiritual Sun of the
New Age.”
Emanating
out of the “Central Spiritual Sun” will come the “light”
of the Solar Logos (Lucifer). This
spiritual being is to set up a global kingdom with a world religion over which
eventually his incarnation will rule. Key United Nations leaders are paving the way for this one
world system.
The United Nations:
Establishing a Global Spirituality
Among
the many international leaders aspiring to facilitate globalism, two are
significant to this thesis in light of their worldwide influence and their
commitment to the occultic core teachings of the New Age.
The importance and immensity of the New Age movement is eloquently
expressed by another disciple of the Master, Djwhal Khul.
This disciple, Donald Keyes, is a consultant to U.N. delegations and
committees; representative to the U.N. of the World Association of World
Federalists; a past director of SANE and the International League of Human Rights; president
and co-founder (with Norman Cousins) of the New Age think-tank, Planetary
Citizens, and author of the book, Earth at Omega.
In Keyes’ book, which he dedicates in part to “. . .my Mentors (in
the order of their appearance), “Max Heindel (famous Rosicrucian), Djwhal Khul
(transmitter of The Secret Doctrine to H. P. Blavatsky in 1888 and of the
24 Alice Bailey books from 1919 to 1949) and Ascended Master Norya (transmitter
of the Agni Yoga writings to Helen Roerich), he states:
We
mentioned earlier how the dominant “straight” society has apparently not
recognized the strength and pervasiveness of the new consciousness culture.
Perhaps this is just as well, as so far a polarization between the old
culture and the new one has been avoided. If
the New Age movement does become a target of alarmed forces and defenders of the
status quo ante, however, it will offer a widely dispersed and
decentralized target, very hard to identify and impossible to dissuade or
subvert from its life-serving values.
A
strange thing is being attested to here by a man of international influence:
It must be concluded that Djwhal Khul has “appeared” to Donald Keyes!
D. K. must be aged if he was old enough to both transmit books in 1888 to
H. P. Blavatsky and then influence U.N. consultant Donald Keyes in 1982.
The demon, Djwhal Khul, is beginning to pull together the visible
leadership of the global New Age movement which, if the Plan succeeds will usher
in Maitreya Christ as the world leader and will guarantee peace on earth.
The
theme of “Peace on Earth”! is being disseminated by Robert Muller, the
friend and associate of Donald Keyes at the U.N.
In a lecture at Southern Methodist University, November 3, 1984,
Muller announced that 1985 would be the fortieth anniversary of the
United Nations and that he had been selected
to govern the activities. Muller
has chosen “Security for the World” to be the 1985 anniversary theme.
He stated that when nations begin to believe that the U.N. can guarantee
security they will willingly disarm. Muller
expressed conviction that disarmament and world peace with a U.N. World Court
could be accomplished within the targeted next fifteen years.
Dr.
Muller encouraged parents to teach their children two languages and two
religions so that they will be
compatible with the projected one world system of A.D. 2000.
children are currently being taught this philosophy of globalism in
Arlington, Texas, at the Robert Muller School of Ageless Wisdom.
This school and its principal, Gloria Bueller, were praised by Muller for
their pioneering work with the talented and gifted (TAG) children of the
Dallas-Fort Worth area. A significant portion of the curriculum was designed by Dr.
Muller and is based on the “ageless wisdom” of Alice Bailey/Djwhal Khul and
Helen Roerich/Master Morya. No
attempt is made to camouflage the demonic source of this curriculum.
The Preface to the manual, The World Core Curriculum in the Private
School reads:
The
world is indebted to Dr. Robert Muller, Assistant Secretary General of the
United Nations, author and lecturer, for the formulation of the World Core
Curriculum in its skeleton form. It
is upon that scaffold combined with the Ageless Wisdom teachings that this
present work has precipitated.
The
underlying philosophy upon which The Children’s School of Wisdom is based will
be found in the teachings set forth in the books of Alice A. Bailey by the
Tibetan teacher, Djwhal Khul (published by Lucis Publishing Company, 866 United
Nations Plaza, Suite 566-7, New York, N.Y.
10164) and the teachings of M. Morya as given in the Agni Yoga Series
books (published by Agni Yoga Society, Inc., 319 West 107th Street,
New York, N.Y. 10025).
Who
is M. Morya in Robert Muller’s World Core Curriculum?
H. Saraydarian in a short but thorough summary of the Plan and its
directors, The Hierarchy and the Plan, tells us:
Master
Morya is one of the members of our planetary Hierarchy of the Masters of Wisdom.
He is a first-ray Chohan occupying a unique position in this branch of
the first Aspect of our planetary Logos. Master
Morya . . . .was King Akbar in the past. He
is the head of all esoteric schools in the world.
He has a large number of students scattered all over the world; many of
them are in Europe. He is one of
the Masters closely related to the founding of the Theosophical Society in 1875
and works in close collaboration with his brother, Master Koot Hoomi.
Assistant
Secretary-General Muller displayed his allegiance to the demon, Morya, and the
Theosophical Society as he mentioned in his S.M.U. address that, in his opinion,
Marilyn Ferguson in her book The Aquarian Conspiracy did not accurately
represent the size and extent of the New Age movement.
He complained that Ferguson should have described the immense European
commitment to the Ageless Wisdom.
Dr.
Muller serves on the Board of Directors of the Lucis Trust (which is,
incidentally, the custodian trust of the U.N. chapel) and writes articles for
the journal of the Theosophical Society. Lucis
Trust was originally the Luciferic Publishing Company (1922) and the journal of
the Theosophical Society was originally Lucifer magazine (from September
1887 until 20 August 1897). The New
Age book, Networking, was built around interviews with Dr. Muller in his
U.N. office. In this book Muller
says:
There
is a pattern in all this, a response to a prodigious evolutionary march by the
human species toward total consciousness. . . .
