The vision of the library will teach you anything you wish to learn. It’s all there, everything that anyone has ever learned. But you don’t learn it book fashion. It sort of moves into you as a knowing. It is a vision that is good to do often, particularly if you are studying esoteric things.
My feeling is that as a priest/priestess or magician, your knowledge should not be from books, but from inner experiences, inner growth and spiritual hard work. Books are something to go to after an experience, to make sense out of what you have seen, or to check a fact that you have discovered. There are some people out there who are teaching and writing books and most if not all of their knowledge is from books and copying other people; it is not from their own experience. I find that sad but also a symptom of our modern day world. Take their books and references away from them and they are like turtles tipped on their backs.
My real relationship, my conscious relationship with the inner temples came when I was 30. And it came with a bang. Once the floodgate was open it became a fast and furious river that pulled me down river and finally deposited me on peaceful banks. The first real inner contact with the Inner temples and Inner Orders came with the vision of the library. I was sulking at home one day, totally bored, when a series of visions came to me as I was listening to some music. I found myself in the great library and I was totally blown away. I knew what this was! It was the first time that something like this had come to me where I actually knew what I was looking at.
I started going into the library very often and soon I was being my usual self and peeking through doors to what was beyond. That was how I found the Chapel. Now the more I hung out there, the more I began to truly understand what these places were. The library was the consciousness of the people, the collected knowledge of the priest and priestesses. In fact, I began to realize that the books in the library were the priests and priestesses. It was the manifestation of that part of them that had accumulated wisdom. That was my first step of realization that the soul/spirit can be in many places at once.
In the great Library is a place called the Chapel at the Edge of the Void. The Chapel is a place where priests and priestesses stand at the edge of the void and mediate the power of Divinity as it streams out of the void and into the world. At this level, Divinity is neither male nor female; it is before the split. It is whole, complete, Divine power. That power is filtered when it is mediated through the Chapel, through the library and out into the world. There are many thresholds for Divine Power to pass into our world and the Chapel is just one of them.
I was leaving the chapel one day and passing through into the Library when I met a man who started talking to me. This contact talked and talked and I was fascinated by what he had to say. He told me of the Four Temples, how the powers of Divinity expressed themselves through the elements in the temples and how I could go there and learn. I re visited him many times over the space of four years and he was my greatest teacher of all time. He began to lecture me on what I ate and telling me how to cook food properly. I began to follow his regime and I got healthier and healthier. I was impressed
I told my partner about him and the things that I had been taught. He suggested that I ask him who he was, what was his name. So the next time I went in, I asked him. I wasn’t sure how to do it without sounding rude, so I just blurted it out. “ So then, who are yer?” The man laughed and said, “Tell him I’m the cook.” I relayed this to my partner who thought for a moment and then smiled. “Ah yes, Ronald Heaver” he said.
He went on to tell me about Ronald who was a cook before he was struck with polio. He was also one of the most powerful magicians of his age and was the only man alive that William Gray (himself a powerful magician) was frightened of. He was a former colleague of Dion Fortune and was considered one of the silent masters (he didn’t write books or teach) who lived in the Glastonbury area.
There is a story that circulates around the company of esoteric “names,” that Ronald invited loads of people to his death. He sent out a card for his 80th birthday, saying this was the day he was going to die. They all arrived for the party, thinking it was a joke. And with all his friends assembled, Ronald laid down and died.
The vision of the library will teach you anything you wish to learn. It’s all there; everything that anyone has ever learned. The vision itself is short and simple. I have purposely formed it that way to allow the explorer to expand their own version and discover the secrets of the library for themselves.
The Great Library
See the stillness of the flame before you. Using your inner vision, look at the candle flame and see it grow bigger. The flame enlarges to become a wall of fire that does not burn and that does not give out heat. Instead, it brings peace to the room.
You are drawn to the wall of fire. As you step closer, you see that the flames have many eyes that seem to invite you to walk into the fire. You feel no fear as you step to the edge of the flames, feeling the fire regenerate you. Every cell in your body responds and fills with light as the flames flow through you.
The deeper you step into the fire, the more you feel at home. Your awareness of your everyday life falls away as you move deeper into stillness. The eyes seem to see into every part of your soul: the eyes do not judge, they only observe.
Through the fire you see a doorway. The doors are large heavily carved wood with many strange symbols on them. One of the symbols seems familiar to you and you reach out to touch the carving. As your hand touches the wood, the doors swing open and you pass through into the great library.
Bookshelves reach beyond your line of vision in all directions. On each bookshelf is an array of books, scrolls, stone tablets, disks and many other ways of storing information. You are drawn to a particular bookshelf and you let your hands browse among the books.
Your fingers touch a particular book and your whole body reacts with recognition. Picking the book up carefully, your hands recognize the contents of the book as a wisdom that you have searched many years for. Slowly, you open the book and try to read the pages.
The text seems difficult to see and read. On instinct you place the book to your forehead and close your eyes. With your inner vision, you see a priest or priestess of profound wisdom. The knowledge streams out of their eyes and bathes you, filling you with what you need.
Their name echoes around your thoughts and you whisper the name over and over to yourself so that you do not forget. The priest or priestess speaks to you, telling you of their world and their skills. They show you how they became part of the library, an inner service to all consciousness.
The priest or priestess places a hand over your eyes and tells you too look through their flesh. Looking around the library, you no longer see books, but thousands and thousands of priests and priestesses circling around a central flame. Each book is a consciousness, a teacher or mediator who has given of themselves in service to act as an interface for learning.
You bow with respect to the gathered convocation of Priests and Priestesses. Your priest or priestess tells you that each book in your own outside world has a part of the writer’s wisdom impressed into the text of the book. Simply handling and being with the book affects and teaches you: as you read the words, inner and outer wisdom come together as wisdom or inspiration is passed on to you.
A horn sounds heralding your time to leave. The priest or priestess leads you to a small door that you had not noticed before. On opening the door, you peer through the doorway and see the room where you first started your meditation. Looking around the room, you see the life in the objects in the room: the flame of life in the wood, stone, plants and creatures. A feeling of awe flows over you as you look at the power that is constantly around you.
Carefully, you sit back where you first started and slowly open your eyes. Keep your awareness of the life all around you as you gently blow out the candle flame.
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