What is God? (Part 4)

God is the Spirit of Divine Will 

that actuates Perfect Creation

Are you enjoying my rather ambitious series explaining what God is (and is not)? I hope so, because compiling this information was no small undertaking -- and one I definitely could NOT have tackled alone. Up to this point in the series, we've established that God is 1) the Causal and Cognitive Creator of All That Is, 2) the invisible mind-bubble that houses Creation in harmonious Oneness, and 3) the Cause, Effect, and Creative Force of Agape -- the end-all, be-all of All That Is in Divine Reality. 

Along the way, we've also touched on the Law of Love, the Karmic Record, and the Ego Mind's God-blocking Dark Veil, Etheric Web, or Auric Shell. What I have yet to explain -- vis-à-vis God's various attributes -- is how Perfect Creation works.

To set the stage, let's review my definition of Agape. As you may recall, I described this Divine Concept or Covenant of All-Inclusive LOVE as the essence, ethereal substance, or mental vibration of All That Is, Has Ever Been, or Will Ever Be (inside the God-Mind Bubble). Agape is, therefore, the Cause (Father), Effect (Son), and Creative Force (Actuating Spirit) through which Cause wills Effect into being. Stated another way, God is Agape, God's Creative Will is Agape, God's Creations are Agape, Christ's Creations are Agape, and the Creative Will those Creations (be they God's or Christ's) share with their Creator also is Agape.

If it helps clarify the concept, imagine the multi-generational process of Perfect Creation as ripples on a pond, extending outward from the center. In this simple metaphor, God is the pond, the ripples on the pond, and the force that caused the ripples to radiate outward in concentric circles. To set this eternal process in motion, God metaphorically spoke "the Word," as described in the preamble to the New Testament gospel of "John." In the King James version, John 1:1-4 reads as follows: 

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made. In him was life; and the life was the light of men. And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not.

Is this description accurate? Yes, more or less, if we correctly interpret the symbols. Stated without metaphor, God (the Supreme Causal Mind) spoke (activated the Creative Force) to bring the Word (the Divine Idea of the Sonship) into being.

Pretty clear, right? What isn't clear is who the "him" in John 1:2 - 4 is supposed to be. Is this "him" the Word or God? Most Christians believe "him" refers to the Word, the Son of God "made flesh" in the person of Jesus Christ. This all-too-common interpretation is, I believe, inaccurate on more than one level. First of all, the "him" to which John refers HAS to be God, the generative source or "creator" of all things, and without whom nothing real can be made. Second of all, "the Word" is the originating Divine Idea behind the whole Sonship or Christ Mind, not just Jesus.

In the Course, Jesus states this FACT emphatically. He is our brother in the Christ Mind, not the "only begotten Son of God." He also spells out that the Divine Idea or "Word" God willed into being was the Sonship. He further explains that the Divine Idea or abstract concept God willed into being as the Sonship was "My Son is as Perfect and Holy as my Self."  That idea, Jesus also tells us, is how God still KNOWS His ONE Holy Creation. God does not, in other words, recognize sin, guilt, fear, separation, or imperfection as a legitimate idea, let alone as an achievable state of being.

Got it? Good. 

Let's revisit John 1:1-4 with the word God inserted where I believe it belongs:

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. All things were made by God; and without God was not any thing made that was made. In God was life; and the life was the light of men. And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not. 

Makes more sense this way, doesn't it?

Okay, so ... now that we better understand the process of Perfect Creation, let's examine more closely the various components or "aspects" of Agape involved. As I see it, those "aspects" are these:

A) God = Causal Source of Agape (the Pond)

B) Creative Force = Divine Will of Agape (the force introduced to activate the rippling)

C) Creation I (Son of God) = Created Effect (the first set of ripples)

D) Creation II - Infinity (Grandson of God, etc.) = Created Effect of Christ (the subsequent ripples, ring by ring)

Okay, so ... the keys to Perfect Creation are A and B -- the Causal Source and Actuating Force of the ripples (C and D). The ripples, being the effects or products of A and B's inseparable union, can't make more ripples on their own. To keep the process going, the ripples must join the fixed union or partnership of the Source and and actuating Will of Agape. They must, in other words, SHARE their Father's Will to create ONLY the Divine Idea of Perfect Love. To take the metaphor one step farther, the ripples can't even BE what they are without the pond and the actuating force that brought them into being.

To help you visualize what I'm talking about, let's crack open the God-Mind Bubble. The layers we'd find within are remarkably similar to those seen in the cross-section of Planet Earth below. 

The correspondences are, I believe, as follows:

Inner Core = God + Creative Force of Divine Will

Outer Core = God's Creations (first generation)

Mantle = Christ's Creations (second generation)

Crust = God-Mind Membrane

As in my pond-ripple example, the rings of Creation extend outward, generationally, into timeless and spaceless infinity.

Or, as Jesus explains in the Course's "original" edition (not original dictations):

A co-creator with the Father must have a son. Yet must this son have been created like himself. A perfect being, all-encompassing and all-encompassed, nothing to add and nothing taken from -- not born of size nor weight nor time nor held to limits or uncertainties of any kind. Here do the means and end unite as one, nor does this one have any end at all. All this is true, and yet it has no meaning to anyone who still retains one unlearned lesson in his memory, one thought with purpose still uncertain, or one wish with a divided aim.

Does that help? I hope so, because this stuff is a bitch to understand, let alone explain.

When John says "without God was not any thing made that was made," he means that nothing real can be created without God's Creative Force of Divine Will. When John says "In God was life; and the life was the light of men. And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not," he's telling us that the only thing OF GOD in the Kingdom of Darkness is the Divine Spark of Eternal Life that is our Soul. When we perceive the world through the Ego Mind's dark lens, we can't "comprehend" that God-created Spark, Soul, or Christ-Self light-fragment in ourselves and others. To see that inner light or "face of Christ" in ourselves and our brothers, we have to strip away the Ego Mind's Dark Veil, layer by layer.

