Why is there so much suffering in our world? It seems that on both the personal and global levels, people are dealing with much more than they are able to bear. Suicides are occurring at alarming and accelerated rates. Hopelessness appears to be the order of the day. In general, people are losing their ability to cope.
Unfortunately, we have not been able to find the answers to this question in the places where we are generally accustomed to look; not because the answers are not there, but because we have had a general inability to properly interpret those answers. The spiritual texts of the world (the Bible, the Qur’an, the Avesta, the Dhammapada, the Vedas, the Bhagavad Gita, the Upanishads, etc.), all contain answers to this supremely important question, but because these spiritual books are so universally misunderstood, they often do more harm than good in our individual and collective quests to understand them.
As you’ve heard me say if you’ve viewed my previous articles and videos, the scriptures of the world, including the Bible, are all about you and me. They constitute instruction on how to live life joyously and free from suffering. Also contained with their pages are the reasons why we experience massive suffering. The questions of why “God” allows suffering are all answered within their pages, but the answers are camouflaged – hidden like pearls in the heart of the earth – and must be dug out. This takes understanding.
The Biblical story of Job is a story of grievous suffering by one who was considered perfect. Because the intent of the story is so globally misinterpreted, our concept of Job’s suffering is as the result of some wrongdoing on his part for which God had to punish him. However, the very first verse of the book of Job refers to him as “perfect and upright”:
There was a man in the land of Uz, whose name [was] Job; and that man was perfect and upright, and one that feared God, and eschewed evil. (Job 1:1 KJV)
The Bible counsels us to “be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father in heaven is perfect” (Matt. 5:48). This was Job, who scripture says was a perfect man who feared God. Yet God essentially turned Satan loose on this “perfect and upright” man who feared him, and Satan proceeded to wreak havoc in Job’s life. Job’s three neighbors (and the word “neighbor” is the correct interpretation of what the KJV translates as “friends” in the book of Job) heard about what had happened to him and set out to visit him and to comfort him. They were astonished at what they found when they saw him. His suffering and grief were both massive and excruciating. Job was in the midst of the burning fiery furnace, hedged in completely with no way of escape. (If you don’t know the story, I would encourage you to take a few minutes and read the first two chapters of Job before continuing with this article).
Why would God torture one so dedicated to him? Why would God allow Satan to virtually wipe Job from the face of the earth when he trusted God so thoroughly and completely? And if that was perfect Job’s plight, what does that say about OUR suffering, both individually and globally? The answers to these questions will surprise you, and if you are able to accept them, you can be a tool on this planet to assist in completely eradicating suffering from our globe, for each of us is responsible for the suffering of the whole. “God” is no respecter of persons.
The subject of suffering is one of the major themes of the Bible, and when you come to understand the concept of Biblical fire, it all becomes incredibly plain. Unfortunately, our religious culture doesn’t understand this concept. Job’s suffering is OUR suffering. The story and the message of Job is a story about why we suffer, and the way of escape from suffering. It is about trial by fire and its purpose. And make no mistake; there IS a tremendous purpose for the fires we experience. None of it is intended to hurt us in any way whatsoever.
The Biblical concept of fire has everything to do with your trials – the “trying of your faith.” It is what the Bible refers to as “hell, where their worm dieth not and the fire is not quenched.”
We are ALL promised to go through the fire – to experience fiery trials. Notice:
(13) Every man’s work shall be made manifest: for the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire; and the fire shall try EVERY MAN’S work of what sort it is. (14) If any man’s work abide which he hath built thereupon, he shall receive a reward. (15) If any man’s work shall be burned, he shall suffer loss: but he himself shall be saved; yet so as by fire. (1 Cor. 3:13-15 KJV)
No one is exempt from fiery trials. Why? Our trials reveal to us the spiritual filth in us that needs to be cleansed and purified. It is these trials by fire that are intended to cleanse the gold (the Biblical metaphor for “wisdom”) and silver (the Biblical metaphor for “understanding”) within us, and thus to purify us. Notice:
(12) Beloved, think it not strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you, as though some strange thing happened unto you: (13) But rejoice, inasmuch as ye are partakers of Christ’s sufferings; that, when his glory shall be revealed, ye may be glad also with exceeding joy. (1 Pet. 4:12-13 KJV)
That the trial of your faith, being much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it be tried with fire, might be found unto praise and honour and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ. (1 Pet. 1:7 KJV)
I counsel thee to buy of me gold tried in the fire, THAT THOU MAYEST BE RICH; and white raiment, that thou mayest be clothed, and [that] the shame of thy nakedness do not appear; and anoint thine eyes with eyesalve, that thou mayest see. (Rev. 3:18 KJV)
And what is this spiritual filth within us from which we are being purified and made white?
In one word – HATRED!!
Hatred for others is the single greatest cause of all suffering in our world, both individual and global. This is inclusive of what we call “natural disasters,” or “acts of God.” Do you think this is a wild and preposterous proposition?
The acid test of real spirituality is unconditional love. The scriptures assert that this love is the fulfilling of what they call the “law of God.” Unconditional love has no expectations of another. Unconditional love does not love contingent on what someone else thinks, feels or does. Unconditional love has no “ifs” attached to it. Love does no harm to anyone. Love does not condemn, but edifies. Love lifts up, and does not tear down. Love is patient and kind to all. If you love unconditionally, you extend love even to those who hate you, as Jesus does to his enemies on the cross when he prays, “Father forgive them, for they know not what they do.” When you love unconditionally, you love others as you love yourself.
Hatred is the opposite of love, and is the second most powerful force in the universe. The ONLY force in the universe greater than hatred is unconditional love. Love is Omnipotent! Love is Omniscient! Love is Omnipresent! Love is God, and God is love. Love creates, while hatred destroys. Love builds up, while hatred tears down. Love edifies, while hatred condemns. Love loves, while hatred kills.
The theme of the entire Bible can be summed up in one word: LOVE! The Bible is all about God, and God is love. Love is the Biblical definition of God. Love is the SPIRIT that is God, and that is in each one of us, without exception, for “God has not given us the SPIRIT of fear, but of POWER, and of LOVE, and of a sound mind” (1 Tim. 1:7). This spirit of love is sown into each of our hearts, without exception. The problem is that the power to love is the Christ light that shines in the darkness, but that the darkness does not comprehend, and therefore on the grand scale we are unable to actually put it into practice. It is for this reason that the scriptures counsel us to be “born again.” To be born again is to be born of love. This is the very clear teaching of the scriptures. Let me put this together for you:
Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and [of] the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. (John 3:5 KJV)
To be “born of water” means to be born of affliction, and is what the scriptures mean by “water baptism.” “Be afflicted, and mourn, and weep: let your laughter be turned to mourning, and your joy to heaviness” (James 4:9). The “water of affliction” (1 Kings 22:27; 2 Chr. 18:26; Is. 30:20) indicates the baptism by which the Israelites were delivered out of Egypt, the meaning of which is the same as our deliverance out of our fiery trials. This was Job’s “baptism,” his experience of the “water of affliction.”
To be born of the spirit is to be born of love, for love is the Spirit that is God (1 John 4:8), and to be born of love is to “born again.”
(9) Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin; for his seed remaineth in him: and he cannot sin, because he is born of God. (10) In this the children of God are manifest, and the children of the devil: whosoever doeth not righteousness is not of God, neither he that loveth not his brother. (11) For this is the message that ye heard from the beginning, that we should love one another. … (15) Whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer: and ye know that no murderer hath eternal life abiding in him. (16) Hereby perceive we the love [of God], because he laid down his life for us: and we ought to lay down [our] lives for the brethren. (1 John 3:9-11, 15-16 KJV)
(7) Beloved, let us love one another: for love is of God; and every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God. (8) He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love. (9) In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God sent his only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through him. (10) Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son [to be] the propitiation for our sins. (11) Beloved, if God so loved us, we ought also to love one another. (12) No man hath seen God at any time. if we love one another, God dwelleth in us, and his love is perfected in us. (1 John 4:7-12 KJV)
And what does scripture tell us regarding the law of God?
(36) Master, which [is] the great commandment in the law? (37) Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. (38) This is the first and great commandment. (39) And the second [is] like unto it, thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. (40) ON THESE TWO COMMANDMENTS HANG ALL THE LAW AND THE PROPHETS. (Matt. 22:36-40 KJV)
Indeed, the entire law of God is about love! This is the most critical facet of our existence. Why? Because the global well-being of planet Earth depends upon our individual abilities to love one another. Let me give you a proposal and a scenario that I want you to think long and hard about.
Some of the religious among us believe our brothers and sisters to be only those who believe as we do, or who belong to the same church or religious organization that we do, and that if you are not “one of us,” then you are lost. These people miss one critical point about love:
(46) For if ye love them which love you, what reward have ye? do not even the publicans the same? (47) And if ye salute your brethren only, what do ye more [than others]? do not even the publicans so? (Mat 5:46-47 KJV)
We are all an ocean. Think of the ocean as the whole of humanity, and the waves of the ocean as the individuals that comprise that whole. The first cause as to why there is so much suffering in the world is because of the perception of the waves as being separate from the whole. This is a gargantuan illusion. We are ALL a part of the whole. One ocean, but many waves. The scriptures describe it as “one body, but many members.” This is the same thing. There is no separation or distinction; we are ALL ONE global family living in the same house, that house being Planet Earth. We are all many waves, but all comprising one ocean.
Because each wave in the ocean represents an illusion of separateness on the part of the “perceiver,” the perceiver often feels free to judge and condemn the other waves. What the perceiver doesn’t realize, however, is that when he judges the other waves, he is judging himself. The scriptures put it this way:
Therefore thou art inexcusable, O man, whosoever thou art that judgest: for wherein thou judgest another, thou condemnest thyself; for thou that judgest doest the same things. (Rom 2:1 KJV)
Of course, because we are all one! Do you realize that whenever you point your finger at someone, you have three fingers pointing back at you? Do this simple test. Point your finger at something right now and look at your hand. See the other three fingers? This is very symbolic, because as scripture says, pointing the finger at anyone constitutes self-condemnation. You are not loving someone when you point the finger. You’re actually expressing hatred.
However, the POWER to express LOVE is the Alpha and the Omega of our existence. It is the first and the last, the beginning and the end, the be-all and the end-all. If each of us could generate love from within, realizing that “you are me and I am you,” and if we could all treat EVERYONE (no exceptions) as WE want to be treated, we could instantly change the perceptions, and therefore the realities, of the entire globe, because each individual mind is a part of the Infinite Cosmic Mind, and thus we are ALL one.
Love is the power of God within us that totally eradicates fear, for love looks outward and away from the self. In other words, Love “… seeketh not her own” (1 Cor. 13:5), and “… He that fears is not made perfect in love” (1 John 4:18).
God is not a “being” someplace “up there” inhabiting the literal heavenly realms. God is love. “We are the house/temple of God and the Spirit of God dwells in us” (Heb. 3:6; 1 Cor. 3:16). God lives in his house – his temple. That is his dwelling place, and that temple is YOU. The only begotten son of God, or love, is Christ, which the scriptures define as “the power of God and the wisdom of God:
But unto them which are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God, and the wisdom of God. (1Co 1:24 KJV)
I want you to notice something here as it relates to love, power and sin. As I explained to you in my previous article on “Who or What is God and Christ,” God equates to love, and the son of God, who is a spirit, is love and power. Christ, which represents the power to love, is also the “blood” that covers our sins. To further show you how this relates to love, let’s look at the following three scriptures:
[Saying], Blessed [are] they whose iniquities are forgiven, and whose sins are covered. (Rom. 4:7 KJV)
Hatred stirreth up strifes: but love covereth all sins. (Pro 10:12 KJV)
And above all things have fervent charity among yourselves: for charity (love) shall cover the multitude of sins. (1 Pet. 4:8 KJV)
The word “charity” in this last verse is correctly translated “love.” So the blood of Christ, which is the “fruit of the vine” (Matt. 26:27-29), or “fruit of the spirit” (Gal. 5:22-23), covers our sins; and so as Christ is the power of love and wisdom of God within us, these scriptures are saying one and the same thing.
Thus, the inner Christ – the power of love within us, is the answer to ALL that ails humanity. Seeing ourselves as separate from each other is the source, the single greatest cause, of all of the suffering in our experience, both personal and global. Condemnation of others is an ATOMIC FORCE in our universe – a force generated by thought and expressed by the tongue – that is the single greatest cause of what we refer to as natural disasters, which are nothing more than the cumulation of our collective consciousness, and is revelatory of the change of heart – the cleansing of the filth of hatred within us – that is necessary on both the personal and global scales. As I said earlier, hatred is the second greatest power in our universe. The only power greater than hatred is LOVE!
This is why we must be “born again.” Hell is a product of our tongues, and we need to cool our flaming tongues if we are to escape the torment of the flames of hell created by them. This is why we experience our fiery trials.
And the tongue [is] a fire, a world of iniquity: so is the tongue among our members, that it defileth the whole body, and setteth on fire the course of nature; and it is set on fire of hell. (Jas 3:6 KJV)
“As a man thinks in his heart, so is he.” “Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks.” “As a man sows, that shall he also reap.” Thinking leads to speaking, and “death and life are in the power of the tongue.” Every word you speak is a seed that is sown, and every word that you speak is a creation of something. That seed, of whatever kind it is, will eventually produce a harvest, whether of good, or of evil.
Trees in scripture are a symbol for man (Mark 8:24; Deut. 20:19). What kind of tree are you? Are you a corrupt tree, or a good tree? A corrupt tree cannot bring forth good fruit. Fruit in scripture symbolizes the words we speak.
(17) Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit; but a corrupt tree bringeth forth evil fruit. (18) A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither [can] a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit. (19) Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire. (Mat 7:17-19 KJV)
What makes the tree corrupt are the thoughts of condemnation and hatred, which breeds words of the same. Thoughts are things. It is our thoughts that constitute our prayers. Thought, or prayer, is energy. Science has proven that a thought can actually be calibrated. Thus, if we could all convert our thoughts of hatred toward others who are not like us into thoughts of love, we would see a massive change in our world. LOVE is the fulfilling of the “law of God.” To love God means to love LOVE. “Love your neighbour as yourself” is a scriptural exhortation that, if followed, would completely eradicate all suffering on our planet, both personal and global. One may deny this, but the only way to understand it is to DO it.
Love is law. The law of love is as immutable as the laws of physics and the laws of mathematics. It cannot change, and it cannot be changed. We transgress it at our peril, which is very clearly observable if we would only open our eyes. As we would have others do unto us, so must we do unto others. Why? Because as we do unto others, so is it done unto us. We reap what we sow. This, too, is immutable law.
Think about these things. Ponder them. Masticate and digest them. I am certain this is a point of view that you have probably never heard before. Consider it. It takes Christ power to love, and we have to awaken that power – that Christ – within us. This is what the Bible means by the “resurrection of Jesus Christ.” The death of Christ within us means the death of our ability to truly love. It is only the Christ power that gives us the ability to truly love unconditionally. The power to love is our Messiah, and is able to deliver us from all suffering and dis-ease. He who loves is born again.
(44) But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you; (45) That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust. (Matt. 5:44-45 KJV)
Therefore if thine enemy hunger, feed him; if he thirst, give him drink: for in so doing thou shalt heap coals of fire on his head. (Rom. 12:20 KJV)
The scriptures counsel us to love our neighbours as ourselves. The greatest lesson I can find in the scriptures for the answer to the end of our personal and global suffering lies in the end of the book of Job. Listen to the command of God to Job, because this command is for us, as the Bible constitutes spiritual doctrine and instruction:
Therefore take unto you now seven bullocks and seven rams, and go to my servant Job, and offer up for yourselves a burnt offering; and my servant Job shall pray for you: for him will I accept: lest I deal with you [after your] folly, in that ye have not spoken of me [the thing which is] right, like my servant Job. (Job 42:8 KJV)
Now you need to understand that Job’s neighbours had condemned him, accused him, of wrongdoing, and were bearing false witness against God in the process. Thus, God would not hear them. However, God accepted Job because he spoke of God (love) rightly. Also critical to understand is how Job’s captivity – all of his grief, his torment, his suffering – was turned. If you can get this, you are well on your way to understanding the process to ending all suffering:
“And the LORD turned the captivity of Job, when he prayed for his friends (neighbours): also the LORD gave Job twice as much as he had before. (Job 42:10)
Indeed, Job had to pray for those who stood in condemnation of him before he could experience the end of his suffering. This is unconditional love in action. Praying for those who condemn you is one of the definitions of unconditional love. Unconditional love invites answers to your prayers, but prayers are not heard where there is no love. It is for this reason that love is exponentially more powerful than hatred. You have to experience this in order to understand it. “Delight thyself also in the LORD (the power to love); and he shall give thee the desires of thine heart” (Psa. 37:4). Love is the power that brings all things to you.
There is a spirit in man. That spirit is power and love. That spirit NEVER seeks to condemn anyone, but always edifies. The plan for the spirit within you is to prosper you, to give you hope and a future, and it has the power to do that. But whatever it is that you sow, that shall you also reap. Sow love, and you will reap a positive power to end all positive powers, and a wisdom to end all wisdom. Conversely, sow seeds of hatred (through judgment, backbiting, condemnation, viciousness, withholding of good, etc.), and you reap a negative power that is the cause of all wars, natural disasters and all unrest in your world, both personal and global.
Let’s learn from the story of David and Bathsheba for an understanding of how easy it is to NOT love.
In the story of King David and Bathsheba, King David, after committing adultery with Bathsheba, has her husband Uriah, one of his faithful servants, murdered. The prophet Nathan later comes to King David and tells him about two men in a city, one rich and one poor:
(1) And the LORD sent Nathan unto David. And he came unto him, and said unto him, There were two men in one city; the one rich, and the other poor. (2) The rich [man] had exceeding many flocks and herds: (3) But the poor [man] had nothing, save one little ewe lamb, which he had bought and nourished up: and it grew up together with him, and with his children; it did eat of his own meat, and drank of his own cup, and lay in his bosom, and was unto him as a daughter. (4) And there came a traveller unto the rich man, and he spared to take of his own flock and of his own herd, to dress for the wayfaring man that was come unto him; but took the poor man’s lamb, and dressed it for the man that was come to him. (2 Sam. 12:1-4 KJV)
King David, upon hearing the story, was incensed:
[as] the LORD liveth, the man that hath done this [thing] shall surely die, and he shall restore the lamb fourfold, because he did this thing, and because he had no pity. (2 Sam. 12:5-6 KJV)
Righteous indignation on David’s part, right? But then Nathan delivers the bomb:
… Thou [art] the man. (2 Sam. 12:7 KJV)
Does David then say to Nathan, “as the Lord lives, I shall surely die, and I shall restore the lamb fourfold, because I did this thing, and because I had no pity?”
Of course not! David says no such thing. You see, David was all too ready to condemn the man to death; that is until he learned that HE was the man he was condemning. Then he gets contrite: “I have sinned before the Lord” was all he could say. His “punishment” is nothing short of natural law’s retribution for what he had done. The “law of God,” which is the “law of love,” brings automatic reaping of the acts of hatred that we sow against another, and David was about to experience that.
“Love your neighbor as yourself.” This is one of the two laws on which hang ALL the law and the prophets.
My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge: because thou hast rejected knowledge, I will also reject thee, that thou shalt be no priest to me: seeing thou hast forgotten the law of thy God, I will also forget thy children. (Hos 4:6 KJV)
Again, the “law of thy God” is the law of love, for the entire law hangs on loving God and loving your fellow man – loving your neighbor as yourself.
It takes the Spirit of Love for us to truly love unconditionally. No one who kills another actually knows what he is doing to himself, or he would not do it. Whatever you do to another human being, you do tenfold to yourself, whether in love or in hatred, for you reap what you sow. This is a living law. Sow hatred, and you reap hatred. Sow love, and you reap love.
Now you may be asking, “what about people who commit egregious crimes, like killing other people, or committing terrorist attacks, people who steal other people’s identities and rob banks, cyber-criminals who create computer viruses that destroy great works of people who treasure those works. What about governments who commit atrocities like torture, or that intentionally inflict pain and suffering on other human beings? What about them? Do we have to love them?”
Well, love is not something that anyone “has” to do. Love is an automatic reaction in those “born of God.” When we understand the law of God, and when we come to understand that we all commit acts of hatred towards one another in some way, shape or form, it becomes much easier for us to pray for forgiveness and help for those who commit such acts, because we can see ourselves in them. “There but for the grace of God go I.” This represents the humility that is important for us to come to a more complete understanding of unconditional love.
But it is important to understand just what love is, and to understand spiritual law, which is the law of love, and that the law always requires a “return on investment.” The penalty for hatred is always automatic. It may take years before Judgment Day for those acts comes, but it always comes. Whatever it is that you may be suffering right now could possibly be the result of things you may have done many years ago, or perhaps even in a past life or lives. Eventually the bill becomes due and payable.
Every action brings a reaction. This is the law of sowing and reaping, or cause and effect. This immutable law always executes judgment and justice for every act performed against another, whether good or evil. We never have to worry about payback. It is never a question of “if,” only “when.”
We generally get upset if we view a court verdict that goes contrary to what we would consider common sense. It sometimes appears that people literally get away with murder. Not so. The law of love is incredibly just.
Let me give you a story from my own life about the power of sowing and reaping, and why it is critical for you to treat every human being ONLY the way you, yourself, want to be treated, no matter what they may have done to you.