Something gigantic is going on, a real turning point in evolution.
.
. .the beginning of a new age, a gigantic step forward in evolution. . . .
Perhaps after all, we would be able to achieve peace and harmony on
Earth. . . . The human species is
becoming something new, it is similar to the passage from protozoa to the
metazoa.
The
Father of Lies has deceived these men of international renown. Not only will there be no peace and harmony on Earth until
the Prince of Peace, Jesus, returns, but the passage of protozoa to metazoa is
totally without scientific verification as is the entire evolutionary model.
Evolutionist G.A. Kerkut writes:
There
are. . .seven basic assumptions that are often not mentioned during discussions
of evolution. Many evolutionists
ignore the first six assumptions and only consider the seventh.
These are as follows:
(1)
The first assumption is that non-living things gave rise to living
material, i.e., Spontaneous generation occurred.
(2)
The second assumption is that spontaneous generation occurred only once.
The other assumptions all follow from the second one.
(3)
The third assumption is that viruses, bacteria, plants and animals are
all interrelated.
(4)
The fourth assumption is that the protozoa gave rise to the metazoa.
(5)
The fifth assumption is that the various invertebrate phyla are
interrelated.
(6)
The sixth assumption is that the invertebrates gave rise to the
vertebrates.
(7)
The seventh assumption is that within the vertebrates the fish gave rise
to the amphibia, the amphibia to the reptiles, and the reptiles to the birds and
mammals.
Evolutionary
scientist Kerkut assures his readers that the step by gradual step
transformation of simple forms of life into higher forms of life is but an
assumption. It cannot be
scientifically proven that a single organism ever evolved into a higher organism
or event that life evolved from non-life. The
God of the Bible states in reference to the Lord Jesus Christ:
“For by Him all things were created, both in the heavens and on the
earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or
authorities—all things have been created by Him and form Him” (Col. 1:16).
Apart from any process of evolution the true God says:
“All flesh is not the same flesh, but there is one flesh of men, and
another flesh of beasts and another flesh of birds and another of beast” (2
Cor. 15:39).
Catholic
layman Robert Muller and most New Agers are committed to evolutionary faith.
This belief that man must have evolved and is now evolving into a higher
form and higher consciousness is reflected as Willis Harmon of Stanford Research
Institute, (now SRI), coined the term Homo Noeticus and founded the Institute
for Noetic Science—a New Age study center of the paranormal, parapsychological
and extra-sensory perception. Not
to be outdone in coining a new name for Homo sapiens, Ashley Montagu and Floyd
Matson write:
The
humanist alternative holds that man’s fate, his course of conduct for good or
ill, is not preprogrammed but self-determined:
Man at some time is master of his fate; the fault, dear humans, is not in
our stars or our genes but in ourselves that we are. . .whatever we become.
.
. .that there is nothing within us or without to prevent an act of
self-transformation, an evolutionary leap, if that is what is called for. . .
The
time has come for remaking. Homo
Sapiens has had his day on earth—and has failed. . . .
The
possible attainment of full humanness—the transformation of the species from
Homo sapiens to Homo humanus—rests upon our recovery of the lost world of
fellow feeling, the source of all human connection.
Before thinking of new horizons, before planning any bold new
enterprises, we must come back to our senses—or perish senselessly.
Evolution
must continue and man must evolve out of Homo sapiens to prevent global
destruction and the disappearance of mankind.
Robert Muller records his analysis:
For
the first time in history, the question of the survival of the entire human
family, rather than that of any particular nation or group, has been squarely
posed. Many scientists who deal
with the long run do not give us much chance of survival. . . .
Others. . .believe that humanity is undergoing a deep evolutionary change
and will develop new means and perceptions which will help it survive and find a
harmonious relation with its planet and with its own individuals. . . .
We
must see our planet and ourselves as cells of a universe which is becoming
increasingly conscious of itself in us. That
is our royal road out of this present bewilderment.
So
Dr. Muller sees the solution to humanity’s problem as a quantum leap into
cosmic consciousness—into the universal monistic One.
He feels that as a result, “Our children will know a better future, a
more peaceful world, and unprecedented fulfillment of individual human life and
consciousness.”
To this end he wrote the World Core Curriculum for the Private School
which teaches the talented and gifted children of unsuspecting, undiscerning
parents to use Agni yoga to get in touch with their god within and the ascended
masters (demons) from the Hierarchy without.
The “Plan” went public in 1975 with the goal of snatching a
generation of young people away from their “Piscean” parents.
The Seduction of the
Children
An
extended yet important unveiling of the objectives of the occult Hierarchy are
defined in a speech given in 1974 by Mary Bailey, head of the Lucis Trust at
U.N. Plaza:
Mention
of the year 1975 crops up repeatedly. This
year appears to be a real turning point, or more accurately, a time when the
subjective tensions and changes in consciousness experienced over a long period
of time should begin to emerge in recognizable form. . . .
This
process of manifestation will lead towards the externalization of the Hierarchy
and the reappearance of the Christ. . . .
The
main blockage in human consciousness to the presence of the soul is the
selfishness of the little wills of men. Hence
the emphasis in esoteric schools on the spirited will.
It is the main purpose of these schools to evoke the will in their
students just as it is the main purpose of Hierarchy to stimulate and evoke the
spiritual will in humanity. . . . Hence
the tremendous significance of the Shamballa impact in 1975 and again in the
year 2000. . . .
