Questions and Answers Vol.1
20 November 1999

[Editor's note: In 1999 Ananda visited Adelaide where she gave a public lecture entitled Lord Maitreya and the Children of the Heart. Following the lecture Ananda gave a question and answer session and this text is a transcript of that session.]

​The Hierarchy is with us. They’ve always been, but They are very close to humanity now because They are actually slowly incarnating on Earth in a special way. 

If you have ever have read the book, Externalization of the Hierarchy, written by Alice Bailey, you will know that some of the Masters are actually reincarnating shortly because humanity needs it, and a number of initiates who haven’t incarnated for a very long time are doing it as well, and we are all very busy preparing this. It’s all due to the great change and what happens afterwards. 

Well, I’ve got some questions here and I would like to start with this one. 

‘You believe in reincarnation. Spiritualists believe that we only have one life, then go to the spirit realms. Can you shed more light on this question?’

It is so that we have only, I was just about to say we only have one life at the time, but that’s really not true either. Because it is the soul that reincarnates. It reincarnates in an expression of itself, a vehicle of expression called on Earth the personality in a human being. 

But the soul can have more than one incarnation incarnating simultaneously or in very, very close time range, as you may have heard; it can actually have seven incarnations going at the same time. I don’t know if we’ve ever had that, but I know from memory that we’ve had several incarnations going, because I can remember at the same time having one incarnation here, one there. 

When I say ‘I’, it’s not the personality, it’s the soul that remembers. Within the spinal cord there are memory seeds and within certain layers of our inner bodies there are memory seeds, because why would a person, who is astral of consciousness, remember past lives if you had to be in contact with your soul to do so? 

It’s because in all layers of your personality there are stored memories of past incarnations. It’s just that you may not grasp the entire picture from the astral body, even from the mental body – only when you are able to enter into soul consciousness can you actually see the whole picture and understand more of your incarnations.

So why do people start to remember their lives? That’s because people are becoming more psychic on planet Earth, like in the Atlantean days – humanity then was very psychic, but we lost the psychic abilities due to abuse of black magic and due to cataclysmic actions. People reincarnated again but without the psychic abilities; they lost them due to abuse, and Earth became denser. 

See, on Atlantis there was a long period where the then humanity had contact to what we call fairies and angels and lesser entities on different levels and of different elements. 

The veil between the physical and the etheric was thinner, and between the physical-etheric and the astral was very thin. But after the cataclysmic actions and due to abuse of black magic, it became gross and the matter became grosser and we lost contact. It was much more difficult to get the same contact. 

But, since we came into the new time here, where these impulses are at work, we actually see that again the astral world comes closer to the physical, and we can actually look into them if we are sensitive, and we are working a lot within the astral body or the mental body and so on. So people are actually regaining a psychic ability that they had in old, old days.

The spirit realms can be explained as going to the astral planes, or to the mental planes, or to the soul planes after transition. But it is not true that we only have the one life, except if you talk about it like this, that that body sitting in that chair – exactly that body – will not appear again. 

That body in there is a one off thing, but the inner bodies continue to reincarnate as the inner of a physical expression. So when we talk about incarnations we’ve had, we’ve got to understand:  it’s the soul that we are talking about, because of course, this body here only has one life. Then why do we look like former selves? That happens because if we reincarnate very quickly, as many of us have to do because of the crisis on the Earth, we retain the astral and the mental self, they’re not destroyed, they’re not enough years on the inner levels that they go through a rebirth. 

We are actually incarnating with the same astral and mental self, with all their defects and virtues, which means we also look like our old selves and we’re easier to recognise. So that should be an explanation to this question.

The problem is, as was said before, that we are not really human either – most people are more beasts on this planet. That has not changed a lot. And you become human actually when you serve the will, the soul, because, perhaps we could say that when the soul, the will of soul enters into the body, you become a true human being and there are not that many of them on Earth. I wish there were, then we might have some peace.