There were three separate incidents in my life, two of which I understood only years after they happened. The first was in 1973 when I was 16 years of age living in Queens, NY. I was driving my aunt’s car at the time. As I turned the corner, I was eating a cinnamon cake and took my eyes of the road for a second. Next thing I knew, CRASH! I had hit a practically brand new Buick Riviera on the driver’s side. As you can imagine, I was absolutely petrified. I got out of the car to assess the damage, then surveyed my surroundings. There was no one around, and I promptly took off. It was a hit and run. No legal ramifications ever came of that accident for me, and so I got away with it right? It certainly seemed that way.
Fast forward 16 years to 1989. I was driving at about 45 miles per hour up Six Forks Road in Raleigh, NC, going to a doctor’s appointment. A yellow jacket flew in my car and distracted me for probably a couple of seconds. When I looked back up, I had veered into the left turn lane, where traffic was at a standstill directly in front of me. I jammed my brakes and turned the steering wheel hard to try to avoid an accident, but to no avail. I totaled my car and the car I hit, and precipitated a six-car collision. The accident was so bad that my brief case, which was sitting on the seat next to me, was a mangled mess. Because I was not wearing my seat belt, the impact hurled me over to the passenger side door, where my head lay when a sixteen-wheeler blasted the door. My head was numb for about nine months afterward. I needed no hospitalization, however, and the only other damage to me was a big gash on my right foot. That I survived was a miracle, but looking back at it, that day was judgment day for the act against my neighbor that I had committed 16 years earlier when I mangled his or her Riviera and ran off without informing him or her of what I had done.
As you sow, so shall you reap.
When I was 19 years old, my then girlfriend, a woman 13 years my senior, bought a car – an Oldsmobile Toronado. She couldn’t drive, but wanted to bless me with a vehicle so I could travel freely. Living in New York City, I didn’t need a car, but it was just something she wanted to do for me. She didn’t actually say it was mine, but for all intents and purposes, it was, as she couldn’t drive, and had no interest in driving.
I eventually left her, taking the car with me. She wanted the car back, and she had every right to it, as it was her car. I actually lost the car that same night in a massive rain storm that completely flooded the FDR Drive that night. The car stalled and I had to leave it in the middle of the highway, walking in waist-deep water to get to the subway. That was the last time I drove that car. When I finally saw it a week or so later on the highway, it was complete stripped. It was only a shell sitting on crates.
Eight years later, in 1985, I bought the same model Toronado, four years newer than the previous one, and practically the same color. It was relatively cheap, but I had to put a rebuilt transmission in it, which at that time cost me a pretty penny. But after I got it repaired it ran better than any car I had ever had.
Then one morning, exactly three weeks later, I looked outside our kitchen window only to discover that the car was gone. Someone had stolen it during the night. Of course my wife and I were devastated. I had just bought it and paid all that money to get it in really good running condition, and now not only did I have nothing to show for it, but I had no transportation, and no money to buy a new car. Judgment Day for my “theft” of the old car came that day.
As you sow, so shall you reap.
Then, in 2007, I was pulling into a parking spot on my way to work, and just lightly scratched the truck next to me with the driver’s side mirror on my car. It was barely noticeable, and the driver of the truck may not have noticed (it was not a new truck), but I knew it, and I thought that I should put a note on the truck windshield informing the driver that I had done it, with my name and telephone number. I didn’t do it, but figured I would just let fate handle it. By that time I had pieced together the sowing and reaping of the other incidents, and wondered how this one would play out. I didn’t want to take a chance on my insurance going up as a result of this minor infraction, and so let it be, but wondered how “fate” would operate.
About a year and a half later, I was driving down the ramp of an indoor parking lot. As I was turning the corner, a woman in an SUV was backing out of her parking spot. I stopped and waited for her to come out. Well, she didn’t see me, and I finally notice she was not going to stop, I blew the horn. It was too late. She blasted me on the driver’s side of the car, taking out my left panel light.
Because I knew the spiritual significance of what had just happened, I forgave her. I told her not to worry about it. We didn’t even exchange insurance cards. She thanked me profusely and started crying. I felt good about what I had just done, but when I later went to get my car inspected, they apprised me that I needed to get the light fixed before it would pass inspection. It cost me about $250 to repair the light. Probably much less than I would have had to pay the owner of the truck for the light scratch I inflicted on it.
As you sow, so shall you reap.
I challenge you to look at situations and circumstances in your own life, and see if you can make your own connections between actions you may have sown in your life, and things you may have reaped as a result. For every effect there is a cause. As scripture says, “vengeance is mine, I will repay, saith the Lord.”
Love worketh no ill to his neighbour: therefore love [is] the fulfilling of the law. (Rom. 13:10 KJV)
In all three of the above instances, I suffered much later because of things I had done in the past.
The Day of Judgment referenced in scriptures is simply the day of manifestation; the day of reckoning for your actions. No one EVER gets away with anything. EVER!!!
You cannot steal from someone and get away with it. You cannot kill someone and get away with it. You cannot speak ill or condemn someone and get away with it. And sometimes, the smallest acts of ill-will carry the greatest consequences. Judgment Day may not come for many years, but it does come, and when it does ….
But it is absolutely vital to understand that WE ARE NOT THE JUDGE! It is neither our job NOR our right to judge others. We have natural law that does that. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is only to love. Let natural law do its work, and allow yourself to be incredibly blessed by doing yours. Your blessings will flow profusely from loving unconditionally.
So to summarize, we suffer both personally and globally because of a lack of unconditional love for our fellow human beings. The resulting condemnation stemming from our hatred leads to our suffering the flames of hell fire. By learning how to express unconditional love to everyone one you come into contact with, which means awakening the Christ within you, one day all your sufferings will cease. Love is the power of God that dwells within each and every one of us, without exception, because God is no respecter of persons. We are ALL “fearfully and wonderfully made.” Through this power of love we are in Christ, and He is in us, and as a result we have the power to “do greater works than [Christ] does, because he goes to the Father.” These “greater works” include lifting our entire world out of the ashes of hatred and despair, and into the loving arms of the Father. Always edify, never condemn. Leave all condemnation for the corrupt trees. Be a lover, not a hater.
This is why it is incumbent upon you to awaken the Christ within you. Then you will have the power to love like Christ loves – to love like the Christ who saves the woman taken in adultery from the religious masses seeking to stone her (John 8:1-11); to love like the Christ who is able to say of those crucifying him on the cross, “Father forgive them for they know not what they do”; to love like the Christ who heals all who come to him, without exception; to love like the Christ who loves unconditionally, without exception; to love like the Christ who invites you to the wedding feast; to love like the Christ who is “with you, and shall be IN YOU”; to love like the Christ for whom the Apostle Paul labors in travail until he is formed IN YOU; and to love like the Christ IN YOU that is your hope of glory.
Yes, to love like THAT Christ!
And finally, a reiteration:
(11) For this is the message that ye heard from the beginning, that we should love one another. … (15) Whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer: and ye know that no murderer hath eternal life abiding in him. (16) Hereby perceive we the love [of God], because he laid down his life for us: and we ought to lay down [our] lives for the brethren.
(7) Beloved, let us love one another: for love is of God; and every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God. (8) He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love.
Yes, you must be born again! Born of the water of affliction, and born of the spirit of love.
Until next time, this is Paul Young saying, “flee from the crowd and dwell with the Christ within you. Christ IN YOU, your hope of glory.
Paul,
A very interesting take on the subject of love that the world would do good by. I would like to add that all suffering is a suppression of divine life. We must go through these, as you say, to awaken this divine life, as Christ did. You address this by taking about raising the Christ within.
I also believe the waters of affliction symbolize the mind being cleansed, resulting in a final product which is also produced through higher meditation.
Thanks for contributing. I look forward to reading other people’s thoughts.
Indeed, John. Suffering is a suppression of divine life, which is our “love life.” God/Christ are the divine, and God/Christ are love, power and wisdom. God is love. Christ is the power to express “God.” Meditation is critically important in that it assists us in waking up that all-encompassing power of love within us. Love is the be-all and the end-all of everything we are doing on the spiritual plane. It is the master key and the key essential — the only thing that matters. Without love we are nothing more than “sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal” (1 Cor. 13:1)
Much thanks, once again, for the opportunity to serve, Josh.
It is that simple; LOVE! People have built such stone walls around themselves (by confusion and anger and hatred and misunderstanding) that the simple concept of “just love” being the answer seems too simple to penetrate those walls.
I also believe that when Jesus says in the sermon on the mount that you should settle things with your enemy before you get to the judge, and also if a man asks you to go one mile, go two, that he is referring to this law of karma that you spoke of in your own personal experiences. I’ve seen it in my own life that you do not want people holding a grudge towards you or feeling that you’ve wronged them. It will come back to you.
One last thing: I’ve heard that trees represent men, but I’ve never understood the fig tree and how it relates to us. Jesus talked about it in the end time signs, Nathaniel was found resting under one (I think), and Adam and Eve first clothed themselves with the leaves. Can you touch on that? If not here, I think it would make for a great post.
Anyway, nice article. Enjoyed the read and there are some points here to meditate on.
I have not yet studied the fig tree, but I do believe that at least part of the answer lies in the story of the bramble bush, where “all of the trees said to the fig tree, ‘Come thou, and reign over us'” (Judg. 9:10), and the fig tree responds (v. 11). Also, in the majority of cases in scripture where the fig tree is used, we also find that the vine is referenced, which we know is Christ (“I am the vine,” John 15:1, 5).
Regarding your comment about not wanting people holding a grudge towards you or feeling that you’ve wronged them, you don’t have any control over what other people feel, think or do. What is under your control is your ability to love them, regardless of their reception to that love. Jesus is killed because of the perception of the people, not because of a lack of love for them.
Hope this helps.
Paul,
You mention that you don’t have any control over what other people feel, think or do. No one can disagree that this is a common sense notion that is widely accepted. Theory of free will, etc. And your point that since you can’t control them, then you can love them. I agree this is all good sense.
Just want to point out that in some cases it may be possible to control what other people feel, think, or do. With God nothing is impossible. You can pray to have favor with others, even when you would not ordinarily expect it. Mercy triumphs over judgment. Reaping and sowing is subject to a higher law of grace when it serves a good and higher purpose. In fact, the acknowledgement of grace and mercy is all the more reason to forgive and to love unconditionally. That to me is the power of Christ consciousness. But we might not appreciate grace unless we were to get a glimpse of suffering. The law is a teacher that leads us to the higher plane of Christ consciousness, where blessings override reaping and sowing.
Hi Robert.
What I meant by my statement that we have no control over what others think, feel or do, is that we shouldn’t try to control others, but simply love them. For example, I would not want to try to convince my gay brethren that they should live their lives the way I, or someone else, think they should, but simply accept them and love them as they are; treat them and love them the way I want to be treated and loved. I believe this to be the essence of unconditional love.
While I cannot agree that we can ever have the ability to control the minds of others, I do believe that our thoughts have the power to influence other minds, since we are all one with Cosmic Intelligence. In fact, we do it all the time, and those who are unaware are more susceptible to the influence of others than those who are watching their minds. We are all one ocean, and so every thought that we think has an impact on another, to a greater or lesser degree.
Actually, I would never want to control what someone else thinks. People need to develop their own patterns of thought and learn to think for themselves. Any control I could possibly execute on another person would violate the right of one to do that, and thus stunt his or her growth.
Thanks for your comment. It is much appreciated.
I also believe the law of sowing and reaping is not necessarily “subject to a higher law,” but there are simply other laws in operation. I believe all of life is subject to spiritual law, which, as I mention in my article, is just as immutable as the laws of physics and mathematics. Paul addresses this when he says, “But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members (Rom 7:23 KJV).
Chris and Paul,
The Fig Tree represents Love, as Paul has stated in the quoted Scripture.
Yes, just that simple “Love”, all of the trees want the Fig to reign over them.
My own experience with growing figs: Plant them close to the house, not too close, but as near to the home as possible, they adore to be near the home and people in it, they love to feel love!
I have had 2 in my lifetime, both close in to the house and year after year they produced an over abundance of delicious figs.
I usually give most away, one can only eat so many figs 🙂
Plant a fig tree this spring, plant Love!
Sparks
Hi Paul, I like the examples you give with the cars. I had once an amazing thing happen when my 14 year old Honda Prelude was stolen about 14 years ago and will share the story below.
What happened is that my husband’s teenage cousin had borrowed my car to go sightseeing in San Francisco and parked it at a train station in Sunnyvale (one of the lowest crime rate cities of its size in the U.S.). When she returned from her sightseeing trip the car was gone.
Right before I went to sleep the third night after the theft (by then we knew it was stolen and not towed by the city) I felt inspired to say a prayer: I thanked God for having given me such a wonderful car; it had been so dependable for so long. I told God that the person who stole my car probably did so because he had met some unfortunate set of circumstances and couldn’t see another option for himself. And if that car wasn’t going to turn up, I asked that it provide for the new owner the same kind of reliability that it had provided me.
That was it; I was done with my prayer. I went over to my husband who was working late on the computer, gave him a hug and a kiss, and went to bed feeling at peace.
Around one in the morning the phone rang and I spoke with an investigating officer from the Mountain View Police who informed me that my car had been found about 2 hours earlier (right around the time of my prayer). I listened as the officer explained that the car thief had asked a couple of unsuspecting youths for assistance in pushing my car to a gas station as it had run out of fuel. And when a police car turned the corner and headed in their direction, the thief got out of the car in a flash and ran off, leaving the youths standing with my stalled car.
Luckily for me, my fuel gauge had been reading inaccurately for some time, but the thief had no way of knowing this. So what was broken about my car became the thing that “saved” it.
That story still amazes me.
Thanks for the post about the importance of Love!
Christine, what an incredible confirmation and validation of the power of love. What you did in your situation amounted to the shedding of the blood of Christ. You had mercy on the young man who stole your car, wishing him only the best. You did not condemn him for stealing your car, but you edified him. This love and mercy did two things: it set in motion the law of cause and effect for YOU, allowing you to receive the mercy you gave, and it also appears to have released the thief from possible legal ramifications for his actions. Your love covered his “sin.” “Hatred stirs up strife, but love covers ALL sins. (Pro 10:12) Again, this is OUR power. Your love set him free. This is the shedding of the blood of Christ for the remission of sins.
“The LORD [is] merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and plenteous in mercy” (Psa 103:8 KJV). The “Lord” (the Christ within you) acted in the best interests of that young man, rather than seeking vengeance. It didn’t seek its own. The masses, on the other hand, would have wanted “justice” for his acts. Love is the power that we have within us. It needs to be resurrected.
“Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy” (Matt. 5:7). You received mercy as a result of being merciful. Death and life are in the power of the tongue.
“But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin. The “blood of Christ” is the “fruit of the vine” (Matt. 26:27-29). (“I am the vine,” John 15:1, 5). Also, “love covers a multitude of sin.
With your permission, I am going to use your story in future works of mine. Thanks so much for sharing such a powerful story of love.
Christine,
Good to see you again and thanks so much for this comment! Awesome!
I recently came across your website and newsletter. I wondered, have you ever read anything by
Neville Goddard? Have you ever studied Divine Science? Ernest Holmes and several other writers have been blessed to have had the scriptures opened to them.
I am 63 years old and had tried just about everything to have the scriptures make sense. It is only recently that I have come to the true understanding who ” I AM” and in fact who all are. Like you stated, a part of the body. God is no respecter of persons , we all have the same potential. Jesus the
Christ was the way shower. The scriptures are the only manual or guide we will ever need. Unfortunately, most of us do not understand the true meaning of it. It was never meant to taken literally. There is a much deeper meaning and those who will truly seek with loving heart and the desire to truly know who The Father is and how much he truly loves us.
Thank you so much for your articles.
You’re very welcome, Cathy. I was only recently (in the last month or so) exposed to the works of Neville Goddard. I know nothing about Divine Science, although I will do some research on it. Thanks for introducing it to me. I am generally resistant to studying the works of others. I feel that the spirit in me is the revealer, and it is my desire to get my information from the source, as opposed to esteeming men so highly that I must depend on them for understanding and information. I love what the Tao says in this respect:
If you overesteem great men, people become powerless.
What a powerful statement. We are ALL powerful. We are ALL gods. But we will never manifest that power until we seek to generate our own, as opposed to what I call “getting drunk off of the opinions and beliefs of others.” I absolutely love a quote I heard from John Hagee years ago: “If both of you are the same, one of you is unnecessary.”
“Drink waters out of thine own cistern, and running waters out of thine own well” (Pro 5:15 KJV).
Is it possible that you may be greater than the greatest of those you esteem so highly? I just ask the question.
This is why I go within and, in general, do not study the works of others.
Thanks, Cathy.
Paul,
I guess I would have to agree with you about tuning in to the wisdom within you as a primary source of direction and enlightenment, especially after the Christ consciousness has been awakened. I also think there is a balance between taking direction from within and gathering information from without. Perhaps we are not complete without certain others. “If one can chase a thousand, then two can chase ten thousand”. The collected wisdom of our ancestors and peers is part of our communal existence.
Some personalities are more skilled at gleaning truths from others and applying them. Other personalities are better at synthesizing creative ideas, or taking established ideas and teaching them.
I do admit, it is possible to take too much in from the outside. There are so many esoteric schools. It gets confusing. “Of the making of many books there is no end”. In that case it makes sense to tune out the outside, quiet the mind, and listen to the inner voice.
The dogma from the old time religion was fixed and simple, did not require continual evaluation and re-assessment, and therefore in many respects was a temporary advantage…. until we become aware that it is too limiting, erroneous, and unadaptable.
When people feel lost, they want a simple answer, one lifeline to grab onto with all their might until the storms pass. Some churches offer that kind of program. One point of view, one doctrine, one book with answers for everything. This is a good thing when you are totally lost, but once you find your way and are no longer in desperate survival mode, you may find you need something more.
I was taught in church that the bible is a manual for life on planet earth. I have revised that to “the bible is a most excellent source of wisdom, but not the only source.”
Robert, this is a great comment, and I agree with all of it. I will even take it a step further. One does not NEED the Bible at all. It simply represents one method to guide us. However, if we decide to use that method (and I do), we MUST understand it if we are to glean its benefits. Pedro used the term “beautiful” and “dangerous” to describe it. The Bible actually says the same things. “The letter kills, but the spirit gives life.” Pedro is simply paraphrasing this scripture, and he is right on point. The Bible, misunderstood, is like taking a spiritual gun and turning it on yourself. Unfortunately, most of us have gleaned our understanding of it from simply reading it literally, or learning from those who just do not understand it. This is what is meant by “the blind leading the blind.”
I would actually recommend that people leave it alone. It is a VERY harmful book for most people. Why? Because the egregious mistranslation of words and concepts lead us down wrong alleys and valleys. That religion has bought into all of this hook, line and sinker, is the major reason why religion is where it is today. For the most part, Christianity focuses on the literal rendering of the scriptures, and that is why people are so confused, and why many are turned off, by its central doctrines.
That is why I do what I do. I have accepted as my mission the archaeological study of the Bible itself. It takes deep digging, using a variety of resources, including, but not limited to, use of an interlinear version, a study of the Hebrew/Greek words, finding the scripture definitions of those words within its own pages, etc. You cannot understand the Bible by using external resources (e.g., studying nature, studying history, etc.), because the Bible is its own language. Hence, you have to learn to “speak in tongues.” It is written in another “language,” so to speak. The language is only defined within its own pages. You have to learn its language if you are to understand its message. This is the meaning of the Pentecostal experience of Acts 2.
For example, terms like “virgin,” “mother and father,” “children,” “Jerusalem,” “woman,” “kill,” “adultery,” “steal,” “lie,” “covet,” etc., do not have the same Biblical meanings as they do in the English dictionary. They mean something COMPLETELY different in the scriptures. The Ten Commandments, and the law of God in general, are SPIRITUAL concepts (John 6:63; Rom. 7:14). Indeed, we must learn the Biblical language if we are to understand its spiritual meanings.
This is what I attempt to bring to SOS. However, I must admit there is much more to this book that I will probably never understand than what I could ever hope to understand. This project is actually way to big for one person, or even a group of people. What we need are new translators of this great book — spiritually minded people who understand the spiritual. We need a new translation. We need new lexicons, new concordances, new voices. This is not going to happen overnight, but I am just arrogant enough to believe I can be a part of the master solution to this problem, and help to get the ball rolling in the right direction.
That’s why I use the Bible in the manner I do. I believe it to be the greatest book on planet earth, but we have to extract the “poison of asps” that has been injected into it.
With all of that said, the church (the external one) does serve a vital purpose. Just as the Israelites ask for a king and God gives them one because “they have rejected me,” so the people ask for human leaders, and religion is what we have. The masses want to be told what they must do. This is why we esteem great men so highly — often worshiping men as God.
Religion is the great “sword of God.” It is one of the four deadly plagues of Ezekiel 21. But as you astutely point out, Robert, people need a lifeline to hold onto when in the midst of their tempests. Religion is that lifeline for those who don’t want to listen to the voice of God (the thunder, hail and coals of fire — the adversities — that are God’s messengers – Heb. 1:6; Ps. 18:13; 2 Sam. 22:14). Therefore, religion serves a very valuable purpose, but its purpose is only for “those who are perishing” (spiritually).
Your verse of I Timothy 1:7 is wrong, please correct this. The correct verse is II Timothy 1:7.
Thank you.
Scott, you are absolutely right. Thanks for catching that.
ScottB, Paul, Others,
This brings to mind that it can make a big difference which book of the bible we are using. Many biblical scholars believe that II Timothy was written by Paul, but I Timothy was not. There are two other NT books (one of them includes Ephesians) that are largely considered forgeries (not written by the assumed author) and three more suspected of being forgeries. Then there are all kinds of irregularities in the OT.