In the Course, Jesus tells us that God placed that Divine Spark or Christ-Self fragment at the center of what he calls the "Inner-Altar" or "God's Altar" within us. As I understand it, this metaphorical "altar" can be found on the uppermost/innermost plane of the "separated" or "dreaming" Christ Mind, which butts up against the God-Mind Bubble. As we advance through the Holy Spirit's at-one-ment, purification, undoing, forgiveness, or salvation process, we begin to see that "altar" through the inward-looking Spiritual Eye. The image below offers a rough idea of what we might see in meditation as we approach that Inner-Altar.

In the Dream of Darkness, that bright "spark" or "star" shining down from Heaven is the only created effect of Agape. As such, it is the source of our Eternal Life and Divinity -- the only part of us that's actually real or alive. It also is the only part of us that's recognized by and still connected to God.

Or, to quote Jesus:

There IS no life outside of Heaven. Where God Created life, there life must be. In any state apart from Heaven, life is illusion. At best, it seems like life; at worst, like death. Yet both are judgments on what is not life, equal in their inaccuracy and lack of meaning. Life not in Heaven is impossible, and what is not in Heaven is not anywhere. Outside of Heaven, only the conflict of illusions stands; senseless, impossible and beyond all reason, and yet perceived as an eternal barrier to Heaven. Illusions are but forms. Their content is never true.

John tries to tell us this but, like many things in the Bible, his message has been obscured by unilluminated interpreters. When luminously interpreted, John's gospel also imparts something else of vital importance. That something else is that neither God (A) nor the Creative Force of Agape (B) are present in the Dream of Separation.

Without these conjoined components of Perfect Creation, we can't create anything REAL or ETERNAL. With our puny, separate wills, we can only conjure fantasies that will break our hearts when they crumble into dust and blow away. Anything and everything we produce in partnership with the Ego Mind is, in fact, MISCREATION. It's all smoke and mirrors, my dreaming brother, and nothing more. The instant we wake up, the world and universe -- and everything they appear to contain -- will vanish into thin air.

What I've explained so far raises some important questions. The first is: Why are God and the Creative Force absent from the dream-dimension? The answer is: Because we wanted to experience what it would be like not to always share everything with everything. We wanted to be "special," in other words, instead of the same as everything else in Creation. When God refused to indulge this insane "whim," we bailed out of Heaven -- by splitting part of the Christ Mind away from the God Mind. In so doing, we manifested the realm of perception -- the little basket hanging under the God-Mind Bubble in another dimension. In that dimension, our understanding of reality is completely upside-down.

Another question we might ask is: How did we exclude God and His Creative Spirit from the split-off dream-dimension? The short answer is: When we asked the Ego Mind to manifest a sphere of mind in which we could perceive ourselves as separate, our new creative partner wove the silken threads of fear into a web to block God's transmissions of Agape. That web didn't only block God and His Creative Will; it also trapped us in the dream-realm it manifested OUTSIDE the God-Mind Bubble. Once we were caught, it wound those same threads around our Soul-memories to bind us within its Agape-starved Dark Kingdom.

In the Course, Jesus tells us that Agape and fear, being antithetical to each other, can't co-exist in the same sphere of mind. He also tells us fear isn't real because God didn't create it. Fear does NOT, therefore, exist within the God-Mind Bubble.

Stated another way, we can't experience fear in the Sphere of Superconsciousness or Knowledge we share with God. We can only experience fear in the split-off Sphere of Consciousness we projected part of our mind into to hide from God in shame and guilt. As the product of the unreal ideas (fear and separation), the Sphere of Consciousness doesn't actually exist. It's only a dream or alternate-reality we keep in place as long as we value anything it appears to offer more than the Truth about what and where we really are. Stated another way, the dream won't dissolve until we choose the priceless virtues of right-minded creating over the worthless vices of wrong-minded miscreating.

Okay, so ... another big question we might ask is this one: If God is All-Powerful, couldn't He just throw a lightning bolt through the Ego's Web of Fear and blow the whole dream-world to smithereens? The answer is: He could, but 1) God doesn't throw lightning bolts because we're inside His Mind and 2) having given us free will, He won't do anything to override or revoke it (within reason). Thus, we have to choose to end the dream of our own accord. We are not, however, on our own in this regard. After the dream went south, God sent the Holy Spirit into the Sphere of Consciousness to help us choose right.

In future posts, I'll describe how the Holy Spirit helps us "see the Light." For now, let's jump back to the gospel of John. To comprehend the preamble's full meaning vis-à-vis God's creative powers, we must know a few facts of history. The first of these FACTS is that the four gospels chosen for the New Testament were written accounts of oral narratives of what Jesus did and said. These four gospels were originally written in Greek, the common language of trade and higher learning in Judea in the time of Jesus.

The second FACT is that the surviving disciples of Jesus, all of whom spoke Aramaic, were the original sources of these narratives. The third FACT is that the early followers of Jesus were hunted down, stoned to death, crucified, beheaded, burnt alive, and fed to lions, among other atrocities. To escape persecution, torture, and death, they met in secret and shared their stories orally for at least a century before these narratives were written down. Except for the gospels composed by the disciples themselves (including John, James, Mary, Philip, and Thomas) these passed-down narratives were recorded by various unknown scribes in several languages, including Aramaic, Coptic, Greek, and Hebrew. 

The fourth FACT is that the gospels written by the surviving disciples were not only excluded from the New Testament canon, they also were condemned as heretical by the men who chose the four New Testament gospels. The author of "John" is NOT, therefore, John, the alleged "beloved disciple" of Jesus -- but the men who commissioned that gospel to promote their own ends wanted people to believe it was.