We are striving to be one with our divinity and one with our expression of divinity. And when you have reached that level, then you are very, very close to adeptship also, because you then control the human kingdom and you’re well into the soul kingdom as well.

There is a question here that I often get. The question is, ‘according to English lecturer Benjamin Creme, who has written books on the reappearance of the Christ and the Masters of Wisdom, Lord Maitreya is on the Earth now, is living in London and has appeared to people all over the world. Soon He will speak on the television, maybe next year. Have you heard this information?’

Of course we all know each other. If you work for Spirit, you of course hear about other people’s work. I have met Benjamin Creme twice – first in England where he transmitted beautiful energies of the Lord Maitreya and other beautiful entities and when he used the centre in Bentleigh some years back for an activity in Australia, in Melbourne. 

I would like to explain that the Christ Principle, the Christ energy, is not the same as the Lord Maitreya as a Master.

The Christ energy, the Christ Spirit, can use different entities, human beings, that are prepared to be used, but that has nothing to do always with the Lord Maitreya Himself being involved. It could be that the Christ Spirit descends through another Master, it could be through Lord Jesus or another initiate to an initiate.

After having read some of Benjamin Creme’s books and seen his newsletter and other things, it has come to my understanding that of course the being that speaks through him regarding world affairs and politics is often the Christ Principle, the Christ energy, that speaks. 

And in the Fellowship, it’s very much religious, Theosophical work. We also talk a bit about, of course, religious and political problems and world affairs, but we don’t teach so much at the moment – we concentrate more on reaching the Children of the Heart and talking about the Maitreya Theosophical teachings that are coming down. 

I would like to say the truth, because that I owe people who ask me straightforward questions. I do not believe the Lord Maitreya lives in London. I have never felt Him there. I have contact with Him and that contact leads to His inner body which He has had for so many thousands of years. But I know that there are two Masters in England and I believe that Benjamin Creme is in contact with at least one of them and that it is that Master he is in contact with. 

If you have ever heard or read Alice Bailey’s books, there are two labour Masters they’re called, in England, and I know another Danish disciple who was also in contact with that Master on the physical level. All Masters work for Christ, They’re His senior disciples. It’s a little bit complex, you understand. 

What was it that I wanted to say – it’s that overshadowing principle again. I saw Benjamin Creme in England transmitting the most beautiful presence of Maitreya, His Light, and his words were beautiful and true and authentic. And when I met him in Bentleigh, I had a little talk to him that day before we started on his meditation. I felt, I could feel immediately that it was the Lord Kuthumi that works through him. So it’s different Christs, if you understand what I mean, and Christ is using different people.

So that the picture that is being sent around the world of Christ speaking is not the Lord Maitreya, but it is perhaps seemingly a disciple being used by the Christ Spirit, speaking beautifully.

You see, when the Christ uses me as a transmitter, it can be the Cosmic Christ aspect, the Christ Principle, the Christ energy speaks. It can be the Lord Jesus, the Lord Kuthumi, it can be the Lord Maitreya, it can be any of the Masters, known or unknown, Who have that seventh initiation and are Christed. But when it’s the Lord Maitreya, there is a difference, and I felt the Lord Maitreya clearly through Benjamin Creme in England about 20, 21 years ago. But when he came to visit us in Bentleigh, it was so evident that I saw the Lord Kuthumi there instead that day; and when he did his meditation later on, it was the Holy Spirit. It all depends what work you do. 

But disciples are disciples for the reason that that’s what they do – they are used by their Masters and the Masters to talk to future pupils of the Masters and people who seek divine instruction but who cannot get in contact with the Masters at the present stage in their evolution; that’s how the disciples are working. As I often say to people who are disciples, your Master can be seen through you. It is evident if you are a disciple of a certain one of the Ray Masters, you can actually or occasionally see that Master working through that disciple clearly.

[Someone asking Ananda a question:  'Do you mean similar to when you’re working for Spirit, either healing or doing clairvoyance, you have your different guide with you, you feel it?']

