창조 신화

[심창식]

Tim & Mo's Creation Myth...

The Spiritual Frontier

This creation myth is about our spiritual history.  It provides a review of our Creator's actions regarding spiritual life on planet Earth.  There's nothing mystic in this story and there are no hidden messages.  What this portrays is the foundation of spiritual thought for one family.  And since perspectives depend on ones position around a focal point and there are infinite varieties of positions, our family will form many different conclusions than other families.  This is why faiths rarely agree with each other - we all see things differently.  But there is unity in what we consider to be acceptable behavior as will be shown within this story.  If you haven't explored the possibilities of our existence, let this be a springboard for your own thoughts and legends about life.

It is necessary that a healthy idea of creation is formed; for unless this is done, the human mind easily falls into either the notion of a creation purely by nature, or that God created humans outside of the order of material physics. 

While these two opposing ideas seem to define the options, the obvious conclusion is approached when we understand that the world of nature is just part of God's Universe.  When we comprehend how the spiritual world continuously interacts with the natural world, we can then see how and why God created the material world, where the appearance of evolution fits into Creation and why so many bad things seem to happen in a world created by Divine Love.

And after we learn how creation is linked to the Creator, we can discover why most of the fears that we have are unfounded.  Everything happens to us for our spiritual success.  This is enlightenment.

The story begins with the assertion that God is Everything; that there are two worlds - the spiritual world and the material world; and that the interaction between these two worlds is key to understanding our life.

It verifies that humans have passed through different periods that began with what some call the Golden Age and others call the First World - and even though each successive age has degenerated spiritually, the people of this Earth will eventually return to the Golden Age once again.

It declares that God respects our freewill above all; and to protect the spiritual freedom associated with this freewill, we are completely isolated from the overwhelming presence of God while in the material world. The Creator will not compel us.  This isolation gives us the appearance of chance - or evolution - and will never yield direct material evidence of God.

Above all, the main theme of this myth involves how our Creator - throughout the progression of history - has tamed the hells and answered doubts regarding the existence of the spiritual world and of God.
 

Divine Love is not distant from us and does not depend on humans to help it penetrate the world.  This Love comes to each of us directly from God, individually packaged to meet our exact spiritual needs.  Our duty is be a good person.  Now, each of us have learned all this while we were very young, but have grown to confuse or deny it as we became more involved with the demands and worries of material life. 

So to bring our minds back to the spiritual purpose of our life, let us begin the story that reminds us where we came from; and let us walk together through the spiritual frontier...

"...be a Columbus to whole new continents and worlds within you - opening new channels, not of trade, but of thought." 
- H. D. Thoreau, Walden, 1840
 

 

Contents...
	Ø	God
	Ø	Humans
	Ø	The Material World
	Ø	Beginnings
	Ø	The Golden Age
	Ø	Transition
	Ø	The First Great Judgment
	Ø	The Seeds of Spiritual Rebirth
	Ø	The Silver Age
	Ø	The Divine Story
	Ø	The Bronze Age
	Ø	Summary of the Ages
	Ø	The Material Birth of God
	Ø	The Last Judgment
	Ø	Today
	Ø	Ever After
Appendix...
	Ø	Things We've Found to be Right
	Ø	Things We've Found to be Wrong
	Ø	Things to Come
	Ø	Other Things

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Gather 'round children and give us a listen
sit back and watch the fire and stars glisten.
We bring you stories of new and old
about times of famine and times of gold.
So let us start with praise and applaud
because for us everything good is

God

Before the beginning, in the Infinite world apart from time and space, lives our Creator.  With an Essence of Pure Love and an Exterior of Pure Wisdom, God shines forth as the warm and brilliant Sun of Eternity.  The Divine Love is Spiritual Heat, which radiates pure affections of love throughout Creation; and the Divine Wisdom is Spiritual Light, which provides enlightenment.  These two aspects generate the Divine Activity which is God: the Divine Human; the Infinite Being; the Creator; the Source of Life - all Loving, all Knowing, all Powerful, all Substance.  And from this Substance, God creates Everything Good.
 

Humans

Now, fellow children, we should know that we are made in the image of God and endowed with two gifts that distinguish us from the rest of creation.  However, it is important to know that we are not life by itself, but are a receptacle of the Creator's Life.  We are a finite vessel containing life that comes from the Infinite God - Who is the Source of all Life.  And we, by ourselves, can neither generate unselfish love nor understand things relating to Infinity.  This ability has to be given to us by God.  Otherwise, we would be no more advanced than the wild animals.

The two gifts that separate humans from the beasts are the rational mind - which is capable of linking to the spiritual world and receiving wisdom to understand ideas about God; and the freewill - that is capable of choosing heavenly love from the Divine.  Without freewill, we could never change our ways and improve - nor could we admit God into our consideration.  We would be fixed in our daily habits without the freedom to find higher ground.  Some say that freewill is the choice between good and evil, but it is in reality an opportunity to reject our own self-focused nature - which we already possess - in favor of a life that will give us more peace and happiness.  The free choice comes by rejecting our own selfish nature and accepting what God is giving us.

The essence of our life is love - and the affections that come from this love: Love is the center of our life.  And each of us has a unique and individual pattern of love that is different from all other people before us and after.  This pattern is a combination of loves that partially come from our family and ancestors and is varied within the ruling loves of our lineage.  And it also comes from the loves that are implanted by God. 

Between these two loves, our freewill can choose whether to stay with our own inclinations and the resulting separation from God or to follow the heavenly affections that we each receive during early childhood.  But, more on this later.

If we were to follow a single affection within us, we could see certain thoughts springing out of it: We love, therefore we think.  And when the specific affection joins to its related thoughts outside of us, they combine to form some type of human use (or activity).  For instance, the ability to bake bread comes from a love for the bread or for those who will eat the bread, combined with the thoughts regarding how to go about making the bread.  If there was no initial love, there would be no motivation or thought concerning it - and the bread would never be made.  We do everything from love in this way - good loves and bad loves.

In other words, every affection has its own companion, a married partner as it were.  In a series, affections of natural love have knowledge, affections of spiritual love have understanding, and affections of celestial love have wisdom.  For an affection without its companion truth has no reality; or in different words: without love, wisdom has no activation and actions would not occur.  Hence it is that in every created thing there is something that is referable to the marriage of affection and thought or, more deeply, to good and truth or, even more deeply, to love and wisdom.

This structure in humans is in the image of God because it is analogist with how Divine Wisdom springs from God's Divine Love, and both join to form the Divine Human Activity [love, wisdom and activity as in "end", "cause" and "effect"].  But, even though we exist in the image of God and feel as though we have an independent life, we must constantly remember that we are only receptacles of God's Life - receptacles of love and wisdom from the Creator.  In fact, since all Substance is God's, then the only things that do belong to us are the unique loves selected by our freewill and the experiences and lessons we collect along the way.

  The Material World

The physical world is the result of the Creator's Actions and Substance.  But before we can understand this, we must be able to understand the difference between the spiritual world and the material world - between spiritual substances - which are infinite and living - and material substances - which are finite and only a shell of the living. 

The material world and the ideas influenced by the material world are made up of the things we see around us and that are directly revealed to our senses - material things.  But the spiritual world and ideas originating in the spiritual world are made up of things that are not material - although they may appear as material things or are clothed with material things.  These immaterial objects can be called abstracts or intangibles or spiritual ideas.  They are qualities apart from an object.   In the spiritual world, these qualities have form and substance - pure form and pure substance, resulting in what we can call spiritual objects.

A poem is something material: we can see it and even touch it - but poetry is an abstract quality - or that which gives the poem life.  In our world, it is seen and heard as a poem, but in the spiritual world, it is seen as an element of poetry.  To material people, the difference is not significant; but to the spiritual, this is visible substance. 

A sunset is material, but the beauty that causes inspiration is an abstract.  A song is something we can see, touch and hear; but music is an abstract quality - giving life to the song.  One can love a song or one can love music.  The first one loves the personal experiences and popularity of the song, but those who love music are affected by the pure beauty and quality of it – it’s spiritual substance.

Laws are a material quality; but justice is an abstract that give life to the laws.  Marriage can be seen and touched; but love fills it with life.  And Divine Love and Wisdom are Divine Substances that give everything life. 

Through our spiritual receptacles, we have awareness of these higher non-material things - these spiritual abstracts.  Animals do not have this.  And our own material senses can not detect them - but these things can be perceived and understood by our spiritual senses.  Through our God given abilities, we can learn about and ultimately share joy with the Creator. 

By this process, we are able to understand that the Divine Love and Wisdom are the spiritual substances that both make up the Infinite world and mold the physical universe; and that our Creator is the pure substance of Divine Love and Divine Wisdom.  Therefore, Love and Wisdom are the substantial substances of Creation and everything else is made by their combination - or conversely, by a human perversion of their combination.  Everything good that exists has elements of this Love and Wisdom in them.  But those things that are in opposition come from the evil and falsity that are generated by the freewill of humanity.
 

It also must be known that the very first law of God's Providence is that humanity's freewill is to be protected at all times.  This is key to understanding why the world seems so cruel and why it has progressed through what appears to be evolution.

Furthermore, we need to understand that the good desire of love is to share what it has with others and to receive love in return. Our Creator, who is the Divine Human, has created our world so that the Divine Love can serve this purpose.  Our purpose in life is to receive and share this Love with others and to freely love our Creator in return. 

Because of our spiritual freewill, the Creator will never compel us.  Compelled love is not true love, because compulsion is eventually resented.  So to ensure that we are not overwhelmed by the Divine Presence, the Creator has provided that our entrance into life would be into a world that appears isolated and without direct proof that God exists - so that spiritual freewill can be preserved.  This world, that appears isolated from God, is the finite world - the world of time and space, our world.

However, we are also born into the spiritual world at the same time - because we are in reality spiritual beings.  Birth marks the beginning of our spirit as well as our material body that temporarily contains our spirit.  We can not have our start in the Infinite world since it is a world without beginnings, therefore we begin our existence in the finite material world.  All of us – all angels, so called super angels, satans and devils come from the material world.

From our entrance into life, we have both our material body that lives in this world and our spirit that actually exists in the spiritual world.  In fact, our spiritual part is the real person - we can not exist without this part.  It is this internal spiritual person that possesses the rational mind, the freewill and the life that temporally resides in our material body.  We will know that this is true when our material body falls off and our spirit continues to live. 

To put it differently, our life process consists of entering God's world through the material portal.  This serves several purposes, including preparation for the more complex spiritual world as well as preservation of our freewill.  But during the initial process, we reside within this material body.  The material body in reality isn't us, but is the vehicle that carries our spirit through this world - the world of beginnings.

However, today we are not yet aware of the spiritual side of our life until our spirit fully awakens after what we call death.  A wise and famous early American once described our material body as a husk, covering our spirit and demanding most of our attention.  When the husk dies and falls off, our spirit fully awakens into the infinite world of God.

Our Creator has given us these receptacles of freewill and rational understanding so that we can receive the capability to see God's Infinite Love and willingly return this same love back to God.  Even so, we all have existence (both the good and the evil) because our Creator's Life flows into all of us, whether we choose to receive the Divine Love or not - the rain falls on upon both the evil and the good.  But this can be explained in more detail at another time.  For this portion of our story, just know that there are two worlds - one material and the other containing the spiritual substances that are the root of all material substances; and that these two worlds are conjoined through a spiritual action - such as how a certain quality of poetry corresponds and is conjoined to its material manifestation - a poem.
 

