The Heroic Age

3000 - 2600 BC ±

China, India, Persia, Greece and the Middle East all had their own Heroic Age. After the fall of Atlantis and the decline of Egypt, a new thrust was needed for the world. As in all initiating cycles, the first ray of God's Will - the ray of Blue, takes the lead. The qualities of the Blue Ray are spiritual and physical protection as well as power, leadership, direction and faith. These are all qualities the following heroes had in abundance. Does not a child look up to her father and look for these qualities? Does he not represent the first hero she knows?

This time period was the age of legends, of myths and, above all else, heroes. These heroes are all Fathers to an age and region. They immersed themselves in what the hidden teachings call the blue fire of the first ray or emanation of God's consciousness of leadership and direction. These heroic leaders laid the foundation for their cultures. They prepared their souls in past lives for this mission and they prepared the planet for the next Age: The Coming of the Christ or the Son of God.

That man is called hero who acts selflessly, but this definition is not complete. He is a hero who acts self-sacrificingly, unwaveringly, consciously, and who, acting in the name of the Common Good, thus brings nearer the current of cosmic evolution.

Heroes may be encountered in present-day life. One should not consider this concept inapplicable. If we fear to introduce such a concept, we ourselves break away from the pathleading into the region of truth. One should recognize heroism in life; one should remember that the sword is the staff of the hero. Knowing how to turn sword into staff must find a place in the day's work.

How all magical formulas droop before the irrepressible leap over the abyss to the life-giving Sun! Only those who cognize reality can speak about the Sun without superficial tearfulness.

We wish to see you steadfastly conquering. Each victory teaches prudence, but this restraint palpitates with flights. Be not afraid of bad definitions, but, setting forth for an achievement, see that you have food prepared for the morrow. He who moves toward achievement must proceed as if summoned by a work bell. For the striving one the thinnest surface is sufficient. Aspire! Community, #147 Agni yoga Society

Krishna and Arjuna

~3000 B.C

The story of ancient India is one of conquest. The Ramayana, the Upanishads and the Mahabharata attest to this. They are also about ideal behavior, relationships and most especially dharma and karma. Seven hundred versus of the Mahaharata are called the Bhagavad Gita, The Lord's Song, tells the story of Krishna and Arjuna. These two, Krishna the Teacher and Arjuna the hero struggling with the dilemma of being a warrior and an spiritual aspirant represent everyman's inner and outer battles. The Ramayana and the Upanishads predate the Heroic Age.

The continuous wars in the Ramayana and even the Old Testament of the West may seem a contradiction for those of a spiritual nature today, but not if you factor in reincarnation. We learn from The Lives of Alcyone (Vols. 1 & 2, by C.W. Leadbeater and A. Besant) that the Manus (Cosmic Beings who oversee root races) are continually trying to help mankind evolve spiritually as well as physically. If they see that mankind's development has gone awry then they are support the cultures to get it right. Why is Krishna and Arjuna so important to this era? Because there is without a doubt no greater text in the history of the world's literature that so eloquently explains the need for a spiritual man to defend life. It is found in one of the holiest books in the pantheon of Indian texts, the Bhagavad Gita that is in turn, part of the Mahabharata. Krishna also declares to Arjuna the crucial teaching of dharma, the fulfillment of spiritual duty.

Krishna appears as a Christ figure teaching Arjuna the cosmic law and its bearing on Arjuna's dilemma. Krishna appears to Arjuna as an Ascended Master. Arjuna (meaning 'one who is pure and unsullied' or 'white') finds himself on the battlefield and cannot reconcile his desire for a spiritual life versus the militaristic need of the hour. Krishna takes the battlefield adventure as an opportunity to teach Arjuna on his dharmic duties as a warrior and prince and bringing out the inner truths of different Yogic and Vedantic philosophies. The Bhagavad Gita is often described as a concise guide to Hindu philosophy and also as a practical, self-contained guide to modern life. Arjuna's guru Dronacharya has already taught him to be an archer second to none. He has also made himself spritirually ready for the highest guru possible for his next encounter Krishna.

