Monthly Archives: March 2012

Love is the Fulfilling of the Law

ON GOD; Part LXIII

In our last post we tried to relate the ideas of the Buddha and the Christ to our idea of focus so as to gain the understanding that it is by focus that a man can escape the net and it is by focus that a man can enter in at the strait gate, the narrow path. As the consciousness in form which we see as the Soul, the Christ Within, who is enmeshed in the illusion, glamour and deception of the world of form and his Life in it. Not a physical illusion as we have said before but rather a emotional and mental idea that this world and this Life is THE REALITY which, of course, it is not. This consciousness is the Life that we have in form and in form it becomes rather one with the personality aspects of the body, the mind and the emotions and here is the beginning of that illusory belief that this is what the consciousness is. This is what we know because we are born into it and evolve in it as a infant, a child, a young adult and then an adult. This is the nurture part of our worldly existence and this, together with our nature, that is the body with the emotional and mental apparatus, creates the personality that houses if you will the consciousness for a particular lifetime. Now there is no sense of illusion, glamour and deception apparent to the man until he discovers the duality that is Life and that he IS; the Soul, the Christ Within, living through a personality that has become the essence of the conscious man. Until this duality is sensed, the sense of illusion is not consciously present but it does not disappear, rather it keeps us ensnared in the net which is itself and the world. Whatever a man may believe about his Life, if it is not a belief in the spiritual and the True Self that is not the personality, this is illusion. To believe spiritually however is not the solution to the illusions of Life in form but is better seen as the True beginnings of the solution because when one does not know a thing, it is of no consequence. This is similar to a blind man being in a dark room; he is in the dark but he does not know it and it does not matter nor does it effect him in any way; such is the nature of illusion on those who do not see the duality of Life in form.

When the duality is sensed the gravity of illusion, glamour and deception take on full force and it is here that the man and his society plot and plan to create a way to see the unreal in the real. This is a difficult saying but a True one; for when the difficult ideas of the way of righteousness are seen, there is a tendency to alleviate the way and to create systems that accommodate the lower way while finding also a way to call the accommodation as the higher. This is in part the meaning of yesterday’s verses from the prior day’s Quote of the Day; in his statement to the Galatians the Apostle Paul is clearly telling them of the deception of living one’s life for the things of the world. In the words “God is not mocked” we find an wealth of understanding and of primary importance is the idea that the Christ Within, our own God in form, is not fooled by this tendency toward the things of the flesh but remains pure and unblemished, incorruptible as Paul would put it, awaiting the proper focus of the personality consciousness. The Master tells us “Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal: But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal: For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also” (Matthew 6:19-21). The treasure is of course that which one focuses on and it is in this treasure that the personality consciousness will be. When viewed from the right perspective can we see the straightforwardness  and the simplicity of these sayings by the Master? And, can we see the hows and the whys that men would create ‘safe harbors’ in the world to accommodate his partaking in the “treasures upon earth“. These ‘safe harbors’ are illusion, glamour and deception; we tell ourselves that what we are doing or teaching is right and good based upon our own sense of focus upon the world and the things of the world and we interpret the words of the Master and the Apostles to accommodate our plans. Note that we include ourselves in this matrix as none are free of these plights until we reach that stage of True discipleship and this is regardless of what we think and believe to be so which is, of course, our illusion.

We also related in the last post the idea of freeing oneself from the net of illusion, glamour and deception with the Truth of Love and entered into a discussion on that most powerful saying by Paul to the Corinthians on Love. We discover in this what Love is and how Love acts and remembered that we are Love as God IS Love. In living one’s Life as this Love and in keeping the Master’s commandments on Love that we have discussed so many times, we will free ourselves and overcome the world of illusion, glamour and deception. This is so simple yet so hard because of the illusory world in which we live. The Master tells us clearly yet we make it ever so difficult by telling ourselves and teaching that He did not mean this or that but that He meant what we may come to believe that He meant. Can we see the illusion, glamour and deception in these types of thoughts? The Master says:

“Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself” (Matthew 22:37-39)

This should be telling us of the extreme importance of what it is that He is saying by calling this the First and the Great Commandment and telling us then that the second is just like it in importance. He seals this idea for us in the way it is framed in Mark’s Gospel where He says that “There is none other commandment greater than these” (Mark 12:34). There is confusion however in this idea of neighbour and in the idea of loving oneself which Jesus addressed for us but apparently not to our ease as we so often work around His idea of neighbor and change its meaning to suit Life in the World creating that illusion that even in His Christian world not ALL are our neighbour nor our brother. The Master says:

“And, behold, a certain lawyer stood up , and tempted him, saying, Master, what shall I do to inherit eternal life? He said unto him, What is written in the law? how readest thou? And he answering said, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind; and thy neighbour as thyself. And he said unto him, Thou hast answered right: this do, and thou shalt live. But he, willing to justify himself, said unto Jesus, And who is my neighbour? And Jesus answering said, A certain man went down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell among thieves, which stripped him of his raiment, and wounded him, and departed, leaving him half dead. And by chance there came down a certain priest that way: and when he saw him, he passed by on the other side. And likewise a Levite, when he was at the place, came and looked on him, and passed by on the other side.  But a certain Samaritan, as he journeyed, came where he was: and when he saw him, he had compassion on him, And went to him, and bound up his wounds, pouring in oil and wine, and set him on his own beast, and brought him to an inn, and took care of him. And on the morrow when he departed, he took out two pence, and gave them to the host, and said unto him, Take care of him; and whatsoever thou spendest more, when I come again, I will repay thee. Which now of these three, thinkest thou, was neighbour unto him that fell among the thieves? And he said, He that shewed mercy on him. Then said Jesus unto him, Go , and do thou likewise” (Luke 10:25-37).