The next part of our story may not be as interesting to some of you.  If you understand that the material world was made from and is sustained by God's Divine Substance and that this material world is a reflection of the spiritual world, you may take a break until we reach the next part.  But if you would like to fill your imagination with ideas of how this process could occur and why, then sit back while the progression of our story leads us through the material creation, towards the emergence of humans.
 

Our creation began in this manner.  Emanating from God are spiritual atmospheres that form the spiritual world - each quality of God's Love and Wisdom forming different manifestations within different layers.  These layers have continuous changes within each layer, depending on ‘distance’ from the center; and discrete differences between layers. For instance, heaven is made up of separate, completely different (or discrete) levels, in progression towards God; and within each level, there are related and continuous progressions toward God. 

To put it more clearly, there are three heavens - with the first heaven being further from God - not in distance, but in state of life - and the third being closest. Each heaven is discretely different. One heaven (the first) is driven by natural good, those who do good actions from some type of fear or blind duty.  The second heaven contains those who do good actions because of what they have learned - from spiritual truth. And the third contains those who do good actions out of love - from celestial love.  Each is distinctly different from the other and can not commingle.

But within each heaven, there are continuous and related differences, some being closer to God and others further.  However, it is important to remember that all people in heaven (in any part of heaven) are living in their own highest possible level of happiness - because every person has different loves and enjoyments. So heaven to one person is the same as heaven to another because of the joy they perceive.

Each atmospheric layer is alive with abstracts, depending on their position around God, with each abstract making an appearance of something different within God's Infinite world - ultimately resulting in the beautiful world of nature appearing around us.  However, in the spiritual world, even though the images may seem to appear the same as in the material world, they are in reality purer, with colors and spiritual objects that are more defined and some that don't exist in the material world.

The more remote layers of this spiritual world contain simpler abstracts that can serve as mediums, with the ability to accommodate both spiritual and material ideas.  For instance, one can compare infinity to limitless space - thus holding both the spiritual idea of infinity and at the same time, the material idea of space. These remote abstracts are used to manifest God in the finite world.
 

The first to appear in our creation was limitless space.  It can be called the shell of Infinity.  This immense space came into existence from a constant Divine thought and the actions it excited in the remote layers of the Spiritual World.  It is an Idea of Space from the Creator - thus making it limitless.  And because outer space, by itself, is technically not material and cannot be scientifically proven to be limitless, it is an abstract - a spiritual idea.  It is essentially a limitless bottomless pit, presenting a sub-dimensional mirror image - or clue - of Infinity.  Even so, it is of the finite world since it contains space and time.

And then the first particle of matter appeared.  To understand how objects that are material come from spiritual abstracts, one should know that the first of an object in geometry is a point without dimension.  And since this point has no dimension, it takes up no space; therefore a point without dimension is actually an abstract - immaterial or spiritual - idea.  But after the point begins to move, space is occupied and a shape starts to appear and it can be proven by our senses.  Even so, fellow children, we must remember that substance itself is not the material that we see and feel here on Earth, but pure substance is the abstract to which the material object corresponds - the soul of the material.

Within this limitless space, the Creator began to vibrate a tiny portion of space and finite material had its first appearance.  Picture a pure black void with that “point without dimension” vibrating in all directions within its tiny spherical boundary. A particle would appear from what would seem to be nothing.  To put it another way, imagine this as if it were the first musical note emanating from God for the Song of Creation.  As it passes through the spiritual atmospheres, it takes on the characteristics of the atmospheric states through which it travels.  For instance, in the highest atmospheres, those closest to God, it could sound like a flute; and in the following atmospheres, it could sound like a trumpet, stringed instrument, voice, drum and so on.  When it reaches the more remote spiritual atmospheres, it generates movement in material space and becomes a material object - made real to material humans.

The spiritual idea that produced this first simple particle originated from the Creator's Mind like a seed.  The ultimate end of this particular seed (the Seed of Creation) is to establish a heaven from finite humans so that humans can share and enjoy the Love that God passes through them, while in return, they can give love and enjoyment back to the Creator.  Creation is intended to be the best friend of the Creator - a free and willing friend.  This is the intention of Creation.  In the process and as a result, humans can live freely in joy and happiness for Eternity.

Once this first particle appeared, it then began to exhibit its unique and constant behavior.  This core behavior would never change - because the particular purpose never changes.  And then this new vibrating particle began to vibrate itself - in all directions - forming a new discrete layer; and so on, layer after layer, until the particle had enough mass to allow it to interact with other particles.

And then other particles appeared, this time from rotation - instead of vibration - elliptically around the center in all directions, forming another spherical shaped particle.  Still others appeared moving with opposite rotation; or further with vibrations that are out of phase with the initial vibrations, modulating onto differing combinations of rotations and vibrations, and so forth - all being driven by the constant excitation of Divine Actions (like the Conductor of the Divine Orchestra).  Some say that there were twelve original particles. Others say that there was only one original particle that divided and changed - as cells divide and mutate.  What is important, dear friends, is the knowledge that spiritual substance makes up and is the soul of all material substance. 

And because the constant movement of the these particles is continuously fueled, sustained and kept in motion from spiritual forces - God - then it follows that the material world is being kept constantly alive by God's substance - spiritual Activity.  In fact, the material world would stop to exist if this constant spiritual Activity were taken away.  In this way, the Creator is always connected to Creation. 
 

So you see, fellow children, true substance is not what we see and touch, true substance is the force within those things that we see and touch.  The material world can not appear without that constant force.  So in musician's terms, our reality is made up of the universal hum caused by the creation of limitless space and the complex music that makes up all matter and the resulting objects.  Without the Divine Substance continuously generating this music, the material world would vanish and God would be alone.
 

These first particles also reflect the image of infinity because if we could see deeply into each particle, we would find layer after layer after layer of combinations and of various motions, one after the other, with the same limitless depth within in each particle as the limitless expanse of space.  Both are bottomless pits of the material world - reflecting infinity.  However, both are of the finite world since both contain space and time.

And when one type of vibrating particle came close to its opposite type, the particles attracted since one was moving out while the other was moving inward.  And conversely, when particles came close that were in phase with each other, they would both be going out at the same time, and thereby repel.  And other particles acted similarly and also neutrally, giving the material universe its motions, attractions and repulsions.

This process continued to build and gather in one location within limitless space and multiplied quickly until there appeared all the required mass of matter within that ball of particles to fill our known universe - every star; every planet; every speck of space dust; every quark.  Can you imagine the size of this?  Yet from a distance, it could appear like a tiny point of light in limitless space.

Instantaneously, evolution and the laws of nature were set in motion.  Without this beginning and apparent isolation from God, humans would not have their spiritual freedom.  To us, nature appears as if it exists within the random chaos of what we call evolution; but in the Divine Reality, everything occurs within the Divine Order of what appears to be chaos.  The appearance of chaos being the Mask of God.

Once in space, these particles were set in motion by their own attracting and repelling forces. They began to collide in many different ways and combine into new particles, destroying other particles and condensing to the center.  These new particles joined again, and so forth, into layers and combinations that eventually formed sub-atomic particles. In the course of time, the first atom emerged: Hydrogen - with one proton and one electron, each made up of a series of tiny particles.  All of this originating and sustained from those spiritual movements of abstract substances.

As time went by, one hydrogen atom after another came into existence until there was an immense cloud - held together by physics.  Once gathered in space, this hydrogen ball began to condense even more and react further.  And as this reaction progressed, the hydrogen atoms began to fuse (join together) and re-fuse, under the intense pressure at the core, eventually causing Helium to form.  This fusion also caused excess particles to fly off as a result and speed away from that sun, resulting in the release of energy in the form of material heat and light. 

Eventually, during the process of further collisions within this first sun, carbon was formed; and then nitrogen and oxygen - along with several other light elements.  This continued over a very long period of time until iron was produced.  Iron is made up of particle combinations that can not be added to nor subtracted from and therefore cannot be used as fuel for fusion.  As more iron was formed, this giant star began to lose its fuel and thus its internal reaction.  And then it suddenly collapsed - in seconds - and followed the process known today as super nova - in this case, the big bang.

When the first star exploded, it caused more violent collisions among its particles, creating all the remaining heavier elements, other suns, galaxies and the beginning of our physical universe.  Remember, this first sun and the cloud of particles from it contained all the material required to form the entire material universe and provide for its apparent independent evolution (isolating us from God).  And since matter cannot be destroyed, it will always be recycled into something new.

We should continuously bear in mind that even though the universe seems to be under an independent and chaotic evolution, each particle within it is energized and made living through the direct actions and motions of God; therefore it is under the direction of the Creator in all aspects.

This is the exterior of creation; the material universe; our world; the foundation of the spiritual world. It is a world that reflects the spiritual world in every aspect and serves as its finite shell while it covers and translates the living substances of the Infinite spiritual world.  It is not possible for anything to exist in the natural world out of connection with this spiritual world.  And if one could understand the language, we would see and hear God speaking through the actions and images of nature.  Order - in the universe - is God.  And by way of this material universe, we each emerge as a brand new and unique human life.

Our material body in this life is also a shell.  It is our spirit that contains our life - the body only houses our spirit while in the material world.  Our material sense organs don't actually do sensing, but the abstract function in our spirit does. For instance, our material eyes don't see - they are just the portal through which we receive sight; but our spiritual sight (an immaterial abstract) does see. 

We truly do live in both worlds at once, but we remain unaware of our spirit because we are spiritually asleep most of the time while we remain distracted with the heavy demands of our daily material concerns.  But even though we are mostly unaware of our spirit's life, we live and can rise above material thinking because of our spirit. Our material body is the egg from which our full spiritual awareness will hatch when we die. 

And since the Creator has infinite qualities, there can be infinite options and possibilities in the universe - including our Earth and the particles that make up its animal, vegetable and mineral kingdoms.  So it follows that, on our Earth, as in the rest of creation, all materials are a manifestation of something in the living spiritual world; all coming from God - created, interconnected and sustained by His Love, Wisdom and Activity - each and every good thing reflecting some Quality of the Human God, and by representatives, reflecting some quality in us.  In other words, Nature is a reflection of the Divine Human qualities and, by a finite reflection, of our own human qualities.

So Earth was formed and developed: eventually growing plant life and animal life.   All under the direct influx of the Creator's Providence - all in the sequence and order required for the end purpose of populating the human heaven while preserving spiritual freewill.  Through this influx and this purpose, one line of mammals developed and approached the human form.
 

Beginnings

When the time was arranged for the first humans to enter the world, they were born out of the lineage of evolution: being directly connected to material creation but capable of understanding - through their rational gift - things that are not material. They were in fact spiritual beings, but they did not know this at first. 

When humans initially appeared on this Earth, they were only aware of the immediate world around them - just as we are when we were infants.  In all behavior, they were like the other animals around them - even though they were very different from all other creatures, including their parents.  At one single point in time, the mammal lineage that God prepared for the entrance of humans onto this Earth began to birth the new human.  This meant that the parents of the new humans represented the end of their species.  From this point forward, the new human lineage began to procreate rational people that would have the freewill to enjoy God's Domain.

These new humans found and grew attracted to one another and developed close bonds.  Some males and females united; and some of them began to have offspring.  But they all continued to live their day to day routines the same as those non-humans around them - although a difference was beginning to be evident. 