So, with that in mind, I have three questions:
(1) Should we tend not to use those books as resources? Are they less reliable for containing hidden wisdom?
(2) If the bible is so inconsistent and authorship so unreliable, how can we believe that those who wrote it intended to carefully conceal hidden wisdom?
(3) Or was the spirit working in them behind the scenes, without their direct cognizance, responsible for the hidden wisdom?
Robert,
I have always felt #3 was correct. I say that because I feel that the scriptures, not only Christian but of any remaining ancient belief, are divine in nature. The fact that we even know much about any of them is astounding, how on earth did Judisam survive its history or Christianity become a world religion if not for luck (AKA the divine force). I feel much the same way about the church as a whole. Yes it degrades the meaning of the scripture to literalism, but it keeps the knowledge alive (waiting for someone who is ready to see its truth).
Justin
Justin,
Thanks for your comment in answer to my questions. So far, at this time, until I know better, I agree with you on all counts. It is interesting that as much as we SOS bloggers express our frustrations with the church, the irony of it is that there would be no esoteric message encoded in the scriptures to enlighten us if the scriptures had not been preserved intact as a unified document along with unified doctrines, as flawed as they may be, since the 4th century C.E. The alphabet soup of secret and obscure Gnostic doctrines, and oddball non-Gnostics would never have competed successfully with other politically empowered unified religions and secular powers. It takes a lot of understanding as an esoteric to appreciate this perspective.
job said,’what i greatly fear has come upon me.There is no fear in love,for fear brings torment(hell).PERFECT LOVE CAST OUT ALL FEAR
Very true, Tony. Thanks.
Thank you Paul! You may use my story, and actually I have excerpted it from my book, “What Everyone Believed: A memoir of intuition and awakening,” and I have an excerpt of that story as well in an article I wrote on my blog titled, “How To Pray So That Your Prayer Is Heard.” The link is below:
http://www.christinehoeflich.com/?p=374
Right now I am praying for a way to support myself and my two girls; my finances have been the hardest part of my journey the last several years. It would be great to sell some more books and get them out to the masses. Thanks for sharing my story and hopefully, sharing my book info!
Christine
I thoroughly enjoyed reading your article, Christine, and thanks for your permission to use your story. I think our paths are similar, as are our fires. Lamentations is one of the most powerful books in the Bible. It is a book about fasting, and its power to deliver us from all bondage and captivity. “Blessed are they who mourn, for they shall be comforted.” Our tears are a powerful force in assisting us with deliverance from our bondage and captivity, which is one of the reasons why our adversities are our greatest blessings. We will get through it. “No one who trusts in the ‘Lord’ shall be put to shame.”
Hi Paul,
Thank you for this really fine article on the Power of Love. You highlighted the unconditional love essence beautifully with these inspired insights.
I recommend a second and even third re-reading of sections to help punctuate and establish the understanding even more clearer and purer in the mind/heart.
Wishing love in all your fantastic work!
Blessings!
Raymond
Paul,
Your analogy of the ocean most certainly went straight to the heart of the matter for myself.
I have always loved the ocean and would go there in times of need, it gave me a sense of peacefulness and never ending love. To be there hearing the waves, reminds me that if we are the ocean, then the waves breathe Life. As the tears run down our face we taste the ocean, we taste the life and love that we are, with every human sense we gather through them GOD’S LOVE!
Prior to my only sister’s dying, she said to me, “Sis, I have no more tears, I can’t even cry anymore”.
That made me very sad, because I knew that tears are a sign of healing, It was then I knew and accepted she would leave us and soon.
While in intensive care, she could not speak due to all the tubes she was hooked up to, her family was there and myself, and as I was whispering in her ear, thanking her for being my sister, mentioning all our fun times, and telling her the most beautiful and loving journey she was about to begin, tears began to roll down her cheeks.
I knew then she was with God and the Love she felt with God.
Death is only a beginning, this I knew then more than ever, seeing her tears which had been non-existent for so long reminded me of her glorious victory! As we gave and loved her back to God.
In the beginning we are the Alpha and in the end we are the Omega, Love is the beginning, and greater than that Love has no end.
As always, thank you Paul, for your beautiful and timely writings, but mostly for the uplifting of all the souls your words touch.
With love,
Sparks
Raymond and Sparks:
Thank you for your comments. I truly believe that together we can effect a massive change in our world through understanding, and conveying, the major thrust of the scriptures, which is unconditional love. As scripture says, “the law of God is perfect, reviving the soul” (Ps. 19:7), and love is the fulfilling of that perfect law (Rom. 13:10).
Hi Paul,
Is there truly suffering as you say? Is it possible that what you declare to be “suffering” is only a projection of your own ego, believing itself to be superior to so many pitiable “sufferers” who aren’t as fortunate or savvy as you? Can you say with certainty that this “suffering” isn’t just a projection of your own pain and confusion on other people – people you sometimes, whether you realize it or not, suggest are separate from you? What is more, with all the talk here of “the Christ within”, doesn’t it make sense that the so-called healings of this Jesus character were nothing more than self-healings by the inner process that cures and frees us of our ego’s conditioned responses, such as those of externalized pain and misery on all those poor “sufferers”? Think of the last entry on YHVH and notice that the inner or masculine life (Hah) is connected (Vav) to the outer or feminine life (Hah). “Male and female created he (Elohim) them.” (In Hebrew man is Ish and woman is Isha, with states that the man exists but isn’t alive, while the woman is alive but doesn’t exist. And remember that even in the desecration – er, I mean translation – the end of Gen. 3 states clearly that only the man is expelled from Eden.) As within, so without means that your outer world is nothing less than a reflection of what’s in your head (Reysh). Suffering seems to have a rigid and rooted structure in your thinking, hence you can’t help but “see” it in the world you create (Bara, or Beyt-Reysh-Aleph).
“Jesus”, like “God”, is little more than a dead word in the West, misunderstood and turned more times than not into an external agent. “Jesus” is a physical symbol for a psychological truth. It is worth noting how in the Spanish version of John’s Gospel, “Word” is translated as Verbo. Like Elohim, YHWH, Satan, Amin, Shalom, etc., Yeshua is an equation, a process, and the answer to the equation is the equation itself. And so Yeshua, aka Jesus, is Yod-Shiyn-Vav-Oyin, which is an equation that says the inner life (Hah) in existence (Yod) allows for a choice of emotion (Shiyn) that connects (Vav) to all that you observe (Oyin, realized possibilities). Feeling pity for all those “sufferers” is your way of creating them, and so long as you feel (and therefore believe) the world lacks peace, prosperity, wholeness, harmony, etc., you will only multiply them. So long as you put pity into the world it will appear pitiable. If the world lacks anything it is your understanding that the very belief that you lack or need something perpetuates the lack and need of humanity. The belief that you’re not whole but will be one day perpetuates your own lack, for there is no time but NOW, which is why even speaking of “Jesus” in the past tense buries “him” instead of the structured “I” that uses and projects words and their limited meanings to avoid its dissolution, especially words like “Jesus” and “God”. (The seed buried in the earth cannot sprout until it truly dies. Perhaps this is why Job loses everything physical and is the reason why the Israelites must experience dispossession by the hand of Joseph before possession is possible.) Look at your own thoughts – you can only even think of the “past” or the “future” in the present. The resurrection is NOW or never, it’s that simple.
Is your consciousness focussed on causes (inner Hah) or effects (outer Hah)? Think of attention as a form of energy to be managed and invested, which surely has something to do with our talk of spending time and paying attention. Think about sayings like “I miss you”, “Remember the good old times?” “We’re going to be late.” “I can’t wait for tomorrow.” Why do so many people place their attention on things not present? Aren’t we told to “pray” as if we already have the things we ask for? Therefore, isn’t even the mere talk of “suffering” a form of “praying” for it?
Do you see that this post, and the many verses you italicize, points out countless contradictions in your logic? This is why Bar-Abbas continues to go free while Truth is condemned to death. Is it possible that the so-called scourging at the pillar was nothing more than erroneous thoughts and words torturing the Logos? It’s one thing to talk about love, and quite another to practice it. And looking for answers in a book is a poor substitute for seeking the answers within your own heart. As Jung pointed out, “He who looks outside dreams. He who looks inside awakens.” The Bible, like any other scripture, is merely a set of training wheels to be outgrown and left behind. Again, the crystallized word printed in a book and embedded in the psyche must become a Verb in the heart containing Shiyn with a life (Hah) of its own.
Note how in Hebrew, unlike any other language, devar means both “word” and “thing”. Also note that the English word alphabet is taken from the first two letters of the autiyut – Aleph and Beyt. (Hint, hint.) More importantly, the word for love in Hebrew is Ahavah (AHVH), or Aleph alive, Beyt alive. Consider this in terms of the opening of this post, which includes the words (things) suffering, suicide and hopelessness. And I’d say that hatred isn’t the cause of the things (words) you highlight; rather, ignorance, or Darkness is.
Schopenhauer said “We take the limits of our own field of vision for the limits of the world.” Think of what happens to a beam of white light when it passes through a prism: you get the distinct colors of the rainbow, but we know that this is only a small fraction of the total spectrum from experiments like taking temperature readings outside this array of colored light (UV, microwaves, radio waves, X rays, etc.). While a string may have two ends, they are not separate because the string is whole. Separation is an illusion. And so by saying that there IS suffering you are judging yourself and trying to deny something that is part of you. This comes down to introducing the Light into the Darkness and becoming aware of all those other parts of you that you are unconscious of. This is the role of Judas and is the very reason why Jesus communed with him as indicated by the sign of the sop of bread. (Satan must be received, for he who receives the one Jesus sends receives Jesus, and Jesus puts Satan in Judas and sends him to accomplish the merger of God and Satan, Light and Darkness. To deny this is to refuse to believe there is only ONE Universal Energy and to overlook the fact that Lucifer means “light bearer” or that both Jesus and Satan are called “the morning star”.) We all know the myth says that Jesus was 30 when he began his ministry and that Judas received 30 pieces of silver. This number corresponds to Lammed in Hebrew, which on the existential plane is a physiological action or motion. (Note also that Lamed means “ox goad” and Aleph means “ox”.) Taken to the cosmic level Lammed becomes Shiyn (passion, emotion, “breath” of God) which is clearly contained in the name Yeshua.
Emotion must liberate itself from its bondage to words. People must realize that emotion isn’t thought. When the mind can free itself of its concepts, the heart (emotion) can enjoy freedom, it can act instead of merely reacting to thoughts and words. Then the heart is able to mold the mind according to meaningful emotions. This is why Shiyn-Vav-Reysh means “song” in Hebrew…
“The happiness of your life depends on the quality of your thoughts.” – Marcus Aurelius
Pedro
Hi there Pedro.
Interesting thoughts.
God is a Biblical metaphor (code) for love, while Christ is a Biblical code for the power and wisdom TO love. The Spirit IS love (of course, God is a spirit, and that spirit that is God is love – 1 John 4:8). We derive these terms (God/Christ) from the scriptures, and that is why we use them. So if we’re going to use them, it is important to understand the basis with which they are used. The three (water, spirit and blood) are one. The water, the wave and the ocean are all one in the same way.
If we are all parts of a whole, then the dis-ease of any part of the whole affects the whole. Do you not believe that we all share responsibility for each other? That the Christ is able to help our fellow brethren, even from 15,000 miles away, and is in you? A huge part of what’s wrong with the world is that it is all too easy to ignore our suffering brothers and sisters, turning a blind eye to their plights and thus suggesting to them that they aren’t really suffering. This turning of the blind eye is one of the greatest reasons for worldwide hunger. There is enough food on our planet to feed every person alive today. So why aren’t we doing that? The reasons for why we aren’t doing that are certainly not because we love them.
Acts like those of some of the greatest tyrants in our world affect the whole, and cause “schisms” in the body of humanity. I submit to you that to ignore the sufferings of others is to express hatred for them. How do you help them? How would YOU help them? Do you think they even need help?
Are you really suggesting that there is no suffering in our world?? That it is a figment of my (and the scriptures’) imagination?? I believe that to deny suffering is to deny an obvious reality. People die everyday at the hands of others. People are killing each other through their words of hatred, which the Bible defines as murder. The dramas on the linear plane of our existence lend themselves to suffering, and all of the scriptures of the world address it. One of the themes of Buddha’s “ministry” was suffering.
There is mass hunger in the world because people are denied the right to food. People are committing suicides at alarming rates today because of suffering. People are suffering with all kind of physical maladies, much of it the result of governments that condone processing food for money’s sake, rather than for the health of its people.
Notwithstanding the causes of suffering (and I agree that fear is a primary first cause), suffering exists. I do not believe this can be rationally denied. or somehow explained away through modern thought, or cleverly constructed words. The theme of the Bible, which is a spiritual guide the intent of which is to drive us inward, is that love is the solution to all that ails humanity. To deny this is to deny a fundamental truth that we ARE our brothers’ keeper. We, individually, have the power to lift our brethren above the sufferings that plague humanity. Our thoughts and words play a principal role in this. We are a part of the solution.
Or are we part of the problem.
Our greatest power begins with a thought. Every accomplishment in the history of humanity has always begun with a thought.
Those are my “thoughts,” my friend.
I see what Pedro is saying and actually learned a whole lot from the post (I mean comment, sorry, couldn’t help myself lol).
In the book “The Secret” The author points out that most of her ideas came from an old book called “the Science of Getting Rich,” which is really a book on metaphysics that teaches a new way to think, such as to stop donating to charity and stop creating charities because it only breeds the need for more charity.
“Teach a man to fish…” However it is only through trials and sufferings that this new thought process can even be understood and sought after.
There is only “Now” always, but that eternal truth is something that takes much meditation and a level of consciousness expansion to comprehend. These teachings and others are what Jesus referred to as “earthquakes” of realization and the other signs that only occur during the awakening process. Sadly, because of the ignorance of scripture that is most times mistakenly taught it takes suffering to a terrible degree before a person will even begin to strip off the garments of indoctrination and look within.
I was a Jehovah’s Witness for the first 25 years of my life, and I mean a devout one at that. It took suffering for me to finally deny this false god “they” created and try to see the scriptures in the light they were meant to be viewed.
If every day is a sunny day, then what’s a sunny day?
Very interesting, Chris. Your life seems to mirror my own. I also was raised a Jehovah’s Witness, letting it go a couple of years after I got married at the age of 22 back in the late 70’s. I eventually attended the Vedenta Center of Greater Washington, DC for 8 years, spending a lot of time studying the works of Swami Vivekananda and Sri Ramakrishna, before I embarked on a personal mission to study the Bible independent of any religious affiliation or mentorship. It has been an amazing journey.
Paul,
As usual, you don’t address the many points I made in response to your post and instead completely ignore the issues I raise, simply increasing the amperage of your perpetual recitations of verses from the book you worship – and taking yourself and your observations of the physical world as unimpeachable. If you’re not going to address the following, please don’t bother responding.
Quantum physics tells us that solid particles have the ability to “dissolve” into a wave again. But if particles are observed, then the wave is reduced to a single state, and that is why certain groupings of particles have a way of staying together, because they are locked within the observations of the many.
“Perhaps the immobility of the things that surround us is forced upon them by our conviction that they are themselves and not something else, and by the immobility of our conceptions of them.” – Marcel Proust
“Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.” – Albert Einstein
“Everything we call real is made of things that can not be regarded as real.” – Niels Bohr
“If you want to find the secrets of the universe, think in terms of energy, frequency and vibration.” – Nikola Tesla
Do you believe in science? Do you see that all your talk of the “spiritual realm” states that you believe there are unknown forces at work, unknown factors that influence outcomes? You are unable to overcome the contradictions of your thinking, for you go from saying that the world is just as you observe it as far as suffering, hatred and suicide are concerned, yet you do it in terms of the spiritual, or invisible realm that is essentially the screen upon which “reality” is projected, a reality composed by the very thoughts and words you disgorge. You have zero proof that what you see, hear, taste, touch, and feel is all there is. Period. In fact, you can’t even prove why anything, whether a drop of water or a blue whale, even exists. And to say that suffering must wear the definition that you clothe it in is absurd. Do you really think Jesus saw suffering in anyone he healed? He saw ignorance, bad logic, a misunderstanding of creation, a lack of self-knowledge, a ludicrous belief that God was somewhere outside of man. But of course Jesus is no external agent, this is why he had to be murdered in order to be born in the individual. Hell, haven’t you ever heard of the placebo effect? If there is suffering it is because YOU believe in it and thus create it, not me. Speaking of Job, didn’t he also say “What I feared has come upon me”?
Define “death”. You don’t even know what “death” is, and until you admit that it is nothing but a dead word that you give life to you can’t say that you know what “life” is either. Everything is born to die, death is a part of life – the beginning is in the end as the end is in the beginning. You point out that “everything begins with a thought”, yet fail to realize the extent to which you idolize words and give life to the very things you fear and loathe (like death) and then judge them in ungainly defenses of your apparently irrefutable observations, betraying the very world you create. Do you see that your idolatry of words includes many which you can’t even define? But if you’re going to stick to your guns and these “petrified” words and judgments (judgments based on the unchallenged evidence of the senses, mind you), go ahead and give us your definition of death. Perhaps you’ll reconsider and realize that you can only know life to the extent that you know death – especially the death of words without substance, thought structures, and perspectives based purely on the ideas and images in your head mired in emotions that are obviously reactions to the physical world of effects. (And while you include words like “hatred” as far as causality goes, you conveniently exclude yourself from any blame despite breathing words/things into existence that are the very thoughts you point out as being the seeds that flower into these horrible things you despise. )
People tend to think that questions are incomplete without answers. Well, every answer is incomplete without a question. Your response is so laden with doubt it’s not funny. Do you not see that your own psyche is immured in a cloud of words you refuse to even question? I’m reminded of Peter in Matthew 16:22 saying, “Never Lord, this shall never happen to you!” And of course this wasn’t only in response to the “death” but also to the resurrection, which are only psychological.
Jesus taught man how to die to himself, to the imaginary self asleep to reality. He taught the individual how to awaken from the sleep of the senses. I’m reminded of a few more apt sayings:
“Freedom would not be so hard to attain were prison not so sweet.”
“If the psyche is to awaken to what is real, then it must learn to live with and face up to uncertainty. To do so requires that it be free from all the stereotyped formulas which bind it to rigid ways of living. The psyche is subconsciously afraid. Afraid to lose its precarious security. It calls its state of fixation good. Above all, it fears to live in uncertainty. But to do so is the condition of openness to all possibilities. Man clings to the known and fears to see what is unknown because then he will have “no place to lay his head”. He prefers to build nests, Chinese boxes inside boxes, endlessly. Nests in which he can live in comparative safety, insulated from the hazards of reality. He does not wish to open his eyes and see things as they really are, infinite.”
Since you like to use the phrase “the Bible defines (X, Y, Z) as…”, I’ll give you something from Mark 13.
For whosoever hath, to him shall be given, and he shall have more abundance: but to whosoever hath not, from him shall be taken away, even that he hath.
The world isn’t “what you see is what you get”, rather, it’s “what you put in is what you get”. By believing the thoughts that you think you perpetuate the world as you believe it is. Take a look at the Pentateuch in Hebrew and tell me why you think the biggest letter in the whole thing, in fact in the whole Bible, is the very first letter of the very first word in Genesis 1:1 – Beyt. This is the second letter of the Hebrew alphabet and 2 is clearly a symbol for duality, as in reality isn’t only what you can observe, that the senses deceive. Beyt means form, image, shell, polarity, surface, duality, twofold, reflection.
What you see outside of you cannot exist without first existing in your mind. This is the formula of the Tetragrammaton, Yod-He-Vav-He. “God” doesn’t allow suffering to happen, YOU do. Own up to your responsibility and stop blaming people like me who refuse to harbor the thoughts that create.
“We, individually, have the power to lift our brethren above the sufferings that plague humanity. Our thoughts and words play a principal role in this. We are a part of the solution.
Or are we part of the problem?”
Your thoughts are definitely part of the problem, a problem that begins and ends in your mind. And until you understand why Calvary is called Golgotha, or place of the skull, you’re the very center of everything you complain about. I suggest you learn how to die.
Pedro
My dear brother, I respect your right to your opinion, as well as your right to express it in the manner you have chosen.
Blessings.
My dear brother Paul,
You are a true gentleman.
Psalm 37:11
But the meek shall inherit the earth; and shall delight themselves in the abundance of peace
Love,
Sparks
And that coming from a true lady.
Thanks, Sis.
Pedro,
I may be having a hard time processing your arguments. There are too many points compressed into rebukes, without much explanation of any one point. So I can’t unravel it into a cogent message that is useful for me. The only consistent theme I can pull out is that you are adamantly opposed to Paul’s approach. There is nothing wrong with that. But the way you express it comes across as antagonistic, angry, agitated, overkill. It suggests that you are struggling with internal issues and allowing them to overflow into your communications, that you are in some kind of pain, and so I have concern for you.
I only have an inkling of what your alternative approach is … that suffering is an illusion and we can escape it by some method. It would make more sense to me if you mentioned the alternative method in positive terms, demonstrating its benefits, rather than focusing so sharply on condemning Paul’s ideas.
Pedro,
Something nice to soothe your soul…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iF2__
Be Love OK?
