"Simplicity" meaning the unification of all the being’s powers, is a feature of the return to the "primordial state"; and here is seen the whole difference that separates the transcendent knowledge of the sage from ordinary and "profane" knowledge. This "simplicity" is also what is called elsewhere the state of "childhood" (in Sanskrit baalya), to be understood of course in the spiritual sense, and this "childhood" is considered in the Hindu doctrine as an indispensable condition for attaining to true knowledge. Studies in Comparative Religion Winter Issue (1973) AL-FAQR (’SPIRITUAL POVERTY’)

If now we intend to define more rigorously the domain of what may be called the initiations through the crafts, we have to say that they belong to the "lesser mysteries". referring as they do to the development of the possibilities which belong to the human state proper; this is riot the last aim of initiation, but constitutes at least its first obligatory phase. It is necessary, in fact, that this development is accomplished in its integrity in order then to allow a surpassing of the human state; beyond this, however, it is evident that individual differences, in which these initiations through the crafts have their support, disappear completely and play no part any more. As we have explained elsewhere, the "lesser mysteries" lead to the restitution of the "primordial state", as it is called in traditional doctrines; yet, once the being has arrived at this state, which still belongs to the domain of human individuality (and which is the point of communication between it and the superior states), the differentiations which give birth to the diverse "specialised" functions have disappeared, "although" it is there that they all have equally their source, or rather "on account" of this very fact; to this common source one has to remount so as to possess in its plentitude all that is implied by the exercise of any function whatever. Journal of The Indian Society of Oriental Art, Volume VI. 1938 INITIATION AND THE CRAFTS

If we view the history of humanity as taught by traditional doctrines, in conformity with cyclical laws, we must say that in the beginning man had the full possession of his state of existence and with it he naturally had the possibilities corresponding to all the functions prior to any distinction of these. The division of these functions came about in a subsequent phase, representing a state already inferior to the -primordial state", in which however every human being, while having as yet only some definite possibilities, still spontaneously had the effective consciousness of them. It is only in a period of greater obscuration that this consciousness became lost; hence initiation became necessary so as to enable man to find once more along with consciousness, also the former state in which it inheres; this is, in fact, the first of its aims, and the one at which it aims immediately. In order to be possible, this implies a transmission going back by an uninterrupted "chain" to the state to be restored and thus step by step to the "primordial state" itself; still, the initiation does not stop there and the "lesser mysteries" being but the preparation for the "great mysteries", that is for the taking possession of the superior states of the being, one has to go back even beyond the origins of humanity. In fact, there is no true initiation, even , in the most inferior and elementary degree, without the intervention of a "non-human" element, which is the "spiritual influence" regularly communicated by the initiatory rite. If this is so, there is obviously no room for searching "historically" for the origin of initiation-a search which now appears bereft of sense-nor the origin of the crafts, arts and sciences, viewed according to their traditional and "legitimate" conception, for all these, through multiple, but secondary, differentiations and adaptations, derive similarly from the "primordial state" which contains them all in principle, and from there they link up with other orders of existence, even beyond humanity itself; this is necessary so that all and each, according to its rank and measure, can concur effectively in the realisation of the plan of the Great Architect of the Universe. Journal of The Indian Society of Oriental Art, Volume VI. 1938 INITIATION AND THE CRAFTS

This realization of the integral individuality is described by all traditions as the restoration of what is called the primordial state, which is regarded as man’s true estate and which moreover escapes some of the limitations characteristic of the ordinary state, notably that of the temporal condition. The person who attains this "primordial state" is still only a human individual and is without effective possession of any suprain-dividual states; he is nevertheless freed from time, and the apparent succession of things is transformed for him into simultaneity; he consciously possesses a faculty that is unknown to the ordinary man and that one might call the sense of eternity. This is of extreme importance, for he who is unable to leave the viewpoint of temporal succession and see everything in simultaneity is incapable of the least conception of the metaphysical order. The first thing to be done by those who wish to achieve true metaphysical understanding is to take up a position outside time, we say deliberately in "nontime," if such an expression does not seem too peculiar and unusual. This knowledge of the intemporal can, moreover, be achieved in some real measure, if incompletely, before having fully attained this "primordial state" that we are considering. Essays: Oriental Metaphysics