One
of the basic objectives in Hierarchy in providing a new interpretation of the
Ageless Wisdom and inspiring the emergence of esoteric schools is the
conditioning of the human consciousness. . . .
Many schools have emerged since H.P.B. did her pioneering work with D.K.
at the end of the 19th century.
Some of them, but not all, are “true” esoteric schools; that is, a
definite projection from the one “school of occultism” founded in Shamballa.
. . .
In
the last few years it has become apparent that the schools that will continue on
into the future to become part of the new wave of Mystery Schools due to appear
towards the end of the century are those whose orientation is on the life-line
toward the center of purpose and will. The
goal is transference of the life focus, soul contact and soul fusion having been
achieved at least to some extent. The
method used is the relating of the Monad, the One, to the personality. . . .
This obviously presupposes the existence of the Antahkarana, the rainbow
bridge.
The
teaching we how have is fundamental to these objectives. . . .its time has come.
As predicted by D.K., certain aspects of esoteric training are now
possible in academic education. . . .today the teaching is moving out rapidly
into schools and universities. This
is not confined to the many thousands of young people who are themselves
studying esotericism, practicing meditation, and seeing to it that their student
libraries provide esoteric books. . . . Increasingly
we find teachers, professors and lecturers are using D.K.’s books for their
own classes and programs. . . . teachers
of psychology, philosophy, humanism, political and social science and
international affairs. Meditation
and yoga classes are becoming almost mandatory; telepathy and various forms of
ESP and the continuity of life are under serious study and research.
The reality of so-called “magic” is becoming better understood and
lifted out of its “black” frame of reference.
It
should not be long before many studies now available only in esoteric schools
will form part of the regular curriculum in academic training. The constitution of man, meditation, the true psychology of
the soul, mental communication or telepathy, are among such subjects.
This will release esoteric schools to concentrate on some of the more
practical and profound aspects of initiation and the restoration of the
Mysteries.
The
revelatory teaching to be given on a world-wide scale via radio after 1975 will
obviously not be “new” teaching. . . .
We
will begin to realize that the teaching we now have can be—and must
be—related to each one of the seven main fields of hierarchical
work—political, religious, economic, philosophical, psychological, scientific
and cultural or educational. . . .
Esoteric
teachings are intended to expand consciousness to become more
inclusive—this is the major objective. And
we are today vitally concerned with what is called the “new consciousness,”
from which “new values to live by” may be born as an impetus to carry
humanity on into the new age.
One
stated objective of this thesis is to document the goals of the New Age
leadership. This last admittedly lengthy quote allows a recognized leader
of the occultic core to tell in her own words the major objectives of this
movement.
A
generation of young people, living in 1975, are targeted as candidates to form
an indoctrinated, initiated corps of New Age leaders for around the year 2000.
In 1975 a major thrust into the lives of young people of the Western
world was begun. This new assault has as a primary goal the promotion of a
dread of nuclear war. The
anticipated end result is that this coming generation will willingly sacrifice
nationalism and traditional family relationships and responsibilities for the
promise of global unity and peace. Children
are being taught that their parents’ ways are outmoded and obsolete.
Laws being tested now will make traditional Judeo-Christian lifestyles
illegal (See: A Christian
Manifesto by Dr. Francis Schaeffer, pp. 82-88).
In an article entitled “Parental Rights Are Not Negotiable, “ Pro-Family
Alert states:
Children
are the nation’s future. Whoever
controls their minds will determine what the future will be. . .—spiritually,
economically, and in all other ways. The
social planners are keenly aware of this fact, and long-range plans have been
underway for decades. These plans
are being implemented with alarming speed!. . .
The
campaign being waged. . .has two prongs:
one increases the rights of the government, and the other increases the
rights of the child. Parents are
caught in between, where their rights are weakened or destroyed. . . .
This
is clearly the plan of those who are working ceaselessly to increase the
power of the government in the areas of schooling and child care. The plans extend even beyond our Nation, to include global
education, and this concept is embraced by many in our educational establishment
and now taught in many public schools.
One
of the goals of this battle for the minds of our generation’s children is
eloquently expressed by twenty-nine year old John Dunphy.
Dunphy is a summa cum laude graduate of the University of Illinois,
Edwardsville, and holds a degree in history and political science.
This young man enjoys studying “. . .folklore, history, and religion,
especially ancient mystery-fertility cults and the Christian Gnostics.”
As the concluding remarks in his award winning essay “A Religion for a
New Age: Dunphy writes:
I
am convinced that the battle for humankind’s future must be waged and won in
the public school classroom by teachers who correctly perceive their role as the
proselytizers of a new faith: a
religion of humanity that recognizes and respects the spark of what theologians
call divinity in every human being. These
teachers must embody the same selfless dedication as the most rabid
fundamentalist preachers, for they will be ministers of another sort, utilizing
a classroom instead of a pulpit to convey humanist values in whatever subject
they teach, regardless of the educational level—preschool day care or large
state university. The classroom
must and will become an arena of conflict between the old and the new—the
rotting corpse of Christianity, together with all its adjacent evils and misery,
and the new faith of humanism, resplendent in its promise of a world in which
the never-realized Christian ideal of “love thy neighbor” will finally be
achieved. . . .humanism will emerge triumphant. It must if the family of humankind is to survive.