Now this is a beautiful story and in it are many lessons. First we should relate the conduct of the Samaritan to the words of Paul to the Corinthians on Love that we discussed yesterday and second we should note that he priest and the Levite, because of their self deception on what is right to do, left the man in the street. These supposed people of God, the priest of the order of Aaron and the Levite, Gods own tribe that He took to serve Him, who should and likely did know better, ignored the True word of God in favor of what they had built as doctrine and habit, their illusion. In this is the Master’s own definition of one’s neighbour and that is any man and at any time. Another point of confusion as we have said is the idea of loving oneself and in this we have discovered the words of the Master which we call today the Golden Rule:

“Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them“ (Matthew 7:12).

This is of course ever so simple a saying and yet it remains in mans heart and mind just a saying, a platitude if you will, that carries little force in the lives of men and this because the illusion, glamour and deception of Life in the world prohibits the easy accomplishment of this. As we have said, in this saying is the practical understanding of how to Love oneself plus the practical instruction on how it is that we CAN Love our neighbour. When we can see this clearly through the fog and the mist, we can then see also our freedom. The last part of our normal presentation of this idea of Love is to define it away from the sentimental and the emotional affections of one person for another or for a thing animate or not. Our definition is then:

In a general sense love is benevolence, good will; that disposition of heart which inclines men to think favorably of their fellow men, and to do them good. In a theological sense, it includes supreme love to God, and universal good will to men. 

This is Love and this is GoodWill which we say is Love in Action. In the 60’s a troubled rocker wrote these words as the lyrics to a song:  Freedom’s just another word for nothing left to lose and if we can reflect upon this we can get a glimpse of the entirety of the Master’s teaching on discipleship. We can only lose a thing if we have it and if it has any meaning to us. When we can overcome the treasures of this world; be they personal attachments, or possessions and wealth, or fame and position, we are free and in effect we have nothing left to lose from a personal and worldly perspective. Can we see that even at the depths of religion there is illusion, glamour and deception and it is all based on what we as men in form believe and we believe what it is that enables our easy Life which is contrary to so much of the Truth that the Master and His apostles gave us.

We go now to yesterday’s Quote of the Day as it is one of the sayings on deception that we are discussing. James tells us that: “But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves. For if any be a hearer of the word, and not a doer, he is like unto a man beholding his natural face in a glass: For he beholdeth himself, and goeth his way, and straightway forgetteth what manner of man he was. But who so looketh into the perfect law of liberty, and continueth therein, he being not a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work, this man shall be blessed in his deed. If any man among you seem to be religious, and bridleth not his tongue, but deceiveth his own heart, this man’s religion is vain“. (James 1:22-26). This is straightforward and simple as so much of the New Testament is but is never looked at as a reality or else men have lost totally the understanding of what a doer of the word may be. It is likely that both of these accusations are true for there are many who somehow believe that if they keep the Ten Commandments as best they can, that they are ‘saved’. This is illusion and it is contrary to the words of the Master who in many places paints very clear pictures of how a man should live his Life and how he should act. We should remember that the words of the Master are intended to make of each of us a disciple; this is our overall goal and our objective and we must someday accomplish this. To see His words as anything lower than this goal is self deception and this is James’ message to us. Can we understand the next part of this saying by James and can we see in this the like ideas that we find in the balance of Paul’s writing on Love to the Corinthians that we discussed yesterday? Paul writes that: “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. When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things. For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known” (1 Corinthians 13: 9-12).

The idea of seeing one’s face in the mirror is intended to cast a picture for us of one who is not a doer of the word. Speaking to disciples or aspirants, James is telling them that if they know the law and do not do the law, that it is like seeing the Truth of oneself in the glass and then walking away forgetting it and going about one’s worldly business. Conversely, the lesson is that when a man looks into the word of God, “the perfect law of liberty” and stays with it then “this man shall be blessed in his deed“; blessed for staying with the word. The word that is translated natural in these verses it the Greek word genesis which is understood to be one’s birth face or, as Vincent tells it the face he was born with⁴ which makes little sense that this is the face that one would see in the mirror as a grown man. If we take however the idea of genesis, the beginning, and try to see that it is his countenance that he sees, that is his True Self as a disciple showing through the outer appearance in his vision we can understand this better. To know the word of God and not keep it is like that man seeing his True face and walking away from it. Can we marry this thought to the idea of deception? That all these things are deceiving oneself. James goes further into one of his favorite topics and that is the tongue which he shows us as evidence of the man that is the doer of the word, that he can bridle his tongue. We will pursue James’ ideas on the tongue another time. The verses from Paul’s epistle are a bit different  but along the same lines that we are painting above regarding looking in the glass and seeing the Truth of the man as a disciple of the Lord and not just the physical body and its attributes. Paul is speaking from a different perspective and he is saying that to see as a man in the world is to see darkly his own countenance, his True Self,  and we know that this is a thing of stages which can range from totally dark to the ability to see through. Paul is telling us that when we overcome the world however, when the Love that he speaks about prevails in ones Life, that we can then see the True Self clearly; this is freedom from the world and from the  illusion, glamour and deception. Paul finishes his statement with yet another Truth that says much the same thing and that is that now we know our True Selves in part and this as we are working on developing the sense of True Discipleship and KNOWING which, once this is developed, we will know our Truth as our Truth has always known us. Ponder on this.

We will continue with these thoughts in the next post.

Note on the Quote of the Day