One small thing was their laughter.  Even their parents looked oddly at that behavior while the new humans were still infants.  These tiny babies would break out in an open laugh, often for no reason at all.  When they grew older, on some evenings, their sounds of joy could be heard far away from the camp.  And for good reason - life was full of joys.  They found out later that their laughter came from the gift of rationality.

Life for early humans was ideal in the sense that all of creation was friendly to them.  There was no threat of predation nor starvation since the Creator insured that all needs were taken care of and that no harm came to them.  Before humans perverted the Creators world, all was good.  This is not to say that the animal kingdom did not prey on each other and that predators, pests and disease did not exist.  It means that humans were not threatened nor infested with pests and disease in their early years.

As time went by, the grandparents and parents of these new humans began to grow old and die.  This seemed to happen rather early in the lives of these new humans since all of them still appeared to be rather young.  They didn't know that their human spirit allowed them to live longer.  In time, there was no one left in their ancestry who bore them into the world.  This circumstance brought the new humans even closer.

More years passed by and then that fateful day: one of the new humans died.  His friends were in sorrow.  They kept his body near out of love.  It began to stink, so it was taken away from the camp and covered so scavengers wouldn't get it - just as their parents had done before them.  As days went by, his friends went on with their lives, sadder than ever before - but their daily needs were pressing.

One day not long after, one of the friends was gathering food nearby.  She looked up and saw someone coming.  It was the one who had just died!  She was sure.  Running back to the camp, she signaled her mate to come quick.  She just saw the one who had died!  He was walking towards her!  Just then they looked where she came from and both saw him.  In unison, as if by instinct, they began to run to the place where they placed his body.  The rocks were still there and after removing a few they knew that the decaying body was still buried.  They looked at each other and thought that this could not be.  As they turned to look back toward their camp, he appeared again, and waved. They looked at each other and the woman nervously waved back. Approaching, they looked curiously at each other as if to say "How could this be?"  He that died was just as perplexed.  Slowly reaching out, they touched each other.  He felt real.  He was real.  What has happened?  Smiles came onto their faces, then tears of joy.

Soon the other friends started showing up - each expressing their own shock followed by delight.  What has happened?  How could his body be decaying in a hole in the ground and be here at the same time? 

As days went by, the one who died began to show some different capabilities.  He would disappear and then reappear with other friends who were hundreds of yards away.  He'd often appear when they were just thinking about him.   And he could communicate more deeply - making connection with the other friends' affections and perceiving things more sharply.

A few months later, another died.  And the same things happened.  As time progressed, more and more humans died and began to explore the 'new life', while also staying in contact with their Earth bound friends.  Or so it seemed.  Soon the friends in the material world started to see strange things.  Material objects like rocks and trees would appear to move and sometimes change shapes.  They appeared to be communicating with them.  A tree seemed to point to a new source of food.  And a rock appeared to change form, and when they investigated, they found water nearby.  And other objects and even animals acted the same.  The whole world seemed to be alive and communicating with them.

But how could this be?  They never saw things like this before until that first dead one come back to life.  Maybe they are able to see and live in the other world as well.  When they were in the first world, they seemed more restricted and vulnerable; but in the other world, they were freer, happier and strangely comforted.  And they also found that they had special abilities.  However, no one was too shocked by this since they all felt it was just a continuation of discovering new things that began in their childhood.  No one knew different.  In fact, this other world was starting to become far more attractive.

And then came the day of the visitation.  One of the people who had died appeared to a gathering, looking differently than he did before.  And then his whole face began to shine extremely bright like the sun - so bright that the others had to shield their eyes - and his body was suddenly covered with very bright garments.

And when he began to communicate, he taught those who were gathered some amazing things. And since they received joy in learning new things, they drew close with attention. He seemed to know why all these strange things occurred.  And he began to explain how the two worlds work together.  And then this person returned to normal, not quite knowing what had happened; but not feeling frightened because he knew that his new life after death was full of unexpected and wonderful surprises - and was never harmed.  He told the others that previous to this event, he had been receiving a strong influx of love in his chest from an unknown source.  It gave him the urge to share knowledge, but he didn't know from where this knowledge came.

And not long after, this happened again.  In time, they learned that this person who appeared before them was not who they thought when he appeared brightly and taught.  It was in fact the Creator, the person who made all this life possible.  They were to receive instruction directly from God - just as a parent would teach their children.  And since they took delight in learning, this was embraced with extreme happiness.

To facilitate communication, the Creator could adapt to the finite human character and teach the others directly through another willing individual.  From this method, they received instruction regarding God, the two worlds and how they could live in harmony with their Creator.  And they also learned that it was only the beginning of their education. 

In the process, the new humans discovered that they were special in all of creation although they were still part of creation.  They continued to learn about the Creator and the world around them and that their Creator loves them like a father and cares for them like a mother.  They also learned about their abilities in the spiritual world and why they could see and live in both worlds at the same time.  All this was taught to them gradually over the generations - and also to those who resided in the spiritual world at the same time. 

Humans start out by being born into this material world with both a material and spiritual body; and then cast off their material vessels to fully enter into their spiritual body.  But in the early days, they were able to experience both worlds at the same time because even though their material needs were demanding, their spiritual side was more important and compelling to them and brought them more joy.  And for all the materials objects they saw, they were able to relate them to their spiritual correspondence - thus enjoying a higher form of thought above the material.  So regarding abstract thinking, the most ancient people were far more advanced than we are today.  We measure success by the buildings we construct and the civilization we claim to have, but those who belonged to the First World - who today we call primitive - measured success in learning the abstract ideas that generate love and harmony.

We can not know this today, but imagine being able to live in this life and also be aware and live in the spiritual life at the same time.  The material world is created in the progression of time with every object coming from somewhere in time - our furniture from a forest of trees that grew for many generations, our fuel from millions of years of development underground and our metals from distant stars.  But the other world exists by ever changing abstracts altered by the affections of each spirit who receives them.  And what is wonderful, those abstracts appear the same as they do when turned into material in this world.  However, unlike the material world, objects are created instantly from the spiritual atmospheres of God. 

The abstracts that are freely available in the infinite world gather themselves around affections that agree with them.  These affections come from us in the next life and our immediate environment molds to reflect our individual affections.  Now, this could be good and this could be bad - it depends on a person's core affections.

In other words, our house in this life had to evolve from previous materials and once we have applied our touches, it ends up reflecting our personalities.  But our house in the next life will reflect our changing affections and personalities instantly.  Our core love will remain constant (the "house" will continually be there), but as our interests and moods change, so will our surroundings.  And to follow further, the next life has all things that are in this life, and more - mountains, trees, streets, houses, books and everything.  However, they are not made up of material particles, but from the pure substance of Love and Wisdom appearing to us in splendid variety.

Years went by in the First World and one day it was noticed that those who died were not growing older and some even appeared to be younger.  One of those on Earth asked the Creator regarding this.  They were then told that in the spiritual world, humans had no age, but reflected the state of mind that they happened to be in at the time.  In fact, some actually will appear to grow younger until they reach the age - or youthful state of mind - that suits their personality.  And they would never die again because once in the next life, they were in the Lord's World which is the Infinite world.  They then asked why they had not been told this before.  The Creator answered that they were not yet prepared to receive information like this until they were ready; and since they were now in a position to ask, they were ready.
 

The Golden Age

As generation followed generation their understandings grew by means of their teachings, perceptions, and experiences; and they became fluent in the interrelationship between the material and spiritual worlds.  Everything has a relationship and an inner correspondence.  A tree that we see is not just a tree, but is the living spiritual abstract to which the tree corresponds.  A person in all their particulars can be likened to a tree. In its seed lies hidden as it were an end in view, an intention and objective - to produce fruit. Here the seed corresponds to the will in a person. Next the seed is impelled by what it contains to sprout from the Earth, and clothe itself with branches, boughs and leaves, thus acquiring for itself the means to its ends, the fruit. Here the tree corresponds to the understanding in a person.  Finally, when its time has come and it is ready to release itself, it blossoms and produces fruit. Here the tree corresponds to a person's good deeds.  Those of the Golden Age could see both the material tree and the abstract tree while in this world.  Also, a rock that we see is not just a rock by the same approach; because it corresponds to truth or one's faith, depending on what kind of rock it is, where it is positioned and so on.  In fact all of nature - every particle - is a reflection of some kind of Divine Human characteristic, and in relation, some kind of human characteristic.  Nature is alive with knowledge of the spiritual world.

This was the Golden Age, the First World.  Humans lived in harmony with each other and with the world around them.  And God cared for them in every aspect.  And the Celestial heaven became populated.  The character of those first people was like that of a gentle and innocent child.  Always willing to follow the guidance of their Creator and always trusting this guidance - never a worry of harm and never a time without provisions.  And since their character was guided by love, their destination was the heaven of innocent love, which is the Celestial heaven - which is the heaven closest to God.  In later years, humans would become more influenced by truth and understanding - instead of love - and would lean toward the heaven of wisdom, or the Spiritual heaven.  But more regarding this later.

In the First World, men and women would join together for life and then continue on into eternity once they left this world.  In fact, this is the highest love that God can offer to humans.  The love that springs from the union of husband and wife surpasses all others and is the central life of Heaven.  And in the Golden Age, this love flourished.  And the things of the spiritual world remained far more attractive to the first humans than the things of the material world.
 

Transition

When humanity first appeared, their composition was quite different than today.  To put it in simple terms, their will and understanding - affection and thoughts - were inseparable.  This means that there was always agreement between what they willed and what they thought - whatever they did was considered right.  As a result, humans had no such thing as conscience and guilt because their understanding always agreed with their will and could never tell the will when it was doing something wrong. 

This was very similar to the composition of animals - from which humanity sprang.  We must remember, dear friends, that at the base of our lives is our animal nature.  This is our root, but is not our destiny.  But we must learn how the animal is composed in order for us to understand our own complex nature and why animals are very different from us.

Affection and knowledge in beasts act completely as one, and their affection cannot be raised above their knowledge, and their knowledge not above their affection.  If we consider the things that animals do, we know that they do nothing wrong in their own eyes - they only do what is in their best interest to survive.  In their world, survival is selfish and selfishness is expected.  A dog may do something bad, but this is under human rules.  Under animal rules, that pot roast on the table was part of their constant quest for food and survival. 

Since animals have no spiritual mind into which they can be raised, they do not have the faculty of understanding or rationality, nor the faculty of willing freely or liberty; they have merely natural affection with its knowledge.  The natural affection which they have is that of supplying themselves with food and shelter, of propagating their kind, of fleeing from and avoiding injury, together with all the knowledge which this affection requires; and this, not from their life in the natural world, but due to corresponding affections or abstract causes from the spiritual world. They each represent a living embodiment of something spiritual that can teach humans about their Creator and the Creator's world.

Animals, like minerals and plants, appear in the material world because of an abstract idea that exists in the spiritual world concurrently.  They are part of God's communication to humans.  They appear and share their message or affection and then the moment moves on and no longer exists - just as those things do in our own life.  We hold things in our heart or mind for a while, but sooner or later, the event must pass on - or die.  We must always move on to new and different thoughts and affections or we will never be elevated away from our own animal behaviors toward being human. 

Because of this state of life, animals do not and cannot think, "I wish this or I do not; I know this or I do not"; and still less, "I understand this, and I love this"; but from their affection by means of their knowledge they are borne along by instinct and nurture - without rationality and without liberty - as a manifestation of something spiritual in the living universe.  

