Calibration Lists for Spiritual Aspirants
Editor’s note: To serve as a guidepost for spiritual truth, Dr. Hawkins calibrated the levels of consciousness of representative teachers, spiritual literature, practices, and experiences. For practical convenience, these lists are reprinted here from Transcending the Levels of Consciousness, and more comprehensive lists can be found in Truth vs. Falsehood and the Book of Slides.
It is important to remember that the calibration numbers are not value judgments. A calibration of 970 is not “better than” 610. In fact, a teacher or writing at 605 (or 310, for that matter!) is likely to be more helpful to more people than one at 970. The mind is severely limited by its dualistic nature and projects its judgment of better/worse onto a simple number, ignoring the overall context, which is nonlinear. By comparison, one would not say that the highest elevation on an altimeter is “better than” another elevation. If a plane needs to land, or avoid a pocket of turbulence, a wise pilot guides it to whatever elevation the situation requires. The same is true in medicine. Wise physicians know the right medicine (and in the right dose) to apply to a given malady. They are careful not to prescribe the most powerful treatment in many cases, because the patients wouldn’t be able to handle it. Just so, each energy field serves perfectly in a certain context. There is no “good” or “bad” energy field; there is only the needed wisdom to discern which energy is best for a given situation. Dr. Hawkins told me one time, “Many people can’t handle love, so it’s best to give them something else.”
While the scale of 1 to 1,000 is linearly presented in order to help the mind to grasp the existence of attractor patterns of differing degrees of power, the overall terrain of the Map is nonlinear, in that everything within it is of equal value. A tree is not better than a bird, nor a bird better than the wind. Each makes its vital contribution to the evolution of life.
Just so, each of the teachers and writings on the lists below make their contribution. They all calibrate at the rare levels of 600-plus on the Map. These levels of consciousness are beyond duality and therefore transmit trustworthy spiritual guidance. The fact that one scripture is at 600 or 700 rather than 900 might indicate that passages were included in that “canon,” which contain anthropomorphic depictions of God, justifications of violence, and/or sociocultural practices inherited from historical eras. A wise student of spiritual literature knows, for example, that Jesus Christ’s Sermon on the Mount calibrates at a higher level than many other verses in the New Testament. We may assume that the calibration of a writing is a composite of all its verses; some individual verses, and even chapters, may calibrate below 200.
One importance of the following lists is that spiritual truth is found in all the great religions. This statement is in stark contrast to the claim of fundamentalists (cal. 130 and below) that only their religion is the “right” one.
| Teachers | |
| Abhinavagupta | 655 |
| Aurobindo | 605 |
| Karmapa | 630 |
| Kasyapa | 695 |
| Lao-tzu | 610 |
| Magdeburg | 640 |
| Muktananda | 655 |
| Satchidananda | 605 |
| Towles, J. | 640 |
| Vivekananda | 610 |
| Writings | |
| Abhinavagupta | 655 |
| A Course in Miracles (workbook) | 600 |
| Aggadah | 645 |
| Genesis (Lamsa Bible) | 660 |
| Gospel of St. Luke | 699 |
| Gospel of St. Thomas | 660 |
| Kabbalah | 605 |
| Midrash | 665 |
| New Testament (King James) | 640 |
| Psalms (Lamsa Bible) | 650 |
| Teachings of Lao-tzu | 610 |
| Vijnana Bhairava Tantra | 635 |
| Teachers | |
| Bodhidharma | 795 |
| Charya, Adi Sankara | 740 |
| de León of Granada, Moses | 720 |
| DÐgen | 740 |
| Eckhart, Meister | 705 |
| Gandhi, Mahatma | 760 |
| Maharaj, Nisargadatta | 720 |
| Maharshi, Ramana | 720 |
| Patanjali | 715 |
| Plotinus1 | 730 |
| Shankara | 710 |
| Teresa of Ávila, St. | 715 |
| Teresa, Mother | 710 |
| Writings | |
| The Cloud of Unknowing | 705 |
| Diamond Sutra | 700 |
| Heart Sutra | 780 |
| Koran | 700 |
| Lotus Sutra | 780 |
| New Testament (King James, minus Revelation) | 790 |
| Ramayana | 810 |
| Rig Veda | 705 |
| Yoga Sutras (Patanjali) | 740 |
| Zen teachings (Bodhidharma) | 795 |
| Bhagavad Gita | 910 |
| Lamsa Bible (minus Revelation and Old Testament, except Genesis, Psalms, Proverbs) | 880 |
| Nicene Creed | 895 |
| Upanishads | 970 |
| Vedas | 970 |
| Zen teachings (Huang Po)2 | 850 |
| Zohar | 905 |
Consciousness calibration yields a list of representative spiritual practices and experiences that are integrous and therefore beneficial. All of these denote devotion and are common to genuine religions. By intention, the devotee sanctifies both self and others, as well as places of worship. Because of intention, all styles of blessing and prayer calibrate over 500, and their collective effect can immeasurably impact the overall level of collective human consciousness.