Fran
oops…
correct link:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iF2__-K8qFo
Paul,
Thank you so much for allowing Pedro to respond to you posts. I too came from a long journey out of the organized the church by way of Catholicism, Lutheranism, Baptist, and many other “organized religions.” I can now understand why is meant by “Father, forgive them, for know
not what they do.” The scriptures are the only manual or guide we will ever need. They were never meant to be taken literally – they were meant to be studied and treasured as a “pearl of great price”
They are not about history or great men, that are about every human being and journey back to the Father – dying to self and awakening to the Christ within.
I highly respect Pedro for he appears to understand the deeper message. The Pharisees lived by the love of the law. The common people live by law of love – it is the spirit of the law – not the letter of the law. Very few know what it is to live by spirit as Jesus, the way shower taught.
Pedro you have an immense amount of knowledge, but you sound angry. Remember that a true teacher knows who needs milk and who is ready for solid food.
Nothing you’ve said is untrue, but be careful not to “drown” those who are new to an esoteric learning of the scriptures and “soul science.”
I would like to ask? Have you ever suffered or made a mistake in your life? If you say no, then I’m sorry but I don’t believe you. If you say yes, then you must agree that the mistakes or suffering led you to find a better way.
Be patient as you teach and you surely will be able to help many souls with the things that have been given you.
We are all brothers and sisters on the same journey.
A few quotes to think about:
Fear is the path to the dark side. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering. (George Lucas)
Beware of the dark side. Anger … fear … aggression. (George Lucas)
We live a spiritual lifestyle when we treat all life with care, kindness and love. Anthony Douglas Williams.
I want to paint a picture for all of you that illustrates graphically how suffering and illusion work. Suffering is VERY real. However, ALL suffering is CAUSED by illusion. Let me explain (this illustration is paraphrased from the Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna):
In the darkness you may look down and see a rope and mistake the rope for a snake. If you are afraid of snakes, the illusion of the snake will cause a panic within you. Your heart starts pounding, you start sweating, you may get dizzy, you may faint, etc. All of these manifestations are the result of a misperception of something you THOUGHT you saw. The illusion was just that, an illusion. However, the resulting suffering from your experience is VERY REAL, and thus, the illusion has the potential to kill you. We call this “stress.” Nothing actually happened other than that your mind created a false picture for you. It is your mind that actually created your problems, not the rope. The rope was absolutely harmless.
The waters (of adversity/affliction) bring forth the dragon (Satan/fear/ego/negative mind/doubt/unbelief) (Gen. 1:20-21, Rev. 12). In other words, our adversities give us the appearance that something is wrong, and thus give birth to the illusion that we call the dragon. Satan is only an illusion, but taking him to be real, “he” (the illusion) becomes the cause of all suffering. As Pedro astutely points out from the book of Job, “the thing which I greatly feared is come upon me, and that which I was afraid of is come unto me” (Job 3:25). The illusion of the snake brings forth the reality of the torment (suffering). Job’s very real suffering was brought about by his fear (torment).
The answer to the casting away of torment/suffering lies in love. “There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear: because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love” (1 John 4:18). It is only when the light of Christ within illumines the darkness within that we can see that there is nothing in the darkness but the light. It’s just that the darkness has not comprehended this light.
1 Cor. 13 defines love for us, and perfect love (the God/Christ within us) “executes/destroys” fear. This is why God, in scripture, is sometimes referred to as the “destroyer God.” “Though he slay me, yet will I trust him” (Job 13:15). In order to enter the Promised Land (our higher self), “Satan” (our mortal enemy that I define above) must be destroyed, root and branch. The illusion must die! This is where we come in.
We help our brethren on this planet by showing them that what they fear is only an illusion. This is what is meant by “Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do; because I go unto my Father” (John 14:12). The Christ power that we read about in scripture is OUR power. WE have the ability to open the eyes of the blind, to heal the deaf, etc. Of course, none of this is meant to be taken literally (although I do believe even THAT is a possibility once we get fully in touch with our inner power). We do it ALL through LOVE, rather than condemnation, condescension, etc. THAT’s the point of it all. We are POWERFUL beings. We are “fearfully and wonderfully made.”
I hope this makes sense to you.
Paul,
I am not sure of this, but I am thinking Pedro might have had an idea similar to mine, although his is probably based on a lot of esoteric knowledge, and mine is just a hunch. It is that the story of Job itself is an artificially manufactured source of paranoia and is thus damaging and misleading. An honorable good citizen’s entire world and health falls apart for no good reason because a deity allows a lower destructive supernatural being to beat the crap out of him in order to test him? I am not sure there is a lot of love in that playbook. Are we supposed to be feeble ants at the mercy of supreme beings who are in some sort of war with each other? It’s not for us to wonder why, simply to do or die? The motto is to be a good ant and trust the deity “even though he slay me.” Well, I don’t know. I would prefer a better explanation for suffering and I would not want to walk around thinking at any time that a deity is going to allow a meteor to fall on my head to test me.
But I will admit that if I did not know anything else and I was suffering to the breaking point, reading Job would give me some strength and hope that things would work out, and that I would have a playbook to forgive all the sorry physicians who misdiagnosed me.
This post did an excellent job of bringing out the love aspect from Job, something I had not come across before. It was very creative to use the background of Job’s story to interlink with the rest of the bible’s treatment of love. At first I didn’t like such a high concentration of scripture references because it began to remind me of fundamentalist preaching, but later I found myself being reminded of the liberating power of love.
Job is such a different book than any other in the canon, that I have tended to think it is a different brand of wisdom than the rest, and not really congruent with the rest. I still do. But you did something creative with incongruent books that works. I don’t think it was in the books by themselves. I think it was something you drew out from within yourself that made this work.
Robert, thanks so much for your comment. I love your very interesting choice of words: “deity,” and “lower destructive supernatural being.” Here’s how I see it:
There are indeed two major “deities” in scripture. The first deity is love, personified as God. The second deity is “fear,” the “lower destructive supernatural being” personified as Satan. The forces of love and fear are always at war with each other. The force in our life that dominates us determines our experience. The story of Job (a fictitious character of a mythological story), as does all scripture, connotes spiritual instruction. In this case it relates to what fear does to us, and the power of love to lift us above fear.
Again, I see fear as The Great Illusion that causes all suffering, as is demonstrated through Job’s experience. Whatever we fear becomes our experience. Perfect love conquers fear (God conquers Satan). “Fear has torment.” This is what I believe the story of Job is designed to teach us. We can also see this in the parable of the rich man and Lazarus, where the rich man is in hell and asks to have his tongue cooled, for “I am tormented in this flame” (Luke 16:24). He was in the flames of hell, the fires of adversity that are caused by the tongue (James 3:6). “As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he,” and “out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks.” “It is not the things that go into a man that defile him, but what comes OUT of a man, that is what defiles him.” A heart full of fear is going to verbalize that fear, and thus it becomes our reality, as “death and life are in the power of the tongue.”
As it regards my “high concentration of scriptures,” that is by design. What I try to do is to prove through the scriptures that the message of the scriptures is vastly different from what mainstream religion teaches. This high concentration of scriptures allows me to tie doctrine/instruction together in ways that, in my opinion, makes much more sense than the doctrines of mainstream religion. Obviously, there are some who would disagree with this, and that’s okay.
It is my firm belief that the only way to do that is to allow the scriptures to interpret themselves. The Bible is a book of symbols/codes, and when we come to understand the symbols, everything becomes so much easier. The Bible explains all its symbols, so we don’t have to be in the dark about anything. We just need to understand the symbols. I don’t believe any of it constitutes literal history, although historical names, places, and other things are used. This is how the writers are able to “conceal its hidden messages from the wise and prudent, while revealing them to babes.” Unfortunately, it is the scholars/theologians from which religion derives its interpretations. When the blind lead the blind ….
So in a nutshell, the story of Job is not about two literal deities called God and Satan. They are personifications of forces within the human being that battle each other until the greater of the forces wins out. We cannot understand the book of Job (or any other Biblical book, for that matter) from the literal reading. “But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.” And again, “the letter kills, but the spirit gives life.”
Yes, ALL the things of “God” are to be “spiritually discerned,” not merely read “as is.” The Bible is not meant to be read in the letter, but in the spirit.
That’s just my two cents.
Paul,
I learned a lot more from your last comment, which was mostly in simple language, than from the post. Thank you for explaining that. I still start to blank out when I see multiple scripture verses.
I want to apologize to all readers here, and to Joshua, for allowing my emotions to get the better of me in my response to Paul’s post. (And the fact that it contradicts what I said about emotion being subjugated by words doesn’t escape me.) Furthermore there is no doubt in my mind that what inspired my reaction is plainly something in my self that I perceived/projected in Paul’s words, making my judgment a self-critique, and something that warrants deep contemplation. Judge not lest ye be judged, right? My response was childish, arrogant, and counterproductive, and all of the things other responses have pointed to. What is more, last night I went looking for the Empire Strikes Back clip in the Dagobah system, but not able to find the whole thing I simply opened the script and read it. It’s no coincidence that I found Paul quoting that very scene here today. I take it I’m not the only one who understands the symbolism at the end of Return of the Jedi when Luke calls Vader “father” and asks for his help while the Emperor is jolting him with high voltage and Vader comes through. In short, I’m sorry.
I believe the Bible is as beautiful as it is dangerous, and the reasons for this should be as clear as day. It is not just meant to be understood but experienced, and saying this also proves my hypocrisy for using my understanding of it to engage in emotionally-charged word games. However, while knowledge is surely transferable given the right conditions, experience is not, for each of us has our own unique and highly personal journey. Ultimately language, like thought, becomes inept at expressing life’s deepest meanings, for who and what we are – our essence – far surpasses the many containers, or shadows, we use to communicate. And this is why words and their meanings pose so many problems. Is there any doubt that words are often wielded as weapons – sometimes consciously but more times unconsciously – capable of causing wounds and explosions in the mind? What is a word? Do people realize how deeply their words reflect their emotions? Do people understand the extent to which they’ve been conditioned by words, especially the misunderstanding of words? Since words are ultimately only symbols that point to something they signify – empty packages for contents (meaning) determined by common agreement and custom – is it possible that the human psyche builds and uses these limited structures in order to insulate itself from the fact that the ego is nothing but a pseudo-personality trying to sustain the illusion that it is an end instead of a means? (What is Luke Skywalker without Vader, Cain without Abel, Jesus without Judas?)
Resist not evil. Matthew 5:39
What does this mean? What is evil? What is good? How does good relate to “best”? How does bad relate to “worst?” If we insist on “good” and “evil” having fixed moral connotations without seeing that our ideas of good and evil are based on what is familiar in our own culture, aren’t we precluding the possibility of growth and change? Doesn’t this make us fear and even label as “evil” anything new or different or anything our patterns of judgment fail to categorize and file away? Do you realize that the word “evil-doer” has become an incredibly vague word in the English language? If our definitions of things is according to cultural/religious programming and measured against our observations based upon our identification with what we see, how does this affect our faith in what we cannot see? Can you see the energy that causes everything to bloom in spring? Aren’t the things that appear caused by things that do not appear? Aren’t your visible actions based upon invisible thoughts and emotions? Is it possible to define “reality”? Are you reading these words today with an open mind or are you reading this in terms of your reaction to my post from yesterday? Do you see how this matters? What is freedom from judgment? What IS suffering? What thoughts, images and emotions come to your mind at the mere sight or sound of this word, and do you realize that you are calling upon past reactions, memories and judgments associated with previous situations and projecting them into the present? Do we realize the effects of the act of judgment that comes from experiencing anything that clashes with our fixed moral standards?
Do we understand the effect on children when we say “Do not do this or that?” Do we understand the fact that it is impossible to negate something without bringing it into awareness? We’ve all heard the phrase ‘what you resists persists’, but do we know what it means? If I fight suffering or suicide or alcoholism, I’m putting my attention and investing my energy in the very things I’m fighting against, thereby telling myself that they are worth combating. Instead of focusing on what I desire, I’m focusing on what I don’t want, and therefore giving it life and power. Consider the Ten Commandments and their effect on human consciousness. By saying “Thou shalt not kill”, “Thou shalt not steal”, you invoke the very thing you’re trying to avoid, because the very act of killing or stealing is necessary in order for the commandment to be applied. How many billions of people have been raised with the Bible and these teachings? How many people, especially children, who had no exposure to, and therefore not even a concept of murder or theft, until they heard this “teaching”? The very commandments plant these concepts into human consciousness. Think long and hard about this. Do you see that these rules pave the way for a consciousness that ALLOWS for the very acts they claim to be fighting? That these “commandments” actually create a consciousness that includes killing or stealing as possibilities. Killing and theft become the life and motive to enforce these rules, and the very concepts are introduced by words. If I so chose to I could say something so outlandish and horrific that it would leave its mark on your mind and plant itself in the consciousness of anyone who reads this. Does anyone really doubt that 9-11 put all kinds of concepts into the minds of billions of people? Did flying an airplane into a skyscraper ever even cross your mind before then? Do you see what those words just did to you?
Truly, with all the comments in this post – and the blog as a whole – what do we believe about the power of thought and its relationship with the very “reality” we experience? What are the very seeds which lead to manifestation? By trying to prevent something you put into motion the creative forces that end up presenting you with the very things you’re trying to prevent. This is no different than when people tell themselves they WILL be happy when they achieve this, buy that or go there, etc., only to find themselves perpetually lacking fulfillment. For by this very belief you are telling yourself subconsciously that you are NOT happy now, but will be at some future time, and so when that future date comes it should be no surprise that your misunderstanding of Natural Law is the cause of your dissatisfaction, for the message in your mind was WILL be happy, and since there is only NOW, you reap what you sow and never reach the receding horizon. If there is suffering, murder, theft, depression, restless leg syndrome, whatever, it is because you give them life by harboring them in your consciousness and believing they are real and worth your concern. Clearly the ten commandments have done nothing in a few thousand years to eradicate the symptoms they claim to battle. But what causes a symptom? Haven’t we established already that causality resides in the mental realm in countless posts here? What are root causes? Have you ever heard a successful business man use words like “failure” or “I doubt”? Have you ever heard an addict say “I love myself?” Why do parents utilize controls on their children’s media? Why do parents not want their children watching violent movies, drug use or pornography? Why do we talk about life imitating art? Why do we say if it bleeds it leads? What does the news focus on day in and day out? What taboo has actually prevented what it ordered people NOT to do?
For those of you who are computer savvy, consider the human mind in these terms:
Human beings are programmable, much like computers. Like a computer, if a human being has a bad “file-system format” (conditions during a child’s formative years), a bad “operating system” (Culture), and bad software programs (erroneous, rigid and dogmatic beliefs), their “output” (behavior) onto the “screen” (Life) will also be bad, and will contribute to deteriorating conditions on a mass scale. Like a computer, the behavior of a human being will largely depend upon its programming, (the quality of the information put into it, which enables it to process and create efficiently). – Mark Passio
Garbage In = Garbage Out
Quality In = Quality Out
The Ten Commandments are the worst kind of food in your mental diet. Accepting anything but love, peace, prosperity, health, happiness, unity, compassion and life in your consciousness is to allow the barbarians to storm the gates.
If you want to prevent killing, theft, suffering, violence, rape, etc., you must start by combating your own inner world by freeing your consciousness form its acceptance of them in the world. Fighting outer conditions is like crying over spilled milk. Maybe it alleviates some pain, but it doesn’t cure anything. Accept the fact that YOU have allowed murder, theft, suffering, rape and violence to be real in your consciousness, your very essence. You may not even blink an eye when you hear about them. Does anyone doubt that global problems begin with the individual? Just like a virus begins by replicating itself in an infected person and then spreading to others, so too do these concepts begin by being replicated in the minds of humanity where they become raw materials for their very inception, creation, existence and perpetuation.
Pedro,
You bring up a really interesting point about letting your mind dwell on harmonious aspects of life … peace, joy, goodness, etc. You seem to be saying that by doing this, and filtering out the negative aspects, your life will automatically become more harmonious. I think I am just beginning to understand that, and the power to change your life through positive intention.
I think I can only do this a little at a time. I am still programmed to defend myself in a toxic environment. I can nudge myself out of the negative scenario by experimenting and gradually learning to trust this new way. It is good to be encouraged to do this by others, and to push myself a little in the right direction, otherwise the old habits just suck me back in.
I have also noticed that I have to take the responsibility for making progress and that it has to come from me as I am ready and eager to progress. No one can force a demand on me to change, because it will backfire and I will react against the force as a threat. I have noticed the same in trying to get other people to change. I think there is something delicate about the development of the Christ consciousness within. It starts out like a soft mushy embryo until it is more fully developed and ready to peck its way out of its shell. If we try to speed this up in someone by breaking their shell prematurely, we will end up with a gooey mess.
Pedro…
No worries. This is a learning process for all of us. I am glad that you realized a lot of the emotion for Paul was self projected, but at the same time you do bring up a lot of engaging points from a head-knowledge point of view. As others alluded to, much of it is really good and should be addressed, and as you work it out within, you will have some awesome truth to bring to the table. As Paul (in his maturity) would agree with, conflict is not a bad thing as long as we self-assess to see where it is really coming from and then why it is projected. I very much value many of the comments you have made here.
Brothers for life, Pedro! 🙂
Paul,
I wonder if other readers are in the same boat as I am. I have learned in the last year or two to shy away from presentations that link a lot of scriptures together to prove a point. This is because I realize that anyone can do that by picking a topic and using software or a concordance to pick out related scriptures, then connecting them in a sentence. It is sort of like doing a grade school exercise where you use three new words you learned in a sentence.
Back when some of us were fundamentalists and believed that the bible (and the preacher) was infallible, authentic, and authoritative, this was less of a problem. But now that some of those things are up for grabs, we have a different set of criteria for assessing truth and meaning. We don’t shout amen every time we hear a scripture or a doctrine that is as familiar as an old friend. Maybe this is because we discovered our old friends deceived us and wonder why they are still priding themselves in their mission of trying to bring us back into the fold of deception using scriptural formulas. My intuition is thirsting for deeper meaning and they are trying to pump up the emptiness by force-feeding verses. I imagine they believe the “word will not return void” and misinterpret this as meaning that mechanical repetition of scriptures will succeed in brainwashing us or performing some sort of supernatural magic, kind of like abracadabra.
Well guess what? Many of us are spirit freaks now, instead of scripture freaks. If you can’t break down what you want to say in everyday language that reaches our innermost being, you are wasting your breath, because King James by itself don’t mean jack anymore.
Actually, many of us are still probably part scripture freaks by habit, part spirit freaks by need. We’ll eat anything if the best is not available, feeling good for the moment on the same old menu, but starving and wobbling from malnourishment in just a few hours.
Paul,
What is your response to the observation of quantum physics that most of what we thought was once “immutable” is just a local trend or approximation of reality under local conditions, waiting for the exception to happen, a condition to change, or a more inclusive principle to take effect.
Quantum physics, of course, is about the relationship of waves to particles. The laboratory experiments referenced by people like Bruce Lipton and Fred Alan Wolfe show that waves and particles function differently under observation than they do when they are not. Quantum physics is a fascinating study, and one I’d like to delve into a lot more deeply. It shows the science of how thought actually works. I believe all scientific law is immutable. We just have to understand how it works.
As an example, take the law of gravity. You jump off a building and you know the end result. The law of gravity is an immutable law (it cannot change, and it cannot be changed). However, the understanding of the law allows us the ability to create airplanes and rocket ships that work with the laws of gravity to counteract its effects. Does that mean the law changed because now you can fly? Absolutely not. Once you understand any law, you have the option of using the data to make it work for you, provided you are equipped with the knowledge and understanding of how to do so.
These are my own personal thoughts. For all that we’ve learned about quantum physics/mechanics, it is still in the infant stages, and I believe there is much more to learn about this relatively new science.
Paul,
I don’t know how to explain my problem with using the term “Immutable”. But I think I can try to hint at it by using a riddle: If God is immutable and God’s laws are immutable, and God is no respecter of persons, then all people who eat seafood that does not have fins and scales are an abomination to God according to Leviticus. This includes shrimp, crabs, clams, oysters, lobster, catfish, and eels. But if you somehow are able to find a loophole in this example of immutability, and God is no respecter of persons, then the same loophole applies to homosexuals.
Based on the literal rendering of the law, you are absolutely right. But clean and unclean meats (Lev. 11) have nothing to do with literal animals. It has to do with the spiritual food of which you partake. The beasts of the field are “men whose teeth are spears and whose tongues are sharp swords.” Partaking of wrong doctrines (meat) by these “beasts” lead us AWAY from “God” (love). Yes, this is indeed immutable law. The “mark” of the beast is the impression of these doctrines in your “forehead” (the “place of the skull – Golgotha/Calvary).
Paul,
The other problem of using immutable to describe a law derived by scientific observation is that it is impossible to disprove the existence of an exception. All we can do is assign varying degrees of confidence to our conclusions. This can increase from a trend to a theory to a law. But these laws are predictive, not absolute. Immutable means absolute. Here is an article written in 2010 that deals with the problem of immutable laws http://discovermagazine.com/2010/apr/10-is-search-for-immutable-laws-of-nature-wild-goose-chase
Since that time even more astounding discoveries have been made, which include the possibility of time travel and particles traveling faster than the speed of light.
Robert, maybe I am merely picking on semantics here, but a law cannot be derived by scientific observation. Scientific observation can, however, derive conclusions FROM that law. All observable data is subject to interpretation, and while law can never be defective, our subjective interpretations certainly can.
Paul,
Ahah! I missed your comment about scientific observation. Now that I came across it, it explains a lot of why we are seeing things differently. I am a scientist, and in the scheme of things I have come to understand that first we do the observational measurements, and then from the measurements, if it shows a predictable pattern, we “infer” that a repeatable principle, usually described by some kind of mathematical equation, explains how the world works. If we do enough observations of different kinds of behavior (like magnetism, electricity, and motion of particles) and find that our equations for them all work together in a compatible way, then we are even surer we have a handle on how the world works.
