Archangels

ARCHANGELS

Meher Baba

The dissolution of the Subtle plane is the phenomenon which we term Qiamat or Mahapralaya, and both the Gross and Subtle worlds recede and remain involved in the Mental plane in seed form.

The Mental or seed-body is a point of light (Causal body) on this plane. Extended or magnified, it's called the Supra-Mental body. The Sub-Mental plane is the rest-house of Walis of the sixth plane, and the Supra-Mental plane is the abode of Archangels. This plane, unlike the Subtle and the Gross, is eternal in character.

The Archangels are a creation by themselves, and are embodiments of God's qualities. In order to realise God, unlike the Angels or spirits, who are all evolved beings, the Archangels, after a cyclic period, directly take the human form and achieve the object in one lifetime.

The reason why is this. The ocean of divinity consists of drops and waves in a latent form. As soon as the surface of the ocean was ruffled with motion, the waves came into being, and these waves have all the attributes of the ocean in them. These big waves are the Archangels, the manifestations of the principle attributes of God, such as Brahma, Vishnu and Mahesh.

The effort to cause the big waves, i.e., the Archangels, has resulted in producing consciousness, but of rather an impotent nature. In order to remedy this deficiency, and to develop and attain full and complete consciousness, as that of human form, the Archangels even have to incarnate as human beings at the end of every cycle -- which, according to our computation or measure of time, may come to three or four hundred years.

Aw 15: 3&4 p62-63

The Archangels are the mediums for the expression of God's principal divine attributes of creating, preserving and destroying limited life on an unlimited scale, and of communicating unlimited knowledge on a limited scale. The Archangels are entities who always enjoy and never suffer.

The abode of the Archangels, the sub-supramental spheres of the fourth, the composite sphere... comes after the third -- the Mental sphere -- and is nearest the fifth, the Real sphere.

This is true, yet not the whole truth. For in spite of its proximity, it cannot touch the Real sphere.

An Archangel from the highest sub-supramental sphere can never see God, whereas man in the sixth plane of the third, the Mental sphere, can and does see God face to face everywhere and in everything.

The last point of the last of the sub-supramental spheres is what the Sufis call the sadrat-ul-muntaha (the last limit), beyond which, as is properly and rightly believed by the Muslims, even the Archangel Gabriel cannot go.

Man has and man shall (because man alone can) jump over the last seven links of the really non-existent relative existences of all the four spheres into his really own -- the fifth, the Real sphere.

In short, Angels must necessarily cease to be Angels and become man before they can reach the reality attainable to man. And when man ceases to be man and enters the I am God state, he realises that Angels and Archangels are, in fact, his own attributes in one sense or another.

from notes dictated by Meher Baba, GS p247-248

The three attributes of God (Emanator, Sustainer and Dissolver) are expressed through the three Archangels:

    Israfeel, the Angel who creates life,

    Mikaeel, the Angel who sustains life,

    and Izraeel, the Angel who destroys life.

from notes dictated by Meher Baba, GS p178

Even the evolution of Angels and Archangels, with all of their hierarchy, is not to be regarded as an exclusive stream in advancing life. They can incarnate among the human beings and become linked up with the human stream of life. They are also subject to the laws of cycles, and all that happens to them is subject to the control of Perfect Masters.

1956? Be p24

Some drop-bubbles remain latent in the six states of the oceanic stir. They remain stationary in the Mental or Subtle planes with only bubbles of mind, or bubbles of energy. Such drop-souls with only bubbles of mind are called Archangels, and they exist in the Mental world. Drop-souls with only bubbles of energy are called Angels, and they exist in the third Subtle plane. Archangels have a Mental body, but no Gross form. They have Mental consciousness without sanskaras. Angels have a Subtle body, but no Gross form. They have Subtle consciousness without sanskaras.

All other drop-bubbles which come out of the Nothing pass into the seventh state of movement, the Gross world, to journey through evolution, reincarnation and involution. This journey has a purpose - it ends in an answer. The purpose is to attain Everything, and the answer is 'I am God' to Everything's question 'Who am I?'

from notes dictated by Meher Baba, 1968, Meherazad, NE p37

When the drop-bubbles first entered creation through the Mental planes unconsciously, some became Archangels that exist in the sixth heaven...

...Only in human form can a soul become God-realised. God-realisation is the divine goal of all life...

After only one birth and lifetime as a human being, that Archangel... receives Liberation from all future births and deaths - Mukti, the state of infinite bliss realised...

from notes dictated by Meher Baba
1968, NE p79-81

Archangels Book Two

Index - Book One