Day 233: Anatomy is mental Self-knowledge

461:1-463:4

Anatomy, when conceived of spiritually, is mental self-knowledge, and consists in the dissection of thoughts to discover their quality, quantity, and origin. Are thoughts divine or human? That is the important question. This branch of study is indispensable to the excision of error. The anatomy of Christian Science teaches when and how to probe the self-inflicted wounds of selfishness, malice, envy, and hate. It teaches the control of mad ambition. It unfolds the hallowed influences of unselfishness, philanthropy, spiritual love. It urges the government of the body both in health and in sickness. The Christian Scientist, through understanding mental anatomy, discerns and deals with the real cause of disease.

2010

Day 211: Identity & Illusion in Healing

416:16-418:11

The whole reading today grabbed me. My thoughts have been racing toward this all week.

The material body, which you call me, is mortal mind, and this mind is material in sensation, even as the body, which has originated from this material sense and been developed according to it, is material. This materialism of parent and child is only in mortal mind, as the dead body proves; for when the mortal has resigned his body to dust, the body is no longer the parent, even in appearance.

To the Christian Science healer, sickness is a dream from which the patient needs to be awakened. Disease should not appear real to the physician, since it is demonstrable that the way to cure the patient is to make disease unreal to him. To do this, the physician must understand the unreality of disease in Science.

2010

Day 208: Destroy Human Fear of Sickness

410:22-412:15

The procuring cause and foundation of all sickness is fear, ignorance, or sin. Disease is always induced by a false sense mentally entertained, not destroyed. Disease is an image of thought externalized. The mental state is called a material state. Whatever is cherished in mortal mind as the physical condition is imaged forth on the body. Always begin your treatment by allaying the fear of patients. Silently reassure them as to their exemption from disease and danger.

The great fact that God lovingly governs all, never punishing aught but sin, is your standpoint, from which to advance and destroy the human fear of sickness. Mentally and silently plead the case scientifically for Truth.

The power of Christian Science and divine Love is omnipotent. It is indeed adequate to unclasp the hold and to destroy disease, sin, and death.

2010

Day 120: Mind & mind

233:16-235:6

compass the destruction of sin and sickness by overcoming the thoughts which produce them, and by understanding the spiritual idea which corrects and destroys them

The counter fact relative to any disease is required to cure it.

2010

Day 87: Instructional notes for Health

167:1 - 168:29

We apprehend Life in divine Science only as we live above corporeal sense and correct it. Our proportionate admission of the claims of good or of evil determines the harmony of our existence,--our health, our longevity, and our Christianity.

Again, an error in the premise must appear in the conclusion. To have one God and avail yourself of the power of Spirit, you must love God supremely.

The scientific government of the body must be attained through the divine Mind. It is impossible to gain control over the body in any other way. On this fundamental point, timid conservatism is absolutely inadmissible. Only through radical reliance on Truth can scientific healing power be realized.

Disease being a belief, a latent illusion of mortal mind, the sensation would not appear if the error of belief was met and destroyed by truth.

2010

Day 251:

503:6-505:3

The thought came to me today that while reading this chapter, I need to remember the first tenet, the inspired word. It is all to easy to get very literal and what-if the text when that isn’t what I’m reading it for.

Mary Baker Eddy writes the same thing several different ways in this reading but I underlined them all:

No supposition of error enters there.

God creates neither [1] erring thought, [2] mortal life, [3] mutable truth, nor [4] variable love.

Immortal Mind makes its own record, but [1] mortal mind, [2] sleep, [3] dreams, [4] sin, [5] disease, and [5] death have no record in the first chapter of Genesis.

This is a great support for the beginning/only idea of yesterday.

Day 248:

493:9-495:24

Funny thing about reading this chapter before this year journal – I always hated it. Now its another chapter I can’t wait to reread.

Something else I missed in the first read and need to go back and get the full text on: Will you explain sickness and show how it is to be healed?

A full answer to the above question involves teaching, which enables the healer to demonstrate and prove for himself the Principle and rule of Christian Science or metaphysical healing.

I didn’t realize teaching was a component of healing.

I would like to replace the word fear in the following quote with anger. While to me, they are the same thing, I don’t always remember it when reading a passage like this.

