Manly P. Hall: the Maestro of Esoteric Philosophy (II)
Part 2 | America's Philosopher in a Time of War
8. Novus Ordo Seclorum
As the 1920s moved into the 1930s, with the publication of his landmark work “The Secret Teachings of All Ages” already under his belt, Manly P. Hall’s career catapulted to a new level.
In a recent biography on Hall, reporter Louis Sahagun overviewed Hall’s activities during this critical phase of his career, noting that “the early 1930s were Hall’s most intensive years of books and artifact collecting, a quest he called ‘rich in adventures’ (and which put him) in contact with many unusual individuals and institutions.”
During this period, “Hall gave well-attended lectures on Eastern and Western philosophies. The authority in his voice, the magical themes of his books and lectures, and his intensely private nature all gave an aura of mystery to everything he said or did.”
According to Sahagun, the decade began with “a six month lecture campaign, (which) carried him to the nation’s largest cities, including Chicago and New York, where he attracted capacity audiences at Town Hall, the Pythian Temple, and Carnegie Hall.”
Then, “in the spring of 1931, he left New York for the … Yucatan to conduct research at Mayan ruins on the … snake-bird god, Quetzalcoatl. Then, he proceeded by train to Mexico City, where he made short trips to the region’s Toltec and Aztec archaeological sites.”Subsequently, “Hall traveled to France and England, where he acquired his most extensive collection of rare books and manuscripts on alchemy.”
Sahagun writes how, during his time on the East Coast during this period, Hall’s “circle of friends expanded … and included some of the nation’s most famous thinkers and mystics.” In particular, “Hall was an especially popular lecturer among the ‘town-car’ audiences at the 29-story (Master Building) on New York’s Riverside Drive.”
This large Manhattan apartment complex featured on its ground level a museum dedicated to the works of famed Russian artist, mystic, and initiate Nicholas Roerich. Roerich helped design the building and financier Louis Horch constructed it in his honor. Alongside serving as a museum to house Roerich’s works, the building’s original intention was to “be a creative center for outstanding writers, spiritual leaders, and artists.” Joseph Campbell was one of the building’s early prominent tenants.
Meanwhile, at the apex of the building was “an upper-floor penthouse suite with spectacular views of the Hudson River and city in all directions.” This private suite was used by Nicholas Roerich and his wife Helena “for private gatherings and occult explorations.”
Here, an elite network of prominent East Coast esotericists and Masons would meet to host “spiritual gatherings” and seances, presumably lead by Nicholas Roerich’s wife Helena, who claimed to be psychically in tune with the same elite esoteric society of Mahatmas that Helena Blavatsky had previously communed with during her writing of “The Secret Doctrine.”
Here, we discover an interesting congruence of events taking place. To begin with, Helena Roerich was not the only individual involved here who held a special relationship with Blavatsky’s “Mahatmas”; Manly P. Hall did as well. At least, that’s what Obadiah Harris suggests, he being the man who succeeded Hall as the president of the Philosophic Research Society after Hall’s passing in 1990.
Harris stated in an interview during the mid-00s that Manly Hall had felt a special connection to Blavatsky, as if she were a kindred spirit. More specifically, Harris stated that “there’s a feeling that Manly Hall had a bond with (Blavatsky), a kind of spiritual bond. And that when he wrote ‘The Secret Teachings of All Ages', he was writing the next book (that was to follow) her previous book, ‘The Secret Doctrine.’ He was taking it further. And he did. So he felt that, in her, was something of the (same) spirit that gave birth to the Philosophical Research Society.”
Harris also mentions that Hall held a personal affinity for Nicholas Roerich, who he knew and used to meet with in the exclusive penthouse of Roerich’s Master Building. More specifically, Harris stated that “Mr. Hall used to go to the Roerich museum … because there, in the penthouse of the Roerich building, met the very elite - the esoteric elite you might say - who were really into not only the Mysteries of the great world religions but also the Mysteries that many people don’t know (were) part of the very motivation for the founding of our country.”