But as human beings, we are not privileged ahead of time to “know” the laws of physics. We deduce what these laws are from experimental observation. The idea that a law is immutable is an abstract philosophical (not a scientific) concept in the human imagination, based on a human need to feel secure in the universe and to have confidence in controlling some part of it. It is not real. The only thing that is real is that I can use a law to “predict” that a person traveling at a fixed speed will arrive at a destination at a certain time.
In physics 101, we read about laws of physics in a text book. We are introduced to an equation involving speed, distance, and time. We are then given some data and asked to apply the law to determine (predict) when an object will arrive at a given location. This is what you mean by “deriving conclusions from the law”.
But, in physics 102, we go into a laboratory with an object, a ruler, and a stopwatch. Based on experimentation we come up with a formula that describes the motion of the object, a law of motion. All the laws we have ever discovered are based on similar empirical measurements.
The better our empirical laws work by themselves and by combining them, the more we think we have figured it all out for all time, the theory of everything. That is why Einstein was so interested in trying to figure out how gravity fit it with all the other laws. If he could only figure that out, then he would have a uniform theory of everything forever. This is what would philosophically be referred to as the “immutable laws of physics”. But again, it is an abstract concept, not a real thing.
But no one has even figured out how gravity fits in. As the article I referenced suggests, in the last several decades, the harder we try to find the answer, the more weird things appear, until we have a plethora of proposed mathematical concepts that are so complex that we have lost touch with what they mean, and have absolutely no way of verifying them. Some of the latest concepts propose that the laws of physics are changeable with time, which challenges even the philosophical ideal of immutability.
I recommend that you consider letting go of the concept of immutability as a fact. It is not a fact at all. It is a belief. That does not mean we can’t have enough confidence in laws to build things and send rockets to mars. It is next to impossible for these laws to fail. But that is as far as it gets. We cannot conclude that it is absolutely impossible for them to fail.
The advantage of letting go of the philosophical concept of immutability is that it frees us to begin to think of the universe in fluid, instead of static, terms. We can begin to appreciate love as something that flows and touches, and raises consciousness, something we know exists because we appreciate its manifestations, even though by itself it is as intangible as the ineffable All.
Thanks for sharing this article. It is fascinating (at least the parts I have read so far). It makes me wonder: Does the universe work the same way our minds do? That would be a fascinating study. The fact that we exist is its own evidence that there could be other forms of life in the universe that act as we do, that are as we are. Perhaps the universe itself?
Very intriguing!
Paul,
The other problem of using “immutable” to describe a law derived by scientific observation is that it is impossible to disprove the existence of an exception. All we can do is assign varying degrees of confidence to our conclusions. This can increase from a trend to a theory to a law. But these laws are predictive, not absolute. Immutable means absolute. Here is an article written in 2010 that deals with the problem of immutable laws http://discovermagazine.com/2010/apr/10-is-search-for-immutable-laws-of-nature-wild-goose-chase
Since that time even more astounding discoveries have been made, which include the possibility of time travel and particles traveling faster than the speed of light.
Robert, I don’t define immutable as “absolute,” at least not in the way that you do. I believe immutable to be simply “unchangeable.” What you call an “exception,” I define to be simply an “event.” I believe that when we come to truly understand law (in whatever form that law takes), we find that the law operates exactly the same given the same set of events. For example, in the quantum experiments, the waves and particles do one thing under one set of circumstances, while another set of circumstances produces a different result. But I think that what you find with the law is that the results are ALWAYS going to be consistent when the same events are applied.
If something falls off a building, you are going to get the same result every time that something falls off a building. If a drop of water falls off a building, the result is going to be a little different than if a 120 lb. rock falls of that same building, but the result of that 120 lb. rock falling off the building is going to be consistent every time, as is the drop of water.
This is what I call “immutability.” Actually, you could probably use the term “absolute” as well. A manipulation of data can determine the effect of the law. You weigh more on planet earth than you do on the moon. If an airplane launches from that building, it’s going to produce a different effect. It’s the same law of gravity, but different data produce different results. The law itself, however, does not change.
Robert, I completely understand. I guess what I am trying to do with the high concentration of scriptures is to show what they are really saying to us, and that what they are saying to us is vastly different from what we’ve always been taught that they are saying to us. Perhaps I do not do a good job of that. Or perhaps I just need to spell out more of how I come to the conclusions I come to.
The Bible is a spiritual book, not a history book, but the translators of the English versions do a horrible job of translating it correctly. I have yet to see an accurate English translation of it, and so I do my own study of it. I try to piece the independent pieces of the puzzle (verses) together in a coherent manner, which I obviously do not do a good job of.
I actually would prefer not to use the KJV of the Bible, and the only reason I do is because Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance is based on it, and I can therefore do intensive word searches (Hebrew/Greek) to ascertain its deeper meaning. I’m sure I don’t convey this as well as I’d like, or as well as you’d like, and I can certainly understand your reference to “scripture freaks.” Actually, I’m just a freak for understanding (something the scriptures actually counsel AGAINST in the manner that I do it. We’re all creatures of habit, I guess).
“It is hard for rich man to enter into the kingdom of God,” and “they who would be rich fall into a snare and a trap.” These verses have nothing to do with material wealth, but with our desire to become spiritually rich through much study. That just cannot be done. I have actually toyed with the idea of giving up all this study.
“And further, by these, my son, be admonished: of making many books [there is] no end; and much study [is] a weariness of the flesh” (Ecc 12:12 KJV).
But for purposes of this blog, I thought that the purpose of it (and its name) is to understand the “Spirit of the Scriptures.” Which I interpret to mean the understanding of what the scriptures mean by what they say. I thought that is why we are all here in the first place, and why we do what we do on this blog; including the encouragement of healthy dialogue. I think Joshua has done a great job with the blog, but perhaps I need to take a step back and reevaluate. One thing I have no interest in doing is getting into “biting and devouring” debates with my brothers and sisters whom I love dearly. They lead to nothing of value and are counterproductive.
Robert, this comment is a response to your 4/8/2014, 6:34 pm comment. Thanks.
Paul,
I appreciate being able to have a good enough relationship with you that you would accept feedback on something that just seemed to bug me, and that I can take that risk of expressing it without worrying about offending or discouraging you. I think it is healthy for these messages to be exchanged. Iron sharpens iron. You have too much talent to have yes men surrounding you all the time. I think you understand now what I, for one, can and can’t digest, so it would make sense, if you wanted to accommodate me or readers like me, by revising your format to include a little less scripture and a little more bottom line explanation, according to your discretion. There are some readers who benefited from your original format, and it is better for this blog to have some diversity in styles even if not everyone is totally pleased all the time. Maybe its just a matter of finding a balance. Put one foot in your shoe and one in mine, and see what can happen.
When scripture exhorts us to “lean not on our own understanding”, I thought it was addressing the problem of the Israelites grossly ignoring any spiritual wisdom, like preferring King Saul to King David. and letting the Torah scrolls rot in the corner of the run down temple. I didn’t think it meant deactivating our brains. When TV evangelists use this verse to hook everyday people with guilt just before taking up an offering, it rubs me wrong.
Actually, Robert, I thought that perhaps I had offended you. I am thrilled that I did not.
One of the major problems with religion is the dogmatic suggestion to “just believe.” What in the world does that mean. It means throw away your brains and just believe the Bible. I love Proverbs 14:15: “the simple believe every word.” I believe the scriptures are speaking about themselves. The “simple” just believe what they are told, or what they read. But that same scriptures goes on, “but the prudent looks well to his going.”
“The subtle religious message of “lean not unto thine own understanding” is “lean unto OUR understanding.” Actually, it is the spirit within us that has the “wisdom of God.” It is that God within that will “direct our paths.” In all your ways, acknowledge him (the God within) and he will direct you.
I appreciate your overall comment, as well.
Just a word about using concordances to interrupt scripture:
Every person, place, thing, and number have a spiritual significance. I have found much more meaning and consistency using metaphysical dictionaries. The Bible is similar to Esops Fables in that each “story” has a much deeper spiritual lesson. It is all about awakening our awareness that we are not separate from the Creator / Father / Divine ( whatever title we give the supreme power or force ) We are one with it. We can learn a lot from science fiction for truth truly is stranger and
greater than fiction.
May all those who truly seek find ” the pearl of great price “
Absolutely, C. Thanks for your comment.
C,
Thanks for the suggestion of using metaphysical dictionaries. I was wondering if anyone had written an esoteric annotated bible. It would be cool to read the bible through from cover to cover with each page annotated with esoteric treasures. There could be a section for Gnostic scriptures.
It is interesting having a “C” pop into the comments, sort of like Star Trek’s “Q”.
Let me add here that I do not use the concordance to interpret scripture, but for the Hebrew and Greek numbers that make it easy to do scripture word searches that allow me to see how a particular word is used throughout the scriptures. In that way it is an invaluable tool, as I have just written in a comment to Robert a few minutes ago.
Dear All,
There are some very intense comments made here in this blog and I am prompted to remind all that everything holds an answer, what you say, how you react or respond, what the other says, answers in questions.
Also, life itself it is for the living, all through one’s life, go back and think about it, are questions you had then being answered now, the nature teaches, the animals teach us.
Combining all of this with the Scripture and the Bible can and will give us always a better understanding. It was written to teach, to help us evolve, to learn but mostly to help us remember.
Luke 1:37 – For with God nothing shall be impossible.
With Love,
Sparks
Ahhh, the love of Sparks in action. After seeing your comment, I had to go back and look at my comments and see if I am a guilty party here. Guess what? I am. Sometimes we don’t realize the intensity of our words until after we write them. My apologies.
Sparks, that is why I tell you that your love is a vital component of our existence, and is more valuable than you could ever realize.
Thanks again for this, and for ALL of your wonderful contributions to SOS, and to life in general.
“We look for the Secret – the Philosopher’s Stone, the Elixir of the Wise, Supreme Enlightenment, ‘God’ or whatever…and all the time it is carrying us about…It is the human nervous system itself.” – Robert Anton Wilson
“O, what a world of unseen visions and heard silences, this insubstantial country of the mind! What ineffable essences, these touchless rememberings and unshowable reveries! And the privacy of it all! A secret theater of speechless monologue and prevenient counsel, an invisible mansion of all moods, musings, and mysteries, an infinite resort of disappointments and discoveries. A whole kingdom where each of us reigns reclusively alone, questioning what we will, commanding what we can. A hidden hermitage where we may study out the troubled book of what we have done and yet may do. An introcosm that is more myself than anything I can find in a mirror. This consciousness that is myself of selves, that is everything, and yet is nothing at all – what is it?
And where did it come from?
And why?”
– Julian Jaynes, The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind
Robert said something very important in a previous post:
“I think there is something delicate about the development of Christ consciousness within. It starts out like a soft mushy embryo until it is more fully developed and ready to peck its way out of its shell. ”
Right on – words have an inner and outer nature. This is why the unspeakable name Yod-Hay-Vav-Hay contains TWO Hays, or lives. But do we understand the meaning of Vav as the male fertilizing agent? Take a look at the Hebrew character Vav – it is a phallus, just as its expression on the existential plane is Sammekh (strut, support), which is the feminine agent, and the glyph is clearly a womb. (The word mater in latin means mother. We get the word “matter” from mater. Remember that the first Hay in Yod-Hay-Vav-Hay is the inner masculine, while the outer, fertilized by Vav, is the outer female.)
And when he had spoken these things, while they beheld, he was taken up; and a cloud received him out of their sight.
And while they looked steadfastly toward heaven as he went up, behold, two men stood by them in white apparel;
Which also said, Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? this same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven. – Acts 1:9-11
Do we believe that “heaven” is the realm of thought, ideas and imagination – the inner life – while earth is the outer realm of existence or manifestation? Perhaps the “cloud” is nothing more than the air and vapor of words without substance, misconceptions, superstitions, dogma – all those vague and misty concepts that keep people believing Jesus is someone other than the Self, and heaven a “place” somewhere north of here. Maybe the “cloud” in the mind (heaven) receives not only the story and teachings but the very name Yeshua as well, as a seed to be planted in the consciousness of those who remain on earth. Perhaps this points to the tragic mistake of building a physical church on Peter instead of on his name Bar Yownah, or son of the dove.
It is expedient for you that I go away: for if I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you. -John 16:7
Has it occurred to anyone that when Jesus told the Apostles to tell no one that he was the Christ it was because he meant it? Wouldn’t this be a clever way to say that in truth EVERYONE is the Christ?
The “cloud” obscures the manner and form in which Yeshua departed, and since he shall return in like manner (unknown), it is up to the individual – and no one else – how the seed of the name sprouts and returns to earth in a unique fashion. Then you know that your life is a word, and the Word is your life, and the words you vomit unconsciously finally stop devouring the earth you refuse to take complete responsibility for populating. Until then that area beyond words where the Word resides cannot be reached: the map is taken for the territory, shadows mistaken for substance, false Christs palmed off for the real McCoy, and words without meaning, words misunderstood, words divorced from their origin and oblivious of their destiny, will keep people chained by outmoded structures, patterns, conditions and bad programs that they refuse to not only shed but even acknowledge begetting to begin with, thereby leaving the seed of the living Word lost in a cloud of hot air, buried within a shell that dies fruitless in fallow ground. (When Cain “tilled the earth” he was digging up his true identity, and once he found it and understood his origin – and destiny – the mere existence of this Truth destroyed the impostor, for the two “brothers” in Genesis 4 symbolize a complex in your own psyche. Those who fail to acknowledge this see things only from Abel’s childish perspective, which leads them to continue killing Cain, that mythical destroyer of illusion.) What kills a word? What gives it life? Do we see that words play the game of duality, that they are both spirit and matter? What is a name? Who ARE you? WHAT are you? Words, words, words!
Thy words were found, and I did eat them; and thy word was unto me the joy and rejoicing of mine heart: for I am called by thy name, O LORD God of hosts. – Jeremiah 15:16
The conception of words in consciousness (heaven) plants the seeds of events and conditions on “earth”. However, this does’t seem to be an idea with enough traction here, (perhaps for the same reason why it’s easier to call Judas a traitor instead of Yeshua’s alter ego), and the failure to even consider this will prevent the true resurrection. For it is this very process that gives birth to the seed of Yeshua in heaven, or the mind, and brings the name to life in the heart of the individual on earth which comes accompanied by the conquest of death; to wit, the knowledge that death is an illusion – one more misunderstood and misused name – given life by that cloud of words in your head chained to fear and socially conditioned emotions in bondage to words. Just as suffering is a seed growing wild in the minds of many, watered and fertilized right here in countless posts, it manifests and yields a bumper crop on your “earth”. But a new heaven and earth are waiting to be formed right now. The end of the world is real, and it’s here now, this moment. It’s the end of the world as you know it – that is, as you THINK you know it. (Beliefs kill, but the eternal Word gives life.) You must be complicit in your own end in order to know the beginning – which has no end. Get your head out of the “cloud” and stop trying to describe it, because this is what kills the name that cannot be spoken and spawns every false name populating the earth you and only you nourish. (Maybe the deluge Noah had to escape from was one made of words that destroyed the earth…)
This post is called the ROOT cause of all suffering. It too is lost in the cloud without knowing it. The post IS the very root itself, blaming someone or something else for the crop it yields – with words, words, words…
Pedro,
I am very interested in learning about the basics of three themes that reoccur in your comments.
(1) The Y H V H theme. In simple terms, what do the letters stand for? What is the meaning of the sexual metaphor between the H V H? How does this help me?
(2) The Unity of Opposites. Good and Evil. Satan and God. Judas and Jesus. Does this have something to do with good cop/bad cop? How is “Judas the betrayer” the alter ego of “Jesus the savior” and what so good about this if it is true.
(3) The External World as a Manifestation of each of our Interior Worlds. This eludes me. But I acknowledge that if I temporarily block out the toxicity of the external world by going deep into myself and let my thoughts dwell on my personal image of a safe and beautiful world, then when I come back out, the external world seems a lot less toxic.
Pedro…
Tried to e-mail you recently to solicit a blog post from you. I am interested to see where you would take one. Possibly it ended up in your spam folder. If so, check it. If you did get the e-mail and purposely did not respond, then no worries. I can respect that as well.
Paul,
You may want to consider the problem that arises in people when they are exposed to too much legalistic preaching about reaping and sowing from sin, the wages of sin is death, and the so-called “inevitable” payback for wrongdoing. To me that is a false Gospel. When I was exposed to it, it made me nervous, expecting payback for every mistake, gave me a very negative self-image, made me feel that I had no place to hide, that I was wicked and there is no peace for the wicked, etc. It is impossible to love yourself or to love others in such a state of mind. You feel trapped and wanting to break out and rebel against the authority preaching that, or to suppress the pain in deep depression and hopelessness.
My take on your experience with the car, is that it was a jolt that propelled you into a higher state of consciousness because it allowed you to feel connected by common suffering with the owner of the car you wasted. Once you were jolted into the higher state, you became self-corrective and I am certain that you did not have to pay the full penalty for every mistake you made after that, and that you became more gracious to those who made mistakes against you.
If you consider this, then maybe I will have helped you to stretch your presentations beyond such a strong emphasis on the law and open up some additional areas for you to reach and rescue others who are imprisoned by it. You certainly have a lot of ability and a loving heart.
Something I neglected to say.
I also strongly believe in the concept of love/mercy, although not by some “deity” in “heaven.” Love is the answer to our “sins.” Of course, because spiritual law is all about love.” That was the purpose for my article. Love is the answer to all that ails us. “Forgive and it shall be forgiven you.” “Love covers a multitude of sins.” “He who loves is born of God.”
Hi Robert.
The problem with the concepts of “punishment for sin” and “the wages of sin being death” have not so much to do with the scriptural dictates as it does the cultural definition of “sin,” as taught by the church. The church simply does not understand what the Bible defines as “sin,” which is merely the “worship” of external beings, rather than the cultivating of the God power within each of us. The “wages” for this “sin” certainly is spiritual death, meaning “desolation” or “powerlessness.” This worship of man, rather than the cultivation of the internal power — what the Bible calls “seeking the Kingdom” is what the Bible calls the “abomination that causes desolation.” This is a problem common to man. We worship “created beings” (each other) rather than cultivating the God power within us. This is the real meaning of Romans 1:26-27, which has absolutely nothing to do with homosexuality. This worship of man (represented in scripture by Eve — not Adam) is what scripture means by “leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in his lust one toward another.” The scriptures are merely instructing us in what happens to us when we do this. I would ask the question, “does that make it a false gospel?”
When the Bible references the law of sowing and reaping, It is not referring specifically to sin, but to ALL actions. We reap what we sow. I truly believe that. It is something I think we all need to remember, especially when we seek to hurt a fellow human being. All actions bring reactions. It doesn’t mean we are bad people if we commit what some would call “bad” actions. If I tell my 2-year-old: “if you touch that hot stove, you’re going to get burned,” I’m simply stating a fact. If he touches the stove and gets burned, it doesn’t mean he is a bad or evil person; nor does it mean I set out to punish him, but it does mean that he had to learn the lesson for himself. Not necessarily a bad thing. Pain is a very powerful and effective teacher.
The scriptures of the world constitute spiritual instruction regarding how life works. If we ignore them and do as we please, it doesn’t mean we’re bad people. It just means we have to learn the lessons for ourselves. If those lessons cause us pain, perhaps that is the best way to learn the lesson. “Experience” may not be the best teacher (and maybe it is), but it certainly is the most effective.
Finally, I absolutely do believe that the consequences for my actions in my three personal experiences related in my article were karmic in nature. I believe in the law of karma (which is the same as the law of sowing and reaping). I very strongly believe that if everyone would examine their lives, they would find some common “karmic” denominators; the good and the “bad.” This would certainly be more just than the concept of burning in eternal hell fire for actions that could never deserve such a final result. Don’t you think?
So sorry, Robert. This comment (4:42 pm) was intended to go above the 4/10/2014 – 4:55 pm comment.
Paul,
I have come to firmly believe from my experiences that the only purpose of karmic effects are to increase the level of consciousness, not to mete out a balanced punishment in proportion to the crime. Mechanical justice is a scale of ethics that we learn in spiritual kindergarten, and something we carry with us as a useful reference. However, in spiritual first grade, something else takes hold, and we may become aware of some karmic effects of the good and bad we do, but only for the purpose of furthering our growth in special situations, not for the purpose of satisfying a mechanical scale of simple justice, a tit for a tat. In third grade, we learn to seek good because seeking good has become an intrinsic part of us, not because we are worried about punishment and reward. We humans slip and slide in our progress, so we may need occasional reminders through karma to tweak us back on course. But also, at some point, we become grateful when the grace of the universe shines upon us, and so in fourth grade we become motivated to shine that grace on others, to love them and forgive them, to nurture them and overlook simple justice if it does not serve the greater cause of raising consciousness.
This is not at all directed at you, because you are a loving person. But my experience has shown
that people who get stuck on simple justice and never get to grace can become mean and harm others with their attitude. And in almost every case I have seen this, these stuck people are hiding a gross sin that they may not even acknowledge to themselves, and they will whitewash it with every form of feigned spirituality they can create. They usually have had overbearing parents, or some form of excessive justice meted out to them. Or sometimes they have been severely hurt by someone who has violated them or those close to them, and they are motivated to seek revenge on all trespassers.