This is a lesson to learn when a dear animal friend passes on.  Unlike human friends that can live forever, animals - and plants - are abstract friends teaching us things that we may never recognize without their influence.  When the affection passes on, another takes over.  It frequently hurts to leave an affection or thought behind.  Some of them become very close to us and we identify with them.  Losing them - or giving them up - often hurts for a long time. But we must move on so we can learn about other the aspects of our life.  The appearance of animals and plants are the same way.  They come, they teach and they die so new teachings can be presented.

But the non-human aspect of earth's creatures is no reason to cause them foolish harm.  Our conduct as human beings is etched on our hearts - while we are being kind or mean to anything.  Cruelty to nature is a reflection of the desire to be cruel to humans.

To this same animal nature, humans were given the gifts of rationality and freewill to allow us to be human and share joy with God.  But within the human community, we know that we - unlike the animals - are not able to do whatever we please.  We are here to do more than just supply ourselves with food and shelter, or propagate, or avoid harm.  Our life isn't about survival at the cost of others.

In addition to this first human composition - the inseparable link between the will and understanding - we also have three levels of life.  These are the life of the senses (sensual life, animal life or life outside of God), the life of the natural mind (civic life) and the life of the rational (spiritual life).  All three are distinct and necessary.  When humans live in order with God, their rational life is their highest point of interest, their civic life next important and the sensual life receiving the least of their attention.

But as time moved on, the human freewill got the better of them.  Some humans who passed into the spiritual world poked around until they discovered that they could actually enter the body of material humans - just like the Creator could do when they were being taught.  At first it was done without intention of harm and not to embarrass - more like an attempt to get the material people to laugh - humans loved to share laughter.  Remember, there were no strangers among these groups, but all were known at some time - most were family.  However, these mischievous acts planted a seed that would eventually germinate into bad results. 

In discovering this ability, they realized that they would be able to enter back into the sensual world and re-experience what life is like to be on their own - isolated from God by nature.  Unlike humans today, the first humans had the ability to explore anywhere in God's material and spiritual worlds.  They realized that they could choose between the wonders of the spiritual world - with the ever-present closeness of God - and material life, that gives the feeling of being individually powerful due to isolation from God. 

In time, spirits found that they could influence and control those on Earth anyway they wanted to by insinuating their own will into the mind of the material humans.  And in turn, they could receive the feelings of those who they possessed and enter into the external sensual life through their victim.  They could actually see, feel, hear, smell and experience the things of the material world.

And they could also use the mechanism of correspondence - the real connection between abstract spiritual ideas with their material manifestation - to project material images and influence harmful actions in others, often by appearing as animals or unimaginable creatures.

Although it first started out as mischief, eventually, the love of dominance (possessing others) and the love of worldly possessions and pleasures turned into to the most important things of their life; while spiritual ideas and joys became less and less attractive.  They enjoyed exploiting their own powers more than sharing the delights of friendship and love, thus inverting their levels of life: with the sensual life being the most important, civic life being less important and the rational (spiritual understanding) the least of their concerns. 

Imagine the magic that could have been present in those days - with the powers of the spiritual world in the hands of unchecked evil; and then imagine that this is the origin of so many fantastic legends and myths that have been passed on to us until today.  Those special capabilities gave people the impression that they were as powerful as God - because when they felt disconnected from God and also had powers that seem like God's, they could feel like God.  After all, they seemed to be able to do all the many things that they saw the Creator do.

Once the actions of early humanity became completely enveloped in self-centered motives - motives that were opposed to the Creator's love and harmony - there was nothing that could tell them that they were wrong since their understanding always followed their will.  Not even God could convince them.

But our Creator knew of this potential human weakness ahead of time and was prepared for it.  The first great judgment was upon humanity.  By reason of their rejection of God's World and their harmful actions toward each other, the early humans cast themselves (repeat: “cast themselves”) out of harmony with the Creator - or out of the garden - and away from spiritual thinking.  And the more humans removed themselves from spiritual thinking, the more remote they became to the spiritual world.  Lack of regard makes the appearance of distance in the spiritual world because the appearance of distance is in reality just a difference in people's state of life.  Similar states are close and opposite states are distant.  This is why hell can never come close to heaven.

In our ancient history, the gathering of people and the building of cities seemed to be the beginning of civilization, but this was not the case.  People gathered out of the need for protection.  In the most ancient times, humans could live without fear within their small family groups.  If families ever did decide to set up camp together, it was out of love for each other.  But when humanity fell from their spiritual position, the need to combine forces for protection became essential.  So the rise of what we call civilization is actually the main indicator of humanity's fall.

But the worse was yet to come.  As time progressed, the evil grew to unimaginable depths.  The knowledge of the link between the material and spiritual worlds was used for dark magic, and the most evil people could control others with subtle but compelling powers.  And the only thing that could guide them back to sanity was the Divine Truth, but this had no effect on people who felt that all they did was in accord with their will and was reasoned as being good for them.

And since humanity's freewill had to be protected at all times, God could do nothing.  No one could be disciplined because no rules of life could be established in their understanding.  To them, there was no such thing as Divine Truth - only the dictates of their own will.

This wave of false ideas regarding genuine good and truth swept over humanity like a great flood.  It destroyed everyone's chances for heaven and contaminated the human race with an evil that could never be removed from their individual and collective will.  Once the doors of experience are open to us, they can never be shut - we can never unlearn something.

In conjunction with this human tragedy and as a result of it, God changed the composition of all people.  A new human was born from the old humans.  From this point forward, humanity would have a conscience.  Since the will of men and women was forever lost to evil tendencies, and since their understanding was inseparably bonded to this will, it was necessary for God to break this bond and implant a potential "new will" directly into our understanding.  If we listen to our conscience (this new will - God's voice in us), we can then connect with God and it can teach our understanding to lead a heavenly life.   But more will be said later on this subject.
 

The First Great Judgment

As the new humans began to populate the Earth, the old ones died away; but not without using their dangerous powers to cause grave damage in the spiritual world.  During this transition, the Creator protected the new humans from harm.  He also gave them guidance and teaching from Divine Truth while setting up methods to insure that these teachings would be passed on to those who followed. As humanity backed further and further away from God's world, they would need these teachings imbedded in their history because their ability to learn this directly from the spiritual world was being closed off. 

At first, the teachings were passed on through verbal stories, told by those who were skilled in remembering the tales.  But in time, the art of writing came into existence and these teachings were transcribed for posterity.   And although the stories were told and written in material language, they also contained the abstracts of the spiritual world.  By understanding the relationship between the two worlds, stories could be told in material terms that would teach of spiritual things.  And since material things are distinct from spiritual things, the stories contained two meanings: the material relation and the spiritual teachings within the story.  In this way, spiritual ideas would survive the centuries, even though people would occasionally lose their interpretation.  And in this way, the deeper spiritual truths could remain unharmed during bad days, hidden from human misconceptions and ill intended falsities that were able to pervert only the material words.

When all preparations were complete, the antediluvians, who were all in the spiritual world, were separated from others and exposed to pure Divine Truth - a Reality to which no one can stand - and cast down below the lowest hell, never to be able to attack neither the material nor the spiritual world again.  All their powers over others - which were fueled by lies, deceptions and evil arts - were locked up in an inescapable and inaccessible place, generating noxious fumes in hell.  God only intervenes when the total destruction of a person's spirit is at hand.  If a person is clearly on the path that is unrecoverable, God will step in to work against further decline.  This is done by means of isolation and corrective punishments.

And in their place, a new genus of people began their quest for life.  But as said before, they now possessed a new composition.  This composition included a new method of regeneration (spiritual rebirth), and will be described briefly.
 

The Seeds of Spiritual Rebirth

Since the fall of humans in their First World, all who follow after possess a contaminated will. This is because once opened, the door of experience can never be closed. And during the days prior to the judgment of the antediluvians, every bad thing conceivable was experienced.  Since then, all human's who are born, continuing until today and as long as this Earth exists, contain strong tendencies in their will toward rejecting God in favor of their self-centered nature.  If this could not be corrected, humanity's destiny would be dark and finally extinct. 

With humanity's new composition, the Creator is able to implant Himself into the rational mind of each human - by-passing the corrupted will.  This is done by planting good affections and fundamental ideas about God - or truths - into our understanding very early in life, so that we can be gently guided by those ideas and activate the good affections related to them. Because of this, those with conscience know when they do something wrong - because God's truths implanted in them tells them it's wrong.  This is accomplished with what is called the "new will" and it works like this:

God begins by establishing good affections - heavenly affections - and knowledges of faith into every infant.  We are all introduced into many states of heavenly affections just after birth. This is partially done through being fully dependant on our mother's love and care.  And no matter how much this family care may be lacking in appearance, each infant does receive this influx because God insures it - through Providence.  By having no instinct and being fully dependant on our caretakers, we learn how spiritual dependence works in Heaven through direct experience.

And further, influx is also received during the introduction of fair play when children start to interface with each other.  And there are many other introductions to spiritual values that we all receive early in life, including in dreams.  This happens to each one of us, without failure - and regardless of human intervention, although some may deny it or reject it. 

Think back, dear friends, to your early childhood no matter what religion you came from.  What did you think of God?  Wasn't God known to you as a loving caretaker that always knew what was best for you?  One who was always close?  Who is in charge of heaven?  Who, although invisible, was human, just like us?  And what was your understanding of our purpose under God?  Wasn't it to be good to each other?  To cause no harm?  To help where we are able?  To love others?  And later didn't we accept that we were not supposed to steal, or kill, or cheat on our married partner, or lie about others, or want what others have?  And to love God above all?  Don't we have all this in us already?

Deep down in our younger child, we knew these simple ideas were right.  There was no question, there was no doubt.  There was no need for convincing.  There was no need for doctrine.  And today, that child in us still knows.

But somewhere along the line, these simple ideas of God have been obscured by other more complicated teachings and material distractions. Far too often, the religious organizations that were supposed to reinforce your early spiritual understandings caused you to become confused.  Yet we accepted their rules and trusted them because those organizations were supposed to be set up to teach us about God.  What we didn't know at the time was that our religious organizations are always watching out more for themselves than for God.  That most of the rules in these organizations are contrived by humans and are hardly spiritual at all - mostly material. And that some rules were set up for the benefit of those in power to enable them to keep their power. 

So reach back to that younger child that you once had.  Recall those simple ideas about God and reject the complications of worldly organizations and individuals.  Your rebirth can begin from here.

These affections and ideas that God has given us act as seeds and can be recalled later in life for regeneration.  They are planted in the rational part of our spirit and are part of our conscience.

The old will, being useless toward spiritual awakening, is always with us.  Its tendencies come from generations of each family's ancestry.  Early on in the corruption of humanity, each family grew toward their own ruling love and into which they fully enveloped themselves.  It changed the essential make-up of each family's seed.  Every offspring passed a potential variation of this ruling love into their offspring, and so forth. 

So today's human will is incapable of being corrected.  But if our will was capable, the human ability to reason should be able to convince our will that it would be in our best interest to follow the Perfect Guidance of the Creator.  But since our will continues to remain unconvinced, God alone must first convince our understanding to recall those implanted affections in us so that those heavenly affections can become more attractive than the misguided and evil affections coming out of our corrupted will. And then we can begin to use the will that God implanted in our understanding - God's own Will - to gather the deeper truths regarding heavenly life.