Disease is an experience of so-called mortal mind. It is fear made manifest on the body. Christian Science takes away this physical sense of discord, just as it removes any other sense of moral or mental inharmony.

There are some spots in the books where I think Mary Baker Eddy is particularly eloquent -- this question/answer is one example.

Day 225: Human Will

445:19-447:11

Since most of this reading is about human will (or it was to me), I thought I would link up other days I thought included that topic.

Thoughts MBE has about Human Will:

Christian Science silences human will, quiets fear with Truth and Love, and illustrates the unlabored motion of the divine energy in healing the sick.

The human will which maketh and worketh a lie, hiding the divine Principle of harmony, is destructive to health, and is the cause of disease rather than its cure.

The exercise of will brings on a hypnotic state, detrimental to health and integrity of thought. This must therefore be watched and guarded against.

The heavenly law is broken by trespassing upon man’s individual right to self-government.

Day 209: Steps of a Treatment

412:16-414:14

This is a note to myself so I can find this again easily.

To prevent disease or to cure it, the power of Truth, of divine Spirit, must break the dream of the material senses. To heal by argument, find the type of the ailment, get its name, and array your mental plea against the physical. Argue at first mentally, not audibly, that the patient has no disease, and conform the argument so as to destroy the evidence of disease. Mentally insist that harmony is the fact, and that sickness is a temporal dream. Realize the presence of health and the fact of harmonious being, until the body corresponds with the normal conditions of health and harmony.

Day 208: Mental Treatment Illustrated

410:22-412:15

I was surprised by the section title (also this post’s title) because I didn’t remember it. I took class instruction and somewhere in the back of my mind thought I learned about treatments in class, not in Science & Health. Why do I think that? I have no idea. A few points stuck out for me:

Disease is always induced by a false sense mentally entertained, not destroyed.

Silently reassure them as to their exemption from disease and danger.

The great face that God lovingly governs all, never punishing aught but sin, is your standpoint, from which to advance and destroy the human fear of sickness.

Day 200: Tenacity of Belief

395:6-397:7

These few pages of instruction about how to deal with a patient are not new to me but today I read them in a new light. The challenge I'm having with my daughter is only physical in a control sense; she isn't ill but her behavior has changed for the worse and she says she can't control it. I read this section know the issue was about physical behavior and that I was the 'nurse' of my children. The instructions Mary Baker Eddy gives are just as important for my task as they are for disease:

the healer should speak to disease as one having authority over it, leaving Soul to master the false evidences of the corporeal senses and to assert its claim over mortality and disease.

An ill-tempered, complaining, or deceitful person should not be a nurse. The nurse should be cheerful, orderly, punctual, patient, full of faith, -- receptive to Truth and Love.

Avoid talking illness to the patient. Make no unnecessary inquiries relative to feelings or disease. Never startle with a discouraging remark about recovery, nor draw attention to certain symptoms as unfavorable, avoid speaking aloud the name of the disease. Never say beforehand how much you have to contend with in a case, nor encourage in the patient's thought the expectation of growing worse before a crisis is passed.

Day 191: Disease

377-378:32

I’m going to take three quotes from this reading and rearrange them with no disrespect meant. For me, it just made better sense:

God never endowed matter with power to disable Life or to chill harmony with a long and cold night of discord.

The cause of all so-called disease is mental, a mortal, a mortal fear, a mistaken belief or conviction of the necessity and power of ill-health; also a fear that Mind is helpless to defend the life of man and incompetent to control it.

Remove the leading error or governing fear of this lower so-called mind, and you remove the cause of all disease as well as the morbid or exciting action of any organ.

Day 189: The Cause of Disease

373-375:5

This reading dealt with disease. It is an important point for me to getting a better grasp on as I work with the fallacy of material law (from Day 188). Mary Baker Eddy starts by discussing healing of disease versus healing of sin:

If we are Christians on all moral questions, but are in darkness as to the physical exemption which Christianity includes, then we must have more faith in God on this subject and be more alive to his promises.

So a challenge to myself – be more alive to his promises. I’m going to look for inspiration for that.

Next:

The fear of disease and the love of sin are the sources of man’s enslavement.

And the answer to fear of disease:

Establish the scientific sense of health, and you relieve the oppressed organ.

So lots of ideas I need more inspiration for.