THE FALL OF THE ANGELS
How divine beings turned away from God
After God created countless spiritual beings, something very unexpected happened.
How did a perfect creation ever fall into disharmony?
According to these teachings, the answer lies in what is known as the Fall of the Angels.
In the beginning, countless spiritual beings lived in harmony with God.
We are about to see what caused the Fall and how foreign layers of distortion came into being—layers that now separate us from God and from the Kingdom of Heaven.
Another name for these pure Godlike beings—also referred to as the Holy Ghost—is angels.
Note the phrase here: Godlike beings.
We are not saying we are God.
God is a divine being, and what we possess are divine attributes—but not to the same extent as God.
The only way we can reunite with God is for the divine aspects within us to become purified and free.
For the Fall introduced distortions into our divine nature—twisted versions of divine qualities that were originally pure.
As long as these parts of us remain in distortion, union with God is impossible.
Free will means we can defy God.
The gift of free will
Some say God should not have given us free will. Or at a minimum, when things began veering off-track, he should have stepped in.
But this view is shortsighted.
Because true happiness exists only through union with God. And for that to happen, we have to be made of the same substance as God.
We must share the same essential qualities.
Otherwise, we would not be like God, and thus incapable of union with God.
Free will means we can defy God if we choose.
When we abstain from abusing this power, we reveal our innate love and wisdom, along with a whole host of other positive divine attributes.
God gave us so much when he gave us this power to choose.
It’s important we understand just how much we were given.
But then we also were given an infinite number of laws. They guide us back to God if we break divine law.
These laws operate through cycles that must eventually close.
No matter what happens, ultimately all who turn away will eventually turn back.
The greater our distance from God, the more misery we feel.
And that misery becomes the incentive to choose differently.
Until finally we’re back.
Once we understand this law, we can begin to see it at work in our daily lives—even in the smallest incidents.
We may glimpse something obvious that, until now, remained hidden.
The greater our distance from God, the more misery we feel. And that misery becomes the incentive to choose differently.
The first temptation
Going back in time—far back in time—spiritual worlds existed for ages. There, everyone got along and lived in unimaginable bliss.
Until one day, a spirit had the idea to try something different.
The symbolic explanation of this can be found in the story of Adam and Eve in paradise.
Actually, it didn’t happen quite that way.
Although the idea of temptation was there.
It’s more like this. Let’s say we have great power, and we know it could get us in trouble.
But we’re just so curious.
The temptation builds until we are consumed by it.
What would really happen if I tried this?
At this point we have no intention of using this dangerous power in a destructive way. Yet the curiosity becomes overwhelming.
We feel we must try it—just once—to see what happens.
In that moment, our knowledge of the consequences fades under the weight of temptation.
When the first angel gave in, something tragic was set into motion that could not be undone.
That spirit—the first to turn away from God—is known as Lucifer.
He once knew what would follow. But after he succumbed, he no longer wished to remember it.
The result was not an immediate change. As with most forms of evolution, the change was gradual.
The change from harmony to disharmony was just as gradual as our own journey back from disharmony to harmony will be.
Going forward or backwards, evolution is always such a gradual process.
It doesn’t happen suddenly.
Here’s an example we may be able to relate to. Suppose we are tempted to take an addictive drug. Everyone knows, including us, that this could be our undoing.
It certainly has been for many others.
But we have the intention not to succumb to it entirely. We think we can try it just once, to see what it’s like.
But after that one time, we can no longer escape.
We are caught; it reels us in.
The same principle holds true for everything that opposes the law of truth.
When the divine became distorted
The one spirit who fell first created a power that ran in the opposite direction from divine law.
It was still the same power, just used differently.
With this, that spirit could influence other spirits—many other spirits—little by little.
But not everyone gave in to it.
There was a division between those who fell and those who did not. With the former, of course, the Fall of the Angels began.
In this process, every divine aspect was turned and twisted into its opposite.
Harmony turned into disharmony.
Beauty into ugliness.
Light into darkness.
Wisdom into blindness.
Union into separateness.
Love into hatred.
Then wholeness split even further and evil came into existence. ‘
These various spiritual worlds that God created were psychological worlds. But that does not mean they were insubstantial or formless.
Only here, in our material world, are thoughts and feelings abstract.
In other worlds, spirits live in a world that is created by the state of their mind. Landscapes, dwellings and objects arise as reflections of each state of mind.
Only spirits of equal development can live together in such a world.
This allows life in those worlds to function smoothly, but it dramatically slows individual development.
So if attitudes, thoughts, feelings, opinions and goals are what create such a world, then the world of the highest spirits would be beautiful and light.
By contrast, the world of the fallen spirits must be dark and ugly.
Ever since the great plan was put into operation, many in-between worlds came into being. Each has varying degrees of harmony and disharmony, according to the state of development the fallen angels gathering there had reached.
Our material world, planet Earth, is one of these in-between worlds.
No fault exists on its own; each is a distortion of a quality that was once divine.
The birth of dark worlds
Another word that describes the disharmonious worlds … is “hell.” Again, these worlds reflect the state of mind of the inhabitants.
Hell came into being as a result of the state of being of many angels, not the other way around.
But hell is not just one sphere.
There are many spheres of hell, just as there are many spheres in the divine world, or so-called heaven.
When the Fall took place, not all beings fell to the same state of disharmony or evil. So different spheres came into being within the world of darkness, always corresponding to the individual’s state of mind.
But on the whole, it is fair to say that every divine aspect was turned into, more or less, its opposite.
Until we are completely purified, some characteristics of the Fall are still active within us.