What's my point? I have three, actually, which are: 1) More than a century passed before the gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John were written down; 2) Those four gospels were recorded in Greek, rather than the original spoken Aramaic; and 3) The men who chose those four gospels OVER the writings of the surviving disciples did so because these four best told the story of Jesus the way they wanted it told.

As we move forward, I'll explain the history in more detail. For now, just know that the New Testament canon was chosen by men with ego-motivated agendas. Some of their primary aims were to 1) dictate what Jesus was and taught, 2) unite and institutionalize the various "Christian" sects under a flagship "catholic" church whose authority couldn't be questioned by anyone claiming to have direct illumination from the Holy Spirit.

To achieve their aims, the leaders of the "catholic" movement condemned as heretical anyone promoting conflicting interpretations of what Jesus was and/or taught, as well as anyone claiming to have received contradictory "inner-knowing" from the Holy Spirit. To fuel the fire of their condemnation, these "catholic" leaders attached to both these groups the loaded label "gnostic," a word THEY made synonymous with "heretic" or "blasphemer." Stripped of this contrived negative "frame," the word "gnostic" simply means "inner-knowing." 

Let's pause here for a moment, because I want to point out that the New Testament and the Course say pretty much the same things when both are interpreted correctly. The Course does, however, present a more thorough and modern explanation of the process and requirements of salvation than does the New Testament. As stated earlier, this is because the men who selected the New Testament canon wanted the last word on what Jesus was, taught, and did. Because they were virulently anti-illumination and anti-gnostic (inner-knowing), they excluded the teachings about accessing the Holy Spirit directly and seeking the Kingdom of Heaven within our minds.

Jesus DID, in fact, teach these truths and techniques during his earthly life. How do I know this? Because the gospels of Thomas, Mary, Philip, John, and James (among others) say as much. Not only were the gospels of these five Apostles of Christ destroyed by the "catholic" authorities, their legitimate authors were also systematically and mendaciously discredited as heretics, imposters, and/or hypocrites. To slur Mary -- who was both the "beloved" disciple and wedded wife of Jesus -- one of the early Popes went so far as to identify her as the demon-possessed prostitute "saved" by Jesus in Luke 8:1-3. That this mischaracterization of Mary the Magdala (NOT Mary Magdalene) was a slanderous fallacy wasn't openly acknowledged by the Vatican until very recently.

Had these and other equally illuminating so-called "gnostic" gospels not been found in the Jordan Desert in 1945, the world would never know of their existence.

Despite all this, I still consider the Holy Bible (when accurately interpreted) to be a credible source of Higher Truth. Not the whole Truth and nothing but the Truth, perhaps, but certainly credible enough to warrant deep and careful study. Like the Course (as Jesus makes clear), the New Testament is a beginning, not an end. To go "the rest of the way" (to Transfiguration and Ascension), we have to switch the radio-receiver in our hearts and heads from the Ego Mind's blaring, chaotic, and fear-mongering channel to the Holy Spirit's quiet, ordered, and love-mongering one.

(Is it just me, or does it also strike you as strange that the word "mongering" is only ever linked with a negative word like "fear" or "rumor"? The word mongering simply means "the act or practice of promoting, spreading, or trading in a specified thing." So, what do you say to joining me in doing a whole lot more love-mongering in the world?)

Okay, so ... the point I'm trying to make is this: To dismiss the Course, the Bible, or any sacred text or teaching as wrong, inferior, heathen, or blasphemous is, therefore, a narrow-minded (ego-inspired) judgment rather than an open-minded (spirit-inspired) assessment. All such teachings serve a purpose in God's Great Awakening Plan, and ALL -- including the Course and the Bible -- have fallen prey to the dirty tricks the Ego Mind uses to block out Higher Truth. Some of those sneaky tactics are literal and fearful interpretation, inaccurate translation, agenda-driven redaction, "form-over-content" ritualization, and charlatanism, both deliberate and well-intentioned.

What's all this got to do with the preamble to the New Testament gospel of "John"? I'm glad you asked, because the answer is: The real meaning was lost in translation. When the oral Jesus-narratives were written down in Greek, the Aramaic word Milta was changed to Logos. Why? Because there is no Greek word that conveys the full scope of Milta's meaning. Around 1,500 years later, when the New Testament was translated into English, Logos was changed to "the Word" because there is no English equivalent for Logos.

Let's now explore the subtle-yet-illuminating differences in meaning between these three terms. "Word" just means, more or less, "a name humankind has attached to the physical form of an idea." Logos, meanwhile, cuts away a layer by referring directly to the idea. Logos also communicates that the idea to which it refers is Divine, rather than a product of human intelligence. Milta also translates, more or less, as "Divine Thought or Idea," but the Aramaic word also captures the way God's Mind works. Unlike Logos, Milta encapsulates the whole Alpha-to-Omega gamut of the Divine Idea referenced.

Because the God Mind operates inside the ever-repeating now-moment of Superconscious Eternity, the Creative Force of Perfect Love doesn't just bring a Divine Idea into being the moment God thinks "So Be It" or "Let My Will be done."

Yes, well ... it does and it doesn't.

In actuality, the Creative Force plays out everything that Divine Idea will do and become the same now-moment God divines the idea into being. This is, in fact, how God creates and also why His Creations can neither usurp His Supreme Creative Will and Laws nor change their True Identities or destinies in the slightest way. Stated another way, the perfect completion of the Sonship was a done-deal the Holy Instant God first said "So Be It."

This is partly what the Burning Bush meant when it said to Moses, "I Am that I Am." Dialed back to the original Hebrew, "I Am that I Am" means, more or less,  "I Am what always was, what is now, and what will be again." What Milta expresses also is partly what the author of Ecclesiastes meant when he or she wrote: "The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be; and that which is done is that which shall be done: and there is no new thing under the sun."

