The Seventh Sense

from

The  Seventh  Sense

Martin Exeter    June 5, 1983  pm

I am sure that we are all aware of the Holy Place. We know it particularly now and in this hour because within our own minds and hearts there is a certain peace and quietness and, instead of the absence of heaven, the absence of the world. How naturally what needs to happen happens when there is space in consciousness to let it be so. It must be holy space, clear of earthly pollution. Perhaps we find it easier, coming into a setting such as this, to allow this to be so in ourselves. The busyness of human activity can drain away and there may be a spiritual sensing of what has heretofore been beyond the veil. You will recall that in the symbol of the tabernacle of old, and the Temple later, the veil separated the Holy Place from the Holy of Holies. Here was a rather apt symbol of the human state outside of the garden. It is possible to allow the generation of some spiritual substance on the earthly side of the veil, so that there might begin to be a sensing of holiness, a sensing of the natural wholeness of oneself as an individual and of all people. We have such a sensing. We would, I am sure, acknowledge that this is the truth, but the experience of this truth is impossible as long as the veil of separation remains. Fundamentally it is the veil between God and man, between heaven and earth. The veil, as we have seen before, is there consequent upon the impure hearts of human beings and their unclean minds.

But the veil was rent by what one man allowed to happen on earth. In the religious sense, in Christianity, it seems that it is supposed that the rent appeared in the veil in the Temple of that day at the moment when Jesus “expired” on the cross. What is it that actually caused the rent? Obviously there was some sort of culmination at that point. Something was proven out all the way through. It was proven out that nothing that was brought to bear on this particular body and mind and heart could separate the manifest reality from the invisible truth. As it is put in the record of the Master's words: “I and my Father are one.” There was no separation. That fact was there quite some time before the crucifixion. In fact what happened then would not have happened if the truth had not already been established so that, in that sense, there was already a rent in the veil before ever the culmination occurred when consciousness was lost on the cross. Perhaps this being the completion of that particular aspect of the cycle of His experience produced such an impact that somebody became aware that the veil of the temple was rent. That is not to say that it had not been rent before, but nobody was aware of it. Anyway that's more or less academic at the moment.

The point is that there was an individual opening in the veil which up to that point had separated God from man, had prevented the human experience of the oneness of heaven and earth. Now it was immediately possible for anyone to experience that oneness. It had been proven out, and has been proven out for us, that there was nothing that could disrupt or distract the external manifestation of the man from the internal reality of Himself. This experience was then made available to all people. But, as I say, except for a brief reference to the rent in the veil, no one noticed or considered that there was any significance that there should be a rent in the veil. Of course that was just a symbol, but what was being symbolized has not really been noticed. Christianity certainly has obscured it with all their peculiar doctrines, the doctrines of men.

We ourselves are aware that there is actually nothing to prevent the experience of oneness, in the sense that I have been describing it, for each one of us now. There begins to be the facility by which what is in the Holy of Holies can come forth through the Holy Place into the whole body of human beings. First of all, there must be a Holy Place. We have considered this matter of the Holy Place as we have moved along the way, letting it be emphasized within ourselves that it was necessary for us to give space in our own consciousness for it. Nothing much was said about the Holy of Holies, just the need for a Holy Place where the sense of wholeness could begin to be touched. For this to happen the control through the physical senses, operating in hearts and minds, needed to be seen as a false control, an unneeded control. Whether you, and others concerned, permitted that control to recede in your own experience or not, the fact of that necessity had to percolate in your consciousness. The prince of this world comes in this fashion, clothed in garments of light at times; those garments were usually self-fashioned. In our own experience we have fashioned some garments — concepts and views, and so on, about this and that — with which we have tried to clothe ourselves, feeling rather righteous, having done that. But it is of course still the old human nature state, so that the prince of this world could come through our senses, and heart and mind would bow down and worship; in other words behaviour would emerge accordingly.

There is another sense. If there are five physical senses in the usual way, there are those who talk sometimes about a sixth sense. People get a little bit hung up on this sixth sense — a sensing a little beyond the ordinary gamut provided by the five physical senses. Perhaps we should recognize a seventh sense, which is spiritual sensing. There are things in the world that man has made which are quite invisible in the sensual sense, except from the standpoint I suppose of the sixth sense, and so there are those who have tried to develop ESP, as though that was going to achieve something. Five senses were bad enough; to have six becomes terrible! Well we can sense things in that way; but the habit has been to be controlled by what one so sensed, and this is the source of the trouble. The prince of this world comes and usually finds plenty. The senses are stimulated; human minds and hearts and bodies go along with it. There is always a certain amount of self-deception in this regard, particularly with respect to those who deem themselves to be good, and who try to figure out what should be done on the basis of the stimulation occurring through these six senses. Well nothing needs to be done on that basis. There have been many in the world who have seen something of this and retired into monasteries, or what have you, so as to try to exclude the impact of the world upon the senses. It wasn't all that successful, and to the extent that it was successful the individual tended to retire from any useful function on earth.

There is another sense which makes it possible for the connection to be made into heaven. This seventh sense has rather atrophied in most people. It needs to be reactivated. There must be something to start with. Obviously many people are quite unconscious of any sense of this nature; nevertheless it may still be there and capable of being activated. This proves out to be one of the responsibilities of the Priesthood in the Holy Place: the activation of this, wherever it is possible for it to be activated. However, our concern is not immediately with this but with allowing the reality of the Holy Place to be established in our own consciousness, the place of our own experience — not some belief about something but a place of holiness, of stillness, of quietness, of a sensing of the heavenly reality, even though it may yet be invisible. It has been invisible because of the veil, but where this sense begins to be activated then there certainly is an assurance available in the individual experience that there is something more to be known.