I will now write, I will ask Ann, just a little drawing. 

​Draw a little man, draw the auric egg and the line through the head up to the higher, the other egg which is the soul and Spirit. ​

​That’s right, the causal body looks like that, and that is displaying every lesson you’ve learned, your development, your evolution as a human being, soul and Spirit – it’s displayed in that causal body.

And now we come to the Masters. If you are a disciple and the Master uses you, what is it He uses? He uses the casual body, He uses that energy up there.

Make such a radiant thing about it.

Master overshadows your soul, and in order, if the disciple cannot be in direct contact with that soul, that Master, in between, there’s another Master.

 On that line between the casual body, make a little round sun there. This is how it works. If the Christ as the Master or one of the Masters cannot get totally through to the personality, They work through an intermediary Master or initiate who can transform, the energy vibration is lower. When we talk about guides, especially guides, not Masters, but guides for healing or angels that do healing work, they stand usually in the mental body or the astral and have entrance into the etheric if you’re really lucky. 

When we get to the topic tomorrow night about Avatars, then we will explain to you how these Avatars work, how they transform, down, down, down, this energy into lower and lower kinds of energy, so in the end someone can hear them or get contact to something within. 

When it is said that the Dalai Lama is the reincarnation of the Buddha, it means that he is not the Buddha himself, even though many may think so, but that the Buddha sends inspiration and light perhaps into his soul and another Master or initiate is giving the energy from the inner levels. But if the Buddha overshadows in a certain way, the Dalai Lama becomes through a period, a moment, an hour, a week, a year, two years, the incarnation of the Buddha, because the Buddha takes over the consciousness in order to write a book, to create a system or do something special for the planet Earth – that’s how the Avatars work. That’s why we have the expression ‘Avatar’, ‘lesser Avatar’ and so forth. It is because it is a downward process which can be explained – it’s not as easy as it sounds.

‘Which were the groups mentioned, teaching about Maitreya,’ – what’s that, who wrote this question, who wants to know about other groups’ teaching – I don’t completely understand the question. [Someone talks.]  Oh, you didn’t hear. No, what I meant is – I will explain it like this: 

On the Seven Rays we have talents for art, music, writing, scientific talents, talents as healers, reformers, liberators, teachers, whatever. And the Lord Maitreya, the Christ, may stimulate a lot of vehicles so that they do beautiful art, music, writing and so forth, for the Christ aspect of the principle. And the people who work with the Lord Maitreya, I have noticed on this Earth, work with the Lord Maitreya with different aspects of the Christ energy. In some, it’s definitely religious work, in some it’s political work, in some it’s art, it’s music, it’s writing beautiful books - it is different.

We have so many disciples on this Earth who actually write very well for the Masters, but they don’t understand, most of them, that their personalities are involved, that it is not coming down 100% correct because often it comes down through their particular aura at the stage they are developed. It is very difficult to get the message down completely correct. It’s actually easier in art and music, where enormous devas overshadow the musicians or artists and they get the image. 

But when you are actually writing for a Master or a greater being, it is difficult to get the writing 100% correct because there will be mistakes made by the personality vehicle according to texture of aura, connection to soul. But that’s why when you read books where it says, Lord Djwal Khul has written this book or the Count of St. Germain or the Lord Hilarion, it is easy to see, if you know what the Masters are like, how much the Master writes and how much the personality writes, because the Ray that comes down gives information and the Master stimulates the work, but giving occasional inspirations and sentences. 
 
So, if I directly transmit the Lord Maitreya, it is Him, it is Him, you can hear the difference actually, you can hear His voice, His energy, all the way through it. But sometimes my soul takes over certain transmissions and then the energy of the Master disappears and another energy comes in. One gets to know that when one hears the transmissions. 