I say "partly"  in both instances because the Old Testament bush and scribe also meant that the dream of earthly existence is both already over and never happened ... but let's table that mind-bending Truth until another time.

The point I'm trying to make NOW is that "the Word" wasn't an actual word because God doesn't communicate in words. God thinks and communicates abstractly, as do (according to Jesus) the Souls He created. More specifically, God communicates directly (telepathically) with His Thought-Creations through "concept-packets."

Being ONE with everything, God also has a one-track mind; meaning He only ever thinks, communicates, and creates ONE all-encompassing and ever-extending "concept packet." That "concept packet" expresses Perfect Love in all its Divine Attributes, which include glory, joy, peace, comfort, devotion, mercy, abundance, generosity, goodness, loving kindness, fraternity, charity, sharing, eternal being, and grace (among others).

Unfortunately, by substituting "Word" for Logos, the men who translated the New Testament into English perpetuated the FALLACY that God looks, speaks, and behaves like a human being. In actuality, our Heavenly Father has NOTHING in common with our ego-authored self-concepts -- our humanness, in other words. Despite what the Bible appears to say, God did NOT create "man" in His physical likeness. God, being CAUSAL SUPERCONSCIOUS MIND, is invisible, and so are His Creations.

What God created in His own likeness (meaning "of a like quality," according to Jesus) is the Divine Idea or Sonship that IS Creation. That Sonship is God's clone or twin in every respect but one. Being the Causeless Cause, the God Mind existed before the Christ Mind, which the God Mind ideated into existence by extending the Creative Force of Perfect Love. The God Mind is, therefore, the CAUSE of the Christ Mind, while the Christ Mind is the EFFECT of the God Mind.

This may seem like a minor distinction, but it's actually of vital importance. Why? Because, as Jesus explains in the Course (and John explains at the start of his gospel), nothing real can be created without the Force of Divine Will through which God and His Creations expand the Divine Idea, "concept-packet," "pond" or "bubble" of Perfect Love that GOD IS.

In the Course, Jesus says something else of monumental importance pertaining to the relationship between creative mind and thought. What does he say? That ideas can't leave their source. Part of his meaning is this: Being God's Divine Idea, we're still safe at home in the God Mind, only dreaming we're in exile on Planet Earth. And if nothing we do in God-excluding dreams can have any real effects, then nothing we do on Planet Earth can change anything in Creation.

Let's take this idea one step further: If nothing we do changes anything REAL, God has no reason to get mad or punish us when we screw up in our dream-lives. Not that anger, wrath, judgment, sin, punishment, or damnation are Divine Attributes. They are, in fact, unreal opposites invented by the Ego Mind to fool us into agreeing to live in its God-less "desert." The Great Deceiver also uses our BELIEF in these unreal opposites to 1) keep its love-blocking Web of Fear strong in our minds and 2) use the anger, guilt, and condemnation we project onto others to both punish our dream-selves and chain our Souls to the Karmic Wheel of Rebirth.

What we THINK in the dream can't create anything real, but our ego-generated thoughts can and DO generate their like at the level of form. As explained, this is because the Divine Law of Love dictates that we receive (at the level of effect/form) what we give (at the level of mind/will). And Divine Law still governs how thought manifests, even in the Kingdom of Darkness. It is, however, our belief in sin, guilt, and karma that chains us to the Ego Mind's Wheel of Rebirth. To liberate our Souls, we need only forgive ourselves and others for wrongly believing in these dream-imprisoning deceptions.

Is this a tall order? Hell, yes. Can it be achieved? Not until we fully accept that the world we perceive is a dream in which nothing real actually happens. Because our acceptance of this FACT is the key to the karma-busting practice of True Forgiveness, we must strive with every fiber of our being to 1) see the world as the thought-projection it actually is and 2) correct the wrong-minded thoughts and beliefs blocking our memories of God and Heaven.

My job is to help you achieve both objectives, so keep reading.

What is God? (Part 3)

God is Love
We’ve all heard the expression “God is Love,” but what does this statement really mean? Well, it means this: God, being the Causal Source of Perfect Love, extended His Mind-Self -- through the Creative Force of Perfect Love -- to create more Perfect Love. God is, therefore, the Causal Mind or Generating Source of the Divine Idea of Perfect Love, the Creative Force is the Absolute Divine Will through which God extends or projects that Divine Idea, and the Sonship or Christ-Mind is the Creation, Effect, or end result of that three-party creative process.

Being the Father's thought-creation, the Son must and will remain forever in the mind of its Source. Being an extension of the God-Mind, the Son also shares its Father's creative powers. The Son also can, therefore, expand Creation by extending its "Mind-Self" -- the created effect of God's first extension. God's Son or Effect can NOT, however, extend its "Mind-Self" unless it 1) shares the Father's Will and 2) obeys the Father's established laws for Perfect Creation.

Before we get into what the Father's Will and Laws dictate, let's clarify what Jesus means by the phrase "Perfect Love." For starters, he means a kind of love that is not of this world and, therefore, incomprehensible to our concrete human intellects. What the world calls "love" is NOT what love really is, he repeatedly points out in the Course. What the world calls "love" is fear disguised as love. It is, in fact, the imaginary opposite the Ego Mind devised to block our memories of Perfect Love.

Or, as Jesus explains:
 

No law the world obeys can help you grasp love’s meaning. What the world believes was made to hide love’s meaning, and to keep it dark and secret. There is not one principle the world upholds but violates the truth of what love is, and what you are as well. Seek not within the world to find your Self. Love is not found in darkness and in death. Yet it is perfectly apparent to the eyes that see and ears that hear Love’s Voice.

Satan's wolf-in-sheep's-clothing version of "love" is what Jesus refers to in the Course as "special love." This deceptive replacement for God's Perfect Love includes self-love, familial-love, and romantic-love, all of which promote exclusivity, separation, and ego/body-self identification, rather than inclusiveness, unity, and Christ/Soul-Self Identification.