The
last vestiges of the biblical roots of the West are being methodically stripped
away. In their place is growing
Religious Humanism or New Age Mysticism. Since
1975 children have been introduced to the supernatural elements behind this
“scientific façade” by such euphemisms as the “Force” of George Lucas
with its light and dark side (as in the Yin and Yang of the East). The George Lucas movies were intended to provide a religion
for children.
“Basically,
George is for good and against evil, but everyone has his own interpretation of
what that means,” says Lawrence Kasden. Seeing
Lucas’s religious philosophy unfold in Star Wars tells us as much about
the man as the movie. . . . an evil monster is revealed to be the hero’s
father. . . . Children get the
message—they know eventually they’ll have to leave home, take risks, submit
to trials, learn to control their emotions, and act like adults.
What they don’t know is how to do these things.
Star Wars shows them.
.
. .Luke. . . .undergoes an initiation common to mythological heroes. . . , but
in the course of the movie he grows up and realizes his potential. It’s a ray of hope for kids who fear they’ll be little
forever.
.
. .when it’s as popular as Star Wars, the shared emotion becomes a
cultural force. . . .Lucas wanted to instill in children a belief in a supreme
being—not a religious god, but a universal deity that he named the Force, a
cosmic energy source that incorporates. . .all living things.
The
message of Star Wars is religious: God
isn’t dead, he’s there if you want him to be.
“The laws really are in yourself,” Lucas is fond of saying;
the Force dwells within. . . .
Lucas’s
concept of the Force was heavily influenced by Carlos Casteneda’s Tales of
Power, An account of a Mexican
Indian sorcerer, Don Juan, who uses the phrase “life force.”
Other
post-1975 films with this same display of the Force, occult supernaturalism,
witchcraft, incantations, demonic characters, initiations, etc., are The
Return of the Jedi, E.T., Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Raiders
of the Lost Ark, Temple of Doom and Dune.
A progression is seen in these movies as they expose young people to a
display of the “powers” and then show them how to actively participate in
the use of these powers. Dune goes one step further and unfolds the path of a
young man through initiation into godhood.
Genesis 3 is indeed relevant to the last quarter of the twentieth
century, “. . .you will be like God. . . .”
With
the removal of biblically based systems from legal American life (see the
Preface to The Creator in the Courtroom “Scopes II”
), children are ripe for the occult. Fantasy
Role Playing (FRP) games in the genre of Dungeons and Dragons have
exploded into young America since 1975.
Gygax,
a former shoe-repairman, insurance underwriter, unpublished novelist and
unemployed gaming enthusiast, describes the phenomenal growth of D&D. . . .
Our gross sales volume has gone from $150,000.00 in 1975 to $2.5 million
in 1979. . . . “D&D is now equal to any board game, including Monopoly,”
says Dana Lombardy, whose games column in Virginia based Model Retailer
magazine has closely monitored the rise of D&D and FRP. . . .
FRP wasn’t even listed as a games category in 1974.
.
. .This spring Random House bought the rights to sell D&D in bookstores.
There are players in Israel and Saudi Arabia, in most small towns and
virtually every campus across the United States and on the U.S. military bases
around the world.
The
fantasy role playing of this game encourages violence and immorality.
In the words of D&D enthusiast, physician John Eric Homes:
“’Be ye for Law or be ye for Chaos?
Shouting the Dungeons and Dragons challenge, my players rush into the
fray with their magic war hammers; before getting an answer, their fantasy
selves may indulge in murder, pillage, arson, rape. . . .”
No
Christian should be a willing participant in a game that involves demonic
characters. No Christian should be
involved in any setting that includes fantasizing murder and rape.
D&D involves its participants in all of this and more.
Jesus said, “. . .I say to you, that every one who looks on a woman to
lust for her has committed adultery with her already in his heart.” (Matt.
5:28) It is, then, a sin to fantasize sin. Further, it is not biblical to call God’s Holy Scriptures
“Word Runes” and to call our Lord and Savior, Jesus, “The Overlord of Many
Names.” The Christian counterpart
of Dungeons and Dragons, Dragonraid, uses these terms (and other
anti-biblical/occult terms) and employs weapons designed for brutal killing as
well. The “Runes Letters” of
antiquity are occult Germanic characters used by the Vikings, early
Scandinavians, Hitler’s SS troops and the New Age occultic core, in a manner
similar to tarot cards. A complete
“Runes Letters” kid with directions for use, a short history and an enclosed
reproduction of the demon Djwhal Khul’s “Great Invocation” can be
purchased at most retailers of New Age and occult books in Dallas (such as
Taylor’s, the Constellation and the Pleides).
About Runes Webster records: “.
. .any similar character or mark having some mysterious meaning or magical
powers attributed to it.”
The pervasive subtleness of Satan is displayed when Christians commit
themselves to games like Dragonraid, which fuses the occultic and
historically diabolical Runes letters to the game’s simplistic representation
of God’s Word. The Word of God is not secret and mysterious to
Spirit-indwelt Believers. Neither
does it have occult magical powers associated with it.
Dragonraid is a prime example of how Satanic deception is
infiltrating the Christian community. And
finally, it is a game calling for a questionable use of imagination.
Romans 1:21 warns against people who become “. . .vain in their
imaginations. . . .” and we are called to be continually “bringing every
thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ” (2 Cor. 10:5b NKJV).
Such
games and toys for younger children as Mattel’s Masters of the Universe
can be seen to be based on the Masters of Wisdom of the occult world.
In a typical “Masters” package the set of Skeletor Weapons comes with
a pamphlet that reads in part:
When
you put on your Skeletor helmet and armored belt you become transformed into an
agent of evil. Use your power sword
and shield to combat good. With
your mystical ram’s head scepter you will be able to call forth the denizens
of darkness to help conquer the forces of good.
