Musings About the Astral Plane

A few days ago I was able to observe a lively discussion about the astral plane that was going on in an esoteric forum I am part of. The debate stemmed from a few statements from the writings of the Master DK through Alice Bailey, particularly in the book The Externalization of the Hierarchy.

Just to give a background, Alice Bailey was once a member of the Theosophical Society. From 1919 until her death in 1949, she started channeling the teachings of a certain Tibetan initiate named Djwhal Khul. He was termed either The Tibetan or the Master DK. These channeled teachings resulted in 24 published books on a wide range of esoteric topics that are still the subject of intense study among various esoteric practitioners and groups across the world. Alice Bailey has her detractors and her supporters, but there is no doubt that the writings she channelled from the Master DK are a rich source of esoteric lore.

The problem with Alice Bailey's books is that they are very heavy reading, not for the casual reader at all. Deciphering the meaning and intent of the books has proven to be a challenge for many an esoteric student and explains why there can be debates about the interpretation of certain statements and passages.

And so we go back to the lively debate I mentioned earlier. The statement in question was about the assertion that the astral plane was literally an illusion. One student clarified that what Alice Bailey was saying was that the astral plane did not exist for the ascended masters, but for the rest of humanity, the astral plane was very much real. It did not mean that the astral plane was literally non-existent. I'll have to review what I've read, but I seem to remember reading in Glamour: A World Problem (the Alice Bailey book, not the magazine) that the astral plane was literally an illusion and did not exist.

In any case, you can see how the debate might arise, because it's very difficult to validate the above statements. And for those who can do astral travel, they're in the astral plane so how can it be non-existent? Also, assuming that the astral plane exists for most of humanity, how can it not exist for the adepts and ascended masters?

Answering the above is not so simple. One needs to have some background about the different planes of existence and how they interact with each other. But in the name of making things interesting, I'll venture an explanation while trying not to make the both of us dizzy.

There are multiple planes of existence. That much is clear from all the esoteric literature out there. The most familiar to us is the physical plane we live in. Then there's the etheric plane, then the astral, the mental plane and so on. Higher up there is there is even the atmic plane, where the Higher Soul resides, and the monadic plane where the Divine Spark is located. There are even higher planes but we don't need to concern ourselves with those right now.

To say that the astral plane is an illusion would be to also say that the physical plane is also an illusion, because the physical plane is located "lower" than the astral plane. In one sense, this is true because of the impermanence that is a hallmark of the physical and astral. We can easily understand physical impermanence, but how can astral substance be impermanent? The astral body is also called the desire body, so you can infer that the astral plane is the realm of desire and emotions. You don't hold any particular emotion in the forefront all the time, i.e. you're not angry all the time, happy all the time, afraid all the time. These emotions may lurk below your conscious level but in terms of your attention (when you're feeling them), your emotions are always shifting from one moment to the next, hence it's impermanent in that sense.

A little more tricky is explaining why the astral plane does not exist for the masters and adepts. For me, I compare the astral plane to those aids we use when trying to learn something, like those side wheels when learning how to bike, or the multiplication table when learning basic math. They're not meant to be permanent and once you master the required skills, those training aids essentially "don't exist" for you anymore. In some Theosophical texts, there are statements to the effect that one must be completely desireless in order to elevate to the higher realms. Since the masters and adepts do operate on those higher realms, it may be said that the complete non-existence of desire in them means that they have no astral substance, hence they are absent from the astral.

The Rosicrucian Cosmo-Conception takes a similar tack in saying that the vibration of the higher realms is so high that beings there cannot occupy forms from the lower planes because the higher vibrations would destroy the lower form in short order, if not instantly. Imagine plugging a toaster directly into a high voltage transformer. The toaster is not built to withstand the higher voltage electricity coming from the transformer.

Below is an image taken from the Rosicrucian Cosmo-Conception. It will be difficult to decipher for most, but it does illustrate the different levels of existence and how far "down" a spirit takes form depending on the level of development.


In the above image, you can see that the Lord Jesus was of so high a vibration that he couldn't directly incarnate into the physical plane. According to Rosicrucian lore, there had to be an intermediary, in this case an initiate who developed his subtle bodies to a level that could withstand higher divine energies, at least for a time, which allowed the Christ spirit to make enough of a leap across the lower planes and do a walk in. Try to read the Rosicrucian Cosmo-Conception if you can, but I must say that like the Alice Bailey books, it's very heavy reading.

This is all very interesting, but is there any practical benefit we can derive from this knowledge? It depends on one's level of development, but at the very least it shows us just how far we need to go in order to get to the level of the adepts. It also emphasizes one important aspect about esoteric knowledge that the erstwhile student should be cognizant of: not everything found in esoteric literature is always applicable for the student.

It's something that Master Choa Kok Sui also mentioned in his book Inner Teachings of Hinduism Revealed. The example Master Choa cited was certain teachings on karma where some writings indicate that all good karma must be given away. This is applicable for initiates who are about to be liberated from the wheel of rebirth (because karma, whether good or bad, binds us to rebirth), but this teaching is not applicable for a young soul who has a lot of future incarnations to look forward to and/or a lot of negative karma to pay off. In this case, one needs all the good karma one can get, so it won't make sense to give it all away.

Perhaps this short discussion about the astral plane has stretched the limits of your understanding, but just like in weight lifting perhaps this has helped expand your mental threshold just a little bit more. It's just one small step, considering the scale we need to achieve, but like the Chinese saying goes, the journey of 10,000 li begins with one step.