1999-4-25 09:54:00
The Test
"If you want to test your theory of learning within I'll give you a question that you cannot retrieve from a past life. I am writing in my notepad a one digit number. This gives you a reasonable chance of getting the right answer. Go within and tell me what it is."
By the way, just to make sure you understand, the rule is one guess per individual per day, not just one guess per day for the group. Also, I said that one number guessed was close. By that I meant that someone guessed the right number in the positive mode. So what we have here are six numbers left to guess as of this writing. -1, -7 and -9 are taken and are not correct. Sorry Diane it's not -0. All the positive digits and zero have also been guessed. And rest assured, I will tell you the truth about the number I wrote down when it is guessed correctly.
Even though no one has retrieved the number yet I thought I would proceed here.
The fact that everyone guessed in the wrong direction until all the options were taken corresponds with our search for truth in real life. We often accept and look in the obvious direction until we reach a dead end. Only then does another path appear before our eyes, and only then will we even consider it.
One of the missions of all spiritual teachers is to dispel common illusions and misconceptions so the wrong path does not have to waste ages of our time. It is a difficult job because students caught in old age teachings, or even close disciples of the teacher, become frustrated and angry.
The story of Christ is the prime example of this. The leaders and common people both held many rigid beliefs that Jesus shattered. When a number of people began to believe Him, those who were resistant to change and higher knowledge, fought Him in every way possible, until finally He was crucified.
I seek to use the Master as my prime example. To follow in His difficult footsteps, the spiritual teacher must dispel illusions along the path. The illusions need to fall before him just as a tree growing on the path must be felled before the way can be followed again.
One illusion is that all we need to learn anything is to go within. This is true to a degree when dealing with principles, but is of little use for seeking regular facts and data. To illustrate this is true, I wrote down a single piece of data in my notebook and challenged the group to go within and retrieve it. Now as soon as I wrote that in the notebook, a record of this event was entered in the Akashic records. It is technically possible for an adept to retrieve this.
The number was also floating around in my thoughts, and it is remotely possible that someone would be sensitive enough to pick the number through telepathy. The reason I say the chances are remote is that I don't allow just anyone to probe my mind. It is also possible that certain invisible lives watched me write the number down and they could transfer the information to you.
If you are very sensitive to the etheric, astral and mental bodies and an adept of a high order, it may be possible for you to use these vehicles to pick up some necessary data out there. But the truth is, when the student truly goes within he retrieves no knowledge, data or facts. The only thing you can obtain from within, until you become an initiate, is confirmation of true principles. Once you have mastered this ability, to a degree, the next step is to retrieve principles from the formless worlds.
At this point several objections may arise.
One may say that he receives numerous teachings from invisible entities by going within. It is a possibility that a seeker can receive knowledge from an invisible entity, but that is not learning from within, any more than learning from your algebra teacher is going within. Such a teacher is outside yourself, an outside authority, and no more within you than I am. The only difference is that the seeker uses senses from the astral body for communication rather than the physical.
Another may state, "When I go within I have all kinds of valuable information come to me including facts and data." Part of this comes from learning in this life, that is consciously forgotten, and is merely retrieved from memory, and part may be knowledge brought back from past lives. Once a person taps into the area of the mind where this past life information is stored, you do not have to go within any more than you do when remembering what you ate for dinner.
So why am I teaching this, and why is this important information? If a person has the simple belief that all he has to do to get any information in the universe is to go within, then, if this belief is strong enough, it creates a thoughtform that hovers around the seeker almost as a separate living entity that has a life of its own. This quasi entity also picks up information from questionable sources and feeds the seeker.
What often happens next is that the seeker gets more and more facts and data fed to him from the thoughtform. Usually there is no way to confirm whether or not this data is true and no principles are ever transferred. This person will then get all kinds of false information filtered through his belief system.
If his beliefs are centered on extra terrestrials, he may believe he is in contact with ZOR from Alpha Centauri. This ZOR will have a piece of data for any question asked. He can tell you the exact hour the great earthquake will come, the exact date the world will end, when the mother ship will show up, how many planets are in his system, how old the universe is, what parts of the earth will soon be under water and so on.
The thing is that ZOR is telling you nothing that Xavier, John or Glenys couldn't think up just as well. I could say Alpha Centauri has 10 planets around it and one of them is populated by intelligent lizards and who could prove me wrong? I could say that the mother ship will show up July 5, 2012 and no one could prove me wrong until that date, and even at that time ZOR will tell us that mankind was just not ready in time and the date was moved up.
Beware of anyone who claims to be going within and only brings forth facts and data, but no principles. True disciples of the Christ and the Masters around Him will always teach or amplify principles and teach others to find truth through such principles and verification of principles.
There is no knowledge, facts and data as we understand them in the formless worlds. This is why you cannot retrieve them by going within. You can go within and use the power of the Spirit through your soul to confirm true principles, but you cannot acquire only data by this high method. On the other hand, after a principle is made clear to the student, through an increase in light, much knowledge then becomes available to the physical brain that was previously hidden.
Consider this analogy: You as the master of your body are like a god to the infinite little lives who live there. Similarly, the one God has the whole universe as a physical body, and you are a tiny life that lives within this greater body.
Now there are an infinite number of things going on in your body that you are completely unaware of because your attention is on a higher level. Right now your kidneys and liver are doing a fantastic and complicated job of removing poisons from your body and you are completely oblivious as to how it is done and the intelligence that is doing it even though these life energies are a part of you. Your tiny cells are duplicating themselves and their DNA with overwhelming intelligence and you do not have a clue as to how it is done.
You (the wholeness), as a god to your body, don't know anything about many of the things going on in your body. If your little cells were to ask you a question about how to alter their DNA, there is little you could do to help them because your attention is on a higher level. Because these little lives have their attention on their own world, they are expected to solve their own problems; for you, as a larger entity, have your own new worlds to conquer.
If there was some purpose in it, you could use your power of ATTENTION to commune with the lives in your body, but it is important that they handle their own problems so you are allowed to place your ATTENTION on the world where your normal consciousness is.
From the beginning of this list my main goal has been to lead some of you into the true world of the soul, so many can learn to verify information through the soul by using correct principles. A great leap forward in this process is to not be deceived by a multitude of facts and data, but to learn that the Spirit within can and does verify principles, and principles behind various packages of knowledge.
Let us use an example of a principle taught in the Immortal book. "I AM BECOMING that which I DECIDE to BECOME." When many of you compared this principle with the idea of a static, never-changing condition for all eternity, it just struck a chord within your soul. The reason this statement of principle felt so good was that with principles, we are dealing with the language of the soul. From and through the soul we can receive a true communication and confirmation and we experience it as joy. The good part is that as we progress from confirmation to confirmation, our sensitivity to this communication becomes more and more reliable, until the seeker can bring down principles from on high, for not only him, but others.
But as far as a regular knowledge that is available in the world through books and teachers is concerned, the best way to acquire it is from without. A good teacher is invaluable and so is a good book written by a teacher. One thing our experiment on the number demonstrates quite clearly is that it is much easier and faster for me to just "teach" you the mystery number than to let you stumble along trying to find it within yourself.
The problem is that we often want to feel that we are completely self sufficient and do not need anyone, but in truth all of us do. Even Christ has a teacher and that is the Ancient of Days and then there is a teacher above him. When the student is ready the teacher will appear.
Question: What qualities in the student show that he is ready?
Copyright 1999 by J.J. Dewey, All Rights Reserved