Documentarian Christopher Pinto, who conducted this interview with Obadiah Harris, wonders “is it possible that inside the mysterious penthouse at the upper level of the Master Building, the so-called ‘esoteric elite' decided on the design for America’s dollar bill? Remember, the Master Building was finished in 1929; the Great Seal was not placed on America’s currency until 6 years later, in 1935.”
Let’s also remember that it was in Hall’s magnum opus “The Secret Teachings of All Ages, published in 1928, that the long-forgotten Great Seal imagery was unearthed and presented once again to the world.
Pinto further observes that “all of the players in this drama were involved in Masonry,” including Secretary of Treasury Henry Morgenthau, Vice President Henry Wallace, President Franklin D. Roosevelt, and of course Manly P. Hall, who is widely-regarded as the greatest philosopher in Freemasonry’s history.
Putting it all together, we discover that Hall, throughout the 1920s, while still a young man, was revealing in lectures and publications - some public, some private - invaluable (and in some cases, previously unavailable) knowledge about the inner architecture of the Mystery Schools. He also disclosed the governance model followed by its elite orders of initiates and masters (i.e. its “Mahatmas”), the esoteric origin story of their fraternity, as well as of the human race as a whole, and the idea that America has a secret destiny it has not yet fulfilled.
Surveying these early works of Manly Hall’s, a body of work which includes more than one in-depth analysis of Helena Blavatsky’s epic “The Secret Doctrine” and its concept of the “Mahatmas”, it becomes clear that Hall was, like Blavatsky, also in conscious communication with an “Invisible College” of spiritual Masters or Mahatmas that Blavatsky, her colleague Henry Steel Olcott, Nicholas Roerich’s wife Helena, and esotericist Alice Bailey all claimed to have been in communication with.
As Hall’s later colleague Stephen Hoeller once described, “(Hall) was someone who was in communication or has been in communication with a power beyond this world.” As such, like Blavatsky, he derived his knowledge not only from a survey of available literature on the topic of esoteric philosophy, but also from inner “sources only available to himself.”
It seems to me that the plan to resurrect the twin images of the Great Seal - The All-Seeing Eye and the Eagle, which is actually a disguised Phoenix - came at least in part from the remote esoteric order of Masters or Mahatmas that Hall, Blavatsky, and Roerich all explicitly reference in their teachings. Certainly, Francis Bacon’s legacy network of Rosicrucian and Freemasonic societies also played a significant role in the formulation and implementation of the plan.
The plan to put the All-Seeing Eye on the dollar bill was a campaign hatched and carried out from the top-down. It originated at the level of the Masters, Mahatmas, or Adepts, which Hall and Blavatsky had both been in psychic communication with. The plan was then implemented at the level of disciples, which in this case was represented by the Masons FDR, Henry Wallace, Louis Horch, and Henry Morgenthau, who all played their part in implementing the plan.
Documentary filmmaker Christopher Pinto offers supporting evidence for this conclusion, pointing out that the unorthodox design of Roerich’s “Master Building” penthouse meditation room bears a strong resemblance to a painting of his titled “Arhat”. This painting features an enlightened Adept seated in meditation in the center of a jagged rock structure - the shape of this rock structure comparing favorably to the shape of the Master Building’s penthouse suite (pictured above).
Was it here, in the Master Building penthouse suite, that the plan to resurrect the Great Seal and put its imagery on the design of the American dollar bill was originally conceived? Were Hall and Roerich the initiates put in charge of implementing this operation? And was an esoteric lodge of spiritual Masters or “Mahatmas” the mysterious inspirers of the whole plot? I believe a strong argument can be made in each case that the answer is yes.
If the answer truly is yes, then the next question becomes: “Why?” Why go through all this effort? And furthermore, what are the significance of the symbols? What kind of clues do they offer?
The symbolism of the Eagle we’ll cover in the section below, so for now let’s begin by looking at the pyramid capped by the All-Seeing Eye. What does this symbol suggest? In his 1944 book, “The Secret Destiny of America” Hall reveals its esoteric meaning, writing that the pyramid “represents human society itself, imperfect and incomplete. The structure’s ascending converging angles and faces represent the common aspiration of humankind; and above floats the symbol of the esoteric orders, the radiant triangle with its all-seeing eye.”
