The Number Five, symbol of the Kingdoms of Man
The number Five is the expression of the Kingdom of Man in all its attributes. Therefore it is the expression of the microcosmic Universe contained in the essence itself of the earthly Adam.
In the widest possible sense, the Greater Initiate sums up in himself, in his concrete manifestation, his own Kingdom as well as all the previous ones. Here are the first five meanings appearing:
Mineral Kingdom (the skeleton), Vegetable Kingdom (humors), Animal Kingdom (form and instinctive drives), Human Kingdom (lower mental and Psyche) and Super-Human Kingdom (Spiritual).
The Number five is the numeral representation of the microcosm man. But if it is true that it represents the five Kingdoms of Nature, this is initially limited to the Form Aspect of the Matter of which it is made of as "ultimate container".
Man as the "ultimate container" of the microcosmic Universe contains in himself not only the various materials necessary for those planes of manifestation, physical, ethereal, gaseous, super-ethereal, electric; it also encloses all the various energies that are the Life of those materials. Aspects VII, VI, V, IV, III. This leads the thorough researcher to discover the connection between five of the Seven Cosmic Aspects of which the Planetary Logoi are the transmitters, and the first five planes of manifestation of the microcosm.
We always need to remember the esoteric precept that there are Planes of existence above Man as well as below him.
The relations in the man Universe are:
7th Aspect |
1st Kingdom, Mineral |
with the Physical Body |
(bioenergetic) |
6th Aspect |
2nd Kingdom, Vegetable |
with the Ethereal Body |
(ethereal) |
5th Aspect |
3rd Kingdom, Animal |
with the Astral Body |
(gaseous) |
4th Aspect |
4th Kingdom, Human |
with the Mental Body |
(super-ethereal) |
3rd Aspect |
5th Kingdom, Human in contact with the 5th Kingdom creates |
the Higher Mental Body |
(electric) |
Sephir Da^ath, the Abyss – that illuminates the Form
____________________________________________________________________________________________
(inner mutation of energetic polarity, Transformation)
|
2nd Aspect |
Super-Human Kingdom |
with the Animic Body |
(subatomic) |
1st Aspect |
Spiritual Kingdom |
with the Monadic Body |
(atomic) |
for Man here starts the Relation with the real Universe, the Macrocosm.
Although all this is right as a general rule, some initiates made a great error of interpretation that many others accepted, building a dangerous illusion of which we must become aware.
Here we need a further digression from our journey.
The Humid Path and the Dry Path; two parts of the Initiatory Path, from the Lesser to the Greater Mysteries.
At the beginning of the paragraph dedicated to the Number Five we highlighted how the general Rule could only be applied to the Greater Initiate and only Him. Let’s see why.
As we have already stated, the arguments of the Lesser and Greater Mysteries can be overlapped; the difference is necessarily the quality of the mental essence of man, which allows a greater and greater penetration into concepts up to the metaphysical level. It doesn’t need the support of the rational mind, only the penetration of the intuitive sphere and pure intellect, the Cloth of the Triad.
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The human Male-Female form, according to the Eastern Cosmogony, precedes the Hebrew concept Adam-Evè of the biblical genesis of many millennia. |
It is commonly accepted that the Man Form and its attributes of instincts and passion, in other words, the sphere of desire, belong to the Animal Kingdom. Therefore the astral development of the concrete mind, egocentric and separating, flooded with impulses that drive it to the "rational" satisfaction of goals that accomplish and reward all that is craved in one’s own personal dreams, is for the man influenced by it, once again the Humid or Lunar Path. However the initiate will soon be differentiated from that level and will constitute the properly called Human Kingdom, veiled by the strength of the Psyche.
At this stage to state that man is gifted with Free Will is a hazard; however this statement is not true. Man is still too conditioned by the lower instincts of the Astral World to be able "to choose" with reason and freedom. Even the so often praised "falling in love" is obviously too often conditioned from the inside by the biochemical elements that Nature uses to condition the "animal choices" for its needs to maintain the species in quantity and quality.
The Form and its physical mind is a receptive, humid and passive container.
For this consideration the Initiatory Schools identify the Lunar and feminine part of the Humankindin the Form, without revealing the gender that is only an attribute of that form.
This "hermetic" statement, misunderstood by men who clearly never had access to those Schools and degrees of Instruction, developed into the easy conviction of the solar "privilege" on the others of one’s male reproductive attributes. Which, by the way, are the same at all levels of the hierarchy of the Animal Kingdom.
All researchers and scholars see this interpretation as filled with the ancient precepts of sexual religions, connected to the divinization of the phallic cult, which science hasn’t been able to eradicate from churches’ beliefs and ordinary men.
In the Symbol of Pentalpha we must distinguish a first stage that we call, complying with Tradition, of "Separated Man" (from the 5th Kingdom), 
, that is a Shadow in the Order.
This stage is followed by a second one where, due to the real mutation of the mental structure, the Initiate allowed the manifestation of his Form (mentis), the presence of the 5th Kingdom.
That Man, for the Power (the Light) of the Ego, is called an "Integrated Man" (with the 5th Kingdom of Nature), 
, and he becomes a Point of Light (or Light) of the Order.
Let’s geometrize with simplicity the concept of Obscure Pentalpha and Luminous Pentalpha.
At the top of the Obscure Pentalpha there is the personal astralness, although evolved, of the man-animal and his mind not yet enlightened by the Triad. Man, still, Separated.
This means that he is traveling on the lunar and passive human Humid Path, expression of the domination of the Form (the Cup) and its attributes on Personality (prisoner of the Form); it is the whitened sepulcher which Christ was referring to when talking to the Pharisees.
