Stop Misreading the Bible: Matthew 5:22, Self-sabotage Affects Success: Are the Negative Things You Really Believe--Taking the Lord's Name in Vain--Causing Your Present Hellfire/Failure?

Nothing happens in the world unless it has first been imagined. Not necessarily by us. We are all of the one Imagination which causes all things. The good news is that we are that one Imagination and can change our local situations by it (because, dude, the kingdom [power] of God—imagination—is within).

Matthew chapter 5 discusses the attitudes of mind—imagination—we can have to change our situations (just as does, I believe, Genesis chapter 5). Outwardly (verse 22), if we kill someone, we are guilty and condemned to punishment. But the point is to the inward attitudes. If we harbor anger toward someone, disparage and/or disregard them, we have "killed" them in our mind. "Idiot!" we think. "Son of a bitch!" "That sneaky little weasel," or whatever. We can't hardly drive or deal with people without thinking such things. But all is God, and all disrespect is despising him!

The point in Matthew 5:22 is that having these negative feelings CAUSES them to manifest in our immediate situation. Hellfire is not something suffered after death, but in this death (state of ignorance) we call "life." Mark is saying, "Don't sabotage yourself." 'Raca,' by the way, according to Alexander's translation from the Aramaic, means "mute," - lunacy - implying the person is demon possessed (and/or a freaking idiot).

Christianity is making Christ, the anointing of the Merciful Father, real. Let everything be done in love, and let not the sun set on your wrath. Remember, in the Bible the "name" of a person, place, or thing means its nature. “Take not the name of YHWH in vain.” YHWH’s nature is imagination. The idea is to eschew negativity and be as positive, loving, and forgiving as God is, you know, all that “and thy neighbor as thyself” stuff, in your imaginings.

In MENTAL DIETS, Neville talks about his wife, "Bill," a designer who mentally argued with her boss all day. Her boss was reflecting her mental arguing. She changed her mental activity, and the hellfire she was condemned to (for she had created it) went away, her boss coming to cherish and praise her.

From The Revealer:

"Now, the words "God" and "Lord" mean I AM! Awareness is the foundation of all life, while the words God and Lord cover it up, like a mask. Rather than calling upon the Lord's name, call with his name. To do that you must say I am! And because all things are possible to God, anything can be called forth with his name. The minute consciousness is connected to desire, you have called it forth with God's name. If your desire is for wealth, fame, or health, call it forth by claiming: I am famous, I am wealthy, or I am healthy. Do that and you are calling with God's name. We are told to not take God's name in vain; for if we do, he will not hold us guiltless. The minute you say: I am a nobody, I am unwanted, or I am no good, you have taken God's name and conjured exactly what He has assumed - be it good, bad, or indifferent. Any assumption is yours! Now that you know God's name, put your trust in the true God who is your own wonderful imagination!"

From The Roll of the Book:

Now let me share with you an experience which happened to me many years ago. Back in the early 1930's I suddenly found myself confronted with two characters. Above me and to my right stood a beautiful angelic being, while below stood a monstrous hairy animal which looked like an orangutan. Speaking in a guttural voice he looked up at this heavenly being and said: "She's my mommy." Repelled by the thought, I struck him and with each blow, he grew in strength. Then, from the depth of my own being I realized that these two were my creations. Speaking with a human voice and looking like an animal covered with hair, this monstrous being was the embodiment and personification of all of my misspent energies. Every unlovely thought, every cruel, thoughtless act aided its growth. Whispering in my ear, influencing my decisions in order to feed its hunger, it fed on violence, while the angelic being was the embodiment of every kind and lovely thought I ever possessed.

Then I realized he had the right to live. By claiming to be the offspring of this heavenly being, he claimed to exist, but I knew he did not. He had no power of his own, only my power of awareness. Although he appeared to be detached and completely free of my perception, I knew I was the cause of his life. And as I pledged myself that I would redeem him, he melted and all of the energy I had given to create and sustain that monster, returned to me. He not only dissolved, but left no trace of ever having been present. Today I can bring him back in memory, but he had no existence outside of myself. He was simply embodied energy; therefore, was he not Christ, the creative power of God? Is not Christ the bearer of all the sins in the world, allowing man to use or misuse him? It was my own creative power that I misused and Christ is the creative power of God. And only God can create and only God can redeem.

Now listen to these, the last words on the cross as recorded in the 23rd chapter of the Book of Luke: "Father, into thy hands I commit my Spirit." That is a portion of the 5th verse of the 31st Psalm, which reads: "Father, into thy hands I commit my spirit: thou hast redeemed me, O Lord, faithful God." Here we find God, the giver of the power, redeeming it, for his creative power cannot be lost, not in eternity. When confronted by my misused power I simply redeemed it. Declaring itself to exist outside and independent of me, I knew it could not be, for there is no other, and as I redeemed all of my misspent energy it returned to me and the glorious one shone like the sun.

We are told in the 13th chapter of the Book of Revelation: "The beast was given a voice to utter blasphemies against God, against his name and his dwelling place, that is, those who dwell in heaven." My monster uttered blasphemy, claiming divine right by declaring the heavenly being was his mother. Are we not told in the 10th [chapter] of John that he was accused of blasphemy because he dared to claim he was the Son of God? Read the 13th chapter of John carefully and you will see that the dwelling place of God is made up of those who dwell in heaven, so that the entire redeemed society form the body of God. The angelic being I saw, personified that society, that dwelling place of God which is God, so my monster was taking God's name in vain.

. . . .Always keep alive that which you love; your emanation is your dwelling place. The monster not only opened his mouth to utter blasphemies against the name of God, but against his dwelling place - that is, those who dwell in heaven. Heaven, made up of the redeemed, is that one dwelling place of God. Everyone, when lifted up and redeemed, will be incorporated into that one body of beauty and glory. The monster, by claiming self-existence, takes the name in vain. He does not have any life outside of the one who, by the misuse of God's creative power, caused him to come into being. When you see him you will know in the depth of your soul that you are the cause of his misfortune. He has no right to live, no right to exist, but you cannot kill him, he must be redeemed.

From Maggy Whitehouse, The Mystical Ten Commandments:

To say “I am stupid; I am unworthy; I am no good” is to take the name of God in vain . . . You are a spark of divinity incarnate; your every word is a command to the Universe. It affects everything in your life and everything in the life of the Universe.

Neville, from Broome:

CHAPTER 2 TAKE NOT THE NAME IN VAIN


Your individual state of consciousness is your level of being and attracts all of the events you encounter in life. Since your reactions determine what you are, any change in your outer world must be produced by your inner level of being.

In the 7th Chapter of the Book of Mark, we are told, "Hear and understand: there is nothing outside which can defile man; but what comes out of a man's mind is what defiles him. He who has ears, let him hear." Now, thoughts are things. When you identify yourself with a thought, it outpictures itself as an act. If the thought is unlovely, it defiles you. Awaken and select only thoughts that contribute to the birth of your desire. You must constantly observe your dwelling place, for where you are psychologically is what you are. Your mood indicates your state, and you are always externalizing the state upon which you stand.

The Upanishads, one of a class of Vedic treatises dealing with broad philosophic problems, states: "The soul, imagining itself into a state, takes upon itself the results of that state. Not imagining itself into the state, it is free from its results." Your soul is what you consent to. As you feel yourself into the situation of your answered prayer, you have entered a state and your soul has taken upon itself the results of that state. If you do not enter the state, you are free of its lovely results. Accept an idea as true. Identify yourself with it and it will outpicture itself in your world. But if you do not accept the thought and identify yourself with it through feeling, you are free from its results. You must become very selective and learn not to associate yourself with unlovely thoughts.