In other words, the symbol is the mark of the Mystery Schools and their quiet custodianship over human affairs on Earth. The fact that it was placed on the US dollar bill - perhaps the most significant single object in 20th century history - is no minor feat. Hall calls it the “monogram of the New Atlantis” and comments that its purpose is to reveal that the American continent has been “set apart for the accomplishment of a great work.”
The timing of this symbol’s placement on the dollar bill is also significant. The original imagery of the Great Seal dates back during the days of the Founding Fathers (1782), but languished in obscurity until 1928, when Manly Hall published it in his famous book “The Secret Teachings of All Ages.” Then, in 1935, it suddenly appears on the US dollar bill.
Hall himself informs us that the symbol’s appearance on the dollar bill at this time “coincides with great changes affecting democracy in all parts of the world. As early as 1935, the long shadows of a world tyranny had extended themselves across the surface of the globe. Democracy was on the threshold of its most severe testing. The rights of man were being assailed on every hand by selfishness, ambition, and tyranny. Then, on the common medium of our currency, appeared the eternal emblem of our purpose.”
Thus, we discover that the imagery of the Great Seal was placed on the dollar bill as a marker to indicate to all “with eyes to see” that America was quietly and secretly being lead by a greater Over-souling presence toward the fulfillment of an inevitable destiny whose fate is written in the stars.
In his book “America’s Assignment with Destiny”, Hall tells us exactly why it was these symbols appeared on the dollar when they did: the Vision of the Great Schools “must be communicated. It must be extended throughout human society until humanity redeems itself by the experience of enlightenment.”
This is the “Destiny” that the American nation must one day fulfill. And the imagery on the dollar was placed there to declare this esoteric truth for anyone to discover, if you can correctly interpret its symbolism.
9. The Eagle and the Phoenix
In 1934, Manly P. Hall founded his official non-profit, the Philosophic Research Society, which would house his library of rare occult works, host his weekly lectures, and serve as the publishing house for his journals and books.
That same year, 1934, Hall gave a lecture titled “1942: The Critical Year in Modern Civilization”, where he made a prediction based off astrological analysis that between 1940 and 1942 a new world war would commence, with the major nations of the world falling once more into a state of global conflict.
Later, in 1940, Hall was quoted in an article in the San Francisco Chronicle stating his belief that “America will not become seriously involved in European affairs before 1942.” He also predicted that Russia would soon become involved in the war, partnering with England, and that England would not suffer defeat, nor the US economy destroyed.
Furthermore, he also stated his view that the Nazi regime was “working against time” and therefore “incapable of achieving ultimate success.” Instead, in place of a Global Reich ruled by the Nazis was to come a “new world” born from “the disintegration of the old.”
What is this “new world” Hall speaks of - the one that was to come into place after the war?
As we noted in our previous chapter on the secret history of the 20th century, the conclusion of WWII brought many significant transformations to the global world order. For one, America rose to become the new world “superpower”, which is a nice way of saying “empire”.
Another significant change was that, within the heart of the American military-industrial complex, there emerged a new governance entity: a scientific ruling body I term the “technocratic superstate”, which arose to develop and protect a covert arsenal of exotic energy technologies based around a highly classified, scientific-age version of alchemy.
But the emergence of this entity is not what I think Hall is referring to; rather, its emergence marks a stage in a longer process, with the birth of the “New World” coming only at the end of this process - something that still has not yet been achieved. Therefore, the quest to build a New World Order remains a long-term ideal, one that we inherit today.
What the phrase “Novus Ordo Seclorum”, placed on the dollar bill, represents is not merely the rise of American Empire. Rather, it indicates a long-term idealistic vision, one aligning with Plato’s concept of the Philosophic Empire, a state prefacing the rise of a new golden age when the governance of world society will be placed in the hands of the Mystery Schools and their hierarchies of Adepts, initiates, and disciples.
In this light, the rise of America’s capitalist empire and the emergence of the technocratic superstate are stages in a long-term growth and development process. In this manner, they are a necessary means to an inevitable end: the eventual attainment of the Philosophic Empire.