We should also take into account that all humans are born with a clean slate.  In order to give humans true spiritual freedom, we have to be born without pre-set, instinctual qualities.  Each person has to be born and spend their life within the equilibrium of free choice; and this is accomplished only by being positioned precisely between heaven and hell from the start of our existence.  God offers His World and he also equally allows the ability for us to keep our own world - a self-driven life: which is hell. 

And although we start life with a clean slate, we also have this old will that contains tendencies toward the corrupted ruling loves in us.  These tendencies are not like instincts because they are not real until acted upon.  They represent a potential that exists - in other words, if we decide to follow selfish behaviors, then the behaviors that will occur are in line with our inherited tendencies.  

And we have parents who have adopted some of these tendencies, passing them on to their children - most of the time without knowing it.  So even though we start with a clean slate, the allurement to our hellish tendencies is strong; but so is the allurement to heaven that God implants in us.  And for each measure that our family ancestry seems stacked against us, in equal measure the Lord stacks heaven in our favor.  And those of us who are attracted more to the affections of heaven will find God and willingly follow His Guidance - while others will choose the allurements of the old will. God knows the needs of each of us and arms us with the proper conscience to fully combat those tendencies - all within the capabilities of our freewill.  Without this attention, all those who are now spiritual would immediately dive into hell and all those in hell would jump into a deeper hell - because this is who we are.

And even though the Creator is Omnipotent, God can only try to convince us.  It is still up to us to follow the path that leads to heavenly joy.  Therefore, once we are let into the world as adults, we must decide to either willingly recall those good affections or to resign ourselves to our own prudence and worldly focus.  If we do the later, we will willingly go toward hell and all its selfish affections.  But if we recall the implanted heavenly affections in us and seek to expand them, God will combat the hells for us and lead us to confirm‎ the new truths; and the new truths will reinforce and grow our spiritual ideas.  When we work to turn away from the actions of hell, God will help us accept the actions of our new will.

It should be noted, though, that God can not enter into us until the things of hell are rejected.  This is why the first of charity is for each of us to stop allowing hell into our actions.

Once these truths begin to be admitted and united with their related good affections, they become active in us and we act according.  And then our path to heaven begins - we are reborn with our active new will.  We will then follow the Lord's will, based on these new spiritual ideas - which are the trustworthy rules of Order.  After time, some move on to be motivated by love instead of by instruction and then these rules become etched on their hearts and their new will is fully activated.  This is the end for all spiritual regeneration.

The new will is not ours, because nothing we can do on our own can lead us to heaven; it belongs only to our Creator (and Rescuer).  But God gives us the ability to have the feeling that we are doing this as if by ourselves - to preserve and also enhance our individuality.  Remember, what belongs to us is our freewill and the experiences we gather along the way - this will always be protected by God.

And to distinguish between our freewill and our corrupted old will so that we can not confuse the two, consider the following.  Freewill is one of the two gifts implanted by God into every human.  Together with our rational mind, they are the essential part that makes us into humans.  It will always be kept in balance by God - without fail.  Freewill gives us the capabilities toward good affections but our old will gives us tendencies of evil. 

It is hard for many people to believe that they have an evil will.  When these people reflect on themselves, they don't see any signs of this completely flawed characteristic.  But understanding this is essential since denial can cause a person to assume that they were born good - and it will also cause them to not be aware of the true state of their old will.  If we hold the idea that people are basically good, we will fail to understand the process (or need) of regeneration and will deny the opportunity.

What these people don't consider is the fact that early in their lives they learned the advantages of being good - not for spiritual reasons, but as part of their natural behavior.  To them, it seems like good actions were always there.  But there is a danger of not recognizing the true state of our old will.  Some think that since they are already doing good actions, they are already regenerated.

When we are children, our freewill and rational mind are not yet fully activated.  This is why children who die are not held accountable for any wrongs that they do and complete their spiritual education in heaven.  However, when we become adults, our freewill and rational mind become fully active and we are then on our own to choose.  At this point, it is essential for us to discover what kind of an internal person we are.  Do we perform charitable acts for our own self gain or from God?  In most pre-regenerate cases, self gain would be the answer.  What we find out when we become mature is that we are doing good actions for the wrong reasons.  In the self-centered world of our youth, essentially everything is for self gain or for reward.  Rebirth will correct this childhood misconception and the illusion that a person is already good - or good from them self - when born.

So from this, the ability of self-reflection is critical for our spiritual well being.  We all must look deeply into ourselves and seek out those things that do not agree with God's world.  And if we don't find much, then we are not looking deeply enough.  Those who have already recognized the corruption of their old will should have an advantage.

In essence, when we eval‎uate how much good we have in us, the spiritual conclusion should be “none” because all good comes from God.  And when we ask ourselves how much good is in our old will, the answer should be also be none.  However, saying that we are all bad is not good enough.  Unless we know our bad actions in detail, we can never start to ask God for specific assistance.  It is as if we are target practicing and we refuse to look where the target is located.  Our target is the specific tendencies of our old will.  The bow is our implanted new will.  The arrow is God's Truth. 

Once the specifics of our old will are exposed to us and recognized as bad, the new will can begin to take hold.
 

The Silver Age - Charity Based Religions

So with this new composition, humans on our Earth began the Second World, the Silver Age, or the age after the spiritual flood.  And where the Golden Age produced Celestial humans and a Celestial heaven, who perform good acts from love, the Silver Age produced Spiritual humans and a Spiritual heaven - who use truth and wisdom as a motivation for doing good.

However, the very composition that allowed those of the Silver Age to be reformed and saved actually inhibited and delayed their ultimate spiritual advancement - entrance into heaven.  In order for those of the Second World to fully accept their new religion, they would have to know that God is real and a Human God - and know it by fact of truth.  Their ability to reason (their belief in God) would have to have physical proof in order for their new will to be fully saved from the infestations of those who lie about God.  Otherwise, those who lie about God's existence could always cast doubt.  And since their salvation depended on truth, any doubt of the truth would cause distortions.

Early in the prophetic pronouncements of the most ancient days, when humanity walked away from their innocence, a promise was made that God would become born on our Earth to personally rescue humanity.

So when those of the Silver Age began their quest, this promise was recalled.  Their whole religion - their belief system - depended in this promise.  And just the promise of this was enough to hold them in their beliefs, although true redemption - including their ultimate access into heaven - would be put on hold until the Creator could be born on Earth and set the hells in order.  Pending this, everyone who died that belonged to the Silver Age would either progress into hell or be held in the ''lower earths'' of the world of spirits and be protected in their beliefs by the Creator until the time of His birth.  To the residents there, these lower earths appeared just as it was when they were in the material world - the term lower earths being more of a spiritual state of mind, rather than a place below the ground.  But more on this later. 

As the new age took form, a universal religion prevailed throughout the world.  This religion arose from the acknowledgment that all people were from the same God and with the primary focus being on the good actions of humans - actions of charity inspired from God.  With the knowledge of the spiritual world still fresh in mind, humans conducted their lives closer to the light of heaven that we do today.  And they understood the true purpose of religion - which is to be good to each other in respect for God's will.

They also recognized that although the basic definitions of charity - good actions to others - were universal, each person or group of people had a uniquely different idea of God.  And since there are infinite possibilities with God, then there are also limitless ideas of God.  What one person sees, another sees differently.

The outcome of this was a widespread respect for the differences among people.  As long as a person performed the precepts of good (or what is the same - acts of charity), they were right with God and with each other.  Differences in faith were understood and accepted.  In fact, the Hindu religion was advanced by accepting these differences.  Although they appeared to be worshiping different gods, they were actually approaching God through the Creator's different aspects.  One aspect is called one name and another aspect is called a different name.  They all knew and accepted this before it became distorted in time.  It is the same with Greek and Roman myths as well as Egyptian writings, where the different characters in the stories represent - or spiritually correspond to - a different aspect of God.  These differences were understood and became part of the culture and were never a reason to cause division.

But as time progressed and as humanity continued to become more and more self-centered and material, God would continue accommodating to the changing states of humanity and provide new teachings - some by communicating through human agents (prophets, seers, shamans...) and some through stories that were full of internal spiritual lessons.  And as more time went by, many of these stories were written down, formalized and preserved - some exist today.  A few were known to be directly inspired by God.  These resulted in the various holy documents that support many of the today's current religions.

The writings of ancient days were primarily focused on spiritual matters because this was the chief interest among those who pursued enlightenment about God and life.  They were presented in such a way as to describe spiritual things using their related link to the corresponding material thing.  Therefore, all their stories had inner meanings - just as all of nature has an inner spiritual relationship.  In other words: they were all analogies or allegories or parables - all using the correspondence between the two worlds to describe abstract ideas that can feed our spiritual minds.  And each religion that had these stories preserved them tirelessly because they were their only link to the purer spiritual teachings of the early days.  And so it was in the beginning days of the Second World.  God taught through His inspired Written Word or through the spoken words of prophets and shamans. And by this method, humanity re-learned how to act toward one another after the horrible reign of the antediluvians.
 

The Divine Story - The Word of God

Our tale will shift its focus toward one family and one story which set in motion the most essential spiritual document that we have today.  It adopted holy writings that came from earlier days and was completed by many authors throughout hundreds of years.  This family came from Abraham and his descendents and was selected for the vital functions of providing the ancestral line for the anticipated material birth of God, and also to begin, carry and preserve what many would call the Word of God.

It was not the first document that was called the Word of God.  The writings that carried this name dealt only with the nature of God and the spiritual history of the world - in continuous order and in spiritual language.  The first of these writings serviced those who lived in the days before and just after the spiritual flood.  And beyond these writings, there have been many other spiritually influenced stories in the history of humanity.  But the collection of documents started by Moses was to be the beginning of the newest revision of the Word of God - that which will be accommodated to the people of the future.  Deep within it would be a living spiritual story - the Divine Story - told by God Himself, as in the days of old.  And because this story was delivered by God's Providence and the deepest internal part deals only with God in connected order, it can be called the Word of God.  And further, since Divine Wisdom shines forth to teach us and the writings of those days were established to teach us about the Divine, God's Wisdom became know as the Word.

Consider the following from one of the Gospels in this light:

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.  The same was in the beginning with 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 shined in the darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not...  That was the true Light, which enlightens every man that comes into the world.  He was in the world, and the world was made by him, and the world knew him not.  He came unto his own, and his own received him not…  And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us…”

However, this does not mean that other families and religions didn't also receive what was necessary to address their own redemption.  God loves all people and will help everyone within all religions and nations.  So each religion has their own story and related doctrine, and all truly religious stories are united through their intention - to teach people about God and about the precepts of true charity; or, what is the same, how to live happily under the Creator's guidance.  But this particular story initiated by Moses would contain the most pure internal sense available to humanity - full of material correspondences containing the Divine Story of Creation and Redemption, as well as the predictions and direct narrative of God's Material Birth and Life on Earth. 

There are in the Word, in general, four different styles.  The first is that of the Most Ancient People - those of the Golden Age.  Their mode of expression‎ was such that when they mentioned terrestrial and worldly things they thought of the spiritual and celestial things which these represented.  They therefore not only expressed themselves by representatives, but also formed these into a kind of historical series, in order to give them more life; and this was to them delightful in the very highest degree. Moses adopted the particulars concerning the creation, the garden of Eden, etc., down to the time of Abram, from the descendants of the Most Ancient People.

The second style is historical, which is found in the books of Moses from the time of Abram onward, and in those of Joshua, Judges, Samuel, and the Kings.  In these books the historical facts are just as they appear in the sense of the letter; and yet they all contain, in both general and particular, many deeper things in the internal sense. 

