We ended the last presentation by defining what a globe is and how this globe goes through seven phases of its development. What happens when a globe has gone from a material state “A”, to the same material state “G”? The answer is that it has had so much fun that it decides to go around again. One circuit of the chain is called a round. We are told that all seven globes of a chain exist simultaneously. This is true to a point but logically you have to start from somewhere. So at the start of a chain, you only have globe A, none of the other globes have been built out. This is my own personal interpretation of the information presented. Some of you who are aware of the writings of Charles Leadbeater may say “But there was a previous chain, so the matter came from there”. Did it or was new matter drawn from the pool of matter within the envelopes of the Planetary Logos? What definitely moves from one globe to another and from one chain to another are the monads evolving through those globes.
But for argument’s sake, let us assume you have all seven globes, already, in existence. What we need to be clear of is that they are not all actively engaged in supporting the bulk of the lifestream passing through the chain. I say the bulk because there is a residue left behind as the life-wave moves through a globe and an advanced guard moves to the next globe to prepare for the arrival of the main life stream. More on this topic later. It should also be pointed out that the whole circus of chains, rounds and globes is not going on just for our benefit, There are six other completely independent life-streams also evolving through our Earth scheme. For the sake of simplicity, we have one globe in a chain that is active and supporting life and we have the other six, which are dormant.
When a globe becomes active, it will support the seven life streams mentioned earlier, as well as many sub-grades within each lifestream. Eventually, the life on a globe will lessen and life begins to pop up on the next globe, with the caveat of the rest period between each globe. The time span for a globe was given as 700 million years, but this is just an indication that we are dealing with exceedingly long periods. This period of time is called a globe period. The passage of life around all seven globes is called a round. Therefore a round consists of seven globe periods. As was mentioned earlier, completing a round is so much fun that we do it seven times, cycling from globe “A” to globe “G” and back to globe A.
To represent the seven rounds we have to draw a spiral (Fig 3), although I can only draw circles, where a lifestream comes in from a previous chain and exits to a new chain, after completing the mandatory seven circuits through all seven globes. This means we have 49 globe periods that make up seven rounds that go to make up one chain. There you have it, chains, rounds and globes explained! Not so fast, there is a lot more to be said on the matter.
Just to reiterate, although the bulk of a chain’s lifestream is active on one globe at a time, before it becomes dormant, life on that globe does not entirely cease to exist. A nucleus of life is left on that globe and this serves several important functions, which will be delineated in future presentations.
Now let us look at chains in greater detail. We already know that a chain comprises 49 globes, seven globes times seven rounds. This is a chain period. When the chain period is completed, the globes which form it, disintegrate, and the matter which composed them is re-formed to make seven new globes. This is how it is described but it does not make sense to me. If you have one globe in existence and you begin the process of forming the globes of the next chain, how can you use the matter from the existing chain? Something to ponder. One answer to this conundrum is that the globes disintegrate sequentially. Consequently, in the last round of a chain, Globe A will disintegrate, building the new Globe A in the following chain. It is no longer then present in the existing chain. That would work. These seven new globes, on the following chain, pass through seven rounds of activity, precisely as before and are then broken up, only to be re-formed once more into another set of seven globes.
The process takes place seven times in seven chains, each consisting of seven globes, being thus formed in succession, and each lasting for its seven rounds of activity. You should get the sequence by now.
Leadbeater tells us that the individual globes, which are formed from the disintegrated matter of the preceding chain, although formed of the same ultimate material particles, are not composed of the same grades of matter. You can see from the diagram that the first chain is formed of
Two globes of 45 matter (45:4-7)
Two globes of 46 matter (46:1-7)
Two globes of causal matter (47:1-3) and
One globe of mental matter (47:4-7)
The second chain descends a step, in the order of its matter, so that it has
Two globes of 46 matter (46:1-7)
Two globes of causal matter (47:1-3)
Two globes of mental matter (47:4-7) and
One globe of emotional matter (48:1-7)
This process repeats itself until you finally get to the fourth chain and the appearance of our planet. If you look at the colour coding shown on the diagram, you can see that there are:
Four Lower Spiritual globes (45:4-7)
Eight Unity globes (46:1-7)
Twelve causal globes (47:1-3)
Twelve mental globes (47:4-7)
Eight emotional globes (48:1-7) and
Five physical globes
Thus only the first and seventh chains have purely lower spiritual globes (45:4-7); only the second and sixth have purely unity globes (46:1-7); all but the fourth chain have causal globes (47:1-3); all but the first and seventh have emotional globes (48:1-7); only the third, fourth and fifth chains have etheric globes (49:1-4) and finally only the fourth chain has a physical globe (49:5-7). It is also worth noting that all chains have casual globes except our own and now you know why we have the divide we do between the 1st and 2nd triads and why it is so difficult for us to reunite the two halves of our mental envelope. You see, knowing something about this topic feeds directly back into the information presented to date in previous presentations and makes things clearer. Hang in there, a lot more is to come.
From this consideration, it is clear that the mental plane plays a significant part in Humanity’s evolution: for, of the whole 49 globes, 24, or nearly half, are on the mental plane. Hence the appropriateness of the occult definition of Humanity as, ”that being in the universe, in whatever part of the universe they may be, in whom highest Spirit and lowest Matter are joined together by Intelligence.” Another way to phrase this would be to say that in the seven chains, the highest spiritual is joined to the lowest material by mental matter, the substance of intelligence. The disintegration of the globes into their component materials and their re-integration into 7 new globes at a lower or higher level, as the case may be, numbers 18. This is highlighted in this diagram.
As has already been mentioned, there is a stasis between any two states of being. In the case of the transition from one chain to another, we have a pralaya, also called an inter-chain pralaya. The whole series of seven chains make up a scheme. We can now summarise as follows:
Seven globes-periods make up a round; Forty-nine globe periods equal seven rounds, which equals one chain period; 343 globe periods equal 49 rounds, which equal seven chain periods, which collectively equal one scheme of evolution. Who’s evolution? Not just ours; not just the other six monadic streams but the planetary logos itself.
As should be abundantly clear from a number of diagrams that have been presented, we are in the 4th chain of our scheme and therefore at the lowest point of materiality. In this 4th chain, we are on the 4th globe and in the 4th round. This is highly significant and deserves further attention in a later presentation.
The seven successive chains are sometimes spoken of as ”incarnations” of the chain. Chains are spoken of also as Planetary Chains. The chain may be regarded as a vehicle for the planetary logos, something we will discuss further as well. We may think of the Planetary Logos re-incarnating itself in the seven successive chains, each chain beginning with the fruits of its predecessor, each handing on to its successor that which is achieved in its own cycle.
In the first three chains, we may say Spirit or Life descends into matter; in the fourth chain Spirit and, Matter are interwoven and form innumerable relations; the last three chains are those of upward climbing, at the end of which all will return to the Planetary Logos, to merge into the greater body of the Solar Logos with the fruits of the Planetary Logos’ evolution.
In the next presentation, we look at the bigger picture of the schemes of evolution.