This Philosophic Empire is the vehicle that will in time bring about a new golden age or “New Atlantis”, as Francis Bacon called it. This long-prophesied golden age is the actual “New Order of the Ages” that is declared on the dollar bill - it is a goal that has not yet been achieved, and therefore the Mystery Schools still secretly labor today in the quest for its eventual fulfillment.
The contrast between an eventual good thing that is to one day come (the new golden age; the Philosophic Empire) and a present evil that must first be overcome (American Empire; a world of tyranny) is exemplified in the image of the Eagle, which accompanies the All-Seeing Eye as the reverse image on America’s Great Seal.
Hall explains that the image of the Eagle is actually a veiled Phoenix, which is a symbol of the Adept hierarchy in charge of the Mystery Schools, who together serve as the “hands and feet” of the Great Lord.
But, in his 1945 article “The Bird of Wisdom, the Bird of War,” Hall points out that the substitution of the Eagle for the Phoenix is not arbitrary: the Phoenix represents a high spiritual ideal that must be incrementally worked towards, while the Eagle is the harsh, imperfect reality of the present moment, one that must be first worked through and evolved past before the higher Phoenix ideal can be reached.
Going into the details of the symbolism involved, Hall associates the Eagle with “the intellectual principle behind form”. In using the word “intellectual”, Hall is referencing the teachings of Plato, who contrasted two realms of cosmic existence: a lower “intellectual” realm associated with material form and comprised of quantitive factors such as number, geometry, and mathematics; and a higher “intelligible” realm comprised of transcendent qualitative factors, this realm bearing a close resemblance to the “archetypal” realm of the psyche theorized by psychologist Carl Jung.
In essence, the lower “intellectual” realm of material reality is primarily quantitative and involved with the build out of the mathematics and geometry of material creation and its hierarchy of systems-within-systems. The higher “intelligible” realm, by contrast, transcends the limitations of material form and concerns the pure, archetypal qualities of consciousness that exist within the Divine Mind.
In terms of symbolism, this latter, “intelligible” dimension of reality is the proper home of the Phoenix, while the lower, “intellectual” realm is the proper domain of the Eagle.
In Greek mythology, the “intellectual” world of material form was ruled over by Zeus, who, with his thunderbolts, reigned as absolute monarch over the entirety of material creation. The “intelligible” world, meanwhile, was overseen by a higher order of super-mundane gods.
Zeus, as the divine principle tasked with building, preserving, and ultimately destroying the world of physical form, is the “dictator" of material creation; he alone is empowered to decree the structure, function, and design of the world system. This he does by personifying “the patterns which … mark the boundaries and limits of all elementary motion and combination.”
The ancient Greeks symbolized this process through mythic stories. According to their legends, Zeus “called together the twelve Olympian deities and distributed the world among them. He set up their boundaries, allotted their zones, and bound them as vassals to himself. He codified the laws decreeing obedience or death, and hurled the thunderbolts of his displeasure at any mortal or immortal who dared to oppose his will.”
Following the classic philosophical adage of “As Above, So Below”, Hall points out that, within the human psyche, there is a corollary of Zeus that we can intuitively recognize and connect with: the “Ego”. He also points out that, at a collective, social level, another corollary can be found: the king or tyrant.
At the collective level - that of human society - Hall notes that any time a tyrant rises to take the throne and decree his laws over the people of the kingdoms, dividing “among his generals the lands he has subjugated” and setting up “his autocracies in their midst,“ he is “playing the game of the gods.”
In other words, the tyrant is attempting to usurp Zeus’s role in heaven. This is inevitably a losing game, as there can only be one Lord of Form, and all who attempt to install themselves as his usurpers will inevitably feel his wrath, as the Atlanteans once discovered to their eternal chagrin.
Hall puts it simply: “all who enter into the state of form, taking upon themselves bodies, mental, emotional, or physical, must give allegiance to the Lord of Form”.
Meanwhile, as we mentioned above, on the level of the individual human psyche, the part of Zeus can be found in the psychic principle that Carl Jung called the “ego” or “personality complex”.
