Day 297: Spontaneity

597:16-599:8

WILDERNESS. Loneliness; doubt; darkness. Spontaneity of thought and idea; the vestibule in which a material sense of things disappears, and spiritual sense unfolds the great facts of existence.

2010

Day 296: Thought & Deed

595:7-597:15

THUMMIM. Perfection; the eternal demand of divine Science. The Urim and Thummim, which were to be on Aaron's breast when he went before Jehovah, were holiness and purification of thought and deed, which alone can fit us for the office of spiritual teaching.

2010

295: Spiritual Outing

593:9-595:6

RIVER. Channel of thought. When smooth and unobstructed, it typifies the course of Truth; but muddy, foaming, and dashing, it is a type of error.

ROCK. Spiritual foundation; Truth. Coldness and stubbornness.

2010

Day 294: Error

591:5-593:8

PHARISEE. Corporeal and sensuous belief; self-righteousness; vanity; hypocrisy.

RED DRAGON. Error; fear; inflammation; sensuality; subtlety; animal magnetism; envy; revenge.

2010

Day 293: Spiritual Understanding appearing

589:8-591:4

JUDAH. A corporeal material belief progressing and disappearing; the spiritual understanding of God and man appearing.

2010

Day 292: Always Active

587:9-589:7

GOOD. God; Spirit; omnipotence; omniscience; omnipresence; omni-action.

2010

Day 291 Harmony & love

585:9-587:8

GAD (Jacob's son). Science; spiritual being understood; haste towards harmony.

GETHSEMANE. Patient woe; the human yielding to the divine; love meeting no response, but still remaining love.

2010

Day 290: Glossary Gems

583:10-585:8

God, who made all that was made and could not create an atom or an element the opposite of Himself

Mind measures time according to the good that is unfolded

2010

Day 289: Another Trust in Good

581:8-583:9

ARK. Safety; the idea, or reflection, of Truth, proved to be as immortal as its Principle;

2010

Day 288: Trust in Good

579-581:7

In Christian Science we learn that the substitution of the spiritual for the material definition of a Scriptural word often elucidates the meaning of the inspired writer.

ABRAHAM. Fidelity; faith in the divine Life and in the eternal Principle of being. This patriarch illustrated the purpose of Love to create trust in good, and showed the life-preserving power of spiritual understanding.

2010

Day 297: Time of the Year

597:16-599:8

Both time and year are in the Glossary. I especially liked this thought about year:

space for repentance

Day 296: Superstructure of Truth

595:7-597:15

The terms in this reading forced me to consider my own rites and ceremonies. What veil do I wear and what superstructure of Truth do I expect to find while wearing it?

I wonder how Mary Baker Eddy expected people to use this Glossary. Were the newbies supposed to flip to it while reading the book, in order to understand her text? Or was it meant as an explanation of sorts of Christian Science, a cheat-sheet? I ask that because I didn’t know what Thummim and Urim (MBE definitions) are or how they apply to the book or Christian Science. They seem sort of plopped in here without context or explanation. 

• Thummim (OneLook definition)
• Urim (OneLook definition)

Day 295: The Serpent is here

593:9-595:6

How fitting that today I’m studying the serpent. A lie has crept into my life and squirmed into my thought. It was subtly proposed by someone else. Now I’m considering it, sort of. Only because I love this someone.

The serpent is:

• subtlety
• a lie
• the opposite of Truth, named error
• the first myth and idol
• belief in more than 1 God
• animal magnetism
• 1st lie of limitation
• finity
• 1st claim of opposite of Spirit, good, termed matter or evil
• 1st delusion that error exists as fact
• 1st claim that sin, sickness, death are real
• 1st audible claim that God is not omnipotent, that there is another power, named evil, which was as real and eternal as God, good

Day 294: Power Definitions

591:5-593:8

This reading has the major definitions in Christian Science: Man, Matter, Mind, Miracle, and Mortal Mind on page 591.

In the definition of Mind, Mary Baker Eddy uses substance but with a lower-case s. Is this a typo? Substance is one of the synonyms for God and is usually upper-cased. My book is ISBN 0-87952-259-3 and is last released in 2000.

I’m thinking of creating another page for this site that would link up the words in the Glossary to their location over on Spirituality.com. The link to the page would show up in the right-hand upper side, along with the links for Home, About, etc. Thoughts?