Other characters in the Bhagavad Gita, such as Arjuna's brother Bhima, are also heroes in their own right. Bhima faced dilemmas of chosing between two wrong answers: whether to dishonor himself and violate the warrior's code to save the army or retain his honor, follow the warrior's code and watch his brothers and fellow warriors perish.

Here is Krishna speaking to Arjuna from the Bhagavad Gita about balancing military duty and duty to defend his family against his desire not to kill:

Excerpt from: The Bhagavad Gita: A Primer by Jeanne M. House

DHARMA AND THE LAW OF KARMA-YOGA
The Gita is a practical approach to a spiritual crisis. It applies ethics to human life. It is set in the field of human action or human dharma. It takes place when great forces clash together for destruction and recreation and it can also be seen as an inner transformation of the actual psychology of human evolution. The day will come when humanity will be ready spiritually, morally and socially for the reign of Universal Peace.
The major question of the Gita is: "How can we harmonize our spiritual life withour day-to-day life?"

This is an allegory of the spiritual seeker (Arjuna) and his relationship to his Higher Self, (Krishna), and the secret teaching of the Puruttoma. Krishna, reveals himself as God through knowledge and the God-self of Arjuna. or the divine in man, who moves our whole world of action. Lord Krishna secretly manipulates all that occurs behind the veil, he knows the beginning, middle and end of all things. Arjuna is his chosen representative and friend, who has the potential of becoming one with this higher part of his Being.

The Gita starts with action - Arjuna is a man of action and not knowledge. He is a fighter and not a thinker. He typifies the human soul of action, brought face-to-face through that action in its highest, most violent crisis with human life and its apparent incompatability with the spiritual state.

His problem is his "inner-bankruptcy" "his whole conscious being" thoughts, heart and vital desires are all "dharma-less" and he can't find the law of action. "Give me that which I have lost ...a path of which I can confidently walk ...a true and clear rule of action."

He asks for dharma. He doesn't ask for the secret of life or the meaning and purpose of it all. Yet, he is led by Krishna to give up all the lesser dharmas for the one true dharma - LIVING CONSCIOUSLY IN THE DIVINE AND THEN ACTING FROM THAT CONSCIOUSNESS.

The Gita does not teach disinterested performance of duty, but the following of the divine life. It teaches us to take refuge in the Supreme alone. The goal is to receive all material even as the tranquil and eternal spirit receives the same within us.

Krishna guides Arjuna through the battle while at the same time he is instructing his soul. He shows him that all subjective states and movements are His and their psychological becomings. These conditions and their apparent results are no less than the highest spiritual status. He instructed him to assign to everything its Supernal and Real and not any longer only its present and apparent value. Find the hidden links and connections. Consciously direct all life and act to the high and true object and govern it by the light and power which comes to him from the Godhead within him. See the divine origin of all things.

Immortality is the home, which the soul travels. Self-knowledge is a means of knowing our svadharma — Our Inner Law of Being — The law of His Life. This world, the manifestation of life in the material universe is not only a cycle of inner development, but a field in which external circumstances of life have to be accepted as an environment and an occasion for that development.

There is a specific action that is required of Arjuna, which is his svadharma. His name represents "one who cleaves to the truth", does not become crooked, does not break from the law of truth. If he does not take his place in the battle of life, or fulfill his dharma, reason for being, the society of which he is fighting for, would not "hold together" just as if Krishna did not perform His works, the world would not "hold together."
His dharma is not one of self-pleasing domestic happiness and a life of comfort and peaceful joy with friends and relatives, but one to battle for the right is his true object of life or by the victory win the crown and glory of a hero's existence is his greatest happiness.
Krishna shows Arjuna the higher knowledge of self and what direction his social standing and duty points for him. Indian ethics has always seen the practical necessity of developing a moral and spiritual life and this means to put away egoism, disregard joy and sorrow, gain and loss and all worldly results.

Next, the Age of Heroes - China.