Here, within the human psyche, we discover the ego functioning as a miniature, imperfect replication of Zeus, one that, in its undisciplined, unredeemed form, attempts to usurp power from the Lord of Form by claiming the realm of the body and personality as its own personal fiefdom. For this reason, Hall calls the ego “the king of the personality; the supreme tyrant in the tyranny of matter.”
As a microcosmic expression of Zeus, Hall states that the ego is “an intellectual entity”: meaning, it falls under the dominion of material form. He also declares that the eagle is its appropriate symbol.
In Jung’s model of the psyche, we find the ego counterbalanced by a higher, transcendent principle: that of the Higher Self, which is the Phoenix. In this way, within the human psyche the ego is the Eagle, and the Higher Self is the Phoenix, which in Plato’s system equates to a transcendent “intelligible” center of consciousness within the Soul.
As we discover, the human psyche is polarized between two dimensions, one higher, the other lower. The higher, “Intelligible” realm is the home of the immortal Self, from whence is extended an evolving sequence of mortal personalities or “lower selves”.
The lower personality complex of each incarnating entity is centered around its ego principle, which organizes and directs the personality’s actions over the course of its lifespan. It is for this reason that Hall calls the ego or personality complex “the king who rulers for a day”, with each day representing “one incarnation in a life cycle.”
In a passage from a 1947 issue of his journal “Horizon,” Hall describes the personality as a “localized area of consciousness within the soul,” one that has “no life or identity apart from the soul.” Its purpose is to enable “the extension of the soul downward into the sphere of experience.”
Hall explains that “the soul is actually the growing Self, and it accomplishes its own ends through a sequence of personalities.”
He also tells us that “all the powers of the soul are not used in any single experience or even in one incarnation.” By implication, “all of the soul’s unfinished business is not projected into manifestation in a single personality.”
“All experiences of the personality are registered by the soul itself. It is (therefore) the soul that suffers remorse and sorrow; pleasure and pain.” These are stored within “the substance of the soul,” alongside past life memories and the full spectrum of “soul powers” that have been unlocked thus far within it.
This deposited soul-knowledge, gained from experience, is used “in the molding of new personalities,” through which “the soul builds ever more noble mansions through which to perfect (itself).”
Hall emphasizes that “it is not the whole of the soul that sleeps with the body or personality; it is only the ray or extension of the soul which is involved in that particular incarnation. It is therefore this ray or fragment which must (in time) be awakened into conscious manifestation.”
This reveals the purpose for each human lifespan: “When the soul projects a personality it does so in order to perfect … some particular pattern of living. If the soul were already perfect in that pattern it would not project such a personality.” Therefore, “each personality is born of the soul necessity.”
Hall point out that ultimately “it is the soul, and not the personality, who suffers for its own imperfections”. These imperfections are held as karma within the Soul, which the personality must confront and act through over the course of a series of circumstances it confronts in its outer life.
Life after life, “the soul grows through its personalities.” Indeed, “the life of the soul is fulfilled in the personalities, which are the blossoms and the fruit.”
The problem for the soul is that its ego principle, emerging into place during each physical incarnation as the central coordinator over each individual’s personality complex, demonstrates a tendency to imitate Zeus and exert its own “will to power” and “desire for conquest.” This inevitably leads to conflict between not only the ego and the Higher Self, but also between the ego and the Divine Will, personified by Zeus. The ego inevitably loses this battle every time, with suffering arising as an inevitable result.
Because of the frequent catastrophes the unredeemed ego principle causes for the soul, Hall writes that the soul “begs to be delivered from the tyranny of the personality.” But this can only happen once the Higher Self gains the experience, strength, and wisdom to gain complete control over the lower personality complex, bringing it into harmony with the Law.
In the symbolism of esoteric philosophy, the fully mature human soul is the Phoenix. This describes the rare individual within whom the Higher Self has perfected and redeemed the lower psychic elements, the physical body, and the personality complex. In so doing, the Great Work is achieved, the resurrection attained, and the Adept-Self born, this representing the full evolution and enlightenment of the human soul, as it attains identity with its own archetype.