In the Book of Kings, we are told how those who entered the temple brought something alive with them such as an ox or bullock. These were used as burnt offerings. These sacrifice offerings are your body of suffering. They are the animals you must offer called grievances. No matter what the grievance may be, you have no right to carry it around with you and you cannot ascend in consciousness until all of your grievances are tossed on the altar and sacrificed. Only as you give them up will you find the holy water.

Now, this holy water is not the church variety but the symbol of the twelve aspects of the mind. When your mind is cleared of all of its cobwebs (grievances), the bowl of holy water is placed on the backs of oxen, and your disciplined mind serves you rather than you serving it. The bull symbolizes the mind in its wild state and must be tamed (washed in holy water and clothed in soft raiment). When you enter the Holy of holies alone and bathe in its waters, your mind is washed of all mean thoughts and cleansed. Begin now to associate your thoughts only with the good; then that which proceeds out of your mouth (mind) will never defile you.

I AM is the self-definition of the infinite. "Go and tell them that I AM has sent me unto you. Awareness (I AMness) is the only power of the universe. Its power makes you alive.

If you say, "I am sick," you are! If you say, "I am secure," you are! Feeling yourself into the situation of a given state, you must take upon yourself the results of that state of mind. All things are made alive from a state of mind and without the state nothing can be made, as you only resurrect the state from which you are identified. Where you are psychologically is what you are in reality.

Therefore, if you catch yourself feeling sorry for yourself, stop it and start feeling happy. If you don't, you will identify yourself with the state of self-pity and outpicture it.


"Let the weak man say, 'I am strong'." Don't wait until you become strong before saying this. If you feel weak in any sense, affirm "I am strong," and if you persist in that assumption it will harden into fact. No one should ever take the name of the Lord in vain, for that name is I AM.

The righteous man is already conscious of being the person he wants to be. He never sins, but runs into the name, for sinning is missing his desired state, and righteousness is hitting it. "I will set him on high because he knows my name." Assume the consciousness of being the one you want to be and you will be saved from your present state. Your individual hunger can and will be satisfied when you run righteously into the state desired. This is done through the act of feeling. Feel happy and you are conscious of happiness. Feel married and you have consciously moved into the state of marriage. The thing desired must be felt before you are conscious of possessing it.

Learn to say "no" to unlovely thoughts rather than accepting them with passive indifference, for a soul must imagine himself into the act to taste the fruit of the state acted upon. Remember, consciousness alone is the cause of the fruit you reap and the only explanation for its existence.

There is no one to blame but self for all of the things that have happened, are happening and will happen to you, as they could not come into your world unless you consented to them. Start now to consent only to lovely thoughts of fulfilled desires prior to their confirmation by your senses, and give up the animal instinct of suffering and bathing yourself in the feelings of hurt and self-pity.


The psychological tongue is much like the physical one. If someone annoys you, turn aside and keep the tongue of your mind away from the sore spots of dislike, for your little mental conversations are the producers of your future. Sacrifice your body of suffering by giving it up and tame your mind, for we are told, "Blessed are the meek (tame), for they shall inherit the earth." Clothe yourself with joy and good news and you will walk into your holy of holies clothed in your immortal garment of love.

There is a rhythm in your world which you cannot hear or see, and your aura is like no one else's. A bloodhound knows. If two odors were alike, no bloodhound could find you. But you are unique, one of a kind with your own special aura radiating your level of being. Don't judge auras for the simple reason that you have to see the aura of another through your own, and what you are seeing is only your assumption of the man.

Complacency is a curse. "Blessed are they that hunger and thirst after righteousness." Control your imagination with steady attention and dare to stand and be heard. Andrew is the disciple who symbolizes this aspect of mind. Pay attention to your thoughts and discipline them so that they flow from the feeling of your wish fulfilled, for you are not awake until the outer you becomes placid and the inner you dynamic.

Don't try to argue someone out of their misery. We are told to, "Let the filthy be filthy still; what is that to thee? Follow thou me." Man is given the power of the "I" to think, and everyone is allowed to think for himself.

All things, when admitted to consciousness, are made manifest, be they good, bad or indifferent. Dare to stand on your own by this teaching and you will never again feel the need to justify failure.
______________________________

So, refuse negative thoughts and represent to yourself positive, loving, and lovely images.

What if Mark 15:34 wasn’t a Question but a Realization?

If you did not get to see v-a.com while it was on the Internet, I pity you. It was Victor Nimrud Alexander’s website. I hope he will put it back up. He had priceless jewels of insight from the ancient Aramaic version of the Bible that you truly will not find anywhere else. Not even in his printed translations (which if you do not have I truly, TRULY pity you if you are at all interested in what the Bible actually teaches, which is nothing, NOTHING like what modern "traditional Christianity" teaches).

Not that I in all things agree with Victor (who, hopefully just for the time being, has gone back to making movies). I read the Bible differently than he does. I cannot speak for Vic, but I believe his approach to be more in line with the literal-historical method. He seems to believe that the Milta, the Manifestation of Allaha (God), became a unique human individual named Eashoa, “the Life-giving Living Branch”; whereas my understanding is more in line with the mystical and symbolic methods of dealing with YHWH’s Jesus-anointing which IS the Life-giving Living Branch.

For instance, only Alexander observes from the Aramaic that Jesus did NOT say in Mark 15:34, "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" but rather, "My Allaha, my Allaha, wherefore did you destine me?" He notes that the first word is actually Eil, the divine name from the Aramaic 'to be', meaning "He is," "Supreme Being," and "I AM." I believe I saw in Victor's blog that Jesus was as much as proclaiming, "Eil, Eil, to this I was destined!" (stated as "For this you destined me" in his Story of Jesus).

We are all destined to fulfill scripture. There is no “New Thought”! There is only “that which was from the Beginning.” The Promise is God's power,* his eternally present “future” kingdom, ruling all in and through us. Eventually we realize this reality, and I believe we have in Mark 15:34 OUR realization—becoming aware—of our true nature: “I AM! I AM! To this (realization, awakening, awareness) I was destined!” Destined to what? To fulfill scripture through this crucifixion to the realization of being the Ineffable.

*I owe this understanding to George Eldon Ladd, 1974, The Presence of the Future: The Eschatology of Biblical Realism, Grand Rapids, Michigan: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company. Of course, I do not like Ladd see Jesus Christ as a unique, separate, historical individual, but as YHWH’s never separate Jesus-anointing upon us.

God does not ask us to believe our method, but for our method to be belief.

Assume a Lot in a Little Thing

Everybody wants the prayer technique. Late in his life, Neville said that to “hear” a request unto its feeling of consummation should take no more than 10 seconds. I have not experienced that, but it does underscore the fact that in the techniques Neville advocated, one is to assume a lot in a little thing.

Jairus had a daughter. An idea. A plan. And no way to make it happen. So he took up a prayer. There was some event at the end of his plan that could not bear fruit unless the potential of the plan succeeded. If that one little thing flourished, then the whole kit-and-caboodle of the plan must have come into reality. If. only. that. one. little. event. lived.

So Jairus took that one little event to the Consciousness--the Kingdom of God within him, that it might just touch the hem of God's "garment," the Imagination. That one event, by taking on the virtue of Assumption, caused the whole plan to become alive.

Big events are bunches of little events. You want a big thing to happen. After that big thing does happen, what one little thing would necessarily occur BECAUSE OF IT? Imagine that one little thing assuming the whole plan's success in it.