The third style is the prophetical one, a style that was highly venerated among the Most Ancient People.  This style however is not in historical form, but is broken, and is scarcely ever intelligible except in the internal sense, wherein are deepest secrets, which follow in beautiful connected order, and relate to the external and the internal man; to the many spiritual states; to heaven itself; and in the inmost sense, to God. 

The fourth style is that of the Psalms of David, which is intermediate between the prophetical style and that of common speech.  The Lord is there treated of in the internal sense, under the person of David as a king.  Within all four styles, we have been given the Knowledge of the Ages.

In effect, this Word would define the universal religion necessary for humanity to regain their harmony with God and rise above their unfortunate position.  In fact, the internal sense contains the wisdom of Heaven. And it was not just for one small family or nation. It just seems to be exclusive to one religion due to the contentious attitudes about different faiths.  But in the course of history, it will service the whole world.  [For an example of how a material story can correspond to something spiritual, listen the narration of Genesis in the Appendix]
 

The Bronze Age - Beginning of Faith Based Religions

Since the language of religion was presented this way - encased in material stories, the meaning could be lost in time due to disinterest or distortions.  And so it was - in time.  Selfishness and outright evil continued to grow again, and eventually the precepts of charity, that all the Second World's religions acknowledged, were rejected in favor of more self-centered approaches.  No longer was it acceptable to believe differently - to have different faiths.  Because of humanity's increasing self-centered lives, a religion's faith - their definition of God and life - became a vehicle to hate others who were outside of their belief.  One religion would totally reject another based solely on how they pictured God, not from their common goals of good actions.  And wrapped around each of these different belief systems were manmade rules that defined how each group was to conduct their lives, worship God and support their leaders - most often having nothing to do with true spiritual life.

Religion could no longer be defined by means of charity because people no longer knew what kinds of actions were charitable. And with charity gone, people defined religion in terms of their belief system.  And since everyone's beliefs about God are different, this became a point of contention... to this day. 

In place of the charity based religions, a more ritualistic, representative type of religion arose.  Instead of performing the good acts of charity as part of their spiritual lives, people were allowed to perform their religion by conducting specific actions of worship that are only representative of a true religion.

Because all religion is supposed to lead to a heavenly life and true good actions were lacking at that time, it became necessary to allow humans to worship God through obedient rituals - as a temporary substitute. Without these rituals, there would be absolutely no connection to heaven and the life of heaven - and no correspondence with spiritual abstracts.  These rituals would serve as an allegory of spiritual things.

Many of these rituals were passed down through the millennia.  Some are found through archeological findings and some are still present today.  As we look into virtually all of what we call primitive cultures, we can find histories of people who observed these rituals that were highlighted with dance, music and costumed performers - all telling a story with an inner meaning; all linking the material world to the spiritual world.

In time, after humanity's redemption, there will be a return to the more universal charity based religions; but for the time being, contentious faith based and lifeless ritual based religions are allowed.
 

Summary of the Ages

The following part of the story is presented to summarize the progression of time for humans on this Earth.  The first and most ancient people, who were celestial, thought from correspondences themselves - with the natural things of the world before their eyes serving them as the means of thinking in this way.  Being of such character, they were in fellowship with angels - their ancestors - and spoke with them.  Thus, through them heaven was conjoined to the world. For this reason, that period was called the Golden Age, of which it is said by ancient writers that the inhabitants of heaven dwelt with men and associated with them as friends with friends.  This was also called the First World and also the Age of Atlantis by other cultures.  The people who were of this world are called primitive by our archeologists, but in reality, their rational and spiritual capabilities excelled beyond anything we can imagine.  To the most ancient people, we would be the materialistic primitives.

After this, which is after the spiritual flood, there succeeded those who thought not from correspondences themselves but from a knowledge of correspondences. And there also existed a conjunction of heaven with people, but not so intimate. Their period is what is called the Silver Age or the Second World. As people's attention to material and sensual things became more appealing - under the influence from those in hell - the connection with their heavenly ancestors was reduced and occurred primarily through more formal visitations and through spoken, and then later, through written teachings.

Following this, there were people who had some knowledge of correspondences but did not think from that knowledge, on account of their being in natural good and not, like those before them, in spiritual good. This period was called the Bronze Age and also the Copper Age or in some cultures the Third World.  The beginning of this period was symbolically explained by the story of the tower of Babel in the Old Testament.  The confusion of languages described there actually referred to the rise of the importance of faith in religion.  From that point on, faith would be a point of contention among the religious.  Their visitations became even less personal and more awesome.  Those who taught them from the spiritual world had to take on a more "attention getting" appearance and often with a frightening manifestation - since those in natural good are motivated primarily by fear.  Their ancestors would often appear as animals of all kinds and unknown creatures and by this way would focus the people's attention. Consider all the religions that are still with us today that honor their ancestors and have music and dance rituals containing masked dancers representing their later visitations. These rituals are the remnants of this period.

After those times, men gradually became more external and finally corporeal; and then the knowledges of correspondences were completely lost, and with it a true idea of heaven and of the many things pertaining to heaven. This period was called the Iron Age and much of it continues to linger today.  Direct contact with the spiritual world was essentially cut off.  Only in a few limited instances would the Creator allow this to happen, and it would occur for specific purposes only.  Rituals continued and were later made into religious law.  And further in time, the inner meanings of these rituals were completely lost. 

But although the people no longer understood the inner spiritual stories contained within these rituals, the faithful performance of them could at least maintain the correspondencial link between the two worlds.  From their basic fear of God, the loyal performance of rituals became their part of the deal.  However, in time, they began to actually believed that doing the external actions of ritual was enough to get them into heaven.  They believed this because they could no longer understand the virtues of the deeper spiritual actions of their ancestors; and they could not see this because a life without true charity can not conceive a true idea of charity.

There was no connection made between doing good works and a life that leads to heaven.  All true charity was dead and humans could not see past their own self interests.  When they did reach out to God, it was only out of fear or for self gain.  And conquerors roamed the Earth.

Through all this, the Creator was preparing humanity for the event that would set them free of their infestations by the hells - His birth into the Material World.  But before this birth, humanity had reached the depths of material and sensual living.  It was a dark time in those days - darker than we can imagine because we have no comparison today.  All religions were external at best and because of the increasing power of hell, essentially all people were blocked out of heaven's influence.  And the Spiritual heavens laid empty.  You can imagine the joy in the Celestial heavens when the Lord sent His messenger to announce to Mary that she would conceive the Holy Child.

But in the lower Earth of the world of spirits, they still waited.  Not one person who died after the spiritual flood had yet to ascend into their heaven. This would not be possible until God's Divine showed Himself to the spiritual world as Human, and as Authentic. 

Since the days just after the spiritual flood until God's conquest of the material domain, those who died and who were capable of entering the Spiritual heavens, were held in the lower earths and continued to be commingled with and infested by hellish spirits much as they were while in the natural world.  Since they could not be fully convinced of the existence of God, those from hell could still infest them with doubts.  This went on for centuries upon centuries, and built up layer upon layer in the lower Earth of the world of spirits.  And even though the infestations were allowed for the sake of these people's spiritual instruction, special care was taken by the Lord to protect the good from falling into hell.

Even so, hell's influences extended even into the lower heavens and contaminated the thought of those who were in the good that is motivated by fear - those in the third heaven of natural good.  In fact, before the Lord's birth into the natural world, those in hell (and influenced by hell) had power that could rarely be challenged.  Even though they did not have the power of the antediluvians, they were essentially free to overwhelm others with their falsities and evils because the Lord was limited in what could be done about it.  His Truth could not fully take hold because hell could always deny the existence of God.  But this changed immeasurably when the Lord was born.  Of all epic stories in our world, this is the most epic of them all.
 

The Material Birth of God

One night, in the land controlled by Rome, an Israeli woman had a visitation.  She was told that she would conceive a child.  She did not understand this since she was still a virgin.  But during the night, just as she was told, the God of the Universe filled her material egg with His spiritual substance and she became pregnant with the Human of God.

Now, dear children, some have interpreted this event as the birth of the Son of God, meaning that God made an offspring that was different and independent - thinking that humans procreate the same way that God would reproduce.  But nothing can be further from the truth. 

God is The Infinite Being.  And pure logic will conclude that infinity - being everything - can not be divided.  We can not make another infinity from the original infinity because infinity is everything in the first place.  This is the very First Commandment - that there is only One God, only One Infinity.  This same God was born into the material world and became the Man we know as Jesus.

So in this child's soul, who was born from a mother called Mary, was God Himself. And through the finite body that He acquired from Mary, He would have direct interface with the sensual life possessed by humans and also with the hells that yearn to live from and control sensual life on Earth.  And from this, be able to combat the hells directly.

Immediately after the Lord's birth, while still an infant, He was attacked and tempted internally by the most grievous hells - even more severe than in His later life on Earth because they were attacking His Very Innocence.  So as that babe lay quietly in the manager, deep spiritual attacks began.  And as His life continued, the hells attacked Him on all fronts.  And one after another, the hells were put in their place by the application of Divine Truth.  The Word made Flesh, as was said before.

And with the final proof of the Lord's resurrection after He willingly let Himself be killed, hell would never be as powerful again because the truth of God's Humanity was revealed for the entire spiritual world to see.  In fact, His resurrection transformed every cell in His Human body from material into spiritual substance so that the material itself became Divine, thereby retaining His Human Body to Eternity.   God no longer had to rely on talking to humans through other humans and spirits or through books with hidden meanings.  He could now speak directly from His acquired Human Body as Jesus.

The hells were beat back and placed under the yoke of the New Truths which were revealed at that time and those who were held captive in the lower earths were finally set free and sent to their heavenly homes.  Can you imagine the jubilation?  Can you fathom the spectacle? And a New Age began on Earth.
 

The Last Judgment

But the full Divine Story was not yet complete.  More had to be accomplished before the final blow against hell could be made.  Humanity had not yet advanced to a state where higher truths could be learned.  In the mean time, those religions that would rise up after the Lord's departure became infested with new false ideas - misunderstanding and distorting even the teachings delivered by God Himself during His life on Earth.  Their leaders, like all leaders of earthly organizations, became more interested in maintaining their own power or in promoting their own organization over that of others - at the cost of neglecting true spiritual teachings.  In time, the concepts of God's visit to Earth were twisted to benefit those who had control over others.  But the end of their time was targeted.  In the 18^th century, the Lord made His final installment to the ancient Divine Promise that began with humanity's initial fall.  He would reveal Himself clearly to all rational minds by opening the deep spiritual secrets hidden within the material Word of God.  In fact, He would open up the Doctrines of Heaven for those on Earth to receive.

During the years between the Lord's resurrection and this event, humanity was being prepared in gradual stages for reception of higher spiritual ideas.  As knowledge of the sciences grew, the old illogical dogmas and superstitions began to be challenged.  And ignorance, which is the main fuel for those who desire to control others, could slowly melt away.  Since the rational mind is our connection to the spiritual world, it was first necessary to allow the rational to develop, this would free up people's thoughts concerning the world around them. Which in turn would allow people to become more willing to walk away from the traditional fallacies of material religions.  But first, spiritual balance had to be restored to the Earth by overturning the spiritual influences that blocked Heaven from reaching humanity.  Another Divine Judgment was in store.