It might be asked, Why this appellation of "primordial state"? It is because all traditions, including that of the West (for the Bible   says nothing different), are in agreement in teaching that this state was originally normal for humanity, whereas the present state is merely the result of a fall, the effect of a progressive materialization that has occurred in the course of the ages and throughout the duration of a particular cycle. We do not believe in "evolution" in the sense that the moderns give the word. The so-called scientific hypotheses just mentioned in no way correspond to reality. It is not possible here to make more than a bare allusion to the theory of cosmic cycles, which is particularly expounded in the Hindu doctrines; this would be going beyond our subject, for cosmology is not metaphysics, even though the two are closely related. It is no more than an application of metaphysics to the physical order, while the true natural laws are only the consequences, in a relative and contingent domain, of universal and necessary principles. Essays: Oriental Metaphysics

Referring to the original "yoga," and while declaring that it has always meant essentially the same thing, one must not forget to put a question of which we have as yet made no mention. What is the origin of these traditional metaphysical doctrines from which we have borrowed all our fundamental ideas? The answer is very simple, although it risks raising objections from those who would look at everything from a historical viewpoint: It is that there is no origin, by which we mean no human origin subjected to determination in time. In other words, the origin of tradition, if indeed the word "origin" has any applicability in such a case, is "nonhuman," as is metaphysics itself. Doctrines of this order have not appeared at any particular moment in the history of humanity; the allusion we have made to the "primordial state," and also what we have said of the nontemporal nature of all that is metaphysical, enables one to grasp this point without too much difficulty, on condition that it be admitted, contrary to certain prejudices, that there are some things to which the historical point of view is not applicable. Metaphysical truth is eternal; even so, there have always existed beings who could truly and completely know. All that changes is only exterior forms and contingent means; and the change has nothing to do with what people today call evolution. It is only a simple adaptation of such and such particular circumstances to special conditions of some given race or epoch. From this results the multiplicity of forms; but the basis of the doctrine is no more modified and affected than the essential unity and identity of the being is altered by the multiplicity of its states of manifestation. Essays: Oriental Metaphysics

On the other hand, there is nearly always a close connection made between Enoch (Idris) and Elijah (Ilyas), both of whom were taken up to heaven without passing through bodily death, [NA: It is said that they are to appear on earth again at the end of the cycle; they are the two "witnesses" mentioned in Revelation, Chap. 11.] and the Islamic tradition places both in the sphere of the sun. Similarly, according to the Rosicrucian tradition, Elias Artista, who presides over the Hermetic "Great Work," [NA: He incarnates as it were the nature of the "philosopher’s fire," and according to the Bible narrative, the Prophet Elijah was taken up to heaven on a "chariot of fire"; this is related to the "fiery vehicle" (taijasa in the Hindu doctrine) which in the human being corresponds to the subtle state.] has his dwelling place in the "Solar Citadel," which is moreover the abode of the "Immortals" (in the sense of the Chirajlvis of Hinduism, that is, beings "endowed with longevity," whose life lasts throughout the whole cycle [NA: Let us recall also, from the alchemical point of view, the correspondence between the sun and gold, which Hinduism denotes as "mineral light"; the aurum potabxk (drinkable gold) of the Hermetists is moreover the same as the "draft of immortality," which is also called "liquor of gold" in Taoism.]) and which represents one of the aspects of the "Center of the World." All this is certainly worth reflecting on, and if one adds also the traditions, from almost all parts of the world, that liken symbolically the sun itself to the fruit of "the Tree of Life," one will perhaps understand the special relationship between the solar influence and Hermetism, inasmuch as the essential aim and end of Hermetism, as of the "Lesser Mysteries" of antiquity, is the restoration of the human "primordial state." Is this not the "Solar Citadel" that, according to the Rosicrucian doctrine, is to "descend from Heaven to earth at the end of the cycle, in the form of the Heavenly Jerusalem," realizing the "squaring of the circle" according to the perfect measure of the "golden reed"? Essays: Hermes