At the building of the first, although weak, "Bridge" with the Ego, following the Work of Esoteric Instruction, the lunar Form (mentis) starts being subjected to the solar action of the Ego.
And this stage is called the veiling of the Triad on the Personality.
At this point, the journey of the initiate hides grave dangers.
The Humid Path
starts drying out
due to the effect of Light
and it emanates steam.
The latter produces fog and miasmas
where the Traveller gets lost;
he is blind
and he invokes a Guide
to lead him
to a safe shelter
where he can spend the night.
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.....................(of the Form)
.....................(from the water that in Spiritual Alchemy is the Astral Element)
.....................(of the Triad, the higher heat of the energy of the Animic body)
.....................(the haze of the World of Chaos)
.....................(the illusion of the Aqueous or Astral Element)
.....................(the lesser initiate)
.....................(the inner eye)
.....................(a Master)
.....................(instruct him)
.....................(the Cloak of the Triad)
.....................(Life between two physical manifestations of the Ego)
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This is the correct interpretation of an old Catechism of Spiritual Alchemy that deals with those dangers for the initiate.
These dangers, as we have understood, must be attributed in the most usual terms to the mental haze caused by the personal and oligarchic element of what has been so far acquired by the concrete mind or by the desire of the lesser initiate to be different and better than his brothers; or also by the "mistake of presuming", without the verification of a Greater Brother, of having reached something or someone in the Initiatory sphere.
But we will see later on in this chapter how this can happen.
By metaphorically walking the Dry Path, man, conceptually interacting with the synthetic power of the higher Self , creates that "field of experiences" called higher Mental Body.
At this point we cannot miss the analogy with something that occurred to that man a very long time ago.
By focusing the conscience in the dialogue with instincts and desires of his lower nature, the Mental Body of Man constituted that "field of experiences" called Astral Body through which there is the expression of the drives of egocentrism, curiosity, separation, emotion, insecurity, irrationality and so on.
This typically "herd" stage is a sign of human childhood.
In the dialogue, so to speak, with the higher Self or Triad the conscience, embryo of the inner eye, distracts the attention from the lower vehicle and focuses on the reception channel that the Lesser Adept calls the "Bridge" and that manifests in the lower mind the drives of that higher Entity.
At this point the Mental Body of Man constitutes the other "field of experiences" called superior Mental body or Abstract Mind, through which there is the expression of the Abstract and inclusive Idealism as well as the results of the "synthetic knowledge" assimilated by the experiences in the lower world and by the interaction with the higher world (super-mundane).
Man becomes an Initiate 
and a vehicle between the concrete and metaphysical worlds, having appeared at the top of the Pentalpha the Spirit of Man, the 5th Kingdom of Nature or Spiritual World.
Some people asked Leonardo da Vinci why he used to draw a white circle (vacuum) at the center of his Labyrinth; he answered them that if a Master (an Initiate) had walked past he would have understood its meaning, without the need for him to explain anything. On the contrary, if a fool had walked past nothing could have helped him understand what was hidden in his work.
Of course he meant the Harmonics of Geometry (the Silent Sound) hidden in the forms of his works as an Artist and an Architect.
On the subject of white and vacuum, I would like to remind you of how, initially, the Knowledge of Builders, Architects and Initiates of the Temples ideally relied upon the Book of the Universal Constitutions of the Order in the sacred relations between Man-Temple-Planet-Solar System.
The most explicit traces of that Primitive Initiatory System were burnt, as it is well known, by the Anglo-Saxon priest Anderson and by his acolytes, in the attempt to hide the universal origins of Freemasonry and pass it off as English.
That Book was replaced in the "so-called" modern Freemasonry born in the Vulgar Era by the Bible, one among the books men recognized as sacred.
This is in contrast with the Rule that an Initiate leaves behind any doctrine, cult and particular philosophy, recognizing them as limiting and separating languages, and he opens his own conscience to the influence of the Archetype from which those lesser interpretations also originate.
That change also occurred because of political convenience; indeed the English king, which by constitution is the head of their Freemasonry, is also, and perhaps more, the protector of the Church of England. But we must add that for all the Masons that consider themselves as "subjected" to the recognition and Authority of that particular commùnion, putting it above their Free Will as Adepts, that Head and that Church become their Head and their Church as well.
In actual fact the Greater Adept, in the Light of his own (Spiritual) Free Will accepts to work in any Masonic Commùnion as it is, a part of the whole. His purpose is to keep alive and present in all those parts the Universal Principles of Brotherhood, Wisdom, Knowledge and Research of the Truth.
The Anglo-Saxon suggestion was immediately accepted, although not completely, even beyond the boundaries of that country, also for fear of reaction from local profane and ecclesiastical authorities. Many Masons wished to appease those authorities; for their benefit, later on, many Masons spied on Brothers (!) and betrayed the Principles of the Order.
Nothing new under the sun (of the plebeians).
In practice most was lost, such as the memory of the Great Book of Nature, of Laws and Sciences connected to the "physiological Nature" of the Planet and all that lives in It, passed on in the West through the Therapeutae.
The Book of the Seven Seals - Seven Seals because 7 are the Energies or Aspects that reach the Planet Earth (not yet consecrated) from the 7 Sacred Planets or Luminaries - contains all the Laws of the Solar System with a particular consultation system.
The White Book, placed on the altar of the last Initiation, is shown empty to the Initiate, symbolizing that in order to carry on in the Path of Knowledge and Wisdom, he must from that moment on set off on the inner Path (viz. on the techniques of the inner Path). 