The famous “Hermetic Marriage” of the alchemists is actually a description of the integration within the psyche of the lower principle of Ego with the higher principle of Self. Here, the personal self (i.e. the ego) sacrifices its status as king and tyrant over the incarnating personality by relinquishing its title to the Universal Self in heaven.
Here, the ego is not destroyed or annihilated, but rather kneels down as loyal disciple of a greater spiritual Master, this being the true Guru within - the Higher Self.
Hall explains that accomplishment of this feat “leads to the production of a final personality. In this final personality, all of the potentials of the creature have been fully released and the human being stands forth in the glory of his human accomplishment. He has received into himself all the streams of experience, and has transmuted this experience into soul power,” becoming the reborn Phoenix as a result.
For this reason, the Phoenix “was one of the most ancient symbols of the initiates of the Mysteries.” More specifically, the symbol is associated with the Adept: a philosopher-king or hierophant, who presides over a Mystery School’s student body of initiates and disciples.
As the hierophants of the Mystery Schools, Adepts are the messengers between the gods above and mortals below. The Phoenix or Thunderbird represents the “Adept-King”, who “lived above the clouds and only appeared to mortals in their trances and vigils. It was immortal, and king over all the creatures of the air.”
It was known to appear in visions to shamans and initiates, where “it might be of monstrous size, seeming to fill all space. It could be winged or plumed, or develop feet or a plurality of heads.” Sometimes it sent forth long spiral plumes.
In Plato’s vision of the Philosophic Empire, the ultimate form of human government came when the Phoenix was enthroned as its central hierarch. Around this philosopher-king orbited the Mystery Schools, with their hierarchies of Adepts. initiates, and disciples. Together, these form what Plato called the “Philosophic Elect”, their responsibility being to teach the Doctrine, fulfill the Law, and guide the people.
Hall states in his 1945 book “Journey in Truth,” that “the ultimate rulership of the world is consummated in the philosopher-king (or Adept). He is the one, who by virtue of being the best of all men, is the natural ruler of the rest.”
Elsewhere he elaborates, writing that, in Plato’s vision, the “ideal king was the wise man perfect in the virtues and the natural ruler of those less informed than himself. This king was the father of his people, impersonal and unselfish, dedicated to the public good, a servant of both the gods and his fellow men. This king was descended of a divine race. That is, he belonged to the Order of the Illumined.”
Hall concludes that “the philosopher-king must ultimately inherit the earth. Of all men, he alone is adequately equipped to direct the course of empire.”
As the consummate human, “he must include within his own nature the attributes of a priest, a philosopher, a scientist, and a statesman. He must understand all men according to their own natures, and he must lead them gently and wisely to a state of security appropriate to their needs and temperaments.”
In short, “the philosopher-king must be an ever-flowing fountain of spiritual good, and through him his people must partake in the divine will. He does not rule by the divine right of kings; rather, he is a king by divine right.”
The wisdom possessed by the Adept is embodied in the doctrine of philosophy taught and practiced in the Mystery Schools. As the initiates and disciples of these Schools learn, internalize, practice and teach the Doctrine, they gradually transcend materiality and elevate themselves toward an eventual realization of the Adept ideal within themselves - an end-state that we are all, in the fullness, of time, destined to achieve.
In his book “The Road to Inner Light”, Hall writes that “the esoteric tradition, first embodied in its adepts and later incarnated in the whole body of mankind, brings the kingdom of heaven to earth.”
What results is “a renovated human society, unfolding under the disciplines of the Mysteries, fashioned in the image of the Eternal City, which bears witness to the Laws of Heaven.”
This is what the promise of the Phoenix represents: the coming of the Philosophic Empire and the blossoming forth of a “New Order of the Ages”. This message is symbolically encoded on the dollar bill for all to see, but few grasp its significance.
That this is so is not a mistake or coincidence: in the current age, grand philosophical ideals are not valued or believed in. Instead, we have embraced a worldview that celebrates the ego, the persona, the pursuit of temporal power, and the control of material resources above all else.
Hall elaborates, writing that "human beings, accepting the shadow for the substance, have given themselves over to ambition and the false belief that physical domination of others is an indication of personal superiority.”