Ok so I realize that I have missed much in the few days since i was away from the blog, and I plan on reading and possibly posting responses to the comments above. So this comment may not be needed, but the thought hit me hard as I laid in bed last night and after it passed the thought that It must be shared was so loud that I nearly got up and posted it then (this is 1 am mind you and getting up at that hour would only alert the dog and wake the baby so I held off until today.).
As I lay in bed, doing my nightly meditation/contemplation session I kept being drawn to the idea of Karma. Is it not the very definition of justice and something so easily seen within the old testament. KARMA IS THE LAW OF SCRIPTURE, it brings justice to all (regardless of person). But isn’t the whole point of love to be above justice? Aren’t we told to turn the other cheek, give more of our selves to the thief, and love those who hate us? These things are not just, they are not Karmic in nature, they are loving.
Paul you show very clearly that fear/hatred is the cause of suffering, but I say that it is more than that. Fear is the cause of the LAW, it is the cause of Karma! We are told that through Christ we receive grace, undeserved grace. Grace is the abstaining of the law (sin) so that we could be with God. If we translate this into the esoteric view what we see is that Love allows us to rise above Karma.
Think about it, Karma says you reap what you sow… everyone has done at least one think, knowingly or not, that would cause Karma to sentence them to “hell”. But we all know better than to believe that will occur, unless we will it of course.
Much Love,
Justin
Justin,
I think you clarified a lot of what I was aiming at and added a lot more perspective, especially the part about opting out of grace and choosing instead to will karma into existence.
I thought of the movie “Les Miserables” as illustrating the contrast between overbearing justice versus redemption through grace and love. The police officer who lived by, and only by, the law had a melt down when the man he was trying to bring to justice saved his life. But rather than change his attitude, he committed suicide. The church in France at that time in history was oppressing the poor and needy with an overblown system of justice.
Another example of overblown justice is portrayed in “Lonesome Dove” where cow herders hanged one of their companions who had joined in with a group of men while traveling alone through hostile country to protect himself from Indians, and the men he fell in with later turned out to be cattle rustlers. His fellow cow herders came after the rustlers and when a gunfight ensued, their companion who had fallen in with the rustlers fought for the cow herders. However the cow herders later hanged him as a rustler to preserve the principle of law, rather than trying to redeem their companion (as God had redeemed Lot from Sodom).
Other examples are “The Fugitive” where the detective relentlessly pursues an escaped prisoner who has been wrongly convicted of murder even though he knows he is innocent, and “Red Dawn”. where there was a scenario similar to Lonesome Dove.
A very recent example of heavy handed justice was the trial in Russia of the punk group of young female political anti-Putin activists “Pussy Riot”. They were charged with crimes that could have had them locked away in a Russian labor camp for up to seven years, when all they did was commit a misdemeanor. They were sentenced to two years in a forced labor camp, a very brutal environment where prisoners rights were repeatedly violated.
Robert and Justin:
I so appreciate both of your comments. I guess I am guilty of an inability to adequately convey my thoughts on this matter. The entire point of my article is that love is THE mitigating factor for karma, which includes the suffering brought on by our actions. The way the scripture puts it (and there many ways scripture addresses this, all basically saying the same thing) is that the “blood of Christ” (the “fruit of the vine,” or “fruit of the spirit,” the first of which is love) covers a multitude/cleanses us, of sins. “You must be “born again” in order to enter the kingdom of God, and “he who loves is born of God.” “He who does NOT love is NOT born of God,” etc.
Of course not all karma is “evil,” but love is the “grace” that covers the evil aspects thereof.
This is why love is such an important part of — and I believe the essence of — spiritual life. God is love. Thus “love” is the definition of God. Christ is the power of love. “I can do all things through Christ which strengthens me.” “Without me you can do nothing.” “Christ, the power of God and the wisdom of God.”
I’m not sure I can explain it any better than that, but I am sure not opposed to trying.
Paul,
I think after what you just explained, we are getting to a good clarification and commonality of viewpoint. One of the challenges in discussions among modern esoteric believers is learning how to translate from one school of thought with its pet phrases and terms to another.
I like the statement made by the apostle with the same name as yours, “There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death.” (Rom 8:1,2)
I would think the law of sin and death is somewhat equivalent to the concept of negative karma.
Exactly!! This is why “love worketh no ill to his neighbour: therefore love is the fulfilling of the law” (Rom. 13:10).
Love equals the end of suffering; the summation of the point of this article.
Thanks for your comment, Robert.
Paul,
Thanks. I just read an article by a well known biblical scholar, Professor Bart Ehrman. He was once an Evangelical Christian, minister, studied under the best theologians at Princeton Theological Seminary, and is now Professor of Religious Studies at University of North Carolina.
His scholarship led him to become first a liberal Christian, and then an agnostic. The thing that led him to become an agnostic was not his discovery that the bible is full of errors and forgeries, but that he could not believe that God would allow so much suffering. Many other people react that way to awareness of suffering. But then others do just the opposite. I wonder why?
I think there are varying degrees of sight and blindness. Each of us sees the world not the way IT is, but the way WE are. If we all saw the world the way it is, we’d all see the same things. I am often amazed at how some people believe some of the things they believe. Then I see that I myself believed some of those things at one time, and it moves me away from the judgmental platform.
In my own God awareness, it took a long time and a LOT of heartache and headache to come to the conclusion that if there indeed was a literal God “out there” inhabiting a literal heaven, he would be an awfully cruel and tyrannical being. This tyrannical God, who claims to know all things, knowing the end from the beginning, creates a being (Satan) who turns against him. Then he creates a being (Adam) who disobeys him. Then both beings are condemned to eternal hell fire, to burn forever and ever in an unfathomable torment that boggles the mind when you think about it. If this God knows the end from the beginning, wouldn’t he have know all of this, and if so, couldn’t he have created a different model? This same God allows tsunamis, terrorist attacks, innocent people to die from violence he would have to take credit for, having created it all, etc. It makes no sense.
“When the blind lead the blind ….” Unfortunately, those who understand the least about the scriptures are also the one most visible in teaching them. When you come to understand that the Bible is merely a litany of fables, fairy tales and horror stories, all designed to reveal massive spiritual truths about our inner core, then our studies take on new meaning, as does the Bible itself, as does our lives. In fact, our entire perspectives change. I, for one, am thrilled that there is a guide that deals with our inner core, because most educational materials in the world are concerned with external life.
The God power is in us. This is the greatest truth contained in scriptures. The violent acts depicted in Daniel, Matthew and Revelation, for example, are all acts that happen within the human being and not something that happens in our material world. However, the Bible appears to be a prophetic book that outlines future events to happen on our literal earth. It is these events that give rise to what Matt. 24 refers to as “sign and wonders that would deceive even the very elect, if that were possible.”
For example, in Matthew 24 (the depiction of The Great Tribulation), Jesus leaves the temple and says, “not one stone will be left upon another.” In other words, the entire structure will come crashing down.
Well, WE are the temple, and when Jesus leaves the temple (his death within us), the rest of the stones of the temple are no longer supported by the “Chief Cornerstone,” and the temple perishes. This leads to our powerlessness/suffering in the midst of our trials and tribulations. The whole chapter is about what happens to us when we become powerless. Revelation 6 is a mirror of Matt. 24; the stories are the same.
In short, we have been taught the Bible by people who do not understand it. I once heard it said that it is ten times more difficult to unlearn something once you have accepted it as truth, than it is to learn something new. After much pondering, and through my own personal experience, I completely agree with this. Coming to understand that Jesus was not a literal being who walked planet earth was like experiencing the death of a close member of my family. It was very traumatic, but in the end, I finally came to accept it. Once I did, it began to change my life.
If we want to know the truth, we must be willing to let go of all that we think we know. In my experience, this is one of the most difficult challenges any human being will ever face, primarily because we rest our entire existence on the ideas and beliefs we accept as truth. Unfortunately, this would be a little too traumatic for most people, and so religion serves a very valuable purpose in our culture, as you so eloquently pointed out yourself in one of your previous comments. People need something to hold on to, and believing in one’s own power is a little too big for some to digest.
Below is a link to a news article that came out on 4/10/2014. It contains some interesting data regarding growing skepticism of the Bible in the American culture.
http://www.aol.com/article/2014/04/10/number-of-bible-skeptics-rises-in-u-s/20866877/?icid=maing-grid7%7Chtmlws-main-bb%7Cdl13%7Csec1_lnk3%26pLid%3D463160
Blessings to all.
P
Joshua,
Your email probably did go to my spam box, but I’ll go fish it out and respond once I retrieve it. I’m currently tramping South America and Holy Week is about to commence, so while I’m interested in perhaps turning one of my “comments” into a post, I’ll need some time to think about it…
Robert,
YHVH could be said to mean Existence, Life, Copulation, Life. Yod is the tenth and smallest letter in the Hebrew alphabet and means “hand”, “small fist”, “existence”, and as the tenth letter has much to do with the 10 commandments and the killing of the “first born son”. What comes after the nine months of gestation, from Aleph to Tayt? 10 or Yod. (Notice how the letter Tayt is a snake, containing the Yod within Tayt and Tav.) In English we get iota from Yod – do you know iota? As far as the formula is concerned, it must be experienced, not explained. Visualize the letters and consider their meanings. Hebrew is a projective language, as opposed to a discursive one. Music and mathematics are also projective languages. So for example, a musician looking at a sheet of music from a Beethoven sonata could understand those bars, clefs, numbers (tempo) and notes, and by “reading” the paper would proceed to hear the actual song in his head. Whereas in English, and most other languages, the words are only symbols that point to something else, and even then we understand things in terms of their opposites: hot vs cold, light vs dark, pretty vs ugly, etc.
Furthermore logic doesn’t permit the existence of contradiction, which is a shame because life may very well be a paradox. (The Tao and Heraclitus explain the paradox beautifully, Nietzsche too.) The only way around this is to abolish your way of “logical” thinking and open your mind to the possibility that there is in fact unity in opposites, that there is far more than the senses observe. I’ve used the thermometer as an example before – there is no clear line that separates hot from cold, only degrees. Maybe this is the case with far more of what you observe, for the measurable has its origin in the immeasurable, does it not? (Do you realize that while your 5 senses measure the world around you, it is your mind that interprets the data coming in? There is no greater trickster than your own mind…) There is a double contradictory movement involved in the play between Aleph and Yod, or life and existence. It is at the heart of the Hebrew myth. Most people play on the side of Yod, thus killing Aleph, when life is about playing according to Aleph. To choose Aleph is to eat of the fruit. To choose Yod is to forever avoid the tree of knowledge of good and evil and simply exist with eyes closed. The result of fearing and avoiding the wise serpent offering the fruit is that one day the snake simply bites you and you die – without having ever lived. Qayin (Cain) achieves the unity of Aleph and Yod on the cosmic level (Qof).
When Jesus called himself Ben Adam, or son of Adam (son of Man is a mistranslation), he was saying something immense. Adam is a formula, not a name. Adam is Aleph, Dallet, Mem, which is 1.4.40 or 600. 40 pertains to existence or time, while the 600 is cosmic fertility, hence Noah’s ripe age of 600 when the “flood” came. There is no verse in the mistranslation that says Adam actually woke up from that cute little surgery (keep in mind though that again, the outer feminine, “mother of all living”, has its origin in the inner masculine). And yet this is the job of everyone – to awaken Adam, or Aleph in the blood, for Dam in Hebrew means blood, which makes Adam an equation of Aleph (inconceivable energy of life/death) in Dam (blood). Heaven in Hebrew is Shamayim, and while it contains Yod, it does not contain Aleph because it is frozen in the “earth” awaiting resurrection. Only you can resurrect it. (Remember too that the 10th plague is turning the water of Egypt into BLOOD. Numbers!!!)
Jesus vs Judas = Light vs Darkness, God vs Satan. Opposites merge in union. Think of the word Lucifer. Consider the meaning of Prometheus. Note how the name of YHWDH (Judas) is the Tetragrammaton with a Dallet (door, resistance) thrown in. Note how similar the name Yehoudah is to Yehoudi, or Jew. Ask yourself why Da Vinci put the knife in the hand of Peter instead of Judas in his Last Supper. (There are two Satans, Judas AND Peter, but Satan is a formula which ends in Nuwn (50) but can also be Nuwn Sophiyt (700). This makes a world of difference. Consider what it means that the “Jesus” who appears on the shore at the end of John’s gospel might be a magician manifested by bad logic. Would the apostles really fail to identify him just a few days after the crucifixion, after being with him every day during his ministry? Why does this “Jesus” call Peter Simon, indicating a regression? Would Jesus really suppose that someone could possibly love him more than others, as if Peter was some kind of expert on measuring love? Judas wears the label of traitor because people are rife with guilt for killing the Christ in themselves by ignoring the teaching of Yeshua.
As for the inner and outer worlds, the only reality is what’s inside you. Maybe the “world” you see is nothing more than the answers to your thoughts and questions, making YOU the answer to everything. Perhaps the world is your face, so to speak. The so-called facts take shape according to your own thoughts and emotions about them. “Two men looked through the prison bars. One saw the mud, and the other saw the stars.” Which are you? Ramakrishna said “bondage and liberation are of the mind alone.” Your mind and heart are measuring instruments. If you see suffering outside of you it is because you see it with your inner eye first. Jung said “He who looks outside dreams. He who looks inside awakens.” No one but you creates the world you live in. If there is war it is only a manifestation of the psychological battles raging in the minds of men. Maybe Cain’s offering was rejected because he hadn’t yet understood his identity, and so he was worshiping the same idol as Abel, not yet understanding the name. Look at the ONLY words Eve says at the beginning of Genesis 4. Why do people ignore them?
Everything outside of you is an answer. You are the question. No one else can solve the riddle of who you are…
Pedro,
Thank you for taking the time to try to explain these three concepts while on your busy trek through South America. It’s a little clearer now, not entirely, but at least I am more familiar now with the areas of knowledge from which these concepts are derived. I would probably have to read some basic books or web articles before I could truly grasp them.
On the inner and outer world issue, are you saying I can make all wars in the outer world go away by going into my inner world and willing it to be, because my inner world creates the outer world?
Based on personal experience and experimentation, I am willing to consider milder versions of that. I believe my inner world can influence the outer world, but not in such an unlimited and immediate manner. I wonder if you could clarify your concept so that it is more real to me, or suggest what I can do to improve my understanding of it.
Paul,
That article is very revealing. The bible’s popularity is declining in the ratings and may be cancelled next season, so to speak. What seems to be taking its place, however, is an amorphous, slightly new age pop secularism, with wisps of alternative spirituality practiced as a hobby being spread a million ways like all the toppings on a supreme pizza.
Some mainstream religions are aware of the decline in conservative Christianity and trying to reform and clean up their act, like the new Pope. Evangelicals have formed a media cult.
SOS is referenced to the bible, even though it is a radically different interpretation of it. As interest and familiarity with the bible continues to fade, will the interest in esoteric interpretations of it also begin to wane? Perhaps SOS and programs like it are a temporary rehabilitation service for spiritual addicts weaning themselves off of the opium of conservative religion.
My question is, where are we all going after that? Are we all going to become stay-at-home spiritual hobby cliques going in a million separate directions with no main focused channel of influence. Or is some new uniting denomination going to go on the air next season, so to speak.
If there is nothing centralized and influential to take the place of Christianity as we know it, it will leave a vacuum for Islam to fill. Islam is now the fastest growing religion in the world. In its purest form, Islam is another beautiful flower in the garden of religions; but as it is practiced today for the most part, it is an overpowering weed that considers every other living thing in the garden to be an infidel to be conquered and extinguished.
Where is the planet going?
The reason for the Bible’s waning popularity is the poison that has been injected into it by the scholars/theologians. Revelation 22:18-19 states:
For I testify unto every man that hears the words of the prophecy of this book, If any man shall add unto these things, God shall add unto him the plagues that are written in this book; and if any man shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part out of the book of life, and out of the holy city, and [from] the things which are written in this book.
The entire Christian world has been deceived by the translators of the book. In many cases, whole verses are practically rewritten. Even as originally written, the Bible is merely a map. But we take the map for the vehicle, believing that by reading it, we are somehow “doing the will of God.” It’s like studying a map with the thought that this study will somehow take us to our destination. “And why call ye me, Lord, Lord, and do not the things which I say” (Luke 6:46)?
Religion calls the Bible “the Word of God,” and thus people worship the book as though it were God himself. But the book itself explains what the Word of God is, and it’s not the book. “And he [was] clothed with a vesture dipped in blood: and his name is called The Word of God” (Rev 19:13).
This is the Christ that is “with you,” and shall be “in you” (you and Christ, ONE FLESH — this is the real meaning of Biblical marriage). It is this Christ IN YOU that is your “hope of glory.”
This message is simply not preached on a global scale, and so the real message of the Bible has been lost. People tired of the “interpretations of hate” by the ministers of religion (God hates sin, God hates homosexuals, God hates black people, God hates, God hates, God hates) are looking for something more. “GOD IS LOVE. This message is given lip service only.
The messages of the Bible are extraordinarily powerful! But those messages must be experienced, not merely read. “Prove all things, say the scriptures. But religious teachings say “just believe.” They simply do not understand what is meant by “belief.”
No one can give you experience. “Faith without works is dead.” God is experiential, NOT intellectual. It’s not about cognition. It’s about BEING. The power of the Bible is not in the READing, it’s in the DOing. Do it, and you will know its power. But do what? How can you do what you don’t understand? Unfortunately, the translators have hid the “do what” from us. “Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools.”
The Bible, like Adam, has to die. It must be “sown naturally” (buried in death), so it can be “raised spiritually” (raised to life). “The words that I speak, they are spirit, and they are life.” The natural Bible will ultimately be replaced by the “spiritual” Bible, and then it will have the capacity to change the world if people would heed its real message, which is to find Christ within yourself, not in the pages of a book. But UNlike the raised Christ, even the spiritual Bible must die, because the great purpose for the Book is to lead you to your inner power. Once it has done that, there is no more need for the book. It will have done its job and can be discarded.
Robert,
Define Christianity. How long have people been worshiping and idolizing a dead man nailed to a cross?
“They must find it hard to take Truth for authority who have so long mistaken Authority for Truth.” – Gerald Massey
There’s no need for any religion. Do you see that by asking what will take the place of “Christianity” you are setting the stage for a continued separation between man and “God”. The Bible is simply a way to bridge that gap (which is only an illusion to begin with) and no one else can help you with this endeavor. So long as people continue to look for answers anywhere but within, religions – and especially the State – will prey upon the deepest need of humanity and declare that without their intercession there is no salvation. Peter has literally been feeding the “sheep” for almost 2000 years, teaching them to follow wolves playing pastor. To seek the approval of any authority but the one within is to seek to gain the world at the cost of the soul.
Pedro,
You bring up an interesting paradox. Religion causes all these problems so we should do away with every form of it entirely. If we do that, then we would have to be sure that children would be able to instantly and automatically learn to live harmoniously in society if given one simple instruction “look within”, without any other parental advice or restrictions to protect them. Infants would be taught to look within and then they would automatically know that they should share their toys and go to bed at a regular time. When the teenage hormones kick in and drive them nuts, they would automatically look within and conquer all biological excesses in a manner that is socially acceptable and without unexpected pregnancies. Immature adults or adults who have been traumatized or abused, or males with double Y chromosomes would also just fit right in by being taught to look within.
I am not sure I can agree with that based on what I know, but I am willing to consider something less extreme, like less mature people could improve by being trained to look within, to harness intuition and connection to the All. But wouldn’t the act of training them to do so be the imposition by parental authority of a “look within” religion?
I guess what I seem to observe is that we do not get to the “look within” level until we have been trained in some temporarily useful but imperfect code until we are mature enough to rise above the code and embrace something better. As Josh has pointed out, this usually occurs as a result of a crisis associated with suffering, and which awakens the inner being to search and find a better solution than the original code.
I also observe that as much as we are upset with the code and its corruptions, that there is a symbiotic relationship between the code and the better (esoteric) solution. One cannot exist without the other., even though they are contradictory.
So if a code is needed in order to transcend it, and if we destroy a code, such as Christianity, there will be a natural need for another useful but imperfect code to take it’s place, in order for the process of transcendence to occur.
Another thing I have observed, is that diversified, independent, fractionated schools of learning do not survive well in mass society. The early myriad of Gnostic movements lost out to a politically unified, somewhat corrupted, but stable movement of Christianity that served as an imperfect but necessary infrastructure and vehicle to carry the hidden seeds for transcendence.
We can revise and improve the infrastructure so that it does not have so many barriers to transcendence. But there are some good reasons those barriers are there … like to prevent profaning of the hidden wisdom by the immature.
But just to demolish the infrastructure would invite something possibly more corrupt or unknown to take its place.
So the current decline of our parent Christianity will effect its offspring … esoteric Christianity. We can reform the parent. But if we destroy the parent, either another parent will takes it place, or total chaos.
Perhaps a uniform esoteric religion will take its place, where everyone understands the common basics and there is not so much confusion translating concepts from one school to another as there is now. Several attempts have been made so far, but no one school has emerged. Also, early communist societies in Russia and China experimented with trying to destroy all religious infrastructure. It didn’t work.
The best shot we have is to reform the infrastructure.
Robert:
The first question I would ask is, “is religion causing all of our problems, or have all of our problems caused religion?”
You question what would happen to the culture without the current Christianity. I would counter that with a question. What gave birth to Christianity? Wouldn’t it have been the creation of people who, believing the literal interpretation of the Bible, sought to teach their interpretations to the masses? And what was the culture like before Christianity was created? Because if the culture once existed without it, couldn’t the culture again exist without it?
