What are body and Soul? answer
Soul is the substance, Life, and intelligence of man, which is individualized, but not in matter.
Does brain think, and do nerves feel, and is there intelligence in matter? answer (answer cont’d tomorrow)
Matter cannot see, feel, hear, taste, nor smell. It is not self-cognizant,--cannot feel itself, see itself, nor understand itself. Take away so-called mortal mind, which constitutes matter's supposed selfhood, and matter can take no cognizance of matter.
Quotes from answer:
Man is spiritual and perfect; and be cause he is spiritual and perfect, he must be so understood in Christian Science. Man is idea, the image, of Love; he is not physique. He is the compound idea of God, including all right ideas; the generic term for all that reflects God's image and likeness; the conscious identity of being as found in Science, in which man is the reflection of God, or Mind, and therefore is eternal; that which has no separate mind from God; that which has not a single quality underived from Deity; that which possesses no life, intelligence, nor creative power of his own, but reflects spiritually all that belongs to his Maker.
Man is incapable of sin, sickness, and death. The real man cannot depart from holiness, nor can God, by whom man is evolved, engender the capacity or freedom to sin.
Man is not matter; he is not made up of brain, blood, bones, and other material elements.
man cannot be separated for an instant from God, if man reflects God.
Evil still affirms itself to be mind, and declares that there is more than one intelligence or God.
Man was not created from a material basis, nor bidden to obey material laws which Spirit never made; his province is in spiritual statutes, in the higher law of Mind.
It is ignorance and false belief, based on a material sense of things, which hide spiritual beauty and goodness.
Divine Principle is the Life of man. Man's happiness is not, therefore, at the disposal of physical sense.
Continuing our definition of man, let us remember that harmonious and immortal man has existed forever, and is always beyond and above the mortal illusion of any life, substance, and intelligence as existent in matter. This statement is based on fact, not fable. The Science of being reveals man as perfect, even as the Father is perfect, because the Soul, or Mind, of the spiritual man is God, the divine Principle of all being, and because this real man is governed by Soul instead of sense, by the law of Spirit, not by the so-called laws of matter.
Spiritual man is the image or idea of God, an idea which cannot be lost nor separated from its divine Principle.
When the divine precepts are understood, they unfold the foundation of fellowship, in which one mind is not at war with another, but all have one Spirit, God, one intelligent source, in accordance with the Scriptural command: "Let this Mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus."
The realization that all inharmony is unreal brings objects and thoughts into human view in their true light, and presents them as beautiful and immortal
In divine Science, man is the true image of God.
The Christlike understanding of scientific being and divine healing includes a perfect Principle and idea,--perfect God and perfect man,—as the basis of thought and demonstration.
Immortal ideas, pure, perfect, and enduring, are transmitted by the divine Mind through divine Science, which corrects error with truth and demands spiritual thoughts, divine concepts, to the end that they may produce harmonious results.
Science reveals the possibility of achieving all good, and sets mortals at work to discover what God has already done
Mortals must change their ideals in order to improve their models.
Mind creates His own likeness in ideas, and the substance of an idea is very far from being the supposed substance of non-intelligent matter.
God expresses in man the infinite idea forever developing itself, broadening and rising higher and higher from a boundless basis.
The infinite Principle is reflected by the infinite idea and spiritual individuality
Man is not absorbed in Deity, and man cannot lose his individuality, for he reflects eternal Life; nor is he an isolated, solitary idea, for he represents infinite Mind, the sum of all substance.
Matter does not express Spirit.
Whatever enslaves man is opposed to the divine government.
A higher and more practical Christianity, demonstrating justice and meeting the needs of mortals in sickness and in health, stands at the door of this age, knocking for admission.
If man is governed by the law of divine Mind, his body is in submission to everlasting Life and Truth and Love.
Soul has always been one of the tricky synonyms of God to me. So much so that when Mary Baker Eddy uses the word, it sticks out to me. Generally, I know what she means with the following, but how do you apply the specific term Soul to it? In other words, how does this specific attribute clarify the passage:
Knowing that Soul and its attributes were forever manifested through man…
I didn’t think much about Christian Science Treatments or know the details until I took class instruction. That isn’t to say the information was secret; I just wasn’t interested in pursuing it. But now that I’m a few days back from annual association of class instruction, and it ended with example treatments, they are on my mind.
These two stories are so clearly different in every possible way. I’m sure there is a scholarly reason for including both, just as the four gospels recount the same stories of Jesus (sort of). But from a figurative perspective, a spiritual perspective, they appear to be parts of an original treatment.
There are two quotes in this reading that hit home for me.
…a material creation which followed the spiritual, – a creation so wholly apart from God’s, that Spirit had no participation in it.
And,
man exists because God exists
This reading pits the Tree of Life (first story) against the Tree of Knowledge (second story). It might be more clear if the tree were called Material Belief or even False Belief. The idea is that the knowledge that the tree has and imparts is not of God but of false belief. A lie.
I last sentence of the reading is:
Man is God’s reflection, needing no cultivation, but ever beautiful and complete.
Cultivation could be interpreted to mean education (academic, such as college). I have someone in my life who never extends beyond the basics of life and looks down on anyone that does – like me. If given an opportunity, I would be a professional student, always in school learning.
So I wonder if Mary Baker Eddy was worried about the influence cultivation (education) would have on a student of Christian Science. When we open ourselves (and our minds) to an education, we are asking to be influenced with knowledge.
In my opinion, while I don’t think an education is requisite for spiritual growth, education is no different than any danger that we must guard against anywhere. We must listen to God for the right ideas and hold to our own highest sense of right and let that sense of right grow.
The question is What is Man? I’m grappling with more issues with my son again. Ugh. This has got to stop. So I appreciated this question because I remember how someone told me to use this answer by replacing the word man with the name of the person who I need to see as God’s idea. Today, that would be my son. So I used the name Bill and changed up the sentences I’m praying with today:
Bill as no separate mind from God.
Bill has not a single quality underived from Deity.
Bill is incapable of sin, sickness, and death. The real Bill cannot depart from holiness, nor can God, by whom Bill is evolved, engender the capacity or freedom to sin.
Earnestly see the spiritual status of Bill, which is outside of all material selfhood.
These two points stood out:
Christian Science declares that Mind is substance, also that matter neither feels, suffers, nor enjoys. Hold these points strongly in view. Keep in mind the verity of being,--that man is the image and likeness of God, in whom all being is painless and permanent. Remember that man's perfection is real and unimpeachable, whereas imperfection is blameworthy, unreal, and is not brought about by divine Love.
And:
To remove the error producing disorder, you must calm and instruct mortal mind with immortal Truth.
inexhaustible Loveand
incorporeal Life and LoveSo I'm still looking for Love but I started thinking about God as father:
Hence the Father Mind is not the father of matter.Father's Love is incorporeal and inexhaustible. That led me to remember how sad I've been this year, drenched in regret over past mistakes. But even then, God still loves me:
Mortals have a very imperfect sense of the spiritual man and of the infinite range of his thought.Guilty there.But then:
Through spiritual sense you can discern the heart of divinity, and thus begin to comprehend in Science the generic term man. Man is not absorbed in Deity, and man cannot lose his individuality, for he reflects eternal Life; nor is he an isolated, solitary idea, for he represents infinite Mind, the sum of all substance.So I represent the sum of all substance. That's a lot to live up to. But the reading today made me want to get there. Very inspirational for me. How about you?