Christian
young people and children also take pride in their collections of unicorns (an
element of both D&D and Dragonraid), occultic figurines, and
Masters of the Universe He-Man paraphernalia.
Many things of seductive occultic significance surround both the
advertising and the marketing of these games.
The designers and marketers of these toys, games and movies are, whether
knowingly or unknowingly, serving the purposes of the Plan of Satan by
captivating the minds of a generation of young people.
Enthusiasts of these modes of entertainment are internalizing the ancient
ways of the occult during their fantasy roles.
This is preparing them for the Luciferic Initiation and their entry into
the Age of Aquarius. This may
appear to be a rather broad deduction, by Marilyn Ferguson tells how this
transformation comes about:
.
. .we will describe the process in terms of four major stages.
The
first stage is preliminary, almost happenstance:
an entry point. In
most cases, the entry point can only be identified in retrospect.
Entry can be triggered by anything that shakes up the old understanding
of this world, the old priorities. . . .
For
a great many, the trigger has been a spontaneous mystical or psychic experience,
as hard to explain as it is to deny. . . .
The
second stage. . .is exploration—the Yes after the final No. Warily or enthusiastically, having sensed that there is
something worth finding, the individual sets out to look for it. . . .
This
exploration is the “deliberate letting” psychologist Eugene Gendlin
describes. This letting permits the
inner knowledge to come forward. . . .
In
the third stage, integration, the mystery is inhabited. Although there may be favorite methods or teachers, the
individual trusts an inner “guru. . . .”
Now
in the fourth stage, conspiracy, he discovers other sources of power, and
ways to use it for fulfillment and in service to others. . . . If the mind can heal and transform, why can’t minds join
to heal and transform society?
.
. .Michael Murphy, co-founder of Esalen, suggested that the disciples themselves
conspire for renewal. “Let’s
make that conspiracy apparent! We
can turn our daily common life into the dance the world is meant for.”
So
the young people dabble with occultic powers in their fantasy games and the
adults find “inner gurus” and “other sources of powers.”
To
internationalize these concepts Robert Muller, Norman Cousins and Donald Keyes
took some money left over from the 1970 U.N. “Conference on Human Survival”
and founded the tax exempt New Age propaganda networking organization,
“Planetary Citizens,” in November 1974.
Planetary citizens’ intention is to encourage the citizens of the world
to push their “nation-states” into the one world consciousness of A.D.2000.
As Keyes explains:
The
first objective of Planetary Citizens is to help people around the world cross
the threshold of consciousness from a limited, local perspective to the
inclusive and global view required in a planetary era. . . .
Planetary
Citizens, in essence, advances the planetary view and values in terms
appropriate to a broad range of societal groupings: “new consciousness” young persons, educators in schools,
academic international order organizations, disarmament groups, the diplomatic
community, intentional or alternative-lifestyle communities, social change
agencies and “cause” organizations.
One International
Order: Freemasonry
One
international order organization awarded Robert Muller its highest honors.
It is hardly surprising that this order is Freemasonry.
The world Masonic order has an aura of sanctity about it; yet the deeper
(or higher) one investigates, the more the rotten heart of the occult is
uncovered. It becomes apparent that part of the responsibility to
establish a one-world system lies with Freemasonry.
The concept of an all-pervading Force is not foreign to the Masons,
either: “And so, whether we
worship at the shrines and embrace the doctrines of Zoroaster or Mohammad or
Confucius or Moses or Buddha or those of the Christian world, we know that there
moves among us every day a timeless force, greater and stronger than
ourselves.”
It
is interesting to note that Sovereign Grand Commander Clausen calls all the
“prophets” by name except the one at whose name his knee shall someday bow
(Philippians 2:10), the Lord Jesus. The
difficulty in finding the name of the Lord Jesus in Masonic literature stems
from the roots of this age old movement. Albert
Mackey writes:
If all the theories
which have been advanced in relation to the origin of Freemasonry from one of
the secret sects, either of antiquity or of the Middle Ages, there is none more
interesting than that which seeks to connect it with the Hermetic philosophy,
because there is none which presents more plausible claims to our consideration.
There can be no
doubt that in some of what are called the High Degrees there is a very palpable
infusion of a Hermetic element. This
cannot be denied, because the evidence will be most apparent to anyone who
examines their rituals, and some by their very titles, in which Hermetic
language and a reference to Hermetic principles are adopted, plainly admit the
connection and the influence.
Masonry is rooted in the Hermetic
writings of old. Another
acknowledgement of this historical source occurs on the title page of The
Illustrated History of Free Masonry: “This
Work Contains an Authentic History of the Institution from its Origin to the
Present Time. Traced from the
Secret Societies of Antiquity to King Solomon’s Temple at Jerusalem, . . .”
As reported
earlier, humanist John Dunphy encourages the teaching of the religion of
Humanism in every strata of public education.
In a similar manner a deceived churchman, The Reverend Dr. Arthur C.
Fulbright, 32˚, writes in the magazine of 32-33˚ masonry entitled The
New Age:
Every Freemason
needs to speak out against every effort to violate this principle of separation
of church and state. The effort to
undermine the public school system by claiming that it teaches the religion of
“humanism” is wrong; it is a
smokescreen by the radical religious zealots to introduce their sectarian views
into the public schools. . . . The
effort to force public schools to teach so-called “creation science” as a
part of their science curriculum is wrong because creationism is not a science
at all, but a religious doctrine taught by a minority of Christian groups.
