M1970
The Temple of the Psyche
by Martinus

1. "The Forecourt"
Viewed from a cosmic plane the entire mental sphere of terrestrial Man can be divided into three different psychic planes of existence. These three planes of existence are symbolised precisely in the structure of the Jewish temple. We know that the Jews had the idea that a temple had to be divided into three sections. The tabernacle and Solomon's temple were both divided into the "forecourt", "the outer sanctum" and "the holy of holies" or "inner sanctum". This division was not merely a practical arrangement; it was, as already mentioned, a symbol of the three psychic or mental spheres that make up terrestrial mankind's spiritual terrain.
The "forecourt" could be entered by all. It symbolises the mental sphere above which all those who possess only "flock-consciousness" are unable to lift themselves. In this mental sphere we find the ordinary man in the street. If we look at these people we see that they consist of those who are not disposed to individuality but follow the opinions of the majority and act mostly according to habit and custom. They are bound by religious sects and political parties; in brief, they are the "ordinary members" of countless unions and societies. Everywhere they are trapped in one flock or another. They have no independent opinions nor the ability to evaluate anything. So their answers to questions about the most important problems of life are not their own answers but, on the contrary, those of the sect, the political party, the union or the society to which they belong. Here life exists as a colossal, mental confusion. And here flock fights against flock, policy against policy, religion against religion, ideology against ideology. In this fight the single individual, because of his mental dependency on others or affiliation, imposed on him by suggestion, to his sect, party or leader, is merely a sort of mechanical apparatus that, without any kind of independent, logical thinking, automatically begins to react if his sect, party or leader is attacked, in order to destroy as quickly as possible the resistance or opposition.
As there are countless different unions and societies, flocks and associations whose ordinary members consist of such automatically reacting "animal robots", who quite without independent, logical thinking immediately begin to react against even the slightest attack on their opinions, we are here at the root of all wars. As in this situation it is not independently thinking people we are dealing with but, on the contrary, people whose opinions have been imposed on them through suggestion that they automatically obey, any form of war between these individuals is in reality a war between "mental sleepwalkers", "animal machines" or "robots" who have been tuned by a "leader" to explode at the very instant they meet resistance from the followers of other parties, sects or leaders. All the forms of war or struggle touched upon here are thus not struggles between independently thinking people but, on the contrary, struggles between blind, lifeless automatons, whose individual feeling of self (I-feeling) and ability to think logically have become paralysed and put out of action through a suggestion that has been imposed upon them by their party, flock or leader. It is therefore not so remarkable that Christ used the following words about his executioners: "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do." He saw that his executioners were individuals dependent on others who acted only on ideas that were dictated to them from outside themselves. They did not act on the basis of the real truth but, on the contrary, they acted on the basis of what they thought was the truth, what they thought was right and therefore moral. They did not act on the basis of a direct, personally experienced knowledge or cosmic analysis of the situation but, on the contrary, on the basis of a view that was entirely the result of belief. But believing something without, or independent of, accessible knowledge is the same as being subject to suggestion or hypnosis. Jesus' executioners were, like all executioners, "mental robots" who began reacting automatically "in response to orders", regardless of what kind of defence he would logically have to be able to come up with.
In this "forecourt", this mental or psychic sphere, we meet the temporary domicile of all individuals who are dependent on others, that is all those people who have not yet grown up to think independently and can therefore seek to safeguard their lives only through a solid affiliation to a flock whose ideals and structure they are induced to perceive as "the only thing needful". It is such people - dependent on others and mentally asleep or (when it comes to thinking) holding illusory views or notions about life and death - we meet everywhere that many people are gathered. It would therefore be sensible to find out if someone with whom one comes into contact is not such an animal robot, a "piece of machinery" of a larger whole before one has dealings with him or her. For it is no use coming with logical argument, instruction or information to such a person. He would either be absolutely impervious to such arguments or would very quickly explode in exactly the same way as any other automatic "machine of hell" and send a ray of intolerance, hate and aggressiveness towards one. Likewise one ought to be very wary of the enormous stream of suggestive influences that, in the form of newspaper advertisements and the glowing propaganda of the many unions, aim at lulling to sleep one's critical sense and ability to think logically so as to much more easily win power over one and make one an adherent of precisely their view of life or existence. So belonging to such a sphere means that one is never quite oneself. One has not yet found one's own individuality; one shares a collective consciousness; one must live by the opinion of the flock and defend this opinion because one has no independence, nor is one able to hold any absolutely independent, personal view. So someone with a view of life that is dependent on others is not a free person but, on the contrary, a bound or imprisoned being. He is from a spiritual point of view a slave. It is said of these citizens of the "forecourt" that they may not enter the next psychic sphere. Only the "priests" may do so.
2. "The Outer Sanctum"
Above the sphere described in the previous section, in which the majority of the earth's mankind finds itself, there is another psychic sphere, namely that which in the structure of the temple is symbolised by that part of the temple room which is described as "the outer sanctum". To this part of the holy place, this terrestrial human mental sphere, only the priests had access. But who are these "priests"? By "priests" one is to understand all those people who by virtue of their own development have begun to have their own opinions. These people are the obvious ones to be leaders of the others. Among them we find leaders for both the dark and the light mentality. They are the leaders of mission stations as well as of gangs of gangsters. They are great agitators for their own ideas and appear often as leaders of large organisations. With their ability to think independently they are born to seize power over the others, and there is no material area in life where we do not meet them. They are thus the fixed points of the "forecourt", and the forecourt-people are their "slaves", since they are entirely dependent on the opinions, ideas and views of these others, who are the people that become "dictators", "leaders" or "protagonists". It is they who in all the areas of life, both the dark and the light, inflame the others and, through their knowledge and insight, stir up the mentality of these others both in moral and immoral directions.
