The Master Omraam Mikhael Aivanhov was born in 1900 in Bulgaria. He went to France in 1937 and he has lived there ever since. What is striking from the very first in this book is the large number of ways the single question of how man should work to perfect himself is tackled. Whatever the question raised it Omraam Mikhail Aivanhov is invariably answered in terms of how man can bet ter understand himself and better conduct his life. And if the Master's words carry so much weight it is because he himself provides the finest living example of his Teaching. In his lectures over the years, some of which farm the contents of this book, the Maitre Omraam Mikhail Aivanhov shows that Jesus condensed his entire Teaching into the prayer beginning with the words, "Our Father which art in heaven..." now called the Lord's Prayer. Initiates, says the Master, proceed as Nature does. A tree with its roots and trunk, branches, leaves, blossoms and fruit at first is no more than a minute seed but, if you plant it, water it and expose it to the sun, it becomes a majestic tree in all its splendour... because Nature in her wonderful way has condensed the tree's entire potential into the tiny seed. Jesus did the same. He took his Teaching, the new Science he wasbringing mankind, and condensed it into a prayer to his Father in the hope that this seed would take root in men's souls, be nurtured by them with care, and grow into its potential: the massive, fruitful tree of the Initiatic Science, the real Teaching of Christ.