Perhaps Reverend Fulbright,
32˚, does not realize that Secular Humanism itself was recognized as a
religion protected by the First Amendment in 1961 (Torcaso vs. Watkins).
Foster Bailey,
33˚, husband of Alice Bailey and Director of Lucis Trust until his death,
writes about the mason, “. . .eventually he perfects his technique and merits
the title of Master Mason, thus attaining the highest degree in Masonry, a
Master of Wisdom. . . .
Bailey’s analysis of Masonry is:
. . .there must
exist some sure guide in our progress towards the East whence all light and life
emerges. . . .
Such an
organization and such a repository of truth does exist, with a platform so broad
and the truth presented so universally that it can meet a world-wide need. . . .
I refer to the Masonic movement.
. . .Masonry is as
old as humanity itself. Perhaps it
antedates all the great religious systems and holds within itself all that man
needs to know to reach his goal.
This Esoteric and Hermetic heritage
of Masonry is attested to by Arthur Waite:
There is another
Esoteric Masonry, and this is the meaning which lies beneath the surface of the
Grades and can be drawn forth only by those who have a living familiarity with
the history of universal initiation. . . .
Out of this there is evolved a third Esoteric and indeed Transcendental
Masonry, . . .
Masons say they are not a religion,
but one of the Patriarchs of Freemasonry, Albert Pike, writes:
Every Masonic Lodge
is a temple of religion; and its
teachings are instruction in religion. . . .
Universal harmony springs from infinite complication.
The momentum of every step we take in our dwelling contributes in part to
the order of the Universe. We are
connected by ties of thought, and even of matter and its forces, with the whole
boundless universe and all the past and coming generations of men. . . .
Much of the Masonic
secret manifests itself, without speech revealing it. . .and particularly to
those who advance to the highest degrees of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish
Rite. . . . for it there declares that Masonry is a worship.|
The late Freemason,
Foster Bailey, a man who devoted his life to the Plan of Lucifer, writes:
“The recognition of Masonry as a spiritual quest resulting in a
spiritual way of life will hasten the more brilliant shining forth of The Great
Light from all our Temples.”
The Great Light to Foster Bailey can be no other than the light bearer
himself, Lucifer. Is it possible
that Masonic temples are to serve as the centers of worship in the New Age?
The scriptures of the occult core of Freemasonry are found in the ancient
Jewish Kabalah. Albert Pike
confides:
All truly dogmatic
religions have issued from the Kabalah and return to it:
everything scientific and grand in the religious dreams of all the
illuminate, Jacob Boehme, Swedenborg, Saint-Martin, and others, is borrowed from
the Kabalah; all the Masonic
associations owe to it their Secrets and their Symbols.
The Kabalah alone
consecrates the alliance of the Universal Reason and the Divine Word; it
established, by the counterpoises of two forces apparently opposite, the eternal
balance of being; it alone
reconciles reason with Faith, Power with Liberty, Science with Mystery; it has
the keys of the Present, the Past, and the Future.
The Bible, with all
the allegories it contains, expresses [itself] in an incomplete and veiled
manner only. . . .
The bottom line of Freemasonry,
then, elevates the occultic Kabalah above God’s “incomplete” Bible.
In Revelation, the last book of the Bible, John writes:
I testify to
everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book:
if anyone adds to them, God shall add to him the plagues which are
written in this book; and if anyone takes away from the words of the book of
this prophecy, God shall take away his part from the tree of life and from the
holy city, which are written in this book.
He who testifies to
these things says, “Yes I am coming quickly.” Amen. Come, Lord
Jesus (Rev. 22:18-20).
This book, the completed Word
of God, has been held, historically, to relate to events surrounding the second
coming of the true Christ, the establishment of His kingdom and the beginnings
of eternity. An interesting verse
occurs in Revelation 2:9. In
addressing the church in Smyrna, John writes:
“The first and the last, who was dead and has come to life, says this:
I know your tribulation and your poverty (but you are rich), and the
blasphemy by those who say they are Jews and are not but are a synagogue of
Satan (Rev. 2:8b,9).”
Time will tell if
Foster Bailey was correct in positing that the temples (synagogues) of Jewish
Kabalah-based Masonry will serve as the worship centers of the predicted new Age
one world religion. The Masonic
international administration and network is a functional possibility for this
New Age worship. Benjamin Creme
writes:
The new religion
will be manifest, for instance, through organizations like Masonry.
In Freemasonry is embedded the core or the secret heart of the occult
Mysteries—wrapped up in number, metaphor and symbol.
When these are purified of the extraneous accretions which have crept in
over the last 7,000 years, these will be seen to be a true occult heritage.
Through the orders of Masonry, the Initiatory Path will be taken along
the First ray line of Power.
According to Creme, Freemasonry
conceals the “secret heart of the occult Mysteries.” Alice Bailey, in a 1934 transmission from D.K., shows that
these concepts are not original with Creme:
. . .the church
movement, like all else, is but a temporary expedient and serves but as a
transient resting place for evolving life.
Eventually there will appear the Church Universal, and its definite
outlines will appear towards the close of this century.
In this connection, forget not the wise prophecy of H.P.B. as touching
events at the close of this century. This
Church will be nurtured into activity by the Christ and His disciples when the
outpouring of the Christ principle, the true second coming, has been
accomplished. . . .
The three main
channels through which the preparation for the New Age is going on might be
regarded as the Church, the Masonic Fraternity and the educational field. . . .
But in all these three movements, disciples of the Great Ones are to be
found and they are steadily gathering momentum. . . .
The Masonic
Movement. . .will meet the need of those who can, and should, wield power.