In general, structure exists not because it is a necessity, but because the people call for it. This is the natural state of man, who doesn’t realize that there is no need for structure. Structure causes problems. We steal because there are laws telling us not to steal. We commit adultery because there are laws telling us not to commit adultery. If we had a culture and a society free from all these laws and rules of men, we’d have a much more responsible and orderly society, contrary to popular opinion and belief.
What is the best way to get someone to do something? Is it to tell him to do it, or to tell him NOT to do it? Why do you think that “it is appointed for man once to die,” yet God told Adam and Eve NOT to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil? Adam had to die in order to be resurrected as Christ. This is also why WE eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and die. We, too, MUST learn from experience that eating from it causes spiritual DEATH. This death is good because in order to live spiritually, we must learn what it is that kills us. This must be experiential. No one can teach is to us.
Natural man, seeking to establish his own ideas of peace and justice, makes rules and law that he thinks are for the betterment of the culture. Yet, everything we are told not to do we do with abandon.
Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools” (Rom. 1:22)
Nevertheless, religion serves a vital purpose. We call for it (and it is given to us) because we are not able to accept that we are more powerful than we could EVER know, and that we have no need for others to rule over us. This constitutes the majority of the world as we know it, and is the single greatest reason for the multiple thousands (millions?) of religions on our globe today. When the power and wisdom of God (Christ) is resurrected within us, “IT RULES with a rod of iron.” We want rulers over us because we don’t understand that we don’t need them, and that we are committing adultery with these rulers. “My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge” (Hos. 4:6).
Because strait [is] the gate, and narrow [is] the way, which leads unto life, and few there be that find it” (Matt. 7:14). Few will find the freedom of God within themselves, because they won’t look there. Again, scripture says: “God looked down from heaven upon the children of men, to see if there were [any] that did understand, that did seek God” (Psa. 53:2).
Here is a powerful ancient Indian legend that captures the essence of God within oneself:
There was a time when all men and women were gods, but they so abused their divinity that Brahma, the ‘chief God’, decided to take it away from men and women and hide it where they would never find it again. Where to hide it became the big question.
When the lesser gods were called into council to consider this question, they said, “We will bury man’s divinity deep in the earth.” But Brahma said, “No, that will not do, for man will dig deep down into the earth and find it.” Then they said, we will sink his divinity into the deepest ocean.” But again Brahma replied, “No, not out there, for man will devise a way to dive into the deepest waters, will search out the ocean bed, and will find it.”
Then the lesser gods said, “We will take it to the top of the mountain and there hide it.” But again Brahma replied, “No, for man will eventually climb every high mountain on earth. He will be sure some day to find it and take it up again for himself.” Then the lesser gods gave up and concluded, “We do not know where to hide it, for it seems there is no place on earth or in the sea that man will not eventually reach.”
Then Brahma said, “Here is what we will do with man’s divinity. We will hide it deep down within man himself, in his Heart, for there he will never look!”
* * * * *
Because strait [is] the gate, and narrow [is] the way, which leads unto life, and few there be that find it.”
Today is Palm Sunday in which Christians remember Jesus’ triumphant entry into Jerusalem, cheered on by hoardes of believers, laying palm fronds beneath the hooves of a donkey, divinely ordained to carry the Messiah; presumably to a triumphant appearance at the Feast of the Passover. The long anticipated Messiah had arrived.
One can only imagine what happened in the subsequent few days, culminating in the crucifixion on Friday afternoon. Symbolicly, the week of the Passion can be viewed as a panoply of some of the most profound sources of human suffering; betrayal, destructive mass hypnosis, bitter defeat, out and out cruelty, as well as the other side of human suffering when our expectations of ourselves and others fail to materialise.
So, Palm Sunday is a high point and Good Friday is the lowest of lows. Is this not a reasonable symbol of the grief that seems to visit so many of us in the course of a lifetime?
And is it not natural at times of such utter defeat that we would evetually seek out some form of resurrection of our broken dreams? And is the Christian Church any different in seeking to resurrect their all powerful Messiah, from the defeat suffered at the hands of human fallibility?
The subsequent 2,000 years have been interesting to say the least. One suspects that spin doctors within Roman Empire and its various derivatives, such as the Catholic Church and various Europen monarchs have rewritten history in support of the notion that Jesus did not really die; he really is the supra-human Messiah.
For others, it seems that the memory of Jesus, the man, as well as the Christ consciousness that we are all One, lives on as a source of inspiration in the face of human frailty.
Perhaps, as we remember the historical turbulence of this week leading into Easter, it is worth looking forward as well as backwards, and ask what would Jesus do if he were to return on this Palm Sunday.
What would he do when he heard about Muslims and other non-Christian religions? Would he issue a call to arms or would he seek a way for us to love each other?
How would he view the contemporary Christian Church? Would he endorse the fundamentalist dogma and the infallibility of the Bible or would he rephrase his previous admonition to remember that the Sabbath was made for Man, not the reverse?
Would he wish to be identified as a Christian, given the devisiveness that separate religious labels currently engender in our modern globalised culture? Or would he seek out a more harmonious way forward?
Would he point out that much human suffering actually still arises from some seriously stuffed up insane beliefs held by various groups of human beings?
Or would he simply say, “Peace be with you and try to love one another?”
Great Post, Brian.
The title of this article is “The Root Cause of All Suffering.” The root cause is a lack of unconditional love for one another. Life is all about love, and until we realize that, we will always fall short of the goal of life, which is love, joy, peace, etc. “No man is free until all men are free” (Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.). It is possible to free people from hunger, homelessness, destitution, mental suffering, human aggression, etc. It takes love and awareness. Through love, we could completely eradicate the need for prisons. Through love, we could eradicate the need for all militaries.
“The lamb will peacefully dwell with the lion. The leopard will lie down with kid.” “The wolf and the bear will no longer be wild.” The scriptures define these “beasts of the field” as men whose teeth are spears, and whose tongues are sharp swords.” These beasts can be tamed through love.
“LOVE NEVER FAILS!”
Brian, Pedro, Robert & Paul,
A heart understanding is surely coming through on all these comments, in other words each comment is holding a hidden truth for myself, thank you all for that.
Today, while I was doing errands, I had a particular question on my mind, then within moments, I received my “answers coming, be awake” signal.
I have come to know this over many years and mystical experiences entering after this special signal.
After, the answers were all over, and they were highly coded for only myself to understand through that particular question.
This I believe is where Pedro is coming from when he states:
“No one else can solve the riddle of who you are”…
Now I know it (the special signal), and all that we have been conditioned to believe is not who we are, the true self is quite near to us but it needs to be recognized by the heart and mind, then invited into our world, this self will then begin to reveal the true soul, our authentic being.
This I truly believe is available to every human on the planet, providing they are open to receive.
Actually, I had this on my mind for the comment and got off track for a bit there.
We here of course are all aware of the 10 commandments, which I believe were given in order for man/humans to evolve, this was a turning point in evolution and they were a necessary tool.
Raymond’s interpretation of them is a highly evolved version, the Biblical version was meant to be more severe and instill fear, in order for humans to evolve accordingly.
Fear is a powerful tool, any man who has been in the military can tell you that or anyone dealing/suffering in a Karmic storm, or in suffering physical pain.
Jesus, gave us only ONE (please correct me if I am mistaken) commandment, making them 11 commandments. This was actually a command and not a teaching.
He commanded us to “love one another”…
If only one command was given by Jesus, how important is this?
Especially as there is no such thing as try, its do!
Which I see flowing along nicely in this blog now!!
With Love,
Sparks
Robert,
You’re free to enjoy your infrastructure, but I’ll gladly take indetermination and freedom over any pattern, memory, ritual, routine, or guidelines to follow, which only make one live unconsciously by projecting the past into the future, thus living trapped in a mental cage. Everything you point out is something learned, and you seem to only envision a world where all these things continue to exist, because you insist on possessing a consciousness populated by them. Think about culture as your software. Do you know it’s possible to trash your software and get an upgrade?
You have many preconceptions about anything unknown, as evidenced by your assumption that “to upset the infrastructure would possibly invite something more corrupt or unknown.” You’re afraid of what you don’t know, period. No two moments are alike – yet people spend an inordinate amount of time trying to predict the future and ensure that they don’t encounter any surprises. This is to be afraid, inflexible, dead. Whether you realize it or not you seek comfort, when the Truth is anything but comfortable.
Small changes within cause cosmic changes without. This is why Gandhi said to be the change you want to see in the world. It’s up to no one but you. Your thoughts and emotions can change everything outside of you, people included. Try changing your feelings about something “bad” that happened to you in the past – stick a feeling of love and happiness to your worst memory and witness the fact that you can change the “past”. Then the present also changes, and you realize the power of thought and emotion to craft the world you want to live in. Talk of infrastructure is like a chick who can only envision life within an egg, thereby refusing to hatch and see the real world – and bring forth new eggs and chicks…
Noah is Noach in Hebrew, Nuwn-Cheyt. Cheyt is the archetype of all undifferentiated energy in the psyche. You don’t know what you’re capable of…
Pedro,
I find your conclusion very inspiring. I do realize I have a need to turn off the preconceptions and navigate the world from the inner wisdom, and that I suffer unnecessarily and hinder myself from succeeding when I don’t. Thank you.
WOW!! Very eloquent! Very elegant! Veeery deep!!
To All,
as Pedro has stated in the above comment:
“No two moments are alike – yet people spend an inordinate amount of time trying to predict the future”
Then we just have one moment in time…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wx4v6cO1GMk
to be Free
Hi Sparks.
I suspect the problem is not how much time people spend trying to predict the future; but rather how little. “The only exercise some folks get is when they jump to a conclusion.”
The fact is that it takes a great deal of conscious activity to make worthwhile predictions about the future. And without this logical analysis and scientific investigation, predictions are nothing more than guesses and the correlation between prediction and actual outcome tends to random chance.
The real folly lies not in our human ability to abstract a future tense, but rather in the casual way in which we construct our maps of the future. Far too often, we are guessing when we think we are predicting.
And I agree absolutely, that rather than guessing, our welfare is far better served by living in the moment, until the future (as it evolves into the present) becomes a bit more clear.
Sadly, a massive part of the modern economy is now based on so-called experts trying to sell us their guesses as accurate predictions. It is called snake oil. And there is a awful lot of it on offer. And a lot of its peddlers are not keen on discounting the price of their inferior product.
Sparks, did you ever read the Dice Man, written in the late 60’s. The main protagonist constructs six radically different personas and each hour, he rolls a die to determine which role he will act out for the next hour. It proves to be a whizzer of a party game; very humorous.
Best not to base your health care on the same principle, though.
Brian,
ain’t it the truth, ain’t it the truth
but hey baby, tomorrow’s another day ; )
I will not go shopping, I will not go shopping….
but I do have to try and wrangle up a copy of Dice Men, sounds good, thanks
Sparks
Sparks,
Exceedingly moving song. I decided while listening to it that although I have a past, I refuse to be its prisoner. Nice touch.
Brian,
I applaud your calm approach of integrating the left and right brain.
I retract the left brain and right brain comment, since I recently learned that research has debunked the myth that analytical thought is in one side and intuition in the other. But I think it is important to be calm and balanced. And some day I will be more so.
There are no accidents or coincidences in life. Just a few minutes ago I was playing an online game and a profile of one of the participants said this:
An old Cherokee told his grandson “My son, there is a battle between two wolves inside us all. One is EVIL, it is anger, jealousy, greed, resentment, inferiority, lies and ego. The other is GOOD, is it joy, peace, love, hope, humility, kindness, empathy and truth.” The boy thinks about it, then asks “Grandfather, which wolf wins?” The old man quietly replied, “The one you feed.”
Did this just pop out of the clear blue sky???
Had to share. Blessings to all!
Paul,
Very cool.
Hi Paul,
The Native Americans had such wonder, wisdom and knowing in their stories, there are many more beautiful stories if you are interested in them, just search the net and you will find more.
A true delight to the soul! We should all share these awesome stories with the youngsters and adults as well!
“WA do” for sharing as the universe speaks to you : )
(thank you in Cherokee)
Sparks
Sparks, thank you so much for sharing this. I will check it out.
Hi All,
I came across this, a writing I saved quite some time ago and thought to share in light of Paul’s writing and the succeeding comments:
Steps in perception that support the evolution of your Personal Sovereignty
1. It is of great value to regularly ask yourself “Who am I really”. Answers will begin to come, perhaps slowly – but if you listen and observe, they surely WILL come. They start to form an interlocking ‘jigsaw’ of information that adds up to a higher answer, a higher vision of who you really are. Hold the sum total of the answers you have so far up as a mirror to every opportunity and challenge that arises, so that you use who you really perceive that evolving self to be as context for every decision. This creates a positive feedback loop – the more you use who you perceive yourself to be in your daily life, the more you activate that higher self within you and become who you have envisaged.
2. Expect the answer to your question to evolve as you practice 1. Above. The answer will become bigger, clearer and more profound over time, expanding as you are able to deal with what you are being informed of. You will find – among many other things – that the authentic you has great power. It takes time to align with this, and learn how to use it. Great integrity in doing so will become all-important, for without this element you will undermine your own higher vision of who you are, and the vision will remain out of reach.
3. All around you holds answers to this most fundamental of questions. Answers will come in many forms, from the most direct of guidance to the subtle actions of wildlife around you, and the way in which events in your life flow. Ask yourself “Where does the flow want to take me?”, for it is often in a direction other than that in which you are currently travelling. ‘Going with the flow’ is often ‘preached’ as a wisdom – yet we are all so rigidly focused on the pressures and trivia of the day that that it is easy to ignore the many offers, the direction that ‘the flow’ would take us, that surround us. Such offers that have the potential to move us in new and beneficial directions – but only if we are willing, and only if we operate from love rather than fear. Appreciation of what the flow of events and intuitions may be offering, in the moment, is a key aspect of the context for deciding this key question of ‘Who am I really?’ Understanding of this involves vision, creativity, observation, intuition and lead directly to evolving higher consciousness – so be highly honoring of these modes of being, for they serve you well if so regarded.
4. The task as you move towards personal sovereignty is to be true to who you really are deep inside, almost to the point of being completely ruthless with yourself. The resulting clarity will encourage your evolution toward a new way of being and bring forward some needed actions in your life and path.
5. Present these things to the world with grace, and gently – do not force what you experience, or who you perceive yourself to be, upon others. Quiet power based in your own confidence about the higher vision of who you are will always bring you to a higher frequency than employing any kind of force. This quiet power gives you the authority of authentic beingness, alignment to that part of yourself that is most real (for many aspects of the person we project into our immediate world are un-real ‘fronts’, learned responses and the like). That quiet power allows you to show up as being a master of self, and not as one who is either the victim of circumstance, or is seeking to dictate to the world around them.
6. “I AM THAT…..” This is a powerful way, indeed, an empowering way, to start a statement in which you articulate that which you intend to manifest into your personal world. Used in conjunction with an evolving understanding of who you really are, such statements start to bring into focus your true role in being here – which is to become a fully empowered creator within this physical realm. This can only be derived from a sense of higher consciousness, and acting in service to others – essentially to the planet and humanity. Use ‘I AM THAT’ statements frequently, and as you do, they will become ever more empowering and effective.
7. When we have enough creators active in our world, it absolutely guarantees that the old and dying duality will finally pass, and a much higher reality will come fully into being. We are getting close to this point. Your active participation, as you consciously evolve who you perceive yourself to be and then activate that being into the physical: this participation is vital.
For YOU ARE THE VERY ONE WHO WILL MAKE THE FINAL DIFFERENCE!
Go well – for you are a creator god in the making. Honor your new role, for it, and your service to it. For this is what will now move humanity to the next level. Xavier Hermes
Sparks, this is indeed a very powerful writing. To me it encapsulates all that we are, and all that we are capable of becoming. This is why I say in this article that WE, individually, are the cause of, and the ultimate cure for, all natural disasters — the so-called “acts of God” — that we experience in our world. As God is in each one of us, these “acts of God” are actually acts of humanity. It is the God within each one of us that holds the responsibility for healing our planet and “setting the captives free.” We do it through the POWER OF LOVE — God’s only begotten son. Healing starts with us, individually! The more we come to realize this great truth, the more we can each begin to make the changes in our inner world necessary to effect the massive changes in our outer world that we wish to see. It all starts with you and me.
Thanks so much for sharing this.
“A prophet is not without honor, except in his own country.” – Mark 6:4
Perhaps this is to say that our awareness is suppressed and throttled by all those opinions, creeds, assumptions, aspirations, prejudices, fears…all those things we are used to and identify with. We don’t know what we don’t know, yet all those things we don’t know have a profound effect upon us. For example, do we truly know how thoughts and emotions are related? Do we realize that it is only through our death to all concepts in the mind that the heart can achieve freedom? Are you ready to admit that you can’t explain how it is that anything is? Thought doesn’t understand itself…
“Only when you lose everything are you free to do anything.”
Pedro:
Quick question. I know you are turned off by the title of this article, but did you actually read the article? A lot of the points you make in your comments I actually make in the article itself. You and I are much more on the same page than you think we are.
All:
Joshua posted an article by Raymond a few days ago. If you have not yet read it, please do so. It is a great article on restoration of the soul.
Paul,
For some reason, your posts attracts the highest number of exchanges. It’s incredible. We all thank you for inviting such enthusiastic interaction and sticking with it with your considerate and detailed responses. Shows a lot a love.
Robert, my ego thanks you a ton for your comment. 😉
Actually, I myself am amazed at the feedback I get, although the “statistics” are a bit skewed because I think my own comments comprise perhaps one-third or more of the total comments. Nevertheless, the substance of the comments are pretty cool.
I do want to take the opportunity afforded by this comment of Robert’s to thank everyone on-board for the amazing support and interaction you give my articles and comments. I hope they are as much a blessing to you and you all have been to me. I truly appreciate all of you!
I want to share with all of you a very inspiring 15 minute video that captures the essence of our search for understanding. I am absolutely certain you will enjoy it very much. I shared this with some of you, but wanted to engage the entire SOS audience.
Blessings!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N0–_R6xThs
Paul,
Great video. I really like the slide with the monk meditating with a crown of electrodes over his head.
Paul,
I read the entire article, and every response you’ve made. I could ask you the very same question, for I’ve unfurled my tongue quite a bit here and expounded my reasoning for wanting nothing to do with yours – or anybody’s – belief in suffering. Yod-Hay-Vav-Hay is a formula that holds true for every human being: Yod alive, Vav alive. Yod is Aleph conditioned by existence, Vav connects the two Hah, symbolizing the double life, inner and outer. The two Hah fertilize each other, for the Vav works as a two-way street. (Maybe it will make more sense if you look at Yod-Hay-Vav-Hay in the Hebrew glyphs placed top to bottom. In this case Yod is the head or ego, the first Hah the inner masculine, the Vav the spine connecting the inner Hah to the outer Hah. Looks like a man, no?)
You trust your five senses as if you had some proof that what they tell you is the truth and nothing but the truth. To trust your senses is to fail to challenge your surroundings. Pythagoras said “Man, know thyself, and you shalt know the Universe and God.” Do you truly know yourself? Your mind filters everything you see, hear, smell, taste and touch. You see suffering because your consciousness not only allows for it, but you consciously EXPECT it, and whether you realize it or not you can’t experience anything you don’t expect. What is more, I’m sure you know that we aren’t aware of all our expectations. How often do you analyze your thoughts, emotions, words, expectations, feelings? Your observations, explanations and suggested fixes for “suffering” are nothing but observations of your shadow projected onto the world you seem to believe is outside of you. Your post describes you and the world you’ve created, not me or mine. “Suffering” is nothing but a lack of awareness of a part of yourself, and in order to become aware and end this so-called suffering you need to shine the Light on your shadow – a shadow you cast over others when that shadow is you.
Just to point out some of the things I’m referring to, let me borrow your words:
“Acts like those of some of the greatest tyrants in our world affect the whole, and cause “schisms” in the body of humanity. I submit to you that to ignore the sufferings of others is to express hatred for them. How do you help them? How would YOU help them? Do you think they even need help?
Are you really suggesting that there is no suffering in our world?? That it is a figment of my (and the scriptures’) imagination?? I believe that to deny suffering is to deny an obvious reality. People die everyday at the hands of others. People are killing each other through their words of hatred, which the Bible defines as murder. The dramas on the linear plane of our existence lend themselves to suffering, and all of the scriptures of the world address it. One of the themes of Buddha’s “ministry” was suffering.”
Look at the words you use: tyrants, murder, hatred, suffering, reality, die, people, linear plane of existence. You also use words like starvation, suicide, love and God. What is love? What is God? Do you know that Exodus 3:14 in Hebrew reveals the ONE’s name as AHYH, or Aleph alive, Yod alive. What does the switch of Aleph and Yod for Yod and Vav mean in terms of the Tetragrammaton?
Define all these words if you’re going to continue this line of thinking. Can you prove time exists? What is space? What is murder? What is reality? What is death? What is love? Who are you?
I acknowledge no suffering, though I think it’s possible you’re taking your own and projecting it into a world you believe is just as you perceive it to be. And with that we come to something huge – perception vs conception. Your mind is structured according to all these words you use, and your world is made of these words, for every word is a name and every name is a word. Where did these words come from? Do you know what they are? Do you know where they go?
