resurrection

Resurrection of Spirit After Physical Death

Posted on by Harold Boulette

“Some ask whether one will be saved immediately, if the body is left behind. Let no one doubt. The visible parts of the body that are dead will not be saved. Only the living parts that exist inside will rise. What is the resurrection? It is the revelation of those who have risen. … It is no illusion. It is truth. It is more proper to say that the world is illusion, rather than the resurrection. …

“What am I telling you now? The living will die. How do they live in illusion? The rich become poor and kings are overthrown. All changes. The world is an illusion. Why do I seem to shout? The resurrection has nothing of this character. It is truth standing firm. It is revelation of what is, and the transformation of things, and a transition into freshness. Incorruptibility floods over corruption. Light rivers down upon the darkness, swallowing obscurity. The pleroma fills the hollow. These are the symbols and images of resurrection. They establish its goodness.

“Resurrection is here, O Rheginos, do not lose yourself in details, nor live obeying the flesh for the sake of harmony. … Though you have lived many years, why not look at yourself and see yourself risen now? You have the resurrection, yet you go on as if you are to die when it is only the part destined to die that is moribund. …

“These words I have received from the generosity of my lord, Jesus the Christ. I have taught you and your brothers and sisters, who are my children, about them, and have omitted nothing that may strengthen you.” ~The Treatise on Resurrection

No Resurrection for the Body

This Gnostic treatise makes it quite clear at the beginning. There will be no resurrection of the physical body. Not now, not ever. It is the spirit and soul that survives death and can, potentially, go to Heaven. It is the spirit and soul that can experience resurrection.

Living Parts

The treatise says that only the living parts will experience resurrection. This can be considered in two ways. First, if the physical body is dead, it is what is left alive, namely the spirit and soul, that will “rise”. Or to be more accurate, the spirit and soul will survive. Whether or not they rise to a higher dimension with you along with them depends on what you did to prepare for the eventual death of your body. If you followed the teachings of the ancients and awakened your soul and became a completely integrated being before death, then you complete being, minus the physical body which, after all, is not really a part of your true being, then you will rise along with the spirit and soul. If you haven’t done that, then you will fall to even lower dimensions before eventually returning to Heaven. Continue reading “Resurrection of Spirit After Physical Death” →

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universal knowledge

Universal Knowledge of Matter and Spirit

Posted on by Harold Boulette

“Adam was the first inventor of arts, because he had knowledge of all things as well after the Fall as before. … From this cause, it came about that his successors erected two tablets of stone, on which they engraved all natural arts. … Noah found one of these tablets under Mount Ararat, after the Deluge. In this table were described the courses of the upper firmament and of the lower globe, and also of the planets. At length this universal knowledge was divided into several parts. By means of this separation, one man became an astronomer, another a magician, another a cabalist, and a fourth an alchemist. Abraham … carried the art out of the land of Canaan into Egypt, whereupon the Egyptians rose to so great a height and dignity that this wisdom was derived from them by other nations. …

“So it was in the time of Moses when both the priests and the also the physicians were chosen from among the Magi—the priests for the judgment of what related to health, especially in the knowledge of leprosy, Moses, likewise was instructed in the Egyptian schools, at the cost and care of Pharaohs’ daughter, so that he excelled in all the wisdom and learning of that people. Thus to was it with Daniel who … became a cabalist. Witness his divine predictions. … These words can be understood by the prophetic and cabalistic Art. “ ~Paracelsus

Universal Knowledge

I’m not sure why Paracelsus says that Adam was “the inventor of arts,” but doesn’t mention science. Perhaps to Paracelsus it was all the same thing. In any case, I think it is safe to say that if we consider Adam the inventor of arts, we must also consider him the inventor of science. He is, after all, the symbolic first human being.