The first of Neville's "creation" experiences occurred during the Great Depression. In New York, a truly penniless Neville wanted to visit his family home in Barbados. His teacher, Abdullah, knew that if Neville was in Barbados, he would necessarily sleep in his own bed there. He instructed Neville to go to sleep in New York assuming that he was in Barbados, fully experiencing his going to sleep there. Neville achieved this assumption, and within a month he was given the trip. And this technique was off to the races.

During World War II, Neville was drafted into the Army and wanted nothing to do with the war. "That night I went to sleep in my little bunk with all the other soldiers and assumed that I was in New York City in my own apartment in Times Square, where I had my apartment. I was in my own bed, my wife was in her bed, and our little girl was in her crib. And then I got up – all in my imagination – and walked through my apartment and felt the familiar objects. I could see them all. I could see them in my mind’s eye. And I made it quite clear to myself that I was not there on furlough; I was honorably discharged and sleeping now as a civilian." In a little over a week, he was.

After World War II, Neville wanted to leave Barbados for New York in April. "There’s no way in hell you can get passage so early," he was told. But Neville knew that if he had passage, he would necessarily board the ship in the harbor from the little tender. "I assumed that I was on a small little boat taking me out to the ship . . . Then I assumed that I was stepping off this little boat onto the gangplank. I could feel the rhythm; I could feel it give as I went up step after step after step. My mind wandered before I got to the top. So, I came back to the bottom again and started all over. It wandered again; I came back to the bottom and did it over. When I got to the top I had no room where I could go. I simply assumed now: My hand is on the rail. I could feel the salt of the sea on the rail. I could feel the salt of the sea in the air, and then I looked towards the Island of Barbados with a mixed feeling: one of sadness because I was leaving the family, and one of joy because I was going back to America where I live. That was a peculiar feeling, but it was a natural feeling. And while I had hold of the rail and assumed this state, I then fell asleep in the chair." The very next morning, he received the passage.

Scan through Neville's lectures and books. He has dozens of examples and case histories. People want things, big things, so they assume a little thing consequence of the big thing. I got a tip about Joseph Alai's blog the other day. He wanted a book autographed by Neville. He imagined seeing the signature in his book, and received it as a gift.

This is pretty much the story of the Bible: God IMAGINED light (he hasn't got a mouth, for God's sake). A lot of light occurred. And the plan is still running. Just get a little bit resulting from your success IMAGINED, ASSUMED to be real, and you will find that you are God, too. Happy Kingdoming.

Neville Goddard Lecture Texts and Audios By Date Given

Mind Serpent, Neville Goddard

http://www.mindserpent.com/?page_id=33

Interesting Things to Think About #3, The Rules of Prayer (cont.): We Need to Convince Our Subconscious Mind That What We Desire IS; i.e., In Our Mind We Need to Imagine as Manifest What We Want IN ITS POSITIVE FORM

The world is constantly echoing what we believe is. Because our subconscious mind is our connection, as it were, with God, and if we are convinced - believe - a thing in our subconscious, God manifests what we believe AS A REFLECTION OF OURSELVES in our world. In all actuality, our subconscious minds, our conscious selves, and the echo/reflection of what we believe all are God. Our conscious selves are not real clear on the concept and are working on it.

The subconscious mind does not have any doubts or fears, and it does not understand negatives such as "I do not want that to happen." It simply sees our doubts, fears, and "that" manifested in the mind as beliefs and echos them in the world, much to our dismay. Be careful what you think (i.e., what you manifestly believe in your mind), as what manifests there WILL manifest in life.

In traditional prayer, we may intensely desire some envisioned outcome and intently pray that vision in its desired fulfillment - the answered prayer - over and over in our request unto God. For many thousands of years people have testified that such prayer does work. For God is that Consciousness we are in our subconscious mind. We are thus no distance to God--we all are one consciousness. I guarantee God, the Consciousness, hears us . . . without fear to manifest what we MANIFESTLY believe in our subconscious minds. But is that really what you want manifested in your world? On a scale of one to ten, I'll bet not.

Are you getting what I am suggesting about "manifest" belief? It is one thing to idly entertain thoughts, to daydream, to engage in "wishful thinking," but when something is believed to be real, whether it is or isn't, it becomes manifested mentally. You might say that the thought takes on substance. This is the same kind of creation we read about in the Book of Genesis: "God created." I.e., the Consciousness IMAGINED. Now, the Sabbath, we are taking on physical forms.

To pray, we have to convince our subconscious mind, which is the Consciousness, that what we want is manifest in our mind. Our desire has to become manifested belief. We can either:
a) pray traditionally, requesting our envisioned fulfillment with belief, praise, and thanksgiving.
b) revision the past, which is to re-experience it as though what we desire is what happened.
c) remember when, which is to mentally experience fulfilled desire in an imagined future, like Genesis 1, remembering the present as a distant memory.
d) refuse and recreate, which is to often done on the run, rejecting things seen and heard--experienced--which deny that what we desire exists, and imagining instead seeing and hearing what we desire as though it were what was seen and heard.
e) quantum jump, which apparently is to imagine visiting/being in a world where what is desired already exists. This might be very much like Neville's student suffering writer's-block, who imagined how Robert Louis Stevenson must have felt having completed a wonderful story, and then MANIFESTLY FEELING THAT WAY HIMSELF. Some (generally kids looking to perform Magick) are calling possibly occult ritual techniques like this "dimensional leaping."

Any of these techniques thought in mind to the taking on "all the tones of reality" IN ASSUMPTION may convince our subconscious that it is what we manifestly believe, thus causing its manifestation in our world by the Law of Assumption.


Interesting Things to Think About #3: The Rules of Prayer

Note on "Interesting Things to Think About #3: the Rules of Prayer": the Gospel is Real

"Try it!": Neville Goddard on Successful Prayer

More Neville on Successful Prayer

The Consciousness Wishes Us Well: The Jethro Question

As I read Exodus, there arose a question in Moses' mind about Jethro. It was like a little bird constantly chirping in his thoughts: "What is Jethro? What is Jethro? What is Jethro?" 'Jethro' means "his excellence," i.e., God's Goodness. God's answer to Moses’ question about Jethro was Ahiyeh Ashur hiyeh (Exodus 3:14, Victor N. Alexander's translation of the ancient Aramaic). Ahiyeh is "I come" in the absolute sense. Ashur is "the Beginning Spark Which Kindles the Flame" (i.e., the Eternal Presence; also, the Creator God of the Ninevites [I believe this to be the Ineffable's imagination]). Hiyeh means "his coming." Quite a puzzle.

The Hebrew version is Ehyeh Asher Ehyeh, "I AM THAT 'I AM.'" Ehyeh means "I become" (from hayah, which implies transition), and Asher means "in relation to." Now, who is 'I'? Inasmuch as the second "I AM" is MY "I AM," I could very easily translate this as "I become YOUR becoming."

Let's mark 'the Beginning Spark Which Kindles the flame,' 'the Eternal Presence,' 'the Creator God of the Ninevites,' and 'the One Who Becomes' as the Consciousness. Imagination is of this Consciousness. The first personal pronoun 'I' in "I come" and "I become" refers to the Consciousness: "I, the Consciousness, come/become . . ." You the Consciousness become what? Jethro. Jethro's coming. That is our "I AM." Our "I AM" is his excellence, God's goodness, God's very becoming as Jethro.

But wait. That's not all! In the Consciousness' becoming, he wishes us well! This intent is Jesus (Yahshua, Yeshua, Eashoa), the Life-giving Living Branch, the anointing of YHWH. Jesus is the nature of YHWH's will towards us. YHWH provides lovingly and well towards us. This principle, Jesus, manifest in men SPEAKS to and TEACHES us God's love, that the Consciousness wishes us well--Jethro--in what we become AS WE MANIFEST, i.e, BECOME, HIM.