This is ultimately what the symbolism of the eagle represents: the tyranny caused by an undeveloped ego principle attempting to “play the game of the gods,” so to speak. Under the banner of the eagle, “strong men have gone forth … to enslave the world. These tyrants, autocrats, and despots have been motivated by the pressure of self-will. The martial urge has forced them to their various destinies.”
Indeed, “the tyranny of the eagle lies at the root of the whole competitive way of life” - politically, economically, culturally, socially. Is it not appropriate, then, for this symbol to appear on the dollar at the present moment instead of the Phoenix, whose imagery it masks? Isn’t the substitution of the Eagle for the Phoenix a perfect symbolic representation of what is actually happening in real life?
It is particularly notable that this symbol was placed on the dollar bill in 1935: right when the long-term project for a new American Century was being put into place by America’s oligarchical elite. Is the rise of this American Empire not a literal personification of this Eagle principle - the literal actualization of its symbology? Is it not appropriate, then, for this symbol to have been placed on the dollar bill right as this capitalist empire was coming into formation?
The Phoenix is the ideal; the Eagle is the present reality. The challenge is to raise the Eagle into the Phoenix, a task that can only be fulfilled when the Doctrine is revealed and taught openly, when the Philosophic Elect are enthroned as the leaders and inspirers of society, and when the institutional architecture of world society is centered around a global Mystery School system, as it once had been during the long-forgotten golden age of lost Atlantis.
In sum, the dollar bill can be read as an occult message, one indicating three things:
a) First, that the Mystery Schools are operating quietly behind and through the body of American Empire. This is what the symbol of the All-Seeing Eye indicates. The placement of this symbol on the dollar therefore marks this object as a “vehicle of the Dharma” - i.e. as a means through which a larger initiatic plan, purpose, and destiny is being fulfilled.
b) Second, the Latin phrase “Novus Ordo Seclorum” or “The New Order of the Ages”, which circles the All-Seeing Eye image, indicates that the ultimate goal of these Mystery Schools is to bring about a new golden age, one that Francis Bacon once termed the “New Atlantis”.
c) Third, that this vision for a new golden age is a long-term goal, not to be achieved immediately or easily. The symbol of its achievement is the Phoenix. But masking this Phoenix is the Eagle, which personifies the undisciplined, unredeemed ego. The eagle’s placement on the dollar bill therefore symbolizes the idea that the American nation is going through an “eagle” phase of its development, where its base tendencies toward egoism, greed, materiality, and shadow projection are coming into expression, so that they can be confronted, worked through, and eventually overcome. Only once this Eagle phase of America’s development has been worked through and transcended can the higher archetype of the symbol - the Phoenix - be released.
10. The Causes and Purposes of War
When people today are introduced to the idea that behind worldly affairs exists a “spiritual hierarchy” who quietly guide and direct the evolution of world events, the natural reaction many have is to be skeptical or critical of the idea. After all, if this were true, why does this entity not reveal itself openly and act directly on mankind’s behalf in order to save a world that is mentally and physically tearing itself apart at the seams?
Manly Hall once addressed this issue in one of his later lectures, stating that: “many younger persons in wisdom say, ‘Oh, why doesn’t the hierarchy come out and do something quick? What we really need now is some very powerful exhibition of divine intercession.’ But this isn’t the way it can be done. It will never be done this way, because if it were done this way, then authoritarianism takes over. If a power greater than our own is known to be ruling us, then our growing morality is disadvantaged.”
In a 1942 article titled “The Adepts in a World at War”, Hall further elaborates on this point, writing that “It would be a terrific mistake if man (were to ever become) generally aware that his freedom of action was inhibited. The moment we become aware that our freedom of action was not our own, all action would cease and we would become dead fatalists. We would assume nothing we did would matter, because of everything being rounded out by inevitables. … We would not try to save ourselves if we did not believe we could be lost.”
Therefore, it is absolutely essential that our involvement with this mysterious over-souling presence - the Mystery Schools - “should be so subtle and so carefully timed that we are never actually aware of its presence. For we must never be discouraged from trying to do the thing for ourselves.”