Meanwhile, the "Age of Exploration" began the process of intermingling the world's cultures - to many people, this was an age of domination.  However, since the faith based religions the covered the world caused such division and hatred among each other, a process which would cause more interaction was introduced. And in some parts of the world, the Moslem religion spread throughout the remnants of the older religions.  It caused the rejection of material religion and idolatrous worship of material objects and taught the simple and essential concept of one Human God. 

And once history arrived at what Western people call the Age of Enlightenment, newer spiritual concepts were ready to be introduced.  At last, people in the world, with the help of the Last Judgment, would be able to start breaking away from the clouds of false ideas and rules that have been built up by the misdirected dogmas of the various sects.  And the Truths - hidden deep within the Word - could be learned anew; and the Genuine Truths contained deep within every religion in the world could begin to appear. And the process to heal the humans of this Earth began.

At that time, the Creator re-introduced the world into the lost science of correspondence - the ability to understand the link between the two worlds.  As a result, the inner sense of the Divine Story - the Word of God, which had been developed and passed down through the centuries, was open for those who have spiritual eyes.  We have finally reached a point where true spiritual thinking can begin to be received again.

By reopening the spiritual life within the Word, we can - through the science of correspondence - learn the deeper characteristics of God, the truth about His Human and our own true purpose in life.  And we can confirm‎ those simpler truths we learned in childhood.  At the same time, we are also provided with the truths necessary to finally defeat those false leaders who still cling to their artificial power here on Earth and in the world of spirits.  When the evil are exposed, their true nature will be open for all God's children to see.  And by teaching His children to see the how evil of the hypocrites is destructive, we can reject them. God will then gradually bring a final end to the bad influence of hell on Earth and to those who would mislead us.  Once rejected, they will have no more power and life on Earth will return to its early innocence - in the new Golden Age.  But this is yet many, many generations to come; and it can only come through the freewill of humanity.

So in the last part of the 18^th Century, the last major Divine Judgment began in the spiritual world.  Through these newly revealed Truths contained within the Word, the old order was overturned and new heavens were opened up for those who would follow this more understandable view of God.  No magic is needed to get to heaven and not one particular religion nor person is required - just an earnest belief in the Human God and in the fact that good actions are to be done for the sake of God.  This is the life of heaven.

The results of this judgment will not be readily apparent on Earth.  Humanity's freewill remains critical - especially today.  Since nothing can be done to destroy this freedom, we will continue to be isolated from God in this life.  However, through the actions in the spiritual world over 200 years ago, all people on Earth have had their spiritual freedom restored.  No longer can the balance of equilibrium between heaven and hell be overwhelmed by ignorance of the Truth.  God is very real and His Human aspect can reach out to us like it never has before.
 

Today

Today, we live under completely different circumstances than those who came before us.  And we should be extremely grateful that the antediluvians have been long gone.  Today, we can have confidence that the Lord is in full control of evil - in this world and the other world; and we can be sure that the only evil allowed to attack any of us is strictly for the advancement of our eternal life.  Nothing can spiritually harm us - not one thing, not one person.   Everything in this life is for our instruction.  God will only allow us to experience those things that will make us more spiritual - no matter how severe the circumstances may seem.

Reach back to the faith in God that you had when you were a child and reject that which brings fear and hate.  Remember the simplicity of your image of God, of heaven and your duty - no matter what religion you belong to.  Live that life that your child beckons you to lead and thank God daily for the constant music that brings us this life. 

So with every particle in the universe being the result of a current and active movement by God and now with every doubt about the existence of God being removed from the rational thought of the spiritual world, humanity on Earth should not be afraid and must know that God's power is everywhere and is always in our best interest.  The hells are now subdued and can do nothing beyond what the Lord allows.  Even though hell can still lie and deceive, it can only do exactly what the Creator permits - within the limits of our freewill. 

It may appear that hell has power in this world, but this is just an appearance.  In reality, God will ensure that every one of us enters the spiritual world as the best person we can possibly be.  Not one person will fail to reach their highest spiritual capability.  Hell indeed has absolutely no power at all - only the ability to collect those who willingly desire the things of hell more that the good things of heaven.

Be of good cheer, fellow children. The Lord's loving plan will override all other plans of men and spirits.  Our Creator is in full control of everything and everywhere, and His Providence is all-powerful, infallible and omni-loving.  THIS is the true meaning of Christmas, Easter and June 19, which commemorates our Spiritual Independence Day - the day that God completed the process of subduing the hells.
 

Ever After

Some time in the middle of the 20th Century, two souls were born and were later blessed to have found each other.  They joined hands on August 31, 1974 and grew more closely day after day - and will continue this inseparable love into the next world.  These are many of the things that they have learned along the way and this is their Creation Myth.

---

Appendix ... personal observations

Things we've found to be Right

All those who believe in the humanity of God, who have an affection for heavenly good and who properly participate in this good in their daily lives are known as God's children - no matter what religion they belong to.  Those who do not have this are not His children - no matter what they say with their mouth.  Even so, almost everyone has some kind of affection for good in them.  This is the ''neighbor'' that we are to assist in others; this is the seed of regeneration that we should encourage.  And this is what belongs to God in us.  We need to reach out and encourage the neighbor in others and at the same time, not allow ourselves to enable the evil.  So charity is not helping everyone, but is restricted to helping only the spiritual good in others.  If we blindly help those who would abuse or profane the good, we are contributing to this abuse.  Discrete charity is spiritually good, indiscrete charity can be damaging.

Our primary duty is for each of us to do our part.  To first not allow ourselves to strengthen the hells that travel through us and secondly to be good to others - while knowing that we can neither take credit for the good that flows through us because this belongs to God nor can we blame those who allow hell to work through them because all evil belongs to hell.  We on Earth may control our freewill, but the affections of life come from the spiritual world.

Our spiritual job beyond this as fellow children in the Lord's Kingdom is to find each other - those who have an affection for good, whatever their religion.  And to reach out to any affection of good that may be within others - no matter how opposed to heaven they may seem to be at the time - while being mindful to never feed evil affections. 

God continuously protects each one of us from the constant attacks of hell and will allow only assaults that will convince us to change to a better direction.  The Lord desires only love for us.  Hell desires our fall to materialism and sensual fascination.  Since hell is made up of bad human desires, lessons can be learned by seeing and experiencing the results of these desires.  No one is exposed to anything that will truly harm their eternal spirit.  All that happens is for our advancement.

We can not know the spiritual destination of another.  Someone may appear good, but could be a pure hypocrite; and another might be a murderer and not be held to blame.  It is all in our intentions and only the Lord knows this for sure.

The direct influence that we receive from spirits in the spiritual world comes from those who are most closely associated with us.  The good spirits are under the influence of heaven and the bad spirits under the influence of hell.  These spirits do not have the power to see what we are doing - since their access to the material world has been cut off - but are capable of sharing affections with us.  To put it differently, those in the spiritual world who have the same affections gather into the same societies.  Closeness and distance are determined by whether we have similar or different affections.  Like affections gather into societies, similar affections reside in nearby societies and opposing affections are completely separated.  While in the material world, our freewill decides which affections we choose to associate with coming from the spiritual world.  When we choose to partake in some bad affection, we are actually aligning ourselves with that bad society; likewise, with a good affection and heavenly societies.

Everyone goes to where they want to after death.  No one is judged like we have judgments here on Earth.  Our own lives judge us by the habits we form - our book of life.  It is not a book of history, but is a current book of who we are today.  Tomorrow, the book could completely change depending on what decisions we make and actions we take.  If we have a confirmed habit of evil, we will carry this into our next life and seek the same type of existence there.  If we say we believe in God and still have intentions of evil, the intentions will override anything our mouth may confess.  “Deeds, not words” is our guidance from God.

However, this doesn't mean that all those who still have bad habits won't make it to heaven.  When we die, our final destination is determined by our proactive acceptance of God.  If we are convinced that God's world is better and are attempting to rid ourselves of hell's influence, we will continue on this path when we enter the next life.  Those who are attracted more to their selfish nature will freely travel further from God.  The process of preparing a person for heaven or hell includes a purge of one or the other behavior.  No one can enter heaven with anything of hell in them; neither can anyone enter hell with any elements of heaven in them.  So most of us, after entering the spiritual world, go through a preparation until we are ready to move on.   In the end, we all end up where our heart - not our mind - desires to go.

In this light, we must view our fellow humans as if we are all firm and committed to our own freewill, with the Lord pulling at each of us to keep us from falling down further.  But without this pull, we would all end up in the exact same boat - which is hell.  So, fellow children, look not at a person who does evil with neither hate nor disdain and consider that those who are "good" would not be good without the Lord's influx.  There should be no reason to judge others as harshly as we do.  And those who's freewill is blessed enough to have influx from the Lord should never be arrogant in their privilege.

In the end, we must be prepared to accept that others may never become free of their tendencies - and know that no one is trying harder than the Lord to bring people toward Him.  We have to know that each person that passes on to the next life is pulled up as far as their freewill is capable - without fail.  Even though we humans lack the capabilities to pull other people up - or even ourselves for that matter - we must know that the Lord is applying all Divine power to each one of us toward our rescue.  So if someone rejects heavenly affections, it is purely their choice and not our failing - and definitely not from any failing of the Lord's.  We often think that if people would just catch on, they would see the light.  Some don't want to and may in fact be in complete opposition.

Only God can save the world.  Too often people confuse our work of building a material paradise here on Earth with our duty toward God's Paradise.  The material world deserves only the attention required to take care of our earthly needs and comforts, but there is no virtue in material successes - only in so far as they enhance spiritual development (which is often unlikely).  While it is important to be useful in the material world, it is primarily important to attend to our individual regeneration.  The ultimate rescue of Earth is in God's hands - in comparison, we don't really know where to start.

Hypocrisy is the worst of all sins since it does evil while it is hiding behind good.  This misrepresents and profanes the good - which is from God and is God - causing damage to God's quality.  And the damage done to the name of God is the worst of all sins.  A murderer and thief are better off - at least we know that they commit evil.  The hypocrite is a master of disguise and lies, misleading us to hell.

All those who believe that they belong in heaven will be allowed to go there.  But when the hypocrites arrive, the atmosphere will be full of the things that they truly despise and they will begin to suffocate and jump headlong back to the level of their true loves. “I know you not,” says the Lord.

The rich are rich because they would be worse people if they weren't.  The poor are poor because they would be worse people if they were not.  But rich people are not automatically bad nor do poor people have an advantage.  We all have been given a life that will give us the best chance to obtain our highest spiritual ability.

We can see that natural good (as compared to celestial/spiritual good) is too preval‎ent in this world because of the affect that fear has on the culture.  Those who would lie and cause fear will try their best to convince us that they have the answer - that their way or solution is the only way for us to survive.  But those who trust in God do not flinch when the fear mongers spout their stories.

Pure enlightenment is achieved when we each finally realize that we are nothing without God's Everything -  and fully resign our trust to the Providence of the Lord. 

Beware of anyone or any organization adding to or subtracting from the simple beliefs that God planted in you while you were a child.
 

Things we've found to be Wrong

There is no single Devil who is in charge of hell - how can there be a peer to compete with the Infinite God?  All hell, which is full of willing human evils and lies, makes up what we could call the devil.  It is a collective of devils and satans who work to control the material world so that they can feed their pleasures.  Yet we can call hell the Devil because together, it does act as a corrupt human working against God.  But remember, God has reordered and subdued the hells.