In future posts, I'll say more about "special love," "special relationships," and "specialness" in general. For now, just know that "special love," being a form of fear, prevents Perfect Love from entering our dreaming minds. To open our hearts to God's Presence again, we must give up our desire for and/or attachment to "special love" in all its deceptive guises. The level of ego/body-self surrender (not sacrifice!) this entails is difficult for most people to imagine, let alone achieve. But achieve it we MUST if we wish to liberate our Souls from Satan's silky cocoon.  

Because these two conceptions of "love" are, in fact, opposed, let's set the genuine article apart by calling it not "love" or Perfect Love, but Agape -- the Greek word for Divine Love. Understanding what Agape is and how superior it is to the Great Deceiver's pathetic substitutions is vitally important, so let me walk you through the differences.

Let's start with Agape's etymological origins. As a noun, the word first appeared in the mid-3rd Century BCE in the Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Hebrew Old Testament. Agape’s use a a verb dates back as far as Homer, the presumed author of the Iliad and the Odyssey. In Homer’s time (8^th Century BCE), however, Agape was understood to be synonymous with affection.

In the New Testament's First Epistle of Paul to Timothy, Agape is more accurately described as arising “out of a pure heart, and of a good conscience, and of faith unfeigned.” Elsewhere in the original Greek New Testament, Agape also referred to the “covenant of love” existing between God and Creation. That “covenant” is reciprocal, all-encompassing, and all-inclusive. God loves the Souls comprising the Sonship, and those Souls love Him right back. Being part of the God Mind, those Souls also love their fellow God-Creations and their own (real) Creations as much as they love their Creator.

 

When Jesus uses the word “Love” in the Course -- and in English translations of the New Testament -- he often means Agape, which is, in fact, the word he originally used. Actually, he probably said Hooba, the Aramaic word for Divine Love. In case you don't know, Aramaic is the language Jesus spoke when he walked the earth in a body. As an educated Jewish rabbi who grew up in Egypt (where his family fled to avoid the Massacre of the Innocents), Jesus also would have spoken Hebrew, Coptic, Greek (the common language of trade and literacy in his day), and probably some Latin (the language of the Romans who ruled Judea). But, by all accounts, Jesus delivered his sermons in Aramaic, the spoken language of the common people of Nazareth, Galilee, and Jerusalem in those days.

 

Like Agape, Hooba describes an overflowing, unconditional love that seeks nothing in return. The Divine Idea we ARE and always will be in God's Mind, Hooba and Agape have nothing to do with ardent affection or passionate desire; rather, they describe a general feeling of goodwill, loving kindness, and/or charity toward our fellow creatures. What we think of as “Christmas Spirit” or "brotherly love" embodies the general idea. Inherent in the definition is devotion, loyalty, and service to God, other Souls (not other people's egos!), and the spiritual aspects of life.

As an aside, when I say "charity," I mean wishing only the best or highest good for others; NOT giving to the "less fortunate" at the level of form. To perceive anyone as "less fortunate" -- or "less" ANYTHING -- is to see them through the Ego Mind's truth-distorting Dark Veil of separation, scarcity, and comparison. The only REAL charity we can give anyone, Jesus says in the Course, is to open their mind to Spiritual Truth. He also says we can only help others in this way if 1) we are awake or "healed" ourselves, 2) if the person is receptive, and 3) if we are the "teacher" assigned to this "pupil" in the Atonement Plan.

How do we know if someone we meet is receptive and/or one of our pupils? Jesus will tell us when both parties are ready to begin their teaching-learning partnership. He will also tell us exactly how we are to help them. Because anything we attempt to do without his direction can prove detrimental to the curricular progress and/or well-being of both people, we should NOT attempt to help others on our own.

Okay, yes. What I'm saying SEEMS to go against everything the world defines as "charity" -- and that's the point. How the world defines "charity" is as big a trap as how the world defines "love." To give "charity" or "love" as God defines these "ideas," we must give them to all at the level of shared mind and thought, NOT at the level of separate bodies and material objects or money. What we give in this manner -- in meditation and prayer -- we will receive quid pro quo.

Rightly understood, these charitable exchanges of loving thought are the "miracles" the Course prepares us to perform. These reciprocal thought-transactions are, Jesus tells us, the only real way to heal anyone of separation-mindedness. And separation-mindedness, he also explains, is the root cause of EVERY problem we face in the world.

Before we can perform these mutual mind-healing "miracles," we have to 1) hear the Holy Sprit's "Voice" with our inner-ears and 2) view everyone with the perfect equanimity of Christ's Vision. We can NOT, in other words, perceive ANYONE as "more," "less," "different," or "separate" than we are by any comparative measure the Ego Mind contrived to blind us to our SAMENESS or ONENESS with everything God created.

Stated more simply: To help or heal anyone in the true sense of the word, we must perceive and love everyone as the God-created Souls they really are -- NOT as the insane ego-body "characters" they play in the dream-world.

I'll say more about miracles, how they work, and how we do them in future posts. For now, let's get back to our definition of Perfect Love or Agape. Jesus affirms some of what I've already explained in the following excerpt from the Course's original dictations:

Love is one. It has no separate parts and no degrees; no kinds nor levels, no divergences and no distinctions. It is like itself, unchanged throughout. It never alters with a person or a circumstance. It is the Heart of God, and also of His Son. 

Elsewhere, he just as affirmingly says:

Love knows no bodies, and reaches to everything created like itself. Its total lack of limit IS its meaning. It is COMPLETELY impartial in its giving, encompassing ONLY to preserve and KEEP COMPLETE what it would give. In your tiny kingdom you have so little! Should it not, then, be there that you would call on Love to enter? Look at the desert, dry and unproductive, scorched and joyless, that makes up your little kingdom. And realize the life and joy that Love would bring to it, from where IT comes, and where it would return WITH you. 