So I have read books which have been written by disciples who say that the Lord Maitreya writes or the Lord Morya writes and I can see how much is actually the Master in the book. But it’s okay, it’s okay because that’s how it usually is done. It’s just that the Alice Bailey books were written as notebooks and although some of the material has been given by the Lord D.K.’s own disciples on the inner and certain mistakes have been made, they contain a lot of correct information and it’s really up to the disciple to discriminate what’s correct and not correct and only really use what the heart tells him or her is correct for him.

So the Lord Maitreya is the Lord, He is the Christ, the World Teacher for all human beings and for all angels. And there is no guru nor spiritual teacher of a higher order who is not inspired by the Bodhisattva Office and there is nothing that He is not behind if it is higher orders. 

If it is lower orders at work, it’s usually disciples that are placed in between the energy, and the work is of that nature, that energy vibration. But it takes time to discover and you shouldn’t be bothered – if you think you do good work in healing or writing and teaching, whatever you do, arts, music, and you believe you are inspired by higher beings, then believe it, if it does good. One day it will come to you exactly who it is you are working with, if it’s angels, guardian spirits, guides, teachers from that level, from this level, the Hierarchy itself. It will be evident through the vibration of the work. 

And as we are all working together to benefit humanity, it doesn’t matter who you work with as long as the work is good and comes via good.

Why Jesus was called Jesus Christ was, it is because Jesus was used by Christ and that the Christ Spirit and the Lord Christ used Him and gave Him that title, because Christ is a title – Christos, King. And so Jesus became the King and the Priest King of that time, and the Lord Maitreya incarnated through Him and became the Risen Christ after He, the Lord Maitreya, died on the cross, not the Lord Jesus as man. 

And the Lord Maitreya had to die on the cross, be sacrificed to help the Earth which was in dire conditions and humanity, very dire conditions, in order to send a higher vibration of light into the Earth itself. 

If you look at, the Lord Jesus has told us many times, very much recently, that He is nearly ready to reincarnate, but He doesn’t reincarnate as a child, He reincarnates through one of His initiates, a disciple or initiate who is prepared to hold His consciousness, and that happens because the Lord Jesus is needed in a special part of the world when the great change becomes strong and certain changes are occurring on the physical level in a part of the world. This therefore will be talked about both as an incarnation of the senior disciple or initiate that is being used by Christ
 . . . [and as an incarnation of the Lord Jesus – gap in recording].

[Editor's note: Ananda next refers to a movie called 'Leap of Faith'. The main character, played by Steve Martin, is a travelling preacher who, in one of his shows, actually performs a miraculous healing on a boy from the audience.]

[gap in recording] .  .  .  something called Holy Spirit, and that it actually could work through him [the preacher] and the boy through his faith, he got the shock of his life, he couldn’t cope with it and he left. Then he should of course have continued and he would have worked very well but he couldn’t handle it, his mind was not ready. You see, everything to him was a game, was fun, nothing was authentic, he didn’t believe in God, he made a big show out of it, but God used him, because the moment you open your mouth and you say Jesus or a sentence from the Bible that comes from Jesus or just the word Christ, that energy works through you.

So you see, then without knowing it, your heart is transformed. It may take several lifetimes, it may take one, it happens. But the Holy Spirit, and the Lord Jesus has several times told me, the other Masters can’t work with a person, but He takes over. He can, He would be allowed to do that through the Holy Spirit. It’s mercy. 

If a disciple is very naughty and makes a lot of mistakes because of naughty behaviour and ambitions and won’t listen, Jesus will take him, until in the end there’s nothing to do but He takes over because it is a known fact that, if a person, however evil at heart he may be, if he should say a prayer or a blessing, if he doesn’t believe in God for a moment but he is a priest nevertheless, and he opens his mouth or her mouth and they say the blessing, the Spirit works. 

It is a very interesting thing that a priest can have absolutely no energy throughout a church service until he comes to the sacrament, then the words are so powerful that even though that priest does not believe in his heart, the sacrament works. It’s a safeguard. 

