Post by Rogier van Vlissingen on Apr 8, 2007 20:03:20 GMT -5
P/GoTh:
quote
The disciples said to him, "Twenty-four prophets have spoken in Israel, and they all spoke of you." He said to them, "You have disgraced the living one who is in your presence, and have spoken of the dead."
unquote
MM/GoTh:
quote
His followers said to him, "Twenty-four prophets have spoken in Israel and they have all spoken of you."
He said to them, "You yave disregarded the living one who is in your presence and have spoken of the dead."
unquote
Form:
Pursah chooses the more traditional "disciples" instead of the more general "followers," in ACIM terms one might think in terms of "students." At this stage of the game the stylistic "Twelve" of the canonical gospels, which are symbolic of all of us (the twelve being the signs of the zodiac), are not in place yet, so the term "disciples" still would have a more generic meaning.
Content:
To the ego eternity just seems to be "a lot of time," and since the ego lives in the past, longevity is how it measures relevance and authority, since it cannot see what is in front of us for what it is. We might note that this makes no sense on many levels. Even mathematcally it is clear that "infinity" is a limit, which can never be reached! - within the ego system, we might add.
This statement is very interesting as a rebuke to the ego's need to look to the past for an explanation, which is "blasphemy" to what we are as spirit. The ego is always afraid in the presence of the immediacy of spirit, and uses the past to defend itself and its values, and avoid surrendering to the immediacy of the spiritual present.
In a way therefore this statement is a refutation of the "apostolic succession" avant la lettre, for that obviously false construct on which Christianity sought to found the substitute authority of the church, very much pulled Jesus down into this world in which authority rests on "tradition" and longevity in terms of time and space. Hence we think granite is solid, and mud is not, forgetting that these differences are just part of the illusion, whose purpose is to delude us into thinking that anything here should be eternal, and thus "tempt" us to put our stock in the world of time and space, instead of realizing that our eternal reality (or should I say our "Immortal Reality?") is only in Heaven with God, and that what we should do is to follow Jesus out of this world, instead of pulling him down into it.
Around the Course we see the same thing again. There are those who try to even give the Course a false authority by calling it the 3rd testament, etc. And there is plenty of confusion about the Jesus of the Course, who is NOT the Jesus of Christianity, for the same reasons as this logion reflects. The interesting thing about the Thomas/ACIM connection is that in Thomas we hear only Jesus' teachings and not the mythologies around him, which quickly allowed him to be completely misinterpreted and then re-interpreted by Paul c.s. for the purposes of this world, finally rendering the religion that was to be named after him suitable for service to Caesar (the ego).
And on yet another level this statement is a wonderful reminder of just how foolish and misguided the search for the historical Jesus is, when the problem is we're not listening to him today! For example the book "The Five Gospels," has the subtitle "What did Jesus really say?" and it says on the cover "The Search for the Authentic words of Jesus," and we can now appreciate why these concerns are an ego- diversion, when the issue is listening to Jesus in my life today.
quote
The disciples said to him, "Twenty-four prophets have spoken in Israel, and they all spoke of you." He said to them, "You have disgraced the living one who is in your presence, and have spoken of the dead."
unquote
MM/GoTh:
quote
His followers said to him, "Twenty-four prophets have spoken in Israel and they have all spoken of you."
He said to them, "You yave disregarded the living one who is in your presence and have spoken of the dead."
unquote
Form:
Pursah chooses the more traditional "disciples" instead of the more general "followers," in ACIM terms one might think in terms of "students." At this stage of the game the stylistic "Twelve" of the canonical gospels, which are symbolic of all of us (the twelve being the signs of the zodiac), are not in place yet, so the term "disciples" still would have a more generic meaning.
Content:
To the ego eternity just seems to be "a lot of time," and since the ego lives in the past, longevity is how it measures relevance and authority, since it cannot see what is in front of us for what it is. We might note that this makes no sense on many levels. Even mathematcally it is clear that "infinity" is a limit, which can never be reached! - within the ego system, we might add.
This statement is very interesting as a rebuke to the ego's need to look to the past for an explanation, which is "blasphemy" to what we are as spirit. The ego is always afraid in the presence of the immediacy of spirit, and uses the past to defend itself and its values, and avoid surrendering to the immediacy of the spiritual present.
In a way therefore this statement is a refutation of the "apostolic succession" avant la lettre, for that obviously false construct on which Christianity sought to found the substitute authority of the church, very much pulled Jesus down into this world in which authority rests on "tradition" and longevity in terms of time and space. Hence we think granite is solid, and mud is not, forgetting that these differences are just part of the illusion, whose purpose is to delude us into thinking that anything here should be eternal, and thus "tempt" us to put our stock in the world of time and space, instead of realizing that our eternal reality (or should I say our "Immortal Reality?") is only in Heaven with God, and that what we should do is to follow Jesus out of this world, instead of pulling him down into it.
Around the Course we see the same thing again. There are those who try to even give the Course a false authority by calling it the 3rd testament, etc. And there is plenty of confusion about the Jesus of the Course, who is NOT the Jesus of Christianity, for the same reasons as this logion reflects. The interesting thing about the Thomas/ACIM connection is that in Thomas we hear only Jesus' teachings and not the mythologies around him, which quickly allowed him to be completely misinterpreted and then re-interpreted by Paul c.s. for the purposes of this world, finally rendering the religion that was to be named after him suitable for service to Caesar (the ego).
And on yet another level this statement is a wonderful reminder of just how foolish and misguided the search for the historical Jesus is, when the problem is we're not listening to him today! For example the book "The Five Gospels," has the subtitle "What did Jesus really say?" and it says on the cover "The Search for the Authentic words of Jesus," and we can now appreciate why these concerns are an ego- diversion, when the issue is listening to Jesus in my life today.