There are no angels that were with God from the beginning.  The stories of super-beings are not true.  Every angel that exists was once born in the material world -- even the archangels.  God is Infinite, all else is finite.

Miracles are a form of compulsion and are not a valid part of a spiritual life.  In fact, there is no magic in this world - and we should stop wasting our time looking for it.  The magic, dear friends, is life and the things of nature that surround us.  There is no advantage in delving into the mystic.  We seek things that would compel us to believe, but we resist and reject compulsion.  The world God has given us to enjoy is right here before our eyes and under our nose.  The wonders of the spiritual world will come to us soon enough - but our duty here comes first.

There is no rapture.  There will be no wholesale departure from this world for ''believing'' Christians only - and no reign of the devil and no 144,000 Jews left behind.  It is a false expectation based upon a material view of God and the Word of God.  First, Christians who only believe in the Lord but do not do His Commandments aren't going anywhere but where their own loves will take them.   How can a person who hasn't practiced the actions of heaven qualify to be part of heaven?  “Deeds, not words" says the Creator.  Second, humanity's freewill will never be over-ridden by God - or in other words, spiritual equilibrium will never be removed from material humans on earth.

There is no reincarnation: once people taste the beauty and joy of the spiritual world, they will have nothing to do with going back to such a crude existence as material life.  Only those in hell wish to come back, and they can not do this.  Each person who is born is a unique, individual human who's purpose in life is to work with God to acquire the joys of heaven.  We are born, we find our ruling loves, we hopefully are reborn and then we pass on to eternal life or eternal foolishness.  This is all within our spiritual freedom.

Along the same line, many Christians believe that in the "resurrection", their original material will be gathered from their graves and they will live again.  Again, this is a purely material view of life and is an incorrect notion.

Communication with spirits is not advisable because only evil spirits wish to come back to the material world.  People who say they can communicate with spirits are either claiming it to support their particular hustle or delusional. 

There is no vicarious atonement.  If God and Jesus are the same person - which the First Commandment declares, how can we claim to have vicarious atonement through a father-son sacrifice?  And isn't this a rather bloody event to base salvation upon?  Jesus was the only person to have personally conquered the hells - only God Himself could do this.  The first step in Christian faith is to recognize that Jesus is God Himself.  Secondly, our only way to heaven includes good actions accepted by our freewill.  Today, Christians should honor and pray directly to Jesus as Lord and know that the Trinity consists of the Divine Love, the Divine Wisdom and the Divine Activity.
 

Things to Come

While on Earth, we can expect to have our spiritual freedom and equilibrium preserved at all times.  Although the spiritual world has been reordered and subdued by God, the material world will continue to appear detached from God.  Therefore, events in the material world will continue to be influenced by the spiritual limitations of humans and not by some kind of Divine intervention that many people expect.  Any improvement in spiritual conditions here on Earth will occur gradually over time and will come only by the freewill of humanity. 

But sometime, far into the future, the people of this Earth will return to the Golden Age.  No one living today can imagine what this will be like.  However, the cycles will continue to oscillate - some making it seem like things are getting worse and some making it seem like they are getting better - just as our individual lives oscillate.  But one thing is for certain: the cultures on our Earth will gradually and progressively become more and more spiritual - until the Golden Age is found again.  So today, we stand on the threshold of our spiritual frontier.

In the mean time, the most important thing we as individuals can do to contribute to this is to stop allowing hell to act through us.  This is the first act of true charity.  Not working to save the world and not thinking that we can save others, but working to save ourselves with the help of God. This is a lifetime occupation.  After you are spiritually regenerated, you will automatically contribute more to the world.  And remember, where your attention is focused, your heart will follow. 

Blessings be upon all of God's children!  And be happy!
 

GENESIS

The times and states of each person's regeneration in general and in particular are divided into six, and are called the days of his creation; for, by degrees, from being not a spiritual human at all, a person can become at first somewhat human, and so little by little attain this on the sixth day, in which they can become a regenerated image of God - a true human, a human in deeds, not just a human in name.

Through all this, the Lord continually fights for us against the evils and falsities of hell; and by combats confirm‎s each willing person in truth and good.  The time of combat is the time of the Lord's working; and therefore in the Prophets the regenerate man is called the work of the fingers of God.  Nor does He rest until love acts as our principal; then the combat ceases.  When the work has so far advanced that faith is conjoined with love and a person acts from love, it is called "very good"; because the Lord then actuates the person as His likeness.  At the end of the sixth day the influence of the evil spirits departs from this person, and they are introduced into heaven, or into the celestial paradise. 

Here are the abstracts that correspond to the material words in Genesis, followed by the text:

The six days, or periods, which are so many successive states of the regeneration of each willing person are in general as follows.

·         The first state is that which precedes, including both the state from infancy, and that immediately before regeneration.  This is called a "void," "emptiness," and "thick darkness." And the first motion, which is the Lord's mercy, is "the Spirit of God moving upon the faces of the waters."

·         The second state is when a distinction is made between those things which are of the Lord, and those which are proper to man.  The things which are of the Lord are called in the Word "remains," and here are especially knowledges of faith, which have been learned from infancy, and which are stored up, and are not manifested until the man comes into this state. At the present day this state seldom exists without temptation, misfortune, or sorrow, by which the things of the body and the world, that is, such as are proper to man, are brought into quiescence, and as it were die.  Thus the things which belong to the external man are separated from those which belong to the internal man.  In the internal man are the remains, stored up by the Lord until this time, and for this use.

·         The third state is that of repentance, in which the man, from his internal man, speaks piously and devoutly, and brings forth goods, like works of charity, but which nevertheless are inanimate, because he thinks they are from himself.  These goods are called the "tender grass," and also the "herb yielding seed," and afterwards the "tree bearing fruit."

·         The fourth state is when the man becomes affected with love, and illuminated by faith.  He indeed previously discoursed piously, and brought forth goods, but he did so in consequence of the temptation under which he labored, and not from faith and charity; wherefore faith and charity are now enkindled in his internal man, and are called two "luminaries."

·         The fifth state is when the man discourses from faith, and thereby confirm‎s himself in truth and good: the things then produced by him are animate, and are called the "fish of the sea," and the "birds of the heavens."

·         The sixth state is when, from faith, and thence from love, he speaks what is true, and does what is good: the things which he then brings forth are called the "living soul" and the "beast." And as he then begins to act at once and together from both faith and love, he becomes a spiritual man, who is called an "image." His spiritual life is delighted and sustained by such things as belong to the knowledges of faith, and to works of charity, which are called his "food”, and his natural life is delighted and sustained by those which belong to the body and the senses; whence a combat arises, until love gains the dominion, and he becomes a celestial man.

·         Those who are being regenerated do not all arrive at this state.  The greatest part of humanity, at this day, attain only the first state some only the second; others the third, fourth, or fifth; few the sixth; and scarcely any one the seventh.  But the potential remains.

1. In the beginning God created the heavens and the Earth.
2. And the Earth was a void and emptiness, and thick darkness was upon the faces of the deep.  And the Spirit of God moved upon the faces of the waters.
3. And God said, Let there be light, and there was light.
4. And God saw the light, that it was good; and God distinguished between the light and the darkness.
5. And God called the light day, and the darkness He called night.  And the evening and the morning were the first day.
6. And God said, Let there be an expanse in the midst of the waters, and let it distinguish between the waters in the waters.
7. And God made the expanse, and made a distinction between the waters which were under the expanse, and the waters which were above the expanse; and it was so.
8. And God called the expanse heaven.  And the evening and the morning were the second day.
9. And God said, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together in one place, and let the dry (land) appear; and it was so.
10. And God called the dry (land) Earth, and the gathering together of the waters called He seas; and God saw that it was good.
11. And God said, Let the Earth bring forth the tender herb, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit-tree bearing fruit after its kind, whose seed is in itself, upon the Earth; and it was so.
12. And the Earth brought forth the tender herb, the herb yielding seed after its kind, and the tree bearing fruit, whose seed was in itself, after its kind; and God saw that it was good.
13. And the evening and the morning were the third day.
14. And God said, Let there be luminaries in the expanse of the heavens, to distinguish between the day and the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and for years.
15. And let them be for luminaries in the expanse of the heavens to give light upon the Earth; and it was so.
16. And God made two great luminaries, the greater luminary to rule by day, and the lesser luminary to rule by night; and the stars.
17. And God set them in the expanse of the heavens, to give light upon the Earth;
18. And to rule in the day, and in the night, and to distinguish between the light and the darkness; and God saw that it was good.
19. And the evening and the morning were the fourth day.
20. And God said, Let the waters cause to creep forth the creeping thing, the living soul; and let fowl fly above the Earth upon the faces of the expanse of the heavens.
21. And God created great whales, and every living soul that creepeth, which the waters caused to creep forth after their kinds, and every winged fowl after its kind; and God saw that it was good.
22. And God blessed them, saying, Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and the fowl shall be multiplied in the Earth.
23. And the evening and the morning were the fifth day.
24. And God said, Let the Earth bring forth the living soul after its kind; the beast, and the thing moving itself, and the wild animal of the Earth, after its kind; and it was so.
25. And God made the wild animal of the Earth after its kind, and the beast after its kind, and everything that creepeth on the ground after its kind; and God saw that it was good.
26. And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness; and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the heavens, and over the beast, and over all the Earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the Earth.
27. And God created man in His own image, in the image of God created He him; male and female created He them.
28. And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the Earth, and subdue it; and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the heavens, and over every living thing that creepeth upon the Earth.
29. And God said, Behold, I give you every herb bearing seed which is upon the faces of all the Earth, and every tree in which is fruit; the tree yielding seed, to you it shall be for food.
30. And to every wild animal of the Earth, and to every fowl of the heavens, and to everything that creepeth upon the Earth wherein is a living soul, every green herb for food; and it was so.
31. And God saw everything that He had made, and behold it was very good.  And the evening and the morning were the sixth day.
1. And the heavens and the Earth were finished, and all the host of them. 
2. And on the seventh day God finished His work which He had made, and rested on the seventh day…
 

For those who are curious about how mass can come from energy and how more energy can produce more mass - in this case, spiritual energy making material mass, consider Einstein's discovery:

• E=mc² can determine the mass of an object derived from energy or m = c²/E.

• m = the resulting mass of an object.

• c² = the speed of light (a universal constant) times the speed of light (resulting in the formula constant, which never changes ~ 34.6 trillion miles per second).

• E = the variable material energy corresponding to the Divine energy behind the motion(s). 

If we knew the mass of the universe, we could calculate the energy required to keep it alive. Obviously, know one knows how to measure the Divine “E”, and knowing this does nothing to advance our ability to love each other; but it does present a clue as to how “nothing” - in this case, the invisible spiritual Energy of God - can create something with weight in the material world.
 

 

More to come - as time permits...

[심창식]

인간이 창조되기 이전에 인간모양을 한 인간이 있었다는 사실이 흥미롭습니다. 인간의 영혼은 지니지 못했지만, 인간과 비슷한 외형을 지닌 인간 이전의 인간이 현 인류의 모태가 되었다는군여. 이것이 저서에 입각한 견해인지 궁금합니다만..

[김은경]

인간 이전의 인간이란 말이 어디 써있는지요..? 저는 못찾겠네요. 제가 보기엔 이 글 쓴 사람이 진화론을 바탕으로 하여 유인원에서 태어난 한 세대가 인간의 시작이었을 거라는 가설을 말하고 있다고 봅니다만...