Paracelsus also says that Adam had knowledge of all things, even after “the Fall,” meaning that he retained heavenly knowledge even after “falling” from the dimension of spirit into the dimension of matter. This was fortunate in one way, for Adam probably would have perished very quickly without that knowledge to help him learn, develop, and feed and care for himself in this new place he was now living. On the other hand, he couldn’t help but be depressed about the situation he was now in while he retained the knowledge and memories of the much greater spiritual worlds. Continue reading “Universal Knowledge of Matter and Spirit” →

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innumerable atoms

Innumerable Atoms Whirling and Dancing

Posted on by Harold Boulette

“’The red brick,’ says Science, ‘is a mere convention. In reality, that bit, like all other bits of the universe, consists, so far as I know at present, of innumerable atoms whirling and dancing one about the other. It is no more solid than a snowstorm. Were you to eat of Alice-in-Wonderland’s mushroom, and shrink to the dimensions of the infra-world, each atom with its electrons might seem to you a solar system and the red brick itself a universe. Moreover, these atoms themselves elude me as I try to grasp them. They are only manifestations of something else. Could I track matter to its lair, I might conceivable discover that it has no extension, and become an idealist in spite of myself. As for redness, as you call it, that is a question of the relstionship between your optic nerve and the light waves which it is unable to absorb. This evening, when the sun slopes, your brick will probably be purple, a very little deviation from normal vision on your part would make it green. Even the sense that the object of perception is outside yourself may be fancy; since you can as easily attribute this external quality to images seen in dreams, and to waking hallucinations, as you do to those objects which, as you absurdly say, are really there.’

“Further, there is no trustworthy standard by which we can separate the ‘real’ from the ‘unreal’ aspects of phenomena. Such standards as exist are conventional and correspond to convenience, not to truth.” ~Evelyn Underhill

Red Brick

It is surprising that Evelyn Underhill wrote this about 100 years ago. She shows an understanding of the realm of matter that rivals the best Quantum Physicists of today. But that is true of many great spiritual teachers and prophets. They often saw a reality that was hidden to material science, and still do in some cases.

So first off, she is telling us that the apparently hard-as-rock and totally solid brick is nothing of the sort. It is revealed to be mostly empty space when sufficiently magnified. And this wad when the smallest particles known were atoms. But now we can even look into the atom and see the subatomic particles from which it is constructed. And when it is magnified sufficiently to do that, it is revealed that the greatest part of the atom is empty space. The electrons and the nucleus of the atom make us far less than one percent of the total size of the complete atom. But it probably isn’t completely true to say that what is between those particles is “empty space”. It is more accurate to say they are areas devoid of matter. They are, however, holding great amounts of energy, as we know from atomic bombs which are created by freeing that energy in the atoms.

Innumerable Atoms Dancing

This is something that most people don’t think about, but should. Underhill is correct in saying that the atoms are whirling, dancing, moving. They are always moving. They never stop moving. If they stopped moving, it would probably be as much of a disaster to us as when they are broken open in atomic bombs.

There is a lesson to be learned here. Look at this on another level. Everything in the universe is constantly moving as well. Planets spin around stars. Stars dance around the center of a galaxy, and so on. Movement is life. Yet too many humans seem to have the goal in life of reducing their movement as much as possible. Some would probably be perfectly happy to sit still forever if it were possible. But that is not how things function in a living universe. In fact, it is probably true that those who constantly move are those who grow or at least have the potential to grow if they move in the right direction. Those who try to avoid moving, or changing, cannot grow. The strength of that red brick is in the innumerable atoms moving within it. When we move, within and without, we make ourselves stronger.

Matter Has No Extension

I think what Underhill means by this is that matter has no reality behind it. Matter is an illusion. That teaching is shared by most spiritual and mystery schools of the past and present. But that doesn’t mean that matter doesn’t exist. It does exist, but it isn’t what it appears to be. The physical universe is, according to the findings of quantum physics, just a great hologram. Since a hologram is just an image made of light, that solid red brick is but an image made entirely of light. Quantum physics also tells us that those atoms, or at least the electrons in them, are only particles when observes. When not observed, they are just waves of potential. That is why light is both waves and particles.

So those innumerable atoms whirling and dancing are really beams of light in a hologram whirling and dancing. And to some degree, the dance they do seems to be determined by us. We might say it is a giant sandbox or Lego set. But before you run outside and try to manifest a Rolls Royce, remember it is WE who generate the universe; a collective we, not each individual. It is the sum of all our thoughts that create the world we see. The thoughts of just one have only a very limited effect on the universe and those innumerable atoms.

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creative forces

Creative Forces of God and Man

Posted on by Harold Boulette

“SHM: That brings up a point. Cayce referred often to God as ‘the Creative Forces.’ Is God in this concept more like a Brahman, or a force? Or is God a personal God?