But the fact that one has become an independently thinking human being, gripped by a desire that everyone else should have the same ideas and views as oneself, does not necessarily mean that these ideas and views are identical to the very truth or logic of life, which here means the laws by which the universe is governed. There is thus no guarantee that following these people is tantamount to avoiding unhappiness and suffering. No fact has been more clearly demonstrated in our century than precisely the danger of following the many "leaders" with which this century has been so richly supplied. How many thousands, not to say hundreds of thousands, because of their confidence in these prominent political leaders, have not been led directly to the horrors of the battlefield, to prison and hard labour? In reality all national boundaries, oppression of other states and the inhuman slaughter of entire peoples have been controlled by the most dangerous representatives of this type. But religious fanaticism and destructive intolerance within this area, which is so vital to mankind, has its deepest roots in the highest representatives of the "forecourt", and the same is true of countless other causes of reciprocal warfare and aggressiveness.
One particular area ought to be mentioned here and that is the various political parties with their hosts of journalists who, through their daily and weekly newspapers, each control enormous propaganda crusades with the single purpose of recruiting and thereby mentally enslaving their followers so that they, as blind robots, can be directed to fight against other rivalling systems. No wonder that human life has ended in the confusion, the chaos, that the two recent wars, one immediately after the other, have caused. And no wonder that countless people all over the world have begun to wake up from both religious and political suggestion and have begun independently to seek more stable truths than those they previously so thoughtlessly accepted as "eternal truths". For life in its wisdom is so constructed that everywhere that the human being through suggestion displays a way of behaving, an attitude to life, that is against the cosmic laws, on which an unshakably happy state depends, life responds with pain, resistance and disappointments. Life becomes a veritable hell instead of the kingdom of heaven one had anticipated.
All terrestrial human beings who have passed through these two psychic or mental spheres have in reality passed the darkest part of their evolution or their "initiation" that must of necessity precede the entering of the third and final section, which we know by the term "the Holy of Holies" (or "inner sanctum"). These people have reached the stage of humility. They feel that, amidst their knowledge, they nevertheless know nothing beyond the fact that they can no longer be led by belief or the dictate of others. They feel helpless and cry for peace. They cry for the meaning of life because they feel that such a meaning must exist. They see that others have found this meaning and by virtue of this live completely sovereignly, liberated from every form of suggestion. They see that these people "speak to God as a man speaks to his neighbour", and their consciousness is filled with a deep longing to be like these people in thought and action. And with this attitude they have now become the true aspirants to the last part of the great initiation. They have, through their own personally experienced sufferings and the experiences these have caused, matured sufficiently to enter the third area of the great temple of the psyche: the Holy of Holies.
3. "The Holy of Holies"
Beyond these two psychic or mental areas described above there is a third, the Holy of Holies. It is said that only the "high priests" could enter it. The "high priests" may be identified with the human being who is so pure of heart, so united with the Godhead and so deeply in contact with the divine layers of consciousness and vibrations that he, without putting himself in mortal danger, can enter the "Holy of Holies". His mental state thus represents the peak of terrestrial human spiritual evolution. He is the complete "human being in God's image". He experiences the absolute truth by means of his own senses and has thereby become "one with the way, the truth and the life". So he has cosmically clear sight and senses beyond time and space, and experiences himself as identical with eternity itself. For him "one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day". He cannot be induced to believe in anyone or anything. He sees and experiences in everything and everywhere the true reality. But he can no longer induce others by suggestion or bind them and thereby make them his own followers or worshippers. He knows that he who binds will be bound himself. For this reason he wishes only one thing: to liberate everyone from the constricting mental and physical shackles of fate. With his being he conveys total love, understanding and forgiveness to everything and everyone. And since his highest mission and happiness are to liberate, he himself constitutes the culmination of liberation. He is absolutely sovereign. He lives with the Godhead day and night. He sees in the universe the Godhead's vast organism or means of recognition. He sees in his neighbour the sensory organs through which he, to a particular degree, experiences God and through which God experiences him, just as he, through the same neighbour, can recognise or read his own relationship to the divine I, the eternal Father, whom he acknowledges as: "Thou who art in heaven". This heartfelt, harmonious, living relationship between the "high priest" and the Godhead, between the perfect human being and the divine Father, is expressive of the sphere of the psyche we, in the structure of the temple, have become acquainted with under the name "the Holy of Holies". Such a human being, such a high priest, is an initiated human being; he is a Buddha, a Christ or a cosmically conscious human being. And every human being who has in his life experienced meeting this state or is overshadowed by its powers, which are identical with those that in the Bible have been given the name of "the holy spirit", has in reality "completed the course and reached the goal". Such a human being has no longer any real sorrow or worry. He sees in everything and everywhere the divine will, purpose and intention of life, and experiences as inner, unshakable fact the absolute, basic solution of all knowledge and science, namely this, that everything is very good. He lives therefore in the greatest security and, in all the situations of his own life, wishes only one thing, namely that the will of the Godhead may be done. Such a human being's way of being will in every respect be the divine light that impartially vies in its radiance with the suns and stars. By his impartiality, his inner, unshakable harmony and balance and with his genuine humility he constitutes with his entire way of being the personification of "the human being in God's image after his likeness".
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Original Danish title: Det psykiske tempel. From Book no. 21 Beyond the Fear of Death. From two lectures given by Martinus at the Martinus Institute on 25th and 26th October 1946. Manuscript for the lectures edited by Erik Gerner Larsson and approved by Martinus. First published in Kontaktbrev no. 24, 1956. Translated by Mary McGovern, 1993.
Article ID: M1970
Published in the English edition of Kosmos no. 1, 1993
© Martinus Institut 1981, www.martinus.dk
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