The Hierarchy is a vast, complex, multi-level, multi-consciousness Network. It is, in its entirety, the whole complexity of Being; from the Absolute Being of God to the smallest and simplest being of nature. Though within this Universal Hierarchy are various hierarchies, such as the plant hierarchy, the animal hierarchy, and the human hierarchy; and all of this is just pertaining to our little Planetary Hierarchy (within the Universal). But right now we are just discussing the human Hierarchy of this planet, which we call the Hierarchy of Souls. And as all hierarchies go, there are levels and each higher level encompasses-enfolds its lower levels, while each lower level is within a higher level. And of course, each higher level is relatively lower to some further higher level, and so it goes.
But now, let us consider the need for spiritual mediation. This means that, for each spiritual aspirant or devotee, there are useful mediators between that person and God. Whenever this subject of spiritual mediation comes up, there is an intelligent question of, 'Why is this needed? Can't we go straight to God?'
The first answer is, 'Yes, we can go straight to God.' Go for it; go for God. Make a direct connection with God. The secret to this is through one's heart. God will be known and realized through one's heart. Complementary to this, God can be known through meditation in mind. Through both heart and mind are the pathways to God. Thirdly, selfless service to others and to the world is a pathway to God, (doing God's work).
It is certainly possible to have a direct, immediate relationship with God, without any mediation. One can even develop a personal kind of relationship with God -- relating with God in a very personal way. In this experience God could be experienced as my Lord, or as my Beloved, or as the Friend.
So we can go straight to God, we can directly know God, and we can come into union with God. But this does not contradict the possible need for spiritual mediation, or spiritual mediators. God is here present at every moment, but in many cases and instances we are not yet ready to directly experience the Hugeness, Deepness, and Profoundness of God. Sometimes, and perhaps most times, we need to experience gradual steps. Thus we need to experience the love and light of beings who are steps to God, or links to God. These are souls who are a step in front of us, a step forward in the Journey to God, the Journey to Absolute Love and Knowing. These are spiritual mediators. Spiritual mediators help us reach the ultimate destination of union with God and God-realization.
Anyone can be a spiritual mediator for someone else. This could be a teacher, a counselor, a religious leader, a parent, or anyone. Any of us could be a spiritual mediator for someone else. So this could be any living person, though it ought to be someone who is a spiritual step or two in front of us, and someone who can actually help us or guide us in our life. This could be a very special living spiritual teacher we have found, who becomes like our spiritual parent, and who we fall in love with spiritually. Or this might even be a teacher or saintly person already passed on into the other world, in which case will must contact them on that level beyond this earthy life.
So let us consider higher level Teachers, Guides, and Masters, who we must contact and meet in the inner, subjective, spiritual realm. Let us consider the possibility of contacting a spiritual Teacher in the upper levels of Hierarchy, who can be our guide and helper along the spiritual path. This could be a teacher who more recently passed on from the physical world, or this could be someone who we really never met in this lifetime. Or this might be one of the more known Teachers, such as Jesus, Siddhartha, Mohammad, or Lao-tzu.
The main point here is that we can benefit from being connected with and in relationship with a special inner Teacher, Master, or Saint. What makes this special and profound is if we truly feel close and connected, in both heart and mind. Then, we can learn from this spiritual mediator. We can learn about universal truths. We can have visions of what is possible and also needed. We can be guided in life to make better decisions - with real spiritual purpose.
There are always higher Souls ('above us', as it were, but not literally) who can be spiritual mediators for us in our journey towards Divine Realization, or in our relationship with God. These spiritual mediators become Teachers or Guides for us, helping us find our way towards God and towards becoming a more evolved and awakened spiritual being. They bring Light and also Love to us, which awakens us and leads us forward and also helps us bring more Love and light to everyone we meet. They radiate to us the Light and Love that they received from on High, from God or from their own spiritual mediators.
Of course though, it all originally comes from God, the Source, the Light and Love Itself. So what is going on here is that we each are at some level (of Realization) along a vast continuum ranging from Absolute God to the newest of individual souls. This spans from Universal to Galactic to Solar and then to planetary.