Day 292: Heaven & Hell

587:9-589:7

There seem to be a lot of definitions for God and error in the glossary – different shades, different meanings – but the same overall concept. I didn’t expect that. This reading includes Heaven and Hell below:

HEAVEN. Harmony; the reign of Spirit; government by divine Principle; spirituality; bliss; the atmosphere of Soul.

HELL. Mortal belief; error; lust; remorse; hatred; revenge; sin; sickness; death; suffering and self-destruction; self-imposed agony; effects of sin; that which "worketh abomination or maketh a lie."

But why did Mary Baker Eddy include the word in?

IN. A term obsolete in Science if used with reference to Spirit, or Deity.

Was she referring to God in Man, soul in body? Then the definition from a Christian Science perspective, makes sense. But, wow, the concept had to have been, maybe it still is, so fundamental to other religions that she felt the need to include “in” and then say it was obsolete.

Day 291: God and Error

585:9-587:8

Yesterday, I marked two definitions, Creator and Devil. Today, two more which seem the same words as yesterday’s words but are defined differently. First is:

GOD. The great I AM; the all-knowing, all-seeing, all-acting, all-wise, all-loving, and eternal; Principle; Mind; Soul; Spirit; Life; Truth; Love; all substance; intelligence.

The second is error. This has, in Christian Science, always been my definition of the opposite of God:

See chapter on Recapitulation, page 472.

A side note, I wish I had this book as an editable and mark-able e-book. I would completely change the index, cross-reference the glossary, and note in-text definitions. Each complete read through, though, I would mark clean otherwise since I’m at a different place each time. If this is already available, please leave a comment below so I can link it up and buy it.

And the text from Recapitulation:

Question.--What is error?
Answer.--Error is a supposition that pleasure and pain, that intelligence, substance, life, are existent in matter. Error is neither Mind nor one of Mind's faculties. Error is the contradiction of Truth. Error is a belief without understanding. Error is unreal because untrue. It is that which seemeth to be and is not. If error were true, its truth would be error, and we should have a self-evident absurdity--namely, erroneous truth. Thus we should continue to lose the standard of Truth.

Day 290: God & the Devil

583:10-585:8

These two terms, defined, are a great way to look at Christian Science and my own spiritual growth:

CREATOR. Spirit; Mind; intelligence; the animating divine Principle of all that is real and good; self-existent Life, Truth, and Love; that which is perfect and eternal; the opposite of matter and evil, which have no Principle; God, who made all that was made and could not create an atom or an element the opposite of Himself.

DEVIL. Evil; a lie; error; neither corporeality nor mind; the opposite of Truth; a belief in sin, sickness, and death; animal magnetism or hypnotism; the lust of the flesh, which saith: "I am life and intelligence in matter. There is more than one mind, for I am mind,-- a wicked mind, self-made or created by a tribal god and put into the opposite of mind, termed matter, thence to reproduce a mortal universe, including man, not after the image and likeness of Spirit, but after its own image."

Day 289: Two-fold definitions

581:8-583:9

I’ve read the Glossary before but, honestly, by this point in the book, on a marathon read, my attention and understanding just weren’t there. But that was before. This is a new, fresh, slower read.

I didn’t realize that some of the terms had two-fold meanings: one spiritual, one material. Of course, it makes sense but when I read the definition of Benjamin (Jacob’s son), I had to read it twice. Then I really slowed down. I didn’t want to miss any tiny nugget that was hiding in a two-part definition.

I thought the definition of believing was wonderful. I added “page 582” to the index for belief. I know Mary Baker Eddy spends some time working through belief, faith, and understanding in the book but the last two aren’t in the glossary so that just means belief, to me, is really the key.

I’ve been thinking about marriage a lot lately so I noted the Bride and Bridegroom spiritual nuggets: spiritual bliss and spiritual understanding.

And, mom-that-I-am, I marked the spiritual meaning of children:

The spiritual thoughts and representatives of Life, Truth, and Love.

Day 288: The Purpose of Love

579-581:7

I was a little worried about this chapter, The Glossary. It’s just a dictionary. What insight could it really have? But even on the first few pages, I marked a couple of things.

• Spiritual sense = original meaning
• The purpose of Love is to create trust in good.
• An adversary is one who opposes, denies, disputes, not one who constructs and sustains reality and truth.