In Workbook Lesson 127 (There is no love but God’s), Jesus also tells us: 

Love cannot judge. As it is one itself, it looks on all as one. Its meaning lies in oneness. And it must elude the mind that thinks of it as partial or in part. There is no love but God’s and all of Love is His. There is no other principle that rules where Love is not. Love is a law without an opposite. Its wholeness is the power holding everything as one, the link between the Father and the Son which holds Them Both forever as the same. No course whose purpose is to teach you to remember what you really are could fail to emphasize that there can never be a difference in what you really are and what Love is. Love’s meaning is your own, and shared by God Himself, and so are you unlimited as well.

In the Workbook for Students, the word “Love” appears in the title affirmations of sixteen lessons:

Lesson 46: God is the Love in which I forgive.

Lesson 50: I am sustained by the Love of God.

Lesson 67: Love created me like Itself.

Lesson 68: Love holds no grievances.

Lesson 127: There is no love but God’s.

Lesson 189: I feel the Love of God within me now.

Lesson 195: Love is the way I walk in gratitude.

Lesson 229: Love, Which created me, is what I am.

Lesson 246: To love my Father is to love His Son.

Lesson 264: I am surrounded by the Love of God.

Lesson 274: Today belongs to Love. Let me not fear.

Lesson 293: All fear is past, and only love is here.

Lesson 298: I love You, Father, and I love Your Son.

Lesson 310: In fearlessness and love I spend today.

Lesson 344: Today I learn the law of love; that what I give my brother is my gift to me.

Lesson 350: Miracles mirror God’s Eternal Love. To offer them is to remember Him, and through His memory to save the world.

Lesson 352: Judgment and love are opposites. From one come all the sorrows of the world. But from the Other comes the peace of God Himself.

 

Notice that when used as a noun, the word "Love" is usually capitalized. Only when used as a verb is "love" lower-case. Christ's treatment of the word as a proper noun supports my assertion that he means Agape in these lessons, rather than the changeable emotion the Ego Mind defines as "love."  If you're still in doubt, read Workbook Lesson 127: There is no Love but God's.

Because there is no English equivalent for Agape or Hooba, Jesus substituted “Perfect Love,” “Eternal Love,” "Divine Love," or just plain “Love” for the same idea when he dictated the Course. Whichever word Jesus may use, he makes his meaning abundantly clear by reminding us -- in the Bible AND the Course -- that God's two GREATEST commandments, rules, or laws are these:

1)   Love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your Soul, and with all your mind; and

2)  Love your neighbor as yourself (because your neighbor IS part of your Christ-Self and also, at the Soul level, God’s Holy Creation).

These two directives underpin the Law of Love so often mentioned in the Course. Jesus spells out what that Holy Law decrees in Workbook Lesson 344 (Today I learn the Law of Love; that what I give my brother is my gift to me). In the text of this lesson, he says the following:

This is Your law, my Father, not my own. I have not understood what giving means, and thought to save what I desired for myself alone. And as I looked upon the treasure that I thought I had, I found an empty place where nothing ever was or is or will be. Who can share a dream? And what can an illusion offer me? Yet he whom I forgive will give me gifts beyond the worth of anything on earth. Let my forgiven brothers fill my store with Heaven’s treasures, which alone are real. Thus is the Law of Love fulfilled. And thus Your Son arises and returns to You.

Elsewhere in the Course, Jesus drives home the point that giving and receiving are "one in Truth." Part of what he means is this: Anything we "give" to other people and/or the world in general (through the thought-system or mind we choose to interpret reality for us) we will receive in kind as manifested or ideated form. To receive the love we all crave so much, we must love God with all our hearts and minds by thinking ONLY kind and loving thoughts about everyone and everything.

Is this a tall order? Hell, yes. Is it possible to achieve? Yes, with time, practice, focused effort, and abundant willingness.

What Jesus also means (which took me until this week to figure out) is that, when we focus our attention on the Holy Spirit's "tone" in our minds, we are giving and receiving healing miracles simultaneously. That "tone" is the vibratory echo of the Creative Force of Grace ringing inside the Higher Mind channel through which God communicates with His dreaming Souls. This "tone" is what Jesus calls the Voice for God, the Song of Heaven, the ever-present echo, the Holy Spirit, and the Atonement, among other similar phrases.

This same tone is what Hindus, Yogis, and Buddhists (among others) call the Om or Aum vibration.

Being the Holy Spirit, this "tone," "echo," or "song" is the BRIDGE back to Eternity, Heaven, or Sanity. As that Bridge, this "tone," "echo," or "song" transports us from the lower levels of consciousness through the higher three levels of restored sanity, before God lifts us out of the dream altogether.

At various points in the Course, Jesus says it's the job of God's Teachers to 1) teach those who can't hear the Holy Spirit's Voice, 2) get their assigned pupils to the Bridge, and 3) teach themselves out of a job.

To that -- and to you -- let me say this: At least half of the Course's Text and Workbook are devoted to getting us to the Bridge, while the other half discusses what to do to go "the rest of the way." And yet, nothing I've read about the Course -- by Marianne Williamson, Ken Wapnick, Jerald Jampolsky, Gary Renard, Beverly Hutchinson Neff, or any other self-styled ACIM teacher -- says ONE WORD about any of this. These so-called teachers also do little more than pay lip service to the foundational tenet that the world is an ILLUSION we must GIVE UP to master the at-one-ment curriculum.

Well ... I'm sure there's a good reason for all of this in God's Great Plan, so I won't judge or condemn any of these well-meaning brothers in Christ. What I will say is this: I'm going to tell you how to get to the Bridge. You might not like what you hear -- or be willing to meet the requirements -- but I'm going to tell you anyway ... because that's the job Jesus gave me.

