The etheric template is, in the seven-layer aura model, the fifth layer, one of the higher or "spiritual" layers beyond the astral bridge, and it is described as a kind of blueprint or negative of the etheric body, a perfected template of which the physical and etheric bodies are said to be the expression, associated in the scheme with the will and with divine order.
In Barbara Brennan's synthesis, which drew the seven-fold model together from Theosophical subtle-body doctrine, the upper three layers correspond to the higher spiritual levels as the lower three correspond to the physical, emotional and mental, with the astral between. The higher layers are held to be progressively subtler and to require finer perception. The seven-layer aura is a modern construction of Western esotericism, assembled in the twentieth century from older Theosophical and Indian sources; it is offered here as a description of a belief system rather than a factual anatomy, auras having no scientific basis, and no medical or diagnostic claim is made.
Sources Hands of Light: A Guide to Healing Through the Human Energy FieldBarbara Ann Brennan with Rainbow Body: A History of the Western Chakra System from Blavatsky to BrennanKurt Leland