You say the right words, the right formula and Spirit works. Spirit doesn’t care about that person, as long as that person has said the words, that person has opened up and can be used, that’s the beauty of it all. 

So really, the good news – sounds like an evangelistic meeting – the good news tonight, dear friends, is that you can actually always be used by the Holy Spirit and you should work at it, because It is the most beautiful energy. 
It is in all the Ray energies, and the more you hear or the more you work for good, the more you feel this Holy Spirit – that creates sanctification of your inner Sainthood. 

And that is why we have incarnations in between, that when we work selflessly for Holy Spirit, then we become pure and holy people and people flock around such people and want something from them. You could say they eat off them, but that’s what they do. And they can create many things on Earth because the Holy Spirit creates, It builds, and, with a lot of Holy Spirit, there’s nearly nothing you can’t do on this planet. 

So I would say get on with it. If you feel that you are to attract the Holy Spirit, just think about It when you work, think about It using you and It will use you.

[Editor's note: As part of completing the meeting, Ananda plays a piece of New Age music from the CD 'Celestine' by Asha, to which she transmits the Lord Maitreya.]

Then I’m going to play a piece of music. I’m going to tell you that there’s a lot of New Age music on the market, but not much of it reaches the higher levels and can be used by the Masters, but there is an English New Age composer who can be used and he is called Asha. I’m going to Denmark to do a little tour in Denmark and Iceland in September and I have invited Asha to come to Copenhagen and play before my meetings. 

I’m going to play a piece of his music, just a little piece, because it is so much, if you just knew the Lord Maitreya, it is so much, it is so beautiful. I’m going to guide you through it, the way the Lord Maitreya, He starts to walk towards you and you start to walk towards Him and the way you meet, the energy, the way you merge with it.

Now close your eyes for a moment, close your eyes, and visualise that you stand just where the Way of the Heart begins, on such a long winding road and a heart in the far off distance. And you stand there and you look at the Lord Maitreya, Who you can see, with His Masters behind Him. 

And now the Lord Maitreya takes a step towards you and you take a step towards Him and you walk towards each other.
[transmission begins] 

‘And so I, Maitreya, 
say to you, loved one:
walk towards me 
one step at the time 
and our hearts shall merge tonight.

And see, I, the Lord, 
the Lord of the Sun, 
fire in My Heart, 
My hands and arms outstretched.
Come to me, 
My beloved Child of the Heart, 
for I am always yours. 

I Am the Christ. 
Love, love as I love thee, 
for I Am the Lord of Heart. 

And in My Heart, 
in My Heart, I live God’s Love. 
And through My Heart 
I am so close to thee. 
Take a breath, 
I then breathe upon you. 
I Am the Lord of Life. 
The Heart speaks. 
Take a breath 
and let My Heart sing. 
Forever, we shall be as one. 

I Who am thus Maitreya, 
your Brother. 
I have never been 
so close to thee 
and now, forever as one. 
Your heart, My Heart, 
your mind, My Mind 
as one. 

And so why 
have I come to Adelaide 
to meet with you, 
future Children of the Heart, 
who tonight, some of you 
have taken the first step 
onto the Way of the Heart, 
leading ultimately 
to the dreams come true. 

The world of Light, 
My kingdom, 
opens up to you 
and there I stand 
embracing you. 

I, from the time began, 
have stood like that, 
Christ in the doorway 
between Earth and heaven 
and now, humanity, now 
kingdom of heaven 
opens its doors 
and now you shall walk 
through these doors, humanity. 

Now, finally, finally 
you shall come to know the Son. 
I leave you with My blessing. 
I Am Maitreya.’

Thank you, everyone, for coming to this lecture. I hope that I shall have the honour and joy of working with you throughout this weekend and would like so much to come to Adelaide once a year, and bring you to Daylesford for our enjoyable schools, because there is the abode of Maitreya being built and it’s very special to live there. 

And I hope you have enjoyed and understood some of what I was giving to you. Thank you all, have a happy night.