It is the custodian of the law; it is the home of the Mysteries and the
seat of initiation. It holds in its
symbolism the ritual of Deity, and the way of salvation. . . .
The methods of Deity are demonstrated in its temples, and under the
All-seeing eye the work can go forward. It
is a far more occult organization than can be realized, and is intended to be
the training school for the coming
advanced occultists. In its
ceremonials lies hid the wielding of the forces connected with the growth and
life of the kingdoms of nature and the unfoldment of the divine aspects in man.
In the comprehensions of its symbolism will come the power to cooperate
with the divine plan.
Let there be no doubt about
it—Freemasonry is at the very heart of the occultic center of the New Age
movement. Freemasonry is crowded
with churchmen, men who sacrifice their time and energies and the resources of
their families for their Lodge. Masons
are respected world-wide for their magnificent philanthropic works, but good
works do not cause something to be Christian and the good works of Global
Masonry surely do not bring glory to the Lord Jesus.
A deception has occurred. The
Esoteric Lodges of the inner occultic core of Freemasonry have been methodically
and discretely setting up a global network of initiates and temples.
To accomplish their plans, men that are also in the church have been
robbing Jesus Christ and His Church of its resources (Mal. 3:8-10).
Christian men have been deceived. And
yet Jesus said, “For false christs and false prophets will arise and will show
great signs and wonders, so as to deceive, if possible, even the elect.”
(Matt. 24:24). It is “. . .Satan
who deceives the whole world. . . .” (Rev. 12:9)
Christian men are taking Masonic oaths and vows, in which they
historically have volunteered their very lives if they divulge the ancient
secrets, in spite of their Lord’s warning:
“But I say to
you, make no oath at all, either by heaven, for it is the throne of God, or by
the earth, for it is the footstool of His feet, or by Jerusalem, for it is the
city of the Great King. Nor shall
you make an oath by your head, for you cannot make one hair white or black.
But let your statement be, “Yes, yes’ or ‘No, no’; and anything
beyond these is of evil (or the evil one) (Matt. 5:34-37).
Satan has a plan
and it has a history that can be traced through the occult inner circles such as
Theosophy and Masonry, back to Egypt, Babylon, and Nimrod.
This plan, purposely hidden through the ages from popular awareness,
intentionally went public in 1975. It
is a plan that requires a transformation of mankind.
Writer Brad Steiger proclaims the call to commitment:
I believe that a
deep process of human transformation which began centuries ago on a very small
scale for the most part and touched only a relatively few individuals is now
developing as a public and worldwide movement.
It is taking a great variety of forms, many of them confusing and
inadequate; but probably each of them is telling, or attempting to tell, a
particular aspect of the whole story of all-human transformation.
As this takes place, the inertia of established institutions—and even
more of the traditional and unquestioned modes of thinking, feeling and behaving
of our Western civilization, and of what remains of earlier cultures—can be
expected to react strongly. It is
so doing today in many ways, crude or subtle; and these reactions, overt or
covert, affect both groups or organizations seeking to convey “New
Age” ideals, and individuals who, whether or not they have joined such groups,
have reached in their personal lives a “critical state,” a stage of
transition from the old to the new.
What is at stake is
not merely “doing things” in a new way. . .but (deeper than these external
changes) accepting a new frame of reference for one’s thinking and
one’s emotional life. This means
learning to think in terms of different basic concepts and assumptions
(paradigms), and, as a result, developing a different set of values, not merely
intellectually but in terms of deep feelings; then, sooner or later, making commitments.
. .
What is needed now
is not reacting, but acting in terms of new principles, a new vision of reality
and of human potentiality. It
should be utterly consecrated, transpersonal and inwardly free, unpossessive and
self-abnegating action requiring a real, conscious, and deliberate meta-morphosis
of the entire personality. What is
needed is the clarity of mind enabling us to realize how much, in our every
thought, feeling, and action, we are conditioned by, and bound to, our official
culture and traditional religious background; what is needed is the courage and
will to extricate ourselves from the web of tradition and prejudices, to face
every happening with an unconditional freedom of response, in positive
openness of mind, . . .
Mankind is calling
for a change, one that will transform humanity into a loving and caring global
community. The personal motivation
is fear of death by global nuclear holocaust;
the practical methodology is religion, required by a world seeking
answers to the big questions of life and death. This religious hope is being accelerated through books,
movies, games, music, news media, and international orders and organizations.
It is a hope rooted in the concepts of the ancient, the mysterious, the
powers and energies, the divinity of man, and the merging of science and magic.
Although much of Christianity is blissfully unaware of its power and
pervasiveness, these new trends have not gone totally undetected.
The Plan Exposed
God has always
preserved His Word and His people since the creation of man;
sometimes providentially, but more often, using the instrumentality of
man. Many stalwart defenders of the
Faith could be cited from the patriarchs and prophets through the apostles and
martyrs until this present day.
One mark of a loyal
soldier, said Martin Luther, is his dependability on the battlefront.
As the battlefront against the occult grew, God raised up warriors of pen
and ink to fight the foe, and to warn the flock.
One such warrior of the late 19th century was Samuel Andrews
who correctly evaluated the trends:
A mighty wave of
Pantheism, beginning in Germany, has been sweeping over Christendom during the
present century; and now finds but little to resist it.
As Greek philosophy developed when the popular religions were in a
process of disintegration, so it is now. It
was then an attempt to replace the old faith by a new philosophic religion.
