Samael Aun Weor (Hebrew: סמאל און ואור; March 6, 1917 – December 24, 1977), born Víctor Manuel Gómez Rodríguez, was a teacher and author of over sixty books of esoteric spirituality.

[1] He formed a new religious movement under the banner of "Universal Gnosticism", or simply gnosis, and taught the practical and esoteric principles to awaken and fundamentally change the psychological condition.

[3] Samael Aun Weor referred to his teachings as "The Doctrine of Synthesis", which not only emphasizes the existence of the perennial philosophy, but that its highest teleological function is the accomplishment of "Christification" and "Final Liberation".

At one point he said he had lived with a tribe of indigenous people in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta in northern Colombia, learning the healing secrets which would later form the foundation of his medical treatise, Occult Medicine and Practical Magic.

[9] It was also during these years that he described his first experience of the Illuminating Void meeting his "Inner Being" or Atman whose name is "Aun Weor", meaning in Hebrew "Strength and Light".

However, in 1946, he met and married the Lady-Adept "Litelantes" (born Arnolda Garro Mora) with whom he lived for 31 years and had four children: Osiris, Isis, Iris, and Hypatia.

After March 19, 1952, Aun Weor and some disciples built and lived near the Summum Supremum Sanctuarium, an "underground temple" in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta in Colombia.

Upon being asked exactly what such a title meant, he replied: A messenger or avatar, in the most complete sense of the word, is a courier, a man who delivers a message, a servant or maid of the Great Work.

Therefore, my beloved brethren, the word avatar must never lead us to arrogance, since it only means nothing other than an emissary, a servant, a crew member who gives a message, an epistle, and that is all.

[19]Although he would declare himself as the true Kalki Avatar many times throughout his works, he regularly rejected idolization: I, Samael, am not in need of henchmen or followers, but only imitators of my doctrine: Gnosis.

However, he also wrote sociopolitical works such as the Platform of POSCLA (Partido Socialista Cristiano Latinoamericano, or Latin-American Christian Socialist Party) and The Social Christ.

In the last decade of his life, he penned works such as Parsifal Unveiled, which details the esoteric symbolism of the Wagner opera, and Gnostic Anthropology in which he heavily criticized the theories of Darwin, Haeckel, "and their followers".

[32][33] Throughout his works there are hundreds of techniques and exercises that are of help in the development of psychic powers, for example leaving the dense physical body at will (astral projection),[34] in order to be taught in the schools of the "Higher Worlds.

Aun Weor writes of the awakening of consciousness as being very similar to the traditional Buddhist understanding, and throughout his works he describes many analogous processes as they are spoken of in different religions.

This implies that one must begin to understand every impulse, action, thought and movement one makes, a feat that is said to be accomplished through the mental discipline of meditation and self-observation.

Furthermore, it is stated that the awakening of consciousness is the only way to acquiring gnosis and achieve a true and radical change by removing the spurious psychological aggregates that cause unnecessary suffering.

[54]"Psychological aggregates" are commonly known simply as aggregates in Buddhism, yet it is taught that other religions[55] used a more veiled or less sophisticated method to describe them, such as: the Legion that Jesus is described as removing from a man in Mark 5 and Luke 8 in one of the alleged Miracles of Jesus;[56] overcoming the tortures of the 49 Self-willed demons of Yaldabaoth written in the Pistis Sophia; the killing of the "unbelievers" in Islam; Moses escaping the tyranny of the Egyptians;[57] Arjuna fighting against his own blood (the ego);[58] the demons of Seth[59] that attack Osiris;[60] Jesus throwing the merchants out of the temple;[61] the archetypal death and resurrection of the "Solar Hero" exemplified in the stories of Jesus and Osiris; the descent to Dante's Inferno (representing our unconscious) or Paradise Lost's Pandemonium in order to accomplish a great task, such as those performed by Hercules or Orpheus; the archetypal Dragon (ego) that must be slayed by the Knight, etc.

[53] In order to achieve psychological transformation, extensive methods of meditation, self-observation, and sexual transmutation are taught and prescribed for daily exercise.

It is said that everyone contains seven bodies, closely related to the Theosophical septenary, which Aun Weor calls physical, vital, emotional (astral), mental, causal, buddhic and atmic.

Here it is said that "Mother Nature" mechanically pays out one's accumulated karma through a great deal of suffering over thousands of years until one is returned to the state of an innocent elemental, or Essence.

It is held that after Hell, the elemental is reinserted into the mechanics of evolution in order to once again attempt to gain conscious happiness: They are first inserted at the basic level of existence (minerals), and through millions of years, transmigrate through increasingly complex organisms until the state of intellectual animal is reached again.

The Spiral Path involves reaching a state of relative enlightenment by choosing the enjoyment of the Higher Worlds (Heaven or Nirvana), and occasionally returning to a physical body in order to pay out a little more karma and help humanity in the process.

[88] Aun Weor refers to these as the Pratyeka Buddhas and Sravakas, and that the vast majority who reach this state choose the Spiral Path because it is very easy and enjoyable.

It is the physical (Malkuth), vital (Yesod), astral (Hod), mental (Netzach) and causal (Tiphereth) vehicles – in other words the human soul – of a self-realized spirit, (Geburah-Chesed) who has chosen the Straight Path of the Razor's Edge in order to incarnate the Christ (Kether-Binah-Chokmah).

Christ is said to have existed before Jesus, and is represented in different traditions with names such as Thoth, Ormuz, Ahura Mazda, Osiris, Zeus, Jupiter, Quetzalcoatl, Okidanokh, Kulkulcan, Chrestos, Baldur, and Avalokitesvara.

Jesus is viewed as the Savior of the World because he is a Paramarthasatya (an inhabitant of the Absolute) that physically incarnated specifically for the sake of poor suffering humanity.

According to Aun Weor, Jesus purposefully played out physically the internal or psychological struggle one must undergo in the path of Self-Realization; thus, the Gospels are a mixture of reality and kabbalistic, initiatic symbolism.

Life, according to Aun Weor, is eternal, however its expression is divided into evolutive and devolutive modes: species evolve, reach a pinnacle, and necessarily devolve and return to a germinal state.

[102] The Social Christ is primarily concerned with a comprehensive critique of Marxism or Dialectical Materialism, but deals also with the injustices of the Capitalist system; We are filled with horror in the presence of so much infamy.

[107] In 1990, after numerous consultations with high-ranking members of the Roman Catholic Church and other figures who preferred to remain anonymous such as lawyers, public prosecutors, psychiatrists and psychologists, Pilar Salarrullana, who has been a political figure since 1974 and is considered an expert on sects, published Las Sectas (The Sects: a living testament to Messianic terror in Spain), which became a best-seller with six editions the first year alone and, in spite of its popularly inquisitorial tone, it denounces the Gnostic Movements among others as some of the most dangerous anti-social plagues in Spain.