REALIZING THE FULL POTENTIAL OF THE SOUL
Although the attainment of spiritual enlightenment may mark the culmination of individual evolution, it does not mark the end of universal evolution. A newborn enlightened soul is just a babe regarding knowledge, power, and presence.
It may have realized the field of pure consciousness as its universal self and become identified with the immortal body of Logos, but it has not fully realized all the possible excitations of the field or the full extent of the metaphysical body.Just as a newborn lion cub is still a lion, even though it does not yet possess the form or power of a full-grown lion, so a newborn enlightened soul is still immortal, even though it does not yet possess the omniscience, omnipotence, and omnipresence of the fully immortal Supreme Being. To achieve its full potential, the enlightened soul must “grow up” to become like its father. This means the soul must expand its knowledge, power, and presence over a vast spectrum of space-time scales until it becomes both smaller than the smallest and bigger than the biggest ideas of space and time. To know God fully, the enlightened soul must become like God. The Hermetic texts declare:
If then you do not make yourself equal to God, you cannot apprehend God; for like is known by like. Leap clear of all that is corporeal, and make yourself grow to a like expanse with that greatness which is beyond all measure; rise above all time, and become eternal; then you will apprehend God... make yourself higher than all heights, and lower than all depths... grasp in your thought all this at once, all times and places, all substances and qualities and magnitudes together; then you can apprehend God.1
In order to become like its father, the newly enlightened soul must ascend to the highest heights and descend to the lowest depths until it has fathomed fully the range of the divine mind. Only then will it develop the potential to grasp “all times and places, all substances and qualities and magnitudes together” in its all-inclusive awareness. Only then will it truly become like God, the fully immortal Being.