So today, Christianity being regarded in many quarters as incapable of
giving a satisfactory theory of the world and of human life, philosophy steps in
and undertakes the task. It will
give us a new religion based upon a new conception of Christ, a universe
evolved, not created. How far the
new will supplant the old, time only can tell us, for we do not know how far
faith in the Christian Creeds has been silently undermined.
But Christianity meets a new enemy, a philosophic religion which boasts
itself able to satisfy, as Christianity is not able to do, all the demands of
the intellect; a religion more suitable to our advanced culture than one
transmitted from an ancient and half-civilized people.
It is a religion which many will gladly welcome, for it opens wide a gate
and a broad way in which all men, of whatever race or belief, may walk without
jostling one another.
Andrews was a discerning voice
shouting an alert to God’s people concerning the growing threat of eastern
pantheism.
Also in the last
quarter of this twentieth century, Satan’s Plan to rule the world and receive
the worship of men has not gone undetected, nor unprotested.
Dr. Francis Schaeffer wrote on these coming dangers in Escape From
Reason, The God Who Is There, and A Christian Manifesto, among
others. Os Guinness attempted to
magnify the alert to the West in his insightful work, The Dust of Death.
He writes about the new area of conflict, the coming subjective
orientation:
We must be clear,
however, about the essential feature of this new interest:
It is not a revival of historic Christianity (with truth, content and
objective grounds for faith) but of religious pluralism and perversity where
faith may be contentless and experience counterfeit and both vulnerable to
manipulation.
Guiness, as one of the few
evangelicals who have written specifically concerning this massive move into the
mystical, writes:
Parallel to the
political, social and moral revolutions, another revolution is in the making—a
revolution of consciousness equally critical of the system and society but
dramatically different in its solution. This
swing to the East has changed the tidal flow of three hundred years of Western
radicalism (which had closely related revolution and atheism), yet it has come
about almost overnight and with extraordinary little debate. . . .
But suddenly the whole balance is changed, the status quo is upset and
the swing to the East to find philosophic and religious answers is an important
trend. . . .
The rapid
acceleration of interest in the East hardly needs documentation, for today the
influence is everywhere in a rich profusion, if not confusion. . .there are
thousands of young people on the road to the East either spiritually or
physically. . . . The point is
this: The East is still the East,
but the West is no longer the West. Western
answers no longer seem to fit the questions.
With Christian culture disintegrating and humanism failing to provide an
alternative, many are searching the ancient East.
Another
contemporary evangelical writer with the courage to publish his discerning
conclusions is James Sire, senior editor of InterVarsity Press.
Sire devotes much of The Universe Next Door to documenting the
roots and the rise of what is becoming known as the New Age movement.
Sire seeks reasons for this important trend:
“The swing to Eastern thought is, therefore, primarily a retreat from
Western thought. . . . With its
anti-rationalism, its syncretism, its quietism, its lack of technology, its
uncomplicated lifestyle and its radically different religious framework, the
East is extremely attractive.”
Later, in a chapter
entitled “A Separate Universe: The
New Consciousness,” Sire states:
Eastern mysticism
is posing one way out for Western man caught in naturalism’s nihilistic bind.
But Eastern mysticism is foreign. Even
a watered down version like Transcendental meditation requires an immediate and
radical reorientation of Western man’s mode of grasping reality.
Such reorientation leads to new states of consciousness and feelings of
meaning. . .but the intellectual cost is high.
One must die to the West to be born in the East.
One must also die to the Lord Jesus
to be born in the East and one must die to the Piscean to be born an Aquarian.
A total change of systems must be accomplished.
Any systems grounded on the Bible must be denigrated and eventually
rooted out and destroyed. The world
must be forced to accept the lie: that
easy progress into the Golden Age of man is being hindered by the lunatic fringe
of society, Fundamentalist Christianity. Gradually
and subtlely Satan’s world system is building its case against believers, in
media-influenced attitude, in symbol and in written word.
An area of major
influence in attitude structure and behavior modification with a distinctly
anti-religious and especially anti-Christianity emphasis is modern psychology.
Although outside the space of this paper it must here be noted that solid
biblical and theological evaluation of “Christian Psychology” must soon be
done. Many Christian psychiatrists
and psychologists, with their secularly biased post graduate degrees, center
their counseling on self-help and self-improvement.
Upon this base of “You-can-do-it-(with-my help),” some add Bible
verses to justify the title, “Christian Counseling.”
This root-faith in self and the actualization of self )as in Maslow’s
Hierarchy of Needs”)
is in direct confrontation with Scripture which states in the words of Jesus
Himself: “if anyone wishes to
come after Me, let him deny himself and take up his cross, and follow Me.”
(Matt. 16:24). Jesus also said:
But seek first His
kingdom and His righteousness; and all these things shall be added to you.
Therefore do not be anxious for tomorrow; for tomorrow will take care for
itself. Each day has enough trouble
of its own (Matt. 6:33,34).
For the Christian
“self” must be controlled not improved.
It is the improved self that reaches higher consciousness and is
considered by the occult to be worthy of entering the Age of Aquarius.
Some authors have begun to write in this vein and a few are noted.
This Plan for world
dominion is an ancient one, spanning the ages back to the incident in the Garden
of Eden. It necessitates moving
away from God’s truth and into the lies of Satan. As early as 1973 Os Guinness observed this trend toward the
occult and wrote in warning to the Christian church:
But developing
alongside the psychedelic movement. . .is a further trend we shall consider.
It is a recent but already real defining feature of the movement; it may,
in fact, envelop the counter culture and go far beyond to be a profound
influence in the closing years of the twentieth century.
I am speaking here of the resurgent trend
towards the occult.
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