I can't, however, tell you everything you need to know today. What I can share at present is that our concrete human intellects can't comprehend how we can save ourselves and the world just by listening to this ringing sound in the silence of deep and focused meditation. Our Souls do, however, understand and also greatly benefit from the time devoted to concentrating on this healing tone. Like an internal tuning-fork, this tone reminds us of the Higher Truth we forgot, and also enables us to fulfill our assigned forgiveness and teaching functions.

This is essentially what Jesus means when he says, in Workbook Lesson 169 (By grace I live. By grace I am released), "As you take the role assigned to you, salvation comes a little nearer each uncertain heart that does not beat as yet in tune with God."

Elsewhere in the Course, when Jesus says, "We need do nothing" (except sit and wait for the Holy Spirit to come), this is also what he's talking about. We must, however, prepare ourselves to hear the Holy Spirit's Voice -- and that's where a good human teacher comes in handy. At the risk of overstating the obvious, a good teacher will 1) hear the Holy Spirit's Voice themselves and 2) want to teach their students how to hear it, too -- so they'll no longer need a human teacher. 

I heard the inner-ringing as a child, but forgot all about it until I started hearing it again two or three years ago -- while doing Self-Realization Fellowship's nine-month correspondence course. SRF wasn't my path, but Paramahansa Yogananda knew of what he spoke -- for the most part, anyway. What he got wrong, I'll strive to get right as we roll along.

Let's get back to the Law of Love, which Jesus describes in Workbook Lesson 344. The first thing he says is that the Law of Love is God's, not ours. He then says that, when in league with the Ego Mind, we try to acquire the worldly "treasures" we desire on our own, rather than in the giving-receiving partnerships mandated by the Law of Love. We strive, in other words, to appease our avarice for Satan's temptations (i.e., money, possessions, worldly power, sexual lust and gratification, "special love," etc.) through taking, buying, or self-interested willing, rather than by GIVING the THINGS OF GOD -- all of which are mental -- to our fellow Souls or brothers in Christ. Since Satan's "treasures" are only worthless vapor, all we gain in this unholy bargain is a longer sentence in hell.

The Law of Love is also known as the Law of Giving and Receiving and the Law of Karma. Karma is NOT, as commonly misperceived, a product of the Law of Cause and Effect. Why? Because, as I've explained, there is no CAUSAL MIND in the dream-world. We excluded God and the Creative Force of Agape, remember? It is the Law of Love -- not the Law of Cause and Effect -- that makes it SEEM as if we can generate real effects in the dream-desert. What we actually "manifest" are the "thought-gifts" we give over time to ourselves and others.

The good news is that we can expunge these unreal effects through the practice of True Forgiveness. True Forgiveness is, in fact, the ONLY way to clear the Karmic Record, short of having everything done to us we've done to others since the dream began. As Hindus and Buddhists have understood for centuries, that Karmic Record binds our Souls to the Wheel of Rebirth. 

That Wheel is depicted on the Wheel of Fortune card in the Rider-Waite Tarot deck. Take a moment to study the symbols in the image above, because every little "doodle" tells us something about how the Dream of Separation works. The four yellow figures, for example, are what I like to call the Holy Spirit's Rays of Atonement. In the Bible, these same Holy Powers are known as the four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. It's only the Ego Mind's fearful interpretation of these HELPFUL powers that makes them seem menacing.

The books the winged creatures are reading are the Karmic Ledgers each helps us clear through their prescribed lessons in True Forgiveness. The jackal is the Great Deceiver, whose thought-system binds us to the wheel, and the snake represents the Creative Force of Divine Will uncoiling over many dream-lifetimes. Hindus and Yogis call that serpentine force of God's Will "kundalini."

In the Course's original dictations, Jesus mentions the Record, karmic debts, and reincarnation several times. Unfortunately, these informative references were cut from the Foundation for Inner Peace's "Standard Edition" prior to publication by a presumptuous editor. Other advanced teachings were also altered or removed, as I'll explain in future posts. For now, just know that anyone seeking enlightenment, at-one-ment, or Soul-purification through the Course should study the URText, rather than the "Standard" or "Original" editions. Why? Because (among other reasons) the URText is the ONLY version still containing Christ's critical teachings about sex and sexual desire.

Why do Christ's teachings about sex matter? Because, as Yogis and Buddhists have understood for centuries, we can't hear the Aum vibration as long as we seek to "join" with others at the level of the body.

And on that piquant note, let's close today's post before it gets even longer. In the next, I'll describe in more detail how God creates and why we can't create anything real in the Dream of Separation. 

What is God? (Part 1)

God is Causal Mind

Contrary to what many of us have been duped into believing, God is NOT a bearded old man looking down on the world from a big shiny throne up in Heaven. Our Heavenly Father is NOT, in fact, a person at all, nor is Heaven an actual place. Rightly understood, God is the Supreme Creative Mind or Causeless Cause that, "in the beginning" extended and/or projected the Creative Thought Force that brought into being all that is, has ever been, or ever will be. 

All that is, has ever been, or ever will be is, therefore, God's creative EFFECT. This effect is known by various names, some of which are the Son of God or Sonship, Creation, Christ, the Christ Mind, and the Kingdom of Heaven.

Oh, yes, my sleeping brother. All of these terms are synonyms for the Christ-Self, Holy Mind, or Superconscious Sphere our Souls comprise in Divine Reality. Because God's "Sonship" includes everything the Father created "in the beginning," its membership extends to the Souls within ALL lifeforms, not just human Souls -- and certainly NOT only Jesus.

Think about this the next time you order a hamburger -- or step on a cockroach.