Regarding Robert H. Countess' Criticism of the Christian Lindtner Theory, That if Mark was a Buddhist Missionary Attempting to Convert Jews to Buddhism, He Failed Miserably; for if Mark was a Convert to the Original Ancient Judaism, Mark would have had no Intention of Converting Anyone to Anything but the Personal Religion of Refined Jewish Buddhism, or Buddhist Refined Judaism, What We Call "Christianity"

I must offer that pastor and scholar Robert H. Countess, author of The Jehovah's Witnesses' New Testament: A Critical Analysis of the New World Translation of the Christian Greek Scriptures, certainly had valid criticisms and questions for the Christian Lindtner Theory (CLT). Not the least of which was why would anyone pretending scholarship use a cult-fabricated Greek text for presumably serious and scholarly comparative research? But I digress.

What bothers me in Countess' criticism is his assumption that Buddhist Missionaries (=BM, or Mark), if they indeed wrote the Gospel of Mark as the CLT contends, intended it to promote Buddhism. Writes Countess: "If the purpose of the BM was to promote Buddhism under the guise of a fraudulently created corpus of NT documents, then the BM utterly failed in their purpose, since the result was a new and highly successful religion [Christianity] that at no significant point agrees with Buddhism" (emphasis mine).

Oddly, Countess' contention that Christianity at no point agrees with Buddhism contradicts fellow CLT critic Dr. Burkhard Scherer:

"Is there no Buddhist influence in the gospels? Since more than hundred years Buddhist influence in the Gospels has been known and acknowledged by scholars from both sides. Just recently, Duncan McDerret published his excellent The Bible and the Buddhist (Sardini, Bornato [Italy] 2001). With McDerret, I am convinced that there are many Buddhist narratives in the Gospels. I would differentiate between narratives (like parables), motifs (like Jesus walks on water) and some proper names like place-names etc. (like Magad[h]a). This narratives and elements were transmitted orally by mercenaries (esp. Parthians) along the trade routes, i.e. the Sea Routes and the Silk Route(s). They all have in common that they have a clear contextual and/or narratological functions in Buddhist sources and lack this function in the Gospels so that their Buddhist origin is narratologically proved even without taking more iconographical chronological evidence in favour of the Buddhist texts into consideration. I gave some examples in my book Buddha (Gütersloh 2001, Basiswissen). So there is 'much Buddhist stuff going on in the Gospel.' But its not the only source, not even a main source for the NT."

I agree with Scherer and believe Rev. Countess failed to perceive Mark's intention in writing the Gospel of Mark. I also content that Mark succeeded famously in what he intended until the church Paganized the Gospel by turning God's Anointing in every man into a separate and unique man itself.

A little wiki-history regarding Buddhism: "Siddhārtha Gautama was a monk, sage, philosopher, and teacher on whose teachings Buddhism was founded. He is believed to have lived and taught mostly in the northeastern part of ancient India sometime between the 6th and 4th centuries BCE. Gautama taught a Middle Way between sensual indulgence and the severe asceticism found in the śramaṇa movement common in his region. He later taught throughout other regions of eastern India such as Magadha and Kosala. Gautama is the primary figure in Buddhism. He is believed by Buddhists to be an enlightened teacher who attained full Buddhahood and shared his insights to help sentient beings end rebirth and suffering." (Note that "Buddhahood" means Godhood.)

'Buddha' is God; i.e., Gautama supposedly attained the realization of his godhood, and thus he taught that there is no god other than the One who is also us. Long after he passed, Indian religionists determined that he had become a god, and worshiped the dead (where have we seen this pattern before?). Later, a deeply repentant Emperor Ashoka converted to Buddhism, and his Edicts of Ashoka were an early-on blog to convert the world to Buddhist morals. His emissaries went as far as the Mediterranean, and must presumably have met gnostic-leaning Essene Jews in the Levant and/or the Alexandrian area of Egypt.

My contention is that as a Buddhist missionary Mark would have realized that Gautama's teachings expressed exactly the ANCIENT Gospel Moses preached in Exodus and Genesis, that God's Life-giving, Living Branch Anointing is our inner consciousness of being, our "I am" (Exodus 3:14). He would also have put together that the recently ended Season of Grace had begun contemporarily with the Gautama's appearance in India. Might Mark have associated the advent of Buddha with the verse, "Behold, I send my messenger before your face, the voice of one crying, 'In the wilderness, prepare the way of YHWH'" (Isaiah 40:3)? The wilderness of Moses' meeting God "on Mt. Horeb" being meditation.

Thus Mark begins his Gospel: "He reveals the Life-giving, Living Branch Anointing." He who? God? One of the contemporary enlightened Jews? Gautama Buddha? My choice is the Anointing Itself. Read it, "The Anointing reveals the Life-giving, Living Branch." What Life-giving, Living Branch? Imagination! Our consciousness!

Countess overlooks Mark's conversion to the ancient Mosaic Judaism, a personal religion. Mark had no cause or intention to convert anyone to Buddhism, but to draw them to the original Judaism, the personal religion of acknowledging God’s Anointing in man. Exodus 3:14 can also be read: “I am the Creative Imagination of your Primal Power of Being.” Mark simply gives this power--the Life-giving Living Branch--person and voice.

Personal Religion and the Mess of Truth (the Son is not Separate)--YOU are Responsible for Your Own Theology!

"Those who do not learn history are doomed to repeat it" (popular paraphrase of Spanish philosopher George Santayana; original below).

"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it." — George Santayana
“Those who fail to learn from history are condemned to repeat it.” — Winston Churchill

From "Those Who Do Not Learn History Are Doomed To Repeat It" Really?:
"According to Santayana's philosophy, history repeats. . . if it is true and if history, driven by human nature, is ugly (hint: it is), then this saying ought to guide our public and private policy. . . But, it doesn’t really have any power. Why? History shows that both those who do not learn history and those who do learn history are doomed to repeat it. If it's also true that those who do learn history are doomed to repeat it, then the saying doesn't really add anything at all."

That is a very big 'if.' It is presumptuous to believe that any particular person has actually learned from history, especially with all the evidence that those who presumably have learned and should know better demonstrably do not.

In any case, it remains that THOSE WHO DO NOT REMEMBER THEIR HISTORY AND LEARN FROM IT ARE DOOMED, CONDEMNED TO REPEAT IT. So we have to address the question: WHAT HISTORY HAVE WE NOT LEARNED FOR WHICH WE ARE NOW CONDEMNED AND REPEATING?

I want to present to you one of the premier and most important books, I believe, of religion in general, Judaism, and Christianity. Of the thousands of books I have touched in the last forty-four years, this is the numero-uno keeper: Colonel J. Garnier's The Worship of the Dead, or the Origin and Nature of Pagan Idolatry and Its Bearing upon the Early History of Egypt and Babylonia (New and Cheaper Edition, London: Chapman and Hall. 1909. Kessinger Publishing's Rare Reprints). There are THREE links in that title, and I highly, highly, highly, recommend Kessinger's hardbound to anyone who is interested in the cause, history, spread, interrelationship, and errors of ancient and modern Pagan religions. It is a little pricey, but if you are a reader, a serious student and a thinker, you will appreciate the hardbound (and will probably wear the sucker out). THIS IS REAL HISTORY, OUR HISTORY TO REMEMBER AND LEARN FROM. The question is, IS IT ALSO OUR ERROR?

Originally published in 1904, Garnier traces the history of Pagan religion from the Deluge (what I call the Death) wherein all mankind, save eight, died. Ham begat Cush, and Cush begat Nimrod, and these last two with their wife, Nimrod's mother, dominated the land and were determined by religionists, long after their deaths, to have become gods. Hence, in all the Pagan religions these three dead are worshiped as God. These religions later became Catholicism, and Catholicism begat modern Christianity.