Calibration levels do not indicate that one level is “better” than another but only different, analogous to the selection of clubs when playing golf, which depends on whether one is going to putt, chip, or drive. Therefore, efficacy is the result of intention and not just a technique in itself. Many spiritual students have explored a variety of these approaches and report pragmatic and experiential benefit. Simply reading the lists gives assurance that one is headed in the right direction.
| Practices | |
| Aum (mantra) | 210 |
| Baptism | 500 |
| Bathing in the Ganges | 540 |
| Confirmation | 500 |
| Devotional acts | 540 |
| Devotional burning of incense | 540 |
| Genuflection | 540 |
| Golden Rule | 405 |
| Gregorian chants | 595 |
| Hajj (pilgrimage to Mecca) | 390 |
| Japa | 515 |
| Jesus Prayer | 525 |
| Kirtan | 250 |
| Kneeling to pray | 540 |
| Last Rite | 500 |
| Lord’s Prayer, The (traditional) | 650 |
| Om (pronounced om as in loan) | 740 |
| Om Mani Padme Hum | 700 |
| Om Namah Shivaya | 630 |
| Prayerful hand clasp | 540 |
| Prayer of Jabez | 310 |
| Prayer of St. Francis | 580 |
| Random Acts of Kindness | 350 |
| Saying the Rosary | 515 |
| “Shanti Shanti Shanti” | 650 |
| Surrender (at depth) one’s will to God | 850 |
| Surrender the world to God | 535 |
| Turning prayer wheels | 540 |
| Twelve Steps of Alcoholics Anonymous | 540 |
| Transcendental Meditation | 295 |
| Visualization (healing) | 485 |
| Wailing Wall | 540 |
| Walking the Labyrinth | 503 |
| What is held in mind tends to manifest | 505 |
| Experiences | |
| Buddha-nature | 1,000 |
| Christ Consciousness | 1,000 |
| The Supreme | 1,000 |
| Near-death experience | 520+ |
| Satori | 585 |
| Enlightenment | 600+ |
| Christian Communion | 700 |
| Passover | 495 |
| Durga Puja festival | 480 |
| Ramadan | 495 |
| Sweat-lodge ceremony | 560 |
| Smudging | 520 |
The seeker is advised to avoid exploring spiritual experiences that calibrate below the critical line of integrity (200), even if merely out of curiosity. Just because something is labelled “spiritual” does not mean it is trustworthy and, in fact, may be a major distraction. For example, the “occult” calibrates at 135–185, divination game boards at 175, and transmediumship at 190.
The application of spiritual principles to many human dilemmas is widely acknowledged as efficacious, even when there is no original conscious motivation, such as the hopeless alcoholic who, after being ordered to attend Alcoholics Anonymous meetings by the judge, miraculously recovers and becomes an inspiration to others by practicing the spiritual principles of “carrying the message to others”—that is, sharing rather than proselytizing.
Spiritual integrity manifests as hope, faith, charity, and inspiring others by example. Integrous spiritual organizations that have an open door grow by attraction rather than by promotion, and they are devoid of dogma. Reliance on the power of the field is indicated by the group experience that people “get it by osmosis” instead of by intellectualization.
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1Plotinus’s available writings, as listed in the Great Books of the Western World, calibrate at 503. Plotinus himself in later life calibrated at 730.
2The Zen teachings of Huang Po are problematic in that they describe the Pathway of Negation and mistakenly declare the Void State (cal. 850) as the Ultimate Condition of Buddhahood (cal. 1,000). Subsequent to his classical sermons about the Void, he himself transcended the limitation and eventually reached consciousness level 960 later in life. Therefore, negate only the linear, but do not negate the nonlinear Reality of Love. Negate only special, limited personal attachment, which is a limiting emotionality. Divine Love is a universal quality and a nonlinear context that is innate as the Radiance of the overall context.