In the dream-desert, Jesus SYMBOLIZES the Christ-Self we all comprise in Divine Reality. That Christ-Self is the "loaf," and our individual Souls are the torn-off pieces or fragments of that greater "body." This is the idea Jesus tried to get across to his disciples at the Last Supper, when he urged them to break the symbolic bread "in remembrance of me." He meant, "Break bread on occasion to remember that you are all parts of the Christ-Self, as am I." He did NOT mean, "Imagine consuming my flesh as a wafer to remember how I died for your sins."

As a symbol of the Christ-Self, Jesus represents the purified State of Grace all human beings must attain before returning to or -- more accurately -- REMEMBERING their True Identities as the Perfect and Eternal Idea the God-Mind willed into being "in the beginning." When he says (in John 14:6), "I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life," he means, "I am the WAY because it is I who will guide you along the path back to Christ-Realization; I am the TRUTH because it is I who helps you see through the Great Deceiver's illusions; and I am the LIFE because it is I who symbolizes the immortal Christ-Self we all are deep-down in the core of our beings."

Got it? Good, because our Savior's message is lost on those who erroneously insist Jesus was God's "only begotten Son."

As Jesus himself explains in the Manual for Teachers, The Christ, Christ-Self, or Christ Mind still abides "within the Mind that is His Source." That Mind -- the God Mind -- is our Holy Home, now and forever. In that Holy Home, Jesus tells us, we (as Souls) are still as perfect and innocent as God created us "in the beginning."

The God-Mind in which we dwell eternally is a Superconscious Sphere of Knowledge or Omniscience. The part we occupy is called Heaven or the Kingdom of Heaven. Contrary to what many religions teach, our Souls do NOT go to Heaven when they drop the maya-perceiving instruments their physical bodies actually are. Rightly understood, Heaven is the natural state of Omniscience or Knowledge our Souls share with their Creator. Heaven is NOT, therefore, a reward Souls receive for repenting or being "good"; it's the All-Knowing state-of-being to which they return by remembering what they really are, where they really are, and how they really think and will.

WHAT they are is God's Holy Son; WHERE they are is inside the God-Mind, safe, sound, and impervious to anything Satan can dream up to deceive them into believing otherwise; and HOW they think and will is the same way God thinks and wills.

Jesus affirms much of what I've just explained in the following excerpt from Lesson 45 (God is the Mind with which I think) of the Course's Workbook for Students:

You think with the Mind of God. Therefore you share your thoughts with Him, as He shares His with you. They are the same thoughts, because they are thought by the same Mind. To share is to make alike, or to make one. Nor do the thoughts you think with the Mind of God leave your mind, because thoughts do not leave their source. Therefore, your thoughts are in the Mind of God, as you are. They are in your mind as well, where He is. As you are part of His Mind, so are your thoughts part of His Mind.

To summarize: Only the thoughts we share with the God Mind are REAL and TRUE. Everything else is smoke and mirrors conjured by the Ego Mind -- the Anti-Christ, Devil, Great Deceiver, or Alien-Mind that broadcasts the Dream of Separation into our sleeping minds. Rightly understood, the Ego Mind weaves a Dark Veil, Etheric Web, or Auric Shell around our Higher Minds to block our memories of God, Heaven, and our True Identities.

This "egg" is the cocoon in which we see ourselves as earthbound caterpillars. It's also the Cosmic Egg or Womb in which we prepare for rebirth as the Sons of God we really are. Rightly understood, the Cosmic Egg is a purification chamber, rather than an evolutionary environment.

In Heaven, all thoughts are shared (telepathically) between Father and Son. Everybody knows everything there is to know, so there's no need for words or language. Behind the Ego Mind's Soul-memory barricade, Dark Veil, Etheric Web, or Auric Shell, we can't hear God's direct transmissions, but we ARE still connected to His Mind. And, thanks to Jesus, we CAN hear the Holy Spirit, who "speaks," "sings," or intones on God's behalf through the Christ Mind.

Technically speaking, Heaven isn't just the Holy Home of the Christ Mind. Being the spaceless sphere the Christ Mind occupies within the God Mind, the Kingdom of Heaven IS the Christ Mind. We don't just live there, in other words; we make up that shared Superconscious "kingdom," sphere, or realm. This is the Great Truth Jesus attempts to impart when he says things like "You are the Kingdom of Heaven" and "The Kingdom of Heaven is spread out upon the earth, but men do not see it."

The Kingdom of Heaven is spread out on the earth as the Soul or Divine Spark within all living things. That indwelling Holy Light is the only part of this world created by God "in the beginning." It is, therefore, the only part that's Real and/or Eternal. We don't see that Spark as long as we perceive the world and our fellow creatures through the Dark Veil of ego-manifested opposites and grievances. 

To behold the Kingdom of Heaven all around us, we must look inward -- deep into the Higher Mind memory "banks" of our Souls. Those ethereal storage units are the chakras, which are blocked by the Ego Mind's unreal opposites, unloving thoughts, fear-conditioning, and grievances. The at-one-ment apparatus that enables our inner-sight or Holy Vision is the Spiritual Eye or nous -- the intuitive "eye of the heart." Only by opening this symbolic "single eye" can we look through the Dark Veil into the chakras. And only through this "single-eye" -- as Jesus explains in the Bible AND the Course -- can we perceive the Kingdom of Heaven on earth.

Why must we turn our focus inward? Because the TRUTH is in our minds, NOT in the forms we perceive as outside and unconnected to us. What we perceive "out there" is merely our fearful thoughts and beliefs, projected outward in material form. More specifically, what we perceive with the body's senses are materialized symbols of the wrong-minded errors that blind us to the inner-Truth. To correct those errors, we have to forgive ourselves and everybody else for being duped into believing what happens in the external world is not only REAL, but also consequential.

I'll revisit these and other Great Truths in future posts. Up next, we're going to talk more about how the God Mind thinks, wills, and creates, so be sure to read on or come back.