This is NOT what Paul and Mark intended. Mark presents Jesus as "the Life-giving, Living Branch" of God, His Anointing. The "Word" or Milta (Aramaic-Manifestation) of YHWH is a principle of His nature, which can no more become a man than time can walk out of a grandfather clock (Gerald Massey). But can the principles of God's nature manifest in man? Of course, and that was the whole idea of the Season of Grace! God was saying, "Here, these attitudes applied in experience are the way to manifest Me."

There were people in the Season of Grace who learned this Way, and Mark, I believe an Indian Buddhist missionary and a convert to the ancient Judaism of Moses (see Christian Lindtner's theory [CLT] and detractors Robert H. Countess and Burkhard Scherer), associated this Way with the way he had learned in Buddhism. Mark thus presented Gautama (Sakya Muni) representative of GOD'S ANOINTING UPON THE CONSCIOUSNESS OF MAN, wherein man realizes "Buddha," which means God. That the Gospel writers present Joseph, the son of Jacob, and Merriam, the sister of Moses, as the parents of Jesus should tell you that this seriously is NOT a secular history.

Jesus, this principle, is supposed to be our personal religion. The "Son" is not someone other than ourselves. He is everyone, YOU included! For we all are one Son Who became us in the Death. This is why I posted Emmet Fox's chapter, The Wonder Child. The Wonder Child is God's primal power of being's anointing IN US, in our own consciousness. Says Fox:

"But where, it will naturally be asked, is this wonderful, mystic Power (the Primal Power of Being) to be contacted? Where may we find it? and how is it brought into action? The answer is perfectly simple—This Power is to be found within your own consciousness, the last place that most people would look for it. Right within your own mentality there lies a source of energy stronger than electricity, more potent than high explosive; unlimited and inexhaustible. You only need to make conscious contact with this Power to set it working in your affairs; and all the marvelous results enumerated can be yours. This is the real meaning of such sayings in the Bible as 'The Kingdom of God is within you'; and 'Seek ye first the Kingdom of God, and all the rest shall be added.'

"This Indwelling Power, the Inner Light, or Spiritual Idea, is spoken of in the Bible as a child, and throughout the Scriptures the child symbolically always stands for this. Bible symbolism has its own beautiful logic, and just as the soul is always spoken of as a woman, so this, the Spiritual Idea that is born to the soul, is described as a child. The conscious discovery by you that you have this Power within you, and your determination to make use of it, is the birth of the child.

"The Bible directly and indirectly has a good deal to say on the subject of the birth and growth of the child, and what it can mean for us. One of the most significant pronouncements on this subject is given in the Book of Isaiah, Chapter 9, verses 2, 6, and 7, and it will amply repay us to consider that statement in some detail.

"Isaiah says: 'The people that walked in darkness have seen a great light: they that dwell in the land of the shadow of death, upon them hath the light shined.' This is a marvelous description of what happens when the Spiritual Idea, the child, is born to the soul" (emphases mine). Not as a god to be worshiped separate from us, but found in our person: “For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.” & etc. per Fox, which see via link above.

My point is that worshiping and serving a separate risen and far away man with all the emotions of love, honor, and sentiments of piety (Garnier), even in his godhood, DOES NOTHING FOR US. That is Paganism! Chapter 17 (XVII) in Garnier, The Moral Aspect of Paganism, is worth the cost of the book alone (pages 356 and 357 are my favorite). What purchases for us spiritually is the manifestation of God's nature in us, the Life-giving, Living Branch--faith. Faith is thorough mental ASSUMPTION that what he has promised via the desire he has given, he is unquestionably able to perform to the degree that we assume that it is already DONE. This becomes our person, our mindset--our theology becomes our life. All the accolades in the world to him are nothing without this reality. Which reminds me of God’s standing orders according to Fenton's translation from the Greek:

Our Father in the Heavens (our consciousness),
Thy name (nature!!) must be being hallowed.
Thy kingdom (power amongst us) must be being restored.
Thy will (Manifestation) must be being done” (parentheses mine).

“Those who don't know their history are doomed to repeat it. You have to expose who you are so that you can determine what you need to become.” — Cynthia A. Patterson

Calling Anonymous LB

I have a request from Beverley to contact LB, who left two otherwise anonymous comments on my January 16, 2014, post, "Neville Goddard's Mistake in saying, "Only Two Things Displease God." There is only one." LB, Beverley would like to communicate with you.

Emmet Fox's Power Through Constructive Thinking, Chapter 11, "Getting Results By Prayer," Chapter 24, "Scientific Prayer," and Chapter 10, "The Golden Key"

This is a simple cut-and-paste. I thought I'd put these in a perhaps more logical order.  I was interested in them because it bothers me to try to empty my mind of thought as meditation. I might wind up going that way, but I would rather go the other way and fill my mind with thoughts of God. A valid translation of Exodus 3:14 (yes, another one!) is "I, Life, am your Creative Imagining Consciousness." Can I fill my mind with God to the point of Laughter?

I am very much coming to like Emmet Fox. As shown by his chapter "The Wonder Child," he does not have Jesus as a separate god-man, but as the saving nature of God's nature within us. Sun-god god men are strictly Pagan in origin, throwbacks to Cush, Nimrod and Semiramis. Been there, done that.

GETTING RESULTS BY PRAYER

A great deal of confusion seems to exist in many minds concerning the precise avenue through which the Divine Power is to be approached, and realization and harmony attained. So many schools of thought seem to be competing for the attention of the student; so busy is the printing press; so many new books and pamphlets are written; so many magazines come and go; that people have told me that they have felt quite in despair of ever discovering what it really is that they must do to be saved.

Sometimes it seems as though the story of Babel were repeating itself in the metaphysical movement—and yet we all know in our hearts that the true Gate is narrow and the real Way strait. One well known Eastern teacher of great spiritual power has actually published a pamphlet from which it appears that the genuine criterion of authenticity is to have no Path at all. This is the reductio ad absurdum which pulls us up short and restores the light.

The truth, of course, is this, that the only solution of the problem is definitely to contact the Divine Power which dwells within your own soul; and, having consciously done that, to bring it to bear upon the various difficulties in your life, taking them in due order, that is, attacking the most urgent first. This is the right way of working, and it is the only way that can possibly help you, or your affairs, in the long run. The real remedy for every one of your difficulties is, as we are told on every page of the Bible, to find and know the Indwelling Presence. Acquaint now thyself with Him and be at peace. In His Presence is fullness of joy. Behold, l am with you alway.

This, then, is the task, and the only one—to find, and consciously know, your own Indwelling Lord.

You see now how the confusion disappears, melts away, and the perfect simplicity of the whole thing emerges once you realize this fact. From this it necessarily follows that all schools and churches; all teachers, under whatever name they may be called; all textbooks, magazines, pamphlets, and what-not; are but temporary expedients for enabling you to make this contact. In themselves they are of no importance except as a means to an end. The best mode of approach to Divine things for you is the one that happens to make it easiest for you to locate the Inner Light within yourself.

Such things as temperament, education, family tradition, and so on, will make one book, or one teacher, or one school, more useful than another; but never as anything more than the means to a certain end. That end is effective self discovery. “Man know thyself'"—thy true self which is the Divine I Am. And so we see that the best “movement,” the finest textbook, the greatest teacher, is just the one that happens best to fit the individual need. It is entirely a practical matter, and the only test that ever could or ever will be of any use, is the practical one of judgment by results. Of course, Jesus anticipated this difficulty, and met it, as he has met all our difficulties. He gave us the simple and perfect standard: By their fruits ye shall know them.