If you don’t expect a world free from suffering, you insist on suffering yourself. Whether you realize it or not the world is your face, it is the answer to every thought and emotion in you. You create it, yet you insist on blaming everyone but yourself, which you have every right to do. We’ve bantered endlessly about the power of the invisible world or inner Hah. Aleph cannot express itself without a Beyt, and a Beyt cannot exist without Aleph. (Again, consider why in English we call our system of letters the Alphabet, or AlephBeyt.) Aleph without a Beyt doesn’t exist, and Beyt without Aleph is just an illusion.
What would you call the solar system without the sun?
What would you call the solar system without the earth?
To reiterate, I’m not on your page or anyone else’s page for that matter. Your Bible is an interpretation, and you are interpreting an interpretation, and this is why the blind can only lead the blind into a ditch. Religions depend on half-truths, and half-truths lead to bondage. Hevel (Abel) is Hay-Vav-Lamed. Stop looking outside and taking illusions for truth like Abel! You’re killing the Cain inside you. You’ve got to till your earth and get down to the roots instead of simply harvesting what is only temporal and superficial. Where is Adam in the conception of Cain vs. Abel? This is huge.
In order for true psychological growth to ensue – on all levels – the liberation of feminine consciousness from repetitive structures is required by a process of deconditioning or sublimation.
What does it mean that the seven demons cast out of Mary Magdalene by Yeshua are seven psychological resistances? Why do you resist a world free from all the aforementioned words of yours?
Hi Pedro.
Apologies for my hiatus. I had to get away from all of this for a bit. But I will now address your post. Let me just say before I get started, that you and I will simply have to agree to disagree. Your arguments make absolutely no sense to me for the following reasons:
You say suffering doesn’t exist and that we create it ourselves (a paradoxical statement itself). What, then, would your approach be to the man on the street digging in garbage cans looking for food; the person who comes to you looking for a handout; any person who comes to you in need of something? Based on your understanding, I should simply ignore him because his suffering is simply my own creation and he is not really hungry. I must leave him alone because to address his hunger is an admission that I see some suffering in him, and I should not create that kind of suffering. There is no need to be compassionate because his suffering is all an illusion.
“But whoso hath this world’s good, and seeth his brother have need, and shutteth up his bowels [of compassion] from him, how dwelleth the love of God in him” (1 John 3:17)?
What is a “need,” Pedro? If a person needs clothing, or shelter, or perhaps just a hug, that signifies that something is missing in her life. So because her suffering is just an illusion, I should just ignore it. That makes absolutely no sense whatsoever to me.
We are admonished to “love those that hate you.” Have you considered that hatred is a form of suffering — that people that hate intensely do so because they have not learned what love really is — that they may have no objective experience of it? But you say don’t recognize it as suffering, just let it be. Their suffering is all an illusion. That by recognizing who I really am, I will turn a blind eye to it, and that that will somehow make it disappear, because it doesn’t really exist anyway.
Have you considered what it means to be a “rich man” in scripture? Do you know that it has absolutely nothing to do with money? “But they that will be rich fall into temptation and a snare, and [into] many foolish and hurtful lusts, which drown men in destruction and perdition” (1 Tim. 6:9). To be spiritually rich is to be full of “gold” (wisdom) and “silver” (understanding). Do you understand that the “lust” for gold and silver from man is the Biblical definition of “adultery?” Indeed, these foolish and hurtful lusts and thirsts for wisdom and understanding — going to the tree of the knowledge of good and evil — are what “drown men in destruction and perdition.”
“I counsel thee to buy of me gold tried in the fire, that thou mayest be rich …” (Rev. 3:18).
Pedro, this fire symbolizes suffering. This is why the story of Job is so critical to understanding how the acquiring of spiritual wisdom and understanding really works. Job was a rich man. Yet, he had to buy gold “tried in the fire” in order to attain the true riches. This is how he came to know God:
“I know that thou canst do every [thing], and [that] no thought can be withholden from thee. … I have heard of thee by the hearing of the ear: but now mine eye seeth thee” (Job 42:2, 5).
The flames of fire are the “voice of God.” It is how “God” speaks to us — through the flames. This is what the stories of Moses and the burning bush, the burning fiery furnace of Daniel 3, the story of the rich man and Lazarus, etc., are designed to teach us. “Hell” (Satan/fear) is the voice of God cleansing us of “sin” (defined as going outside of ourselves for wisdom and understanding, the true reflection of “ego”). God messengers — his “angels” — are these flames of fire.
“And of the angels he saith, Who maketh his angels spirits, and his ministers a flame of fire” (Heb 1:7).
Do you realize that the entire Biblical concept of hell fire connotes suffering? All of this signifies suffering. But you say that suffering doesn’t exist and is a figment of our imagination. You say that you don’t live in a world of suffering. That statement is very revelatory, especially given the flames of fire you have hurled at me simply because you disagree with my stance. Where was your love in all this? But of course, there is no suffering, so your words could not have possibly caused any harm.
I don’t say to defend myself, but merely to give you something to think about.
At one time I was a huge proponent of the Law of Attraction. In fact, I have watched the original movie so many times, I have practically committed the entire hour-and-a-half program to memory. I know all the teachings about suffering, and at one time bought into all of it, hook, line and sinker. However, over the past year, I have thought long and hard about all that. Does it all make sense? Much of it does, but some of it does not.
“Charity never fails: but whether prophecies, they shall fail; whether tongues, they shall cease; whether knowledge, it shall vanish away. FOR WE KNOW IN PART, AND WE PROPHESY IN PART, BUT WHEN THAT WHICH IS PERFECT IS COME, THEN THAT WHICH IS IN PART SHALL BE DONE AWAY” (1 Cor. 13:8-10).
“Love never fails.” What does that mean, though? Never fails what? Conversely, what does love ALWAYS succeed at?
“Charity suffers long.” Do you realize that one of the “fruit of the spirit” (the “sons of God”) is LONGSUFFERING? What does that mean to you? You may accuse me of taking my cues from the scriptures, but from where are you taking yours? Do you throw the entirety of the scriptures away because they don’t agree with your own spiritual concepts. Consider that perhaps you do not fully understand the scriptures that you reject.
It’s often very easy to make the thoughts and opinions of others your own, but sometimes we need to go a little deeper. What is OUR spirit saying TO US??? Can we hear it? Are we even listening?
“But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die” (Gen 2:17).
The teachings of the Law of Attraction, along with ALL of the teachings of man, represent eating from this tree. The voice of God represents our adversities — our sufferings. ““… if ye will hear his voice, harden not your hearts, as in the provocation” (Heb 3:15). If one does this, one will understand its power. Most will not, because when the fires (our sufferings) are turned up too hot (hot enough to destroy those without understanding of why they are experiencing them), most jump ship, looking to man for the escape from the intensity of the flames. This is the meaning of the Exodus story of the Israelites not wanting to hear from God. “And they said unto Moses, Speak thou with us, and we will hear: but let not God speak with us, lest we die” (Exodus 20:19).
You accuse me of worshiping the Bible, yet you go to great lengths to interpret the Tetragrammaton (YHVH). From where do we get that symbol?
The Bible!
So aren’t we both doing the same thing? I use the Bible the way I studied when I was in school. That is, I learn the lessons with the realization that the school book is not the subject. We have to put what we learn into practice in order to “prove” whether those things contained in it are so. You study math in a book, but math is not the book. This is how I use the scriptures. It works for me. Feel free to continue accusing me of worshiping it, if you like.
And this is why I cannot agree with your (and the Law of Attraction’s) philosophy of suffering.
Blessings, my brother.
Buenos dias Paul,
“They must find it difficult, those who have taken authority as truth, rather than truth as authority.” – Gerald Massey
“What is truth? For the multitude, that which it continually reads and hears.” – Oswald Spengler
“To suppose that people can be saved by studying and giving assent to formulae is like supposing that one can get to Timbuctoo by pouring over a map of Africa. Maps are symbols, and even the best of them are inaccurate and imperfect symbols.” – Aldous Huxley
Why is it that instead of answering the manifold questions I have asked you simply regurgitate verses from a book translated a number of times before the English iteration came to us in 1611? I’m curious as to why you avoid responding without the aid of phrases attributed to some saint we know little more about than people did 1000 years ago? And why do you say I hurl “fire” at you for simply challenging (warm-heartedly, despite what you may perceive), the sharp and petrified structures that hold your psyche captive to words? Perhaps you forgot that fire also plays the game of duality, for there are flames that burn and flames that purify. If I’m trying to burn anything it is the unconsciousness that walks and talks in the same rut men have been following like drones for millennia, bludgeoning one another with opinions and beliefs adopted with little inspection of their true origin and meaning.
It’s funny you should mention the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Do you know that in Hebrew it is the tree (Etz) of Tov-Raa? But here’s the best part: Tov is translated as “good” despite expressing a clinging to continuity and the status quo, while Raa is translated as “evil” even though it expresses an openness to all possibilities in the universe and a disruption to all static ways of thinking, speaking and acting. I’m sure you can see why the Church translated your “good” book this way, for how many billions live life fearing anything which disturbs their peace of mind, detesting anyone who rocks the boat, all the while prefering convention over change? How many billions prefer the comfort of opinion without the discomfort of thought? Raa is a challenge to every thought and identification you have built yourself and your world with. Tov, or “good” glorifies all that is temporal, static, carnal and conditioned. It is a preference for rigidity and fossilization over ripening and fertility, and a most efficient method to arrest your own development.
“People have a hard time letting go of their suffering. Out of a fear of the unknown, they prefer suffering that is familiar.” – Thich Nhat Hanh
What does it mean that hundreds of millions of people actually believe the idyllic state of ignorance symbolized by Eden (man and woman’s eyes were closed, no?) is some kind of dreamland beyond anything conceivable? Do you realize what it means that swarms of people actually believe birth is a legitimate punishment for inheriting some ancient sin they can’t even explain and continue to mourn its supposed loss? How many people continue to be seduced by the bliss of ignorance and the mindless veneration of rulers? (I include the Bible as interpreted and accepted by the vast majority as one of these rulers.) This so-called “evil”, or Raa, is absolutely necessary for true growth of the psyche. It is the shattering of the egg made of words, patterns, memories, customs, opinions, creeds, etc., one has taken refuge in, refusing to even consider the possibility that what lays outside and beyond is the only true life. After all, everyone knows what happens to a fetus whose egg is too hard or to one who refuses to be born: it is fruitless.
Orthodoxy means not thinking – not needing to think. Orthodoxy is unconsciousness. – George Orwell
I gave you a big hint when I mentioned Qayin (Cain) and digging the earth to get down to roots. Keeping the tree in mind, what is more important to its growth and overall health – caring for the branches and leaves or caring for its roots? Is the strength of a tree to be found in its buds and branches or in its roots and soil? What nourishes a tree, Paul? How many times have you heard that Christianity is said to be a branch grafted onto the olive tree of Israel? Yeshua was a Jew, no? Why do you, and so many others, refuse to get to the roots of the very teacher you sing hosannas to without knowing anything about where he and his ideas came from?
And the Jews marveled, saying, How knoweth this man LETTERS, having never learned? – John 7:15
Do you know what this means? Do you believe this has anything to do with Greek, Latin or English? Perhaps humanity is this tree, each person a cell, and if so then it’s clear that not only are most people unaware of this (just as each of your 100 trillion cells are unaware of you despite functioning together to keep you alive), but most people prefer to stay put on the tree, as twigs and leaves receiving nourishment by way of the larger branches, trunk and roots. But it’s possible to break away from the tree and throw down your own roots and thus receive nourishment directly from the source. This is why Qabalah means to receive. Scripture is certainly a form of food, but not in English – not now, not ever. It’s what you’d call adulterated or processed food. You’re caught up in the interpretation of narratives instead of the essence of the teaching, which is found in the LETTERS. Yeshua came forth as a resurrection of the explosive energy Aleph because the Jews had killed and buried it for centuries by fortifying themselves in a rock-hard shell made of rules, rites, rituals, laws, commandments and rigid interpretations. What is the foundation of Yeshua’s teachings? Why were the Jews always trying to stone him?
There is only a New Testament in existence because of the hidden knowledge preserved in the Torah throughout millennia. The Tanakh is also of incalculable importance, and is an acronym for its parts – Torah or law (Tav-Vav-Reysh-Hay), Nevi’im or prophets (Nun-Beyt-Yod-Aleph-Yod-Mem), and Ketuvim or writings (Kaph-Tav-Vav-Beyt-Yod-Mem). What do you know about the orthodox religion Yeshua was raised in? What is a tree without roots?
It is the glory of God to conceal a thing: but the honour of kings is to search out a matter. – Proverbs 25:2
If you want to put together a pretty bouquet of verses lying on the utmost surface of your English Bible, go right ahead, but you’d be much better served by getting out a pick and shovel to dig the earth, like Qayin.
Buenas tardes, Pedro.
I take it you’re still making your rounds through South America. I hope you’re enjoying your travels. Do you live in America? If so, when will you be coming “home?”
Thanks for taking the time to respond to my comment. Obviously you are good at putting your thoughts together in rapid fashion. I wish I had that kind of talent.
The main reasons for my using scripture in my comments is to show what they really say, as opposed to what religion has always taught us that they say. But both you and Robert have made the same critique regarding my use of scriptures. I will take both of your comments under advisement. It may be that I do, in fact, need to speak my mind without using scripture references. I will attempt to do so in this response to your current comment. I will italicize your statements, and then follow with my comments. Cool? Okay, here goes.
Why is it that instead of answering the manifold questions I have asked you simply regurgitate verses from a book translated a number of times before the English iteration came to us in 1611?
First, because if I answer all of the “manifold questions” you ask, given the length of your comments, it would be tantamount to writing a book (perhaps a couple of books). 😉 I think I already addressed the regurgitation of verses, but although I use many scriptures, I don’t at all interpret them in any literal context. I thought that was evident by the way I use them, but perhaps not.
“To suppose that people can be saved by studying and giving assent to formulae is like supposing that one can get to Timbuctoo by pouring over a map of Africa. Maps are symbols, and even the best of them are inaccurate and imperfect symbols.” – Aldous Huxley
Completely agreed. In fact, I believe I addressed this in my last comment. Perhaps it was another comment, but you said you read my article and “every response you gave.” This is why I have serious doubts as to whether you are actually reading what I write.
In order to understand a map, you must first its symbols. The scholars/theologians give us erroneous meanings of all of the symbols in the map. If you are studying a map and don’t understand the symbols, then when you do actually get in transit, you are not going to arrive at your destination, and if you do it will be quite by accident. It is my intent to show what the symbols really mean. Case in point, my reference in my last comment to a “rich man.” Most people think it refers to money. I use the scripture to show what it really means. This is a prime example of what I am talking about. When we read the English interpretations of the Bible (and if you have read prior comments, you know that I believe ALL English translations to be massively defective), we are reading a contaminated work.
My website is entitled “http://www.decodingscripture.com. My YouTube channel is called “Decoding Scripture.” From the title, I hope you can see that I have made the purpose of my mission to help explain what the scriptures really mean by what they are saying. Of course, I don’t understand all of it. No one does! But I have come to understand much of it, and it is my intent to bring my understanding to the forefront and let people make their own determinations. That’s what every writer does. Otherwise, why is he writing?
And why do you say I hurl “fire” at you for simply challenging (warm-heartedly, despite what you may perceive), the sharp and petrified structures that hold your psyche captive to words? Perhaps you forgot that fire also plays the game of duality, for there are flames that burn and flames that purify.
As to the “hurling fire” aspect, I’ll let the evidence speak for itself. As to the “sharp and petrified structures” reference, there are no “sharp and petrified structures” that I hold to. You only perceive them that way because the scriptures themselves are “sharp and petrified.” In other words, every time you quote a scripture, it reads the same way. That does not mean that I am quoting them in the same manner in which organized religion does. The Bible has great meaning, but needs to be accurately interpreted. When we quote them from the literal perspective, we are misquoting them. I think YOU reject the book as a whole (although you, yourself, quote from it more than a little) because you don’t understand all that it is really saying to you. I believe this is also why you have a problem with me quoting scripture — because the scriptures I quote probably mean something much different to you than they do to me.
The Bible is comprised of spiritual instruction and has nothing to do with a literal history about anything. I use it the same way I use the Bhagavad Gita and the Upanishads. They are scriptures, and contain vital truths, all of which are designed to send us “home” (i.e., inside ourselves).
I’m curious as to why you avoid responding without the aid of phrases attributed to some saint we know little more about than people did 1000 years ago?
This is your own interpretation. I don’t see it as “phrases attributed to some saint ….” What I do see is a book that contains a wealth of spiritual instruction as to how life really works. It is translated very poorly, and I have worked hard to uncover the real meanings. Having put the book and what I believe are its authentic interpretations to the litmus test in my own life, it passes with flying colors. Once again, I don’t believe in it the way the masses do, and so there is no rigid thinking on my part. In fact, quite the contrary. This statement of yours is a judgment that you make simply because I use them so much. It has taken me many years, and much digging, to uncover the truths I have gleaned to date. As you astutely quote, It is the glory of God to conceal a thing, and the glory of kings to search out a matter. I have searched them in order to uncover the real meanings. Of course, I have not figured out the whole, and probably will not do so in my lifetime. The reason I make the effort at all is not to gain any knowledge from them, but merely to show others what they really mean, in a sincere attempt to actually get them AWAY from the scriptures and into themselves, if that makes any sense to you.
Orthodoxy means not thinking – not needing to think. Orthodoxy is unconsciousness. – George Orwell
Completely agreed. I don’t know that anyone who reads my work would consider it “orthodox.”
Perhaps you forgot that fire also plays the game of duality, for there are flames that burn and flames that purify.
Biblically speaking, the purpose for ALL fire is to burn and to purify. There is no duality there. Biblical hell is a purifying fire, commissioned to purify our faith, which is more valuable than gold (wisdom) and silver (understanding). But (leading to this next statement of Hanh that you quote) ….
“People have a hard time letting go of their suffering. Out of a fear of the unknown, they prefer suffering that is familiar.” – Thich Nhat Hanh
Do you realize that this statement is actually an admission by you that there is suffering? If people have a hard time letting go of it, then it exists. BTW, none of your comment actually addresses MY previous comment to you as to the existence of suffering. The title of this article is “What is the Root Cause of All Suffering.” Hanh’s answer to this question, based on his quote, is “People have a hard time letting go of their suffering.” Of course because this is an article, my answers go into far greater detail than this two-sentence answer. But you say it doesn’t exist, that it is an illusion. Why then, does Hanh address it at all? And why do you quote him if you don’t believe in it? Just as I have been courteous enough to respond to your points (although not all) in this comment, I ask that you do the same with regard to the points I make with regard to your stance on suffering in my previous comment, which is the actual subject of all things Pedro/Paul, as it relates to this article.
I gave you a big hint when I mentioned Qayin (Cain) and digging the earth to get down to roots.
This is a fallacious argument, and makes an assumption that is not in the text at all.
Remember that because of Adam’s sin God curses the ground. “And unto Adam he said, Because thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree, of which I commanded thee, saying, Thou shalt not eat of it: cursed [is] the ground for thy sake; in sorrow shalt thou eat [of] it all the days of thy life” (Gen 3:17). It is this “ground” from which Cain brings God an offering. (By the way, this ground, this earth, or land, is YOU and ME.) But the only offering Cain can bring from the ground is “thorns and thistles,” because those are the only things this ground can now produce, because it is “cursed.”
From where in the world do you get the idea of “digging to get down to the roots?” You are reading into the text an assumption that simply is not there. Because the offering is a “curse,” not a blessing.
Abel’s offering, on the other hand, was satisfactory because “he also brought of the firstlings of his flock and of the fat thereof. And the LORD had RESPECT unto ABEL and to HIS OFFERING.” How in the world do YOU make Cain’s sacrifice honorable, while dishonoring Abel’s sacrifice?
Sheep, in scripture, is symbolic of followers. What Abel is doing here is sacrificing the sheep mentality to God. He will NOT follow the “beasts of the field,” nor receive the “mark” of these beasts. In other words, he will not eat of the “tree of the knowledge of good and evil.” He sacrifices following man.
Cain, on the other hand, brings the curse of man, which are the thorns and thistles. Following man results in the producing of only thorns and thistles. “Cursed be the man that trusts in man, and that makes flesh his arm” (Jer. 17:5). Thus, the natural man slays the spiritual man. This story is the same as the story of Job and the confrontation between God and Satan. Satan says “take everything he has from him and he will curse you to your face. Sorry, my brother, but you’ve got it backwards.
The natural always comes before the spiritual, and this is one of the concepts that this particular narrative brings forth. Adam comes before Christ. Cain comes before Abel, Ishmael comes before Isaac, Esau comes before Jacob. “First comes that which is natural, then afterwards that which is spiritual.” By extension, suffering (which you so heartily seek to deny) comes before joy. This is what the scripture of Cain seeks to convey. Abel’s righteousness leads to his death. Job’s righteousness lead to his suffering (spiritual death). This death is by appointment. We’re looking forward to the end of the night and toward the day that HAS no night. Weeping endures for a night, but joy comes in the morning.
You’re caught up in the interpretation of narratives instead of the essence of the teaching, which is found in the LETTERS.
This is another judgment. See immediately above under your last quote regarding Cain.
That’s enough for now. Pedro, I don’t know how you do it. Truly you are a million dollar writer in the making. All this writing really wears me out. I am very impressed by your writing skills.
Looks like we are finally getting into some meaningful dialogue, which I encourage and welcome. As I said before, we are brothers. We are both seeking the same goal. Neither you nor I have all the answers, and that is good. Because I don’t expect you to, I can allow you to have your conclusions without disparaging you.
Continue to enjoy your trek through South America. Blessings!