One should refrain from trying to interpret that. A lot of people have interpreted it this way and that way. If you are particularly embedded in the materialistic world then presumably the “something more” is more money or more pleasing things or a more pleasing environment or something of this sort. It may be that “something more” relates to one's endeavour to balance out the ecological picture, or to protest about nuclear arms, or any other of a hundred thousand different things, all of them related to this realm of form. Nothing is particularly achieved by this in the realm of form, but it may convince some of those who indulge in this sort of thing of the futility of so doing. In other words it may engender an awareness of misinterpretation. There is something being felt. Well, that misinterpretation is liable to continue unless the veil is parted sufficiently for what is being sensed to become somehow visible, somehow perceptible through the six senses. The seventh sense is still hidden for most. So there has been the necessity of allowing a holy place to be developed, a place where there is no judgment and consequently no condemnation, no objection, and so no conflict, no fighting. Are you aware of such a place in your own consciousness? I'm sure you are, but maybe you don't always stay in that place. The prince of this world comes knocking at your door of the physical senses and, lo and behold, you violate the holy place; you become fragmented. Well it has taken a while to begin to experience the holy place collectively, but it is here. We have perhaps some awareness of it right now.

In this holy place we become aware of the veil of separation. Perhaps the veil itself glows — there is a dawning awareness that there is something beyond that veil which is very bright indeed. And I think we can be well pleased that the veil has been there as long as it has, because if that brightness were able to come through, without being conditioned by the veil, we would likely be blinded and dissolved, disintegrated, in the sense of having any facility of body, mind and heart left to do anything. In a way this is what happens at the point of death; we have spoken of that as the angel coming forth. It's too much for what remains of the body and the mind and heart, so it is dissolved; but the brightness is there. Any of you who have something of this seventh sense in operation know, if you've been present with anyone at the point of their departure, that there is emphasized at that point not sorrow and misery and unhappiness but a real sense of brightness, glory. Well there must be something of the seventh sense, as I say, in operation to discern this. Most people are so bogged down in their own self-centeredness, not understanding what is happening, that they are incapable of accommodating any of the brightness; and it's all unrelieved darkness.

So there is a Holy Place developed, a place of no judgment. You can see why it has been so important to emphasize this matter of no judgment. There could be no Holy Place as long as there was judgment. Only as that is dissipated can we begin to find ourselves in actual experience in the Holy Place, and being in the Holy Place we become aware of the reality of the Holy of Holies beyond. It is said that the High Priest enters into the Holy of Holies was once every year. This was done in the world by reason of the experience of the One called Jesus. In order to be in the Holy Place there was the necessity, in representation of mankind, to pass through the veil, and so it was rent. But, really, the rent is not so much so that people can get into the Holy of Holies — I hope not; it wouldn't stay that way for very long — but so that what is present in the Holy of Holies can come out. And it comes out because there is the High Priest, or his representative, present to provide this aspect of service.

It is not required that the Priesthood come into the Holy of Holies; they stay in the Holy Place. They stay at the level of the veil. But there is what is present in the Holy of Holies to be represented and expressed and revealed because there are those who are present to do it in the Holy Place. Here is a coming forth from the Holy of Holies, through the Holy Place, into the consciousness of mankind as a whole. Here is the unifying element which makes possible the restoration of oneness. Many, many people have had an idea that there should be oneness in the body of mankind; they speak of the brotherhood of man, presumably including male and female. But, on the wrong side of the veil and the darkness that is there, nobody has been able to come up with a way by which the brotherhood of man might be experienced; because it can't be, as we have already seen, in that state.

It requires that the veil be dissolved because there are those who abide in the holy place, providing the means by which what is in the Holy of Holies may be brought forth, brought forth in living. I don't think it would be helpful if that bringing forth proved to be such a blaze of glory and heat that the human population couldn't stand it. Let it come forth in a fitting way because there are those present in the Holy Place who discern what is fitting, who differentiate what is coming forth on the basis of the acceptance of responsibility, personally, to do it in the particular field of their responsibility, but never leaving the Holy Place. The prince of this world can come, but the five or six senses which are directed outward are no longer being used to bring the impacts of the world so discerned into heart and mind but are merely being used to perceive what is present in the world beyond. The control is no longer in the hands of the prince of this world then, but is in the hands of the One who comes forth out of the Holy of Holies into expression through His ministers, who abide in the Holy Place. His ministers are no longer governed by what is brought through the senses. That is not the purpose of the six senses; the purpose is simply to discern the creative field into which the action of spirit may be released. And the action of spirit comes because of the seventh sense, which is the means by which the first great commandment is kept.

So we share something that is available to our experience if we abide in the Holy Place. It may take a little training to come into the Holy Place, to start with, and it may take considerable practice to stay in the Holy Place thereafter; but when one begins to recognize intelligently why it is necessary to do so, there's no great deal in it, no particular problem. As the control through the six senses diminishes, the perception through the seventh sense increases, and we become aware of what it is that needs to find expression in our living moment by moment. But as long as we are overrun by all that has been pouring in through the six senses, anything that might be available by reason of the seventh sense is blotted out. Now things are coming back into balance. We have spiritual perception by reason of the seventh sense, and we have six senses to discern the field of our responsibility; and because of our expression of spirit by reason of the seventh sense, we are in position to understand and to know how to handle our field of responsibility with which we are acquainted through the six senses. The prince of this world comes and finds nothing anymore.

I speak of these things in words. How capable are you of knowing what I am talking about? The veil is rent, and the beauty of holiness out of the Holy of Holies may come forth freely as we abide in the Holy Place. We can't abide in the Holy Place as long as the six senses drag us out. And so I rejoice that we might open our awareness some more this evening, that you might allow the increased experience to abide with you as you abide in the holy place.

© Emissaries of Divine Light