“KJT: Cayce actually answered that question for several people, and the answer is, ‘Both.’ He or She is a very personal, loving, parental figure –– a personal God, as well as the Creative Force that imbues everything that exists. Science right now is doing a lot of work with physics and vibrations and looking at the ultimate building blocks of creation, and from Cayce’s perspective, everything is made up of the same stuff. That stuff he called vibrations. You might call it atomic particles, but he suggested that everything is made up of parts of the Creative Forces, parts of God. So ultimately, everything is God, and we are in the process of becoming aware of our own individual spark of the Creator.

“SHM: And our goal is to get back to God?”

“KJT: Our goal is to get back to an awareness of our connection to God. An analogy might be, if we have a child, let’s say, and that child shows some affinity for music with maybe a musical keyboard, that child has to work at it, maybe to go to lessons; it may be to practice. … All along, that has been a part of the soul’s potential, but it still has to go through lessons and a curriculum in order for it to become a part of the [child’s] awareness. And I think that’s very close to what happens to us as a soul. Ultimately, we all have the potential to become a Christ, but we have to have the experiences and choose to learn from those experiences in order to get there.

“SHM: One of the things Cayce said through his readings is that in order to advance it helps to have an ideal –– that we need to have an ideal. What did he mean by that?

“KTJ: Well, ultimately an ideal is basically a spiritual rationale for why we get up in the morning. What we do. The interesting connection to ideals is that ultimately, because of our many experiences in the earth and our many karmic memories with people in our lives, it’s all too easy to fall into old habit patterns and experiences. … And without working with an ideal, we’re apt to just continue in that same trench, or that same way of thinking.” ~Stephen Hawley Martin

Force or Being

This is a question that a lot of people ask. Is God a being and a personal God, or is God a force? And as Cayce said, the answer is “Both”. We have to stop thinking of God as a man with superpowers. That is a false image and concept of God. God is The All, so if any force exists, that force is a part of God. God is all beings, so God is also a being. Perhaps part of the confusion is that we don’t think a force is ordinarily a being, but in a living universe, everything is a being, even a rock or a force. But there are many kinds of forces, so it also makes sense that Cayce sometimes called God the Creative Forces.

Creative Forces

So what are creative forces? Some might think that all forces are creative, but unfortunately, that isn’t the case. In the physical world, there are nearly as many destructive forces as there are creative ones.

There are two primary creative forces at work here. One is the force that gives life and structure to previously unstructured and unliving matter. The other is the force that turns us toward the development of our spirit and soul.

There are also two primary destructive forces that counter the creative ones. One force tried to destroy the living, and disorganize matter. It is a force of entropy. The other is a force that tried to make us more and more material and materialistic.

Sadly, most of humanity has been embracing the destructive forces more than the creative ones, although without realizing it in most cases. But now some of us are starting to awaken and turn toward the creative forces instead. The creative forces are actually more powerful than the destructive ones, but we have to develop them within us and reject the destructive ones. It is the old Native American story of the Two Wolves. The one you feed is the one that thrives, so feed the creative forces from God and of God.

The Goal

The goal of spiritual development could be considered to be awareness, but I think it is more than that. Many people think they are spiritually awakened simply because they have become aware that the realm of matter is an illusion or that materialism and capitalism are failed paradigms. While that is often the first step, it doesn’t constitute true awakening. Real spiritual awakening is when we tap into those creative forces to awaken and develop our spirit and soul. Only when the soul has become conscious can we truly claim to be awake in the spiritual sense. So I think it is more accurate to say the goal is spiritual awakening and enlightenment. That does bring awareness to us, but awareness at a much greater level than simply being aware of the Great Illusion of matter. And awakening the soul helps us know how to use those creative forces to help ourselves and the world we live in.

Ideals

Yes, we should have ideals. That sounds a lot like saying we should have goals, but there is a difference. The ideal is the ultimate. It is an image to hold in our minds as something to aim for. Goals are the methods we use and the steps we take to move closer and closer to the ideal. Becoming one with God and those Creative Forces is the ideal of most spiritual students, or at least it should be. Manifesting a new car or a pile of money is not a spiritual goal and being a greedy rich person is not a spiritual ideal. If you are truly interested in spiritual growth and development, you need spiritual goals and ideals.

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