The great peril to true religion has always been the building up of vested interests in wealthy organizations, or in the exploitation by individuals of their own personalities. An organized church is always in danger of developing into an “industry” which has to provide a living for numerous officials. When this happens the rank and file are sure to be severely discouraged from seeking spiritual things for themselves at first hand. A tradition of “loyalty” to the organization is built up as a means of self protection. Not loyalty to Truth, or to your own soul, be it remarked, but to the ecclesiastical machine. Thus the means becomes an end in itself and spiritual power then fades out. Rash promises and vague claims take the place of real verifiable demonstrations.

In the case of leaders who exploit their own personalities, the student is discouraged from going elsewhere for enlightenment or help; and here again “loyalty” to something other than God is allowed to block the avenue of Truth, and therefore becomes antichrist. What is this but the jealousy of the petty tradesman who warns a doubtful customer of the danger he runs in going to the “shop next door.”

Remember that you absolutely owe no loyalty whatever to anything or anyone but your own soul and to the furtherance of its spiritual development. Your most solemn duty is to make everything secondary to that. “To thine own self be true; and it must follow, as the night the day, thou canst not then be false to any man.”— Shakespeare.

The first step that the earnest student must take is to settle on a definite method of working, selecting whichever one seems to suit him best, and then giving it a fair trial. That means that you must acquire a definite method or system of spiritual treatment or Scientific Prayer. Merely reading books, making good resolutions, or talking plausibly about the thing will get you nowhere. Get a definite method of working, practise it conscientiously every day; and stick to one method long enough to give it a fair chance. You would not expect to play the violin after two or three attempts, or to drive a car without a little preliminary practice.

Having got your method, set to work definitely on some concrete problem in your own life, choosing preferably whichever is causing you the most trouble at the moment, or, better still, whatever it is that you are most afraid of. Work at it steadily; and if nothing has happened, if no improvement at all shows itself within, say, a couple of weeks at the outside, then try it on another problem. If you still get no result, then scrap that method and adopt a new one. Remember, there is a way out; that is as certain as the rising of the sun. The problem really is, not the getting rid of your difficulties, but the finding of your own best method for doing it.

If ill health is your difficulty, do not rest until you have brought about at least one bodily healing. There is no malady that has not been healed by someone at some time, and what others have done you can do, for God is Principle, and Principle changes not.

If poverty is the trouble, go to work on that, and clear it up once and for all. It can be done. It has been done. Others have done it, and you can.

If you are unhappy, dissatisfied with your lot, or your surroundings, above all, with yourself, set to work on that; refuse to take no for an answer; and insist upon the happiness and satisfaction that are yours by Divine right.

If your need is self-expression—artistic, literary, or otherwise—if your heart’s desire is to attain to eminence in a profession, or some kind of public career, that, too, approached in the right spirit, is a legitimate and worthy object, and the right method of Scientific Prayer will bring you the prize.

Keep a record of your results, and on no account be satisfied with anything less than success. Above all things, avoid the deadly error of making excuses. There are no excuses for failing to demonstrate. When you do not demonstrate, it never by any chance means anything except that you have not worked in the right way. Excuses are the true and veritable devil, who comes to tempt you to remain outside the Kingdom of Heaven, while the Gate stands open. Excuses, in fact, are the only enemy that you really need to fear.

Find the method that suits you; cultivate simplicity— simplicity and spontaneity are the secret of effective prayer—work away steadily; keep your own counsel; and whatsoever ye shall ask in My name, that will l do.

WHAT IS SCIENTIFIC PRAYER?

Scientific prayer or spiritual treatment is really the lifting of your consciousness above the level where you have met your problem. If only you can rise high enough in thought, the problem will then solve itself. That is really the only problem you have—to rise in consciousness. The more “difficult” (which means the more deeply rooted in your thought) is the problem concerned, the higher you will have to rise. What is called a small trouble, will yield to a slight rise in consciousness. What is called a serious difficulty, will require a relatively higher rise. What is called a terrible danger of hopeless problem, will require a considerable rise in consciousness to overcome it—but that is the only difference.

Do not waste time trying to straighten out your own or other people’s problems by manipulating thought— that gets you nowhere—but raise your consciousness, and the action of God will do the rest.

Jesus healed sick people and reformed many sinners by raising his consciousness above the picture they presented. He controlled the winds and the waves in the same way. He raised the dead because he was able to get as high in consciousness as is necessary to do this.

To raise your consciousness you must positively withdraw your attention from the picture for the time being (The Golden Key), and then concentrate gently upon spiritual Truth. You may do this by reading the Bible or any spiritual book that appeals to you, by going over any hymn or poem that helps you in this way, or by the use of one or more affirmations, just as you like.

I know many people who have secured the necessary elevation of consciousness by browsing at random through the Bible. A man I know was saved in a terrible shipwreck by quietly reading the Ninety-first Psalm. Another man healed himself of a supposedly hopeless disease by working on the one affirmation, “God is Love,” until he was able to realize something of what that greatest of all statements must really mean.

If you work with affirmations, be careful not to get tense; but there is no reason why you should not employ all these methods in turn, and also any others that you can think of. Sometimes a talk with a spiritual person gives you just the lift that you need. It matters not how you rise so long as you do rise.

“I bare you on eagles' wings, and brought you unto Myself.”

FOREWORD TO THE GOLDEN KEY

I have compressed this essay into a few pages. Had it been possible 1 would have reduced it to as many lines. It is not intended to be an instructional treatise, but a practical recipe for getting out of trouble. Study and research are well in their own time and place, but no amount of either will get you out of a concrete difficulty. Nothing but practical work in your own consciousness will do that. The mistake made by many people, when things go wrong, is to skim through book after book, without getting anywhere.

Read the Golden Key several times. DO exactly what it says, and if you are persistent enough you will overcome any difficulty.

THE GOLDEN KEY

Scientific Prayer will enable you, sooner or later, to get yourself, or anyone else, out of any difficulty on the face of the earth. It is the Golden Key to harmony and happiness.

To those who have no acquaintance with the mightiest power in existence, this may appear to be a rash claim, but it needs only a fair trial to prove that, without a shadow of doubt, it is a just one. You need take no one’s word for it, and you should not. Simply try it for yourself, and see.

God is omnipotent, and man is His image and likeness, and has dominion over all things. This is the inspired teaching, and it is intended to be taken literally, at its face value. Man means every man, and so the ability to draw on this power is not the special prerogative of the Mystic or the Saint, as is so often supposed, or even of the highly trained practitioner. Whoever you are, wherever you may be, the Golden Key to harmony is in your hand now. This is because in Scientific Prayer it is God who works, and not you, and so your particular limitations or weaknesses are of no account in the process. You are only the channel through which the Divine action takes place, and your treatment will really be just the getting of yourself out of the way. Beginners often get startling results at the first time of trying, for all that is absolutely essential is to have an open mind, and sufficient faith to try the experiment. Apart from that, you may hold any views on religion, or none.

As for the actual method of working, like all fundamental things, it is simplicity itself. All that you have to do is this: Stop thinking about the difficulty, whatever it is, and think about God instead. This is the complete rule, and if only you will do this, the trouble, whatever it is, will presently disappear. It makes no difference what kind of trouble it is. It may be a big thing or a little thing; it may concern health, finance, a law-suit, a quarrel, an accident, or anything else conceivable; but whatever it is, just stop thinking about it, and think of God instead—that is all you have to do.

The thing could not be simpler, could it? God Himself could scarcely have made it simpler, and yet it never fails to work when given a fair trial.

