Zero by Bill Heidrick

I think this is so beautiful like the truth shining through! It's an intro to his writing called "The Road to the Sun" about his work with The Tree of Life available at www.billheidrick.com

ZERO

All things have one beginning and one ending. The end is the beginning. I was born into this world at 9:10 in the morning on August ninth, 1943 e.v. in Chico California and I have lived many lives since my birth. Some of these lives have been joyful, some have held the bitter pain of innocence, some have been blind anger, some have been filled with the softness of love. I have learned to hate. In hate I could find no one to hate but myself. The hate was great enough to teach love. The love was small enough to banish hate forever. Now love grows inexorably toward Chesed and that which is beyond all loves and hates, yet ever in love and ever the object of hate. No end and no beginning, yet the semblance of both. Drink deeply in these reflections and know yourself in me. We are one, you and I; and in our oneness we may transcend all and reach the great silence that is somehow everything and nothing. A truth so obvious may be a secret forever.

Let us make an oath never to deceive or willfully hide growing thoughts from one another. There are many secret lodges hiding in their secret thoughts. To know the tale and tell it not is death, and such lodges always die with their makers. True secrets keep themselves until gentle wooing brings them as lovers to our souls. There is no master of such mysteries save the master of the inmost self. Let us share this pledge, brothers and sisters: that light which comes to each of us let us share with any who are open to receive.

There is no jealous god or scheming devil to torment such as we. There are mysteries of great beauty behind these dull and grotesque masks. These masks have been made by half enlightened men who refuse to trod the next step on the way. They remain as bleached and grinning skulls to frighten children into false and stiffening maturity. There is no pain of evil and no sin save by clandestine agreement between half asleep self deceivers. There is no truth but only Truth. That truth we tend to all our lives. Enlightenment is not knowledge of truth; it is steady and continuing growth toward timelessness and perfection beyond the current perfection.

Let us bind ourselves in one more oath. Say anything, even judgments of one another; but let the judgments be soft words forgotten by the speaker as they are spoken. Let us not compare spiritual progress. Let us share our acts and joys, our sorrows and our yearnings; but let no one say: "My state is better than another's." Neither shall anyone say: "I lack the perfections of my brother." This is folly of the lowly sort. Let us partake of the folly of light and make no hateful comparisons. No one can truly know who stands higher and who lower beneath the open Eye of God. In matters of this world there are necessary comparisons to be made, but these mean nothing in the Great Work.

Still, such experiments and searches as we make may aid others to know themselves. Let us share such when we can. Our Order is a great one which has no bounds or rulers. It is the order of Beings and we are of the lodge of Humanity. There is no higher order and no more rightful lodge.