But what is most important to us, from a practical perspective, is Who (above us or further on from us) can help us. From Whom can we receive Love and Light, healing and wisdom? And from Whom can we receive creative inspiration; for remember that we all are artists in some way. So, who can help us in our spiritual journey? Who is most present for us, either living or in the higher/inner world? To find this, tune into Who loves you. For that will be the key.
Spiritual mediators are links to the highest wisdom and spiritual energies. Each person has a possible direct connection to almighty God, the One Divine Being in which all beings exist, the Great Knowing from which all wisdom teachings are derived. But for most people, and even for most spiritual aspirants, this possible direct connection is not yet built. This is not God's fault.
It's like a bridge that needs to be built, and esoteric teachings will sometimes call this the rainbow bridge. From the Highest, as it were, or from the Deepest, God calls to us. The Great Sound resonates out everywhere, but a receptacle must be developed, bridging the manifest world with the Divine. We cannot hear any beautiful music unless we have ears developed to receive the sounds; moreover, we cannot even recognize the beauty unless we have some degree of developed aesthetic sensitivity.
So, development of a receptacle instrument and receptive capacity is needed, in order for the Divine to be even heard, let alone realized. Thus, the bridge must be built from the receptive side. Then, as it says in the Koran, "take one step towards God, then God will take ten steps towards you." There is no problem on the Source side of the possible bridge; where it is weak and in need of work is on the receptive side.
Now the reason this is important to know, in regards to spiritual mediation, is that spiritual mediators are easier to make direct contact and connection with. They are closer to us in the many levels of Being, so the bridge to them is not so hard to build. They are closer to us, as it were, so we can hear them easier - they don't have to shout so hard. So how it is is that certain spiritual souls are closer to us, probably because we have made some bridge to them already, and these become our closer spiritual mediators. But we still have to make some further work to strengthen this bridge, this link, this relationship.
So in summary, a spiritual mediator is a link to higher wisdom and energies, a link to higher levels, a link towards greater spiritual realization, and in a sense, part of our developing bridge to the very Highest, which we can understand as the Spiritual Triad, or as Divine Being, or as God.
Also, the Absolute Light of God is very intense, too intense for our average mind and usually too intense for our individual being. Thus, spiritual mediators help to filter this Great Light, or to step the Energy down to what we can presently handle. All levels within the One Great Being act as 'step down' transformers. Those at each level are able to receive, handle and contain a certain degree of the Great Light, the Great Power. Then, they translate and step this down to make it more receptacle for others in levels below. And so it goes. Spiritual mediators also help us transcend our own limitations, so that we can rise up to our next possible level of realization and capacity for the Light.
Spiritual mediators act as a links in the Great Being and help mediate communication between all levels and all beings. They become our links in spiritual contact, communication, and realization. They are also like translators, translating higher levels of realization into ideas and guidance that we can understand and make practical use of. In a sense, we are each possible translators for other people -- taking what we already know and translating this into a way that other people can understand it best, according to their 'language', or their ways of thinking.
Spiritual mediators also give us better orientation and direction. They help orient us and steer us in better directions. Thus, they can be understood as guides. They share greater Visions with us. Or, in a sense, they help give us more vision. They help open up veils and closed doors. They help to open our minds and hearts, and to realize more of the whole Divine Reality.
In addition to spiritual teachers who help mediate and link us to higher wisdom and energies, there are also angels available who, from their compassion, come to help each person, though the effectiveness of this is still dependent on the person's receptivity and openness.
Spiritual mediators are mediators to God. They help lead us toward divine realizations and also toward divine service (or creativity). They might be found in this living world, or they might be found in the inner spiritual world.
But we should always be discerning about who we trust and are guided by. The mind can be a fooling thing, and also there are disincarnate beings who merely think they are wise. So do not be as naive some spiritualists, who channel whatever being happens to show up and then accept whatever comes to them as being true and wise. Developing an open and receptive ability is very good, but we still need to practice discernment, which means that we should test whatever we receive by our own experience and reason, and also of course test it by the intuition of your heart.
So in the final analysis, we each have to think for our own self and discern by our own self what is true. It would be nice if it were all so easy -- to just be open and accept whatever we hear is true as being actually true, either coming from a living person or from a 'guide' of the inner world. But it is not so easy. We still need to be discerning. We cannot just be passive recipients. We need to mentally consider what is actually true and also what is useful. We each need to be the manager in charge of our own life; yet with an attitude of being open to listening and considering what is really true.