Do not try to form a picture of God, which is, of course, impossible. Work by rehearsing anything or everything that you know about God. God is Wisdom, Truth, inconceivable Love. God is present everywhere; has infinite power; knows everything; and so on. It matters not how well you may think you understand these things; go over them repeatedly.

But you must stop thinking of the trouble, whatever it is. The rule is to think about God, and if you are thinking about your difficulty you are not thinking about God. To be continually glancing over your shoulder, as it were, in order to see how matters are progressing, is fatal, because that is thinking of the trouble, and you must think of God, and of nothing else. Your object is to drive the thought of the difficulty right out of your consciousness, for a few moments at least, substituting for it the thought of God. This is the crux of the whole thing. If you can become so absorbed in this consideration of the spiritual world that you really forget for a while all about the trouble concerning which you began to pray, you will presently find that you are safely and comfortably out of your difficulty—that your demonstration is made.

In order to “Golden Key” a troublesome person or a difficult situation, think, “Now I am going to ‘Golden Key’ John, or Mary, or that threatened danger”; then proceed to drive all thought of John, or Mary, or the danger right out of your mind, replacing it by the thought of God.

By working in this way about a person, you are not seeking to influence his conduct in any way, except that you prevent him from injuring or annoying you, and you do him nothing but good. Thereafter he is certain to be in some degree a better, wiser, and more spiritual person, just because you have “Golden Keyed” him. A pending law-suit or other difficulty would probably fade out harmlessly without coming to a crisis, justice being done to all parties concerned.

If you find that you can do this very quickly, you may repeat the operation several times a day with intervals between. Be sure, however, each time you have done it, that you drop all thought of the matter until the next time. This is important.

We have said that the Golden Key is simple, and so it is, but, of course, it is not always easy to turn. If you are very frightened or worried it may be difficult, at first, to get your thoughts away from material things. But by constantly repeating some statement of absolute Truth that appeals to you, such as There is no power but God, or I am the child of God, filled and surrounded by the perfect peace of God, or God is Love, or God is guiding me now, or, perhaps best and simplest of all, just God is with me—however mechanical or dead it may seem at first—you will soon find that the treatment has begun to “take,” and that your mind is clearing. Do not struggle violently; be quiet but insistent. Each time that you find your attention wandering, just switch it straight back to God.

Do not try to think out in advance what the solution of your difficulty will probably turn out to be. This is technically called “outlining,” and will only delay the demonstration. Leave the question of ways and means strictly to God. You want to get out of your difficulty— that is sufficient. You do your half, and God will never fail to do His.

Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.

Thanks for Joseph Alai’s Blog

I thank Blogger.com for showing me referring web sites. One linked me to Joseph Alai’s Manifestation Blog, of which I had not previously known. I actually shed a tear I was so happy for him in How Joseph Alai Manifested Book, for I had also searched unnumbered years for Channels of Spiritual Power by Dr. Frank C. Laubach, only to find it in a phone call to a used bookstore in San Diego. This was before there were computers (yes, kids, there was a time). Frank Laubach, by the way, was one of the greatest missionaries of all time, and what we would call a manifestor.

A Joseph Alai Manifestation Story

Emmet Fox's Power Through Constructive Thinking, Chapter One: "The Wonder Child" -- Being the Spiritual Idea in YOU; i.e., God Himself!!

THE WONDER CHILD

Strange as it may seem to you, there exists a mystic power that is able to transform your life so thoroughly, so radically, so completely, that when the process is completed your own friends would hardly recognize you, and, in fact, you would scarcely be able to recognize yourself. You would sit down and ask yourself: “Can I really be the man or woman that I vaguely remember, who went about under my name six months or six years ago? Was I really that person? Could that person possibly have been I?” And the truth will be that while in one sense you are indeed the same person, yet in another sense you will be someone utterly different. This mystic but intensely real force can pick you up today, now, from the midst of failure, ruin, misery, despair—and in the twinkling of an eye, as Paul said, solve your problems, smooth out your difficulties, cut you free from any entanglements, and place you clear, safe, and happy upon the highroad of freedom and opportunity.

It can lift you out of an invalid’s bed, make you sound and well once more, and free to go out into the world to shape your life as you will. It can throw open the prison door and liberate the captive. It has a magical healing balm for the bruised or broken heart.

This mystic Power can teach you all things that you need to know, if only you are receptive and teachable. It can inspire you with new thoughts and ideas, so that your work may be truly original. It can impart new and wonderful kinds of knowledge as soon as you really want such knowledge—glorious knowledge—strange things not taught in schools or written in books. It can do for you that which is probably the most important thing of all in your present stage: it can find your true place in life for you, and put you into it too. It can find the right friends for you, kindred spirits who are interested in the same ideas and want the same things that you do. It can provide you with an ideal home. It can furnish you with the prosperity that means freedom, freedom to be and to do and to go as your soul calls.

This extraordinary Power, mystic though I have rightly called it, is nevertheless very real, no mere imaginary abstraction, but actually the most practical thing there is. The existence of this Power is already well known to thousands of people in the world today, and has been known to certain enlightened souls for tens of thousands of years. This Power is really no less than the primal Power of Being, and to discover that Power is the Divine birthright of all men. It is your right and your privilege to make your contact with this Power, and to allow it to work through your body, mind, and estate, so that you need no longer grovel upon the ground amid limitations and difficulties, but can soar up on wings like an eagle to the realm of dominion and joy.

But where, it will naturally be asked, is this wonderful, mystic Power to be contacted? Where may we find it? and how is it brought into action? The answer is perfectly simple—This Power is to be found within your own consciousness, the last place that most people would look for it. Right within your own mentality there lies a source of energy stronger than electricity, more potent than high explosive; unlimited and inexhaustible. You only need to make conscious contact with this Power to set it working in your affairs; and all the marvelous results enumerated can be yours. This is the real meaning of such sayings in the Bible as “The Kingdom of God is within you”; and “Seek ye first the Kingdom of God, and all the rest shall be added.”

This Indwelling Power, the Inner Light, or Spiritual Idea, is spoken of in the Bible as a child, and throughout the Scriptures the child symbolically always stands for this. Bible symbolism has its own beautiful logic, and just as the soul is always spoken of as a woman, so this, the Spiritual Idea that is born to the soul, is described as a child. The conscious discovery by you that you have this Power within you, and your determination to make use of it, is the birth of the child. And it is easy to see how very apt the symbol is, for the infant that is born in consciousness is just such a weak, feeble entity as any new-born child, and it calls for the same careful nursing and guarding that any infant does in its earliest days. After a time, however, as the weeks go by, the child grows stronger and bigger, until a time comes when it can well take care of itself; and then it grows and grows in wisdom and stature until, no longer leaning on the mother’s care, the child, now arrived at man’s estate, turns the tables, and repays its debt by taking over the care of its mother. So your ability to contact the mystic Power within yourself, frail and feeble at first, will gradually develop until you find yourself permitting that Power to take your whole life into its care.

The life story of Jesus, the central figure of the Bible, perfectly dramatizes this truth. He is described as being born of a virgin, and in a poor stable, and we know how he grew up to be the Saviour of the world. Now, in Bible symbolism, the virgin soul means the soul that looks to God alone, and it is this condition of soul in which the child, or Spiritual Idea, comes to birth. It is when we have reached that stage, the stage where, either through wisdom or because of suffering, we are prepared to put God really first, that the thing happens.

The Christ Child was born in a stable, though all the world had anticipated that when He arrived it would be in a palace; and we deeply appreciate the significance of this point as soon as the Holy Child comes to birth in our own soul, for with the natural consciousness of our own unworthiness we feel only too keenly that once more He is indeed being born in a stable. Here we have the inspired intimation that this fact will not prevent His growing up to be the saviour of our own individual world.