This cosmic story is not only about the past—it is also about our inner life today.
This is not a distant or far-fetched theory.
When we examine our faults, we can search for their original divine aspect.
No fault exists on its own; each is a distortion of a quality that was once divine.
There’s no need to feel inferior in finding a fault.
All is not lost.
Nothing is hopeless.
This is what we came here to do—to courageously uncover, face, and unwind our twisted aspects.
Our task after the Fall
At a certain point, then, worlds of darkness gradually started coming into existence.
Fortunately, there are spiritual laws that make it possible for the many fallen comrades to regain their happy state of existence.
But this required that certain decisions and changes be made.
Always, of course, these need to happen in accordance with free will.
God had planned for this and had made provisions, with the timing left for just the right moment.
This is all part of the Plan of Salvation, which God created.
God then enlisted the help of all the spirits who remained faithful to him, to carry it out.
Also contributing to the cause are the spirits who have reached—and are still reaching—sufficient development after the Fall to now help others.
This deserves reflection.
It shines a new light on what life really means, and our reason for existence here.
Perhaps we can go a bit further and think about what our personal task in the Plan may be.
Because everyone has a task.
Those who have peace of mind have found theirs.
We can ask ourselves what our task might be.
If we find unrest, haste, nervousness or anxiety, we can ask God to help us find our task.
We do this by being open and asking for guidance.
Maybe our work is to focus on our personal development. Perhaps we’re blind to something that stands in the way of our fulfillment.
We need not look high and low.
The answer is right there, inside us.
How should we be conducting our life so that God will be pleased with us?
The splitting of wholeness
The Fall not only affected our relationship with God—it also fractured our own inner wholeness.
At the highest level of development, an individual spirit combines both the male and female aspects of divinity.
There is no inner division or disunity at that point.
But due to the splitting that occurred during the Fall, this also split.
The separation into men and women on Earth is one result of this split.
Every human being then, has their counterpart.
Our urge to find and reunite with the right partner is nothing other than the deep longing to reunite with our other half.
We all will have certain incarnations where we are, indeed, joined with our true double, or counterpart.
And in the happiness that such a reunion entails lies a duty to fulfill something.
Other times, we have to go through life without our counterpart.
In that lies a fulfillment of another sort.
But that doesn’t mean one must lead a life of celibacy.
There may be other partners with whom happiness can be built, and with whom other duties may be fulfilled or karma paid off.
If that should happen, don’t worry, our true counterpart is not harmed by this.
No matter how it comes about, whenever we learn to give love, we come a step closer to God, to our fulfillment, and to our liberation—and so also to our counterpart.
What’s more, the splitting went far beyond the half-split of humanity. Lower developed beings—animals, plants, and minerals—reflect yet further splitting.
And from there, the splitting went on and on.
As we will soon see, all beings on Earth are on the slow evolutionary path returning to wholeness and reunion with God. Being human—being split in half—is the final stage of evolution before reunion with our original divine state of being can happen.
Lucifer rules through domination of the stronger over the weaker.
Lucifer’s Kingdom
Let’s circle back to those many spheres of hell.
There isn’t just one place.
There are many possibilities for what a private hell might be.
If our primary essence, in a perfect state, was love—the fire of divine love—then our hell was probably wickedly hot.
For another person, their essence might be wisdom. In a perfect world, this would mean wise judgment, calmness and detached reflection.
These attributes would allow slow divine unfoldment of creative power.
Directed into its opposite form, however, it would result in a world of icy coldness, darkness, and desolation.
There are an infinite variety of ways dark worlds might be. There are spheres of slime and dirt, spheres of intense suffering through overcrowding or through isolation.
It goes on and on and on.
Since one of the most important divine aspects is free will, it only stands to reason that this had to become distorted too.
The spirit who was the first to fall is known as Lucifer, Satan or the devil.
The name Lucifer was what he was called when he was a spirit of light.
He was a marvelous and beautiful spirit—the “bringer of light.”
He is the one who influenced everyone else to follow him in breaking spiritual law. So he is naturally the one to head up these new darker worlds.
Being the leader he was—and is—he then had complete power over all those who followed him.
For free will had distorted into domination.
Contrary to God, who honors free will, Lucifer did the opposite. Instead of giving those who followed him free choice, Lucifer ruled through the domination of the stronger over the weaker ones.
This, right here, was the crux of the problem.
This state of affairs would seem to make the salvation of the fallen angels impossible.
Even if we wanted to come back to God, we couldn’t, because we were under the dominion of Lucifer. And he refused to release us.
On the other hand, how could God not break his own laws to save us?
Especially those of us who began longing to return home.
If God were to use his infinite power and overrule the free will he had given us, he wouldn’t then be any better than Lucifer.
Here, more than anything else, the maintenance of divine principles was of utmost importance.
For only by staying true to himself and his laws would there be a fundamental difference between the ways of God and the ways of the devil.
Why God could not intervene
God’s plan is that we each come to understand this point on our own.
That we recognize God and want to come back by our free choice to once again live in divinity.
So regardless of God’s good intentions, this didn’t mean he could break divine laws and use force.
As in so many things, it is not the end alone that counts, but also the means.
Only by refusing to compromise could God be sure that even the most stubborn among us would one day see the vast difference between these two approaches.
It’s important we understand the dignity that lies deep in divine principles.
Even though this may mean a path of suffering for all of us trying to work our way out of our self-created miserable circumstances.
With all of this in mind, questions like, “Why has God not done away with evil?” need not come up anymore.
But at this point in the story, many souls remain trapped in the realms of hell.
How could they ever return?
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