Open-mindedness should not be confused with gullibility and naivety. To be open-minded is to be open to something new and not merely closed minded to anything does not simply fit in with one's usual way of thinking or one's usual beliefs. With open-mindedness one is ever ready to change present beliefs, rather than hold tight to whatever is presently believed. One is open to listening and then considering whatever is heard as possibly true. One gives due consideration to what one hears, either by a living teacher, from a teaching, or from a guide heard in the subjective realm of mind. Open-mindedness and thoughtful consideration is necessary for any new learning. Heartful consideration is also part of this, because remember that the heart recognizes truth. The heart has its own natural sense of what is true.
Yet this attitude of openness does not mean that one should simply believe whatever is heard, or whatever one is told is true; for that would be gullibility and naivety. Each person has to be the final judge of what is true and believable. This is being self-responsible. Many people do not want to face up to this, so they naively believe any teacher or teaching or religion that happens to come their way. Just think about all the people who believe in their religious holy books, without any questioning at all. The Holy book claims that every sentence of it is the Truth, so people accept it as true, because the book said it was true. Or think about astrology. So many people go along with astrology, without making any real inquiry about its truth. Others accept it as true, so "I will as well".
Instead, let us have our own self-responsibility in thoughtfully considering what might be true or what might be good guidance. Receive what is given with an open mind, but then consider its real truth with the abilities of reasoning, intuition, and experience.
Having a spiritual teacher or guide, or even just listening to one, does not mean that one's own self-responsibility is dissolved. Each person has to remain in charge and self-responsible for what is accepted as true and also responsible for doing what is needed. Spiritual mediators do not eliminate our self-responsibility, in our search for truth and in what we need to do individually. A guide is meant to be just a guide, not a replacement for one's own need to think for oneself and doing some personal good in the world.
A real teacher/guide will challenge us to be self-responsible, to think for ourselves and make our own discernment of truth. A real teacher/guide will give us advice and point us in a direction, but we have to do the actual work. So, we have to continually face our own responsibility.
Also, having a spiritual mediator does not diminish our own individuality. Many people fear and reject spiritual teachers/guides, because they fear losing their individuality. They think that their individuality will be absorbed and lost into the teacher. But individuality will be conserved. One's particular sense of individuality may change, or in fact it may expand, yet individuality remains.
For many people, their sense of individuality is concerned with boundaries and having a sense of being separate from everyone else. But individuality does not have to be this experience of fixed, boundaried separateness. We ought to be able, at times, to let go of our fixed and protected boundaries, in order have experiences of inter-relatedness and even union with others. Though it is smart to choose these others selectively, since there are people stuck in negativity whom we should not be so open with (no sense in getting absorbed into negative auras). So it is true that we should be selective about who to be open with, as much as it is good to be selective about what guidance to accept as true. A helpful key in this selectivity is listening to the wisdom of your heart.
Having a spiritual teacher/guide is a special form of relationship, in which the boundary of oneself may become flexible and even permeable. But this is good, rather than having a fixed and hardened wall of a boundary. So one's own self boundary might be dissolved for awhile, whereby the person might merge with the teacher, but this is really an expansion of oneself; and at some point a more boundaried individuality will again coalesce. So individuality always returns, but in our spiritual journey one's individuality (and sense of self) ought to be expanding, rather than remaining limitedly stuck and fixed. And this is how spiritual mediators, within the whole Hierarchy of souls, can be helpful in the expansive journey of our own mind/heart/soul, because They are already more expansive in their being and so we can expand further into consciousness of the one Divine Being through them.
Thus, the whole Hierarchy of conscious souls can also be understood as a Hierarchy of spiritual mediators. These are helpful mediators between our own degree of realization and the Goal - which is God-realization or Divine Being Consciousness. The whole Hierarchy is a stepping ladder to God, each being a step. At each level, or step, is a more advanced Soul ready to help us climb further to God, further towards complete Divine realization.
So there are always these spiritual mediators available, these Teachers and Guides and Masters, who really do care about us, who really do want to help us, and who really will help us... increase our spiritual knowing and our spiritual love and our ability to serve life. But we have to listen for this and allow Them to help us.