The Bible directly and indirectly has a good deal to say on the subject of the birth and growth of the child, and what it can mean for us. One of the most significant pronouncements on this subject is given in the Book of Isaiah, Chapter 9, verses 2, 6, and 7, and it will amply repay us to consider that statement in some detail.

Isaiah says: “The people that walked in darkness have seen a great light: they that dwell in the land of the shadow of death, upon them hath the light shined.” This is a marvelous description of what happens when the Spiritual Idea, the child, is born to the soul. Walking in darkness, moral or physical, dwelling in the land of the shadow of death—the death of joy, or hope, or even self-respect—describes well the condition of many people before this light shines into their weary, heartbroken lives; and the Prophet rises into a paean of exultant joy as he contemplates the deliverance wrought by the mystic Power: “For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.”

This description begins by giving the gist of the whole matter, simply and concisely-—that the government is to be upon his shoulder. This really covers the whole business. Correctly understood, this statement tells the entire story without need of any further comment. It means that once you have contacted the mystic Power within, and have allowed it to take over your responsibilities for you, it will direct and govern all your affairs from the greatest to the least without effort, and without mistakes, and without trouble to you. The government shall be upon his shoulder. You are tired, and driven, and worried, and weak, and ill, and depressed, because you have been trying to carry the government upon your own shoulder; the burden is too much for you, and you have broken down under it. Now, immediately you hand over your self-government, that is, the burden of making a living, or of healing your body, or erasing your mistakes, to the Child, He, the Tireless One, the All-Powerful, the All-Wise, the All-Resourceful, assumes it with joy; and your difficulties have seen the beginning of the end.

The Prophet next goes on to speak of the “Name” of the child, and if we know something of Bible symbolism, we know that we are now going to learn something fundamental, for in the Bible, the name of anything, means the character or nature of that thing, and so we realize that a name is not merely an arbitrary label, but actually a hieroglyph of the soul. We are given no less than five names or qualities of the child. Let us examine them and see what they tell us. First of all, Isaiah says that the name of the child is Wonderful, and this in fact is the first and the outstanding quality; this child is a Wonder Child. The word “wonderful” used here requires to be carefully scrutinized. As employed in the Bible, it implies simply and plainly a miracle—a miracle, just that, and nothing less, because you have to realize that the Bible teaches the miracle from the first page to the last. The Bible repeatedly says that miracles can happen, and that they do happen; and it gives detailed and circumstantial accounts of many specific cases. And it says, many times, that miracles always will happen if you believe them to be possible, and are willing to recognize the Power of God, and to call upon it.

There have been many efforts during the last two generations to divorce the Bible teaching from the belief in miracles. Attempts have been made to show that in some unexplained way the Bible can be true and useful, and yet mistaken in its teaching of the miracle; in other words, that it can in some mysterious manner be an edifying conglomeration of truth and lies. Indeed, one famous Bible critic said blandly: “Miracles do not happen”—thus dismissing the whole matter with a wave of his hand. The obvious rejoinder to this is that if it were true that miracles do not happen, the Bible would be a mere meaningless jumble of pointless fables. But they do happen, and even as Galileo terminated the other controversy by saying, “nevertheless it revolves,” so when all controversy finishes, we may say of miracles “nevertheless, they happen.”

Well now, just recollect the first quality that Isaiah gives for the child. It is a wonder child; that is to say, it is a miraculous child; it is a worker of miracles. This means that as soon as the Wonder Child is born in your consciousness, the miracle will come into your life—a real miracle, remember. This does not mean simply that you will become resigned to your present circumstances, or merely that you will then be enabled to meet the same difficulties with a higher courage or a clearer brain. It means the miracle. It means that the Wonder Child, not in any figurative or metaphorical sense, but plainly and literally, in the most matter of fact meaning of the term, will work miracles in your life. It will do these things absolutely, irrespective of what your present conditions are. It is in no way constrained or constricted by your present circumstances. The whole point is that the Wonder Child can lift you out of those very circumstances, and set you down in different circumstances. The Wonder Child is the Miracle Child.

Now let us take the second point that the Prophet gives us concerning this Wonder Child. He calls it “Counsellor,” and a counsellor, you know, is one who gives advice or guidance; and so you see that once the Child has been born, you need never again lack either of these things. The Child will be your infallible counsellor. If you are worried because you do not know whether or not to take some important step, to accept or reject a business offer, to sign or not to sign an important document, to enter upon or to dissolve a partnership, to resign your position or not, to go abroad or to stay at home, to trust someone or not to trust him, to say something or to leave it unsaid, the Wonder Child will be your Counsellor, and the Wonder Child is never mistaken.

It is in the third point that the Prophet reveals to us who the Wonder Child really is. It is no less than God Himself, “The Mighty God,” as Isaiah reminds us, and truly the mystic Power that transforms, and transmutes, and transfigures, is God Himself, always present with you, and always available, once you have understood and accepted the Spiritual Idea. And it is because He is God, that the work of the Child is independent of all conditions.

The fourth name that the Prophet attributes to the Child is that of Everlasting Father. This point establishes our relationship to God in unmistakable terms. As Jesus so clearly pointed out, God is our Father, not merely our Creator, and we as the children of a good Father may expect to find ourselves provided with everything that we need for body or soul. But since we have to establish for ourselves our own consciousness of this fact, and as our demonstration is just the measure of our understanding of it, our concept of the Divine fact is the fruit of our own soul, and may mystically be called our child.

Finally, in the fifth point, we receive what is perhaps the greatest name of all. Here the Child is called “The Prince of Peace.” Just try to realize a little what this title must mean for you in practice—nothing less than that the Wonder Child, the Spiritual Idea, born to your own soul, is the Prince of Peace. Now think what perfect peace of soul, if you could attain it, would actually mean to you. If your soul were truly at peace, what in your life could go wrong? If only you had real peace of soul, do you suppose that your body could be ill? Given real peace of soul, how easy it would be to find your true place in the world, which would mean prosperity as well as happiness. How easily, how quickly and efficiently you could perform your work, work such as you have never done yet, and in less than half the usual time. Of course, everybody knows that this is what would follow the attainment of soul peace, but there is still much more in it than that. What you perhaps do not know is that once you have attained true peace of soul, you have made it possible for the Mystic Power, the Wonder Child, to teach you new things, utterly beyond the compass of your present understanding, enabling you to do things in the world, if you should wish to, that nobody would have deemed it possible that you could do. Well, it is in the very nature of the Wonder Child to give you just that very soul peace, and it is because of this function that it is called “The Prince of Peace.”

Isaiah goes on to tell us that this is no limited demonstration, but that once it begins, it goes on and on as we rise higher and higher in consciousness, increasing and expanding more and more unto the perfect day. “Of the increase of his government and peace there shall be no end, upon the throne of David, and upon his kingdom, to order it, and to establish it with judgment and with justice from henceforth even forever.” The throne of David is of course Jerusalem, which is Uru-Salem, the city of peace, this very peace that we have been discussing; and Jerusalem symbolically is the awakened consciousness. There shall indeed be no end to the increase of that government, and in view of the possibility that the weaker souls, the fearful, and the unbelieving, and the depressed, should find it impossible to believe that such good tidings could possibly be true, the Prophet clinches the matter with the definite assertion: “The Zeal of the Lord of Hosts will perform this.” This should remove all sense of personal responsibility for the demonstration, the bugbear of so many seekers. Have we not seen that the gist of the whole matter is just this very point—that the government shall be upon his shoulder?