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Wednesday, March 25, 2020

Truth Discrimination and Service

“Between the right and wrong, it 
should not be difficult to choose, for 
those who wish to follow the Master 
have already decided to take the 
right at all costs. But the body and 
the man are two, and the man's 
win is not always what the body 
wishes. When your body wishes 
something, stop and think whether 
you really wish it. For you are 
God, and you will only what God 
wills; but you must dig deep down 
into yourself to find the God within 
you, and listen to His voice, which 
is your voice. Do not mistake your 
bodies for yourself — neither the 
physical body, nor the astral, nor 
the mental. Each one of them will 
pretend to be the Self, in order to 
gain what it wants. But you must 
know them all, and know yourself 
as their master. 

When there is work that must be 
done, the physical body wants to 
rest, to go out walking, to eat and 
drink; and the man who does not 
know says to himself: 
"I want to do these things, and I must do 
them." 
But the man who knows says: "This that wants is not I, and it must wait awhile." 
Often when there is an opportunity to 
help some one, the body feels: 
"How much trouble it will be for 
me; let some one else do it." 
But the man replies to his body: "You 
shall not hinder me in doing good 
work." 
The body is your animal — 
the horse upon which you ride. 
Therefore, you must treat it well, and take 
good care of it; you must not overwork it, 
you must feed it properly on pure food and drink only, and keep it strictly clean always, even from the minutest speck of dirt. 
For without a perfectly clean and
healthy body you cannot do the ar- 
duous work of preparation, you 
cannot bear its ceaseless strain. 
But it must always be you who con- 
trol that body, not it that controls 
you. 
The astral body has its desires — 
dozens of them; it wants you to be 
angry, to say sharp words, to feel 
jealous, to be greedy for money, to envy other people their possessions, 
to yield yourself to depression. All 
these things it wants, and many 
more, not because it wishes to harm 
you, but because it likes violent vibrations, and likes to change them 
constantly. But you want none of 
these things, and therefore you 
must discriminate between your 
wants and your body's. 
Your mental body wishes to think 
itself proudly separate, to think 
much of itself and little of others. 
Even when you have turned it away 
from worldly things, it still tries to  calculate for self, to make you think 
of your own progress, instead of 
thinking of the Master's work and 
of helping others. When you medi- 
tate, it will try to make you think 
of the many different things which 
it wants instead of the one thing 
which you want. You are not of this 
mind, but it is yours to use; so here 
again, discrimination is necessary. 
You must watch ceaselessly or 
you will fail. 
Between right and wrong, occult- 
ism knows no compromise. At 
whatever apparent cost, that which is right, you must do, that which is 
wrong you must not do, no matter 
what the ignorant may think or say. 
You must study deeply the hidden 
laws of Nature, and when you know 
them arrange your life according to 
them, using always reason and 
common-sense. 

You must discriminate between 
the important and the unimportant. 
Firm as a rock where right and 
wrong are concerned, yield always 
to others in things which do not mat- 
ter. For you must be always gentle 
and kindly, reasonable and accommodating, leaving to others the same full liberty which you need for yourself. 

Try to see what is worth doing: 
and remember that you must not 
judge by the size of the thing. A 
small thing which is directly useful 
in the Master's work is far better 
worth doing than a large thing 
which the world would call good. 
You must distinguish not only the 
useful from the useless, but the 
more useful from the less useful. 
To feed the poor is a good and noble 
and useful work; yet to feed their souls is nobler and more useful than 
to feed their bodies. Any rich man 
can feed the body, but only those 
who know can feed the soul. If you 
know, it is your duty to help others 
to know. 

However wise you may be already, 
on this Path you have much to learn; 
so much that here, also, there must be discrimination, and 
you must think carefully what is 
worth learning. All knowledge is 
useful, and one day you will have 
all knowledge; but while you have 
only part, take care that it is the most useful part. God is Wisdom as well as Love; and the more wisdom you have the more you can 
manifest of Him. Study then, but 
study first that which will most help 
you to help others. Work patiently 
at your studies, not that men may 
think you wise, not even that you 
may have the happiness of being 
wise, but because only the wise man 
can be wisely helpful. However 
much you wish to help, if you are 
ignorant you may do more harm 
than good. 
You must distinguish between truth and falsehood; you must learn 
to be true all through, in thought 
and word and deed....”

Page 35 of 109 from the full (copy and pastable) text of
“At the Feet of the Master” 
by J. Krishnumurti:
https://archive.org/stream/atfeetmaster00krisgoog/atfeetmaster00krisgoog_djvu.txt

Easier to read format (page 35 of 109):
https://ia802708.us.archive.org/11/items/atfeetmaster00krisgoog/atfeetmaster00krisgoog.pdf

Re: Krishnamurti’s “At the Feet of the Master(s)”
Begins at section #172
http://www.ascension-research.org/The_Masters_and_the_Path_by_Charles_W_Leadbeater.htm

Sunday, March 22, 2020

The 3 Hurtful Sins of Gossip, Cruelty and Superstition

“Three sins there are which work more harm than all else in the world — gossip, cruelty, and superstition — because they are sins against love. Against these three the man who would fill his heart with the love of God must watch ceaselessly.
See what gossip does. It begins with evil thought, and that in itself is a crime. For in everyone and in everything there is good; in every one and in everything there is evil. Either of these we can strengthen by thinking of it, and in this way we can help or hinder evolution; we can do the will of the Logos or we can resist Him. If you think of the evil in another, you are doing at the same time three wicked things:
(1) You are filling your neighborhood with evil thought instead of with good thought, and so you are adding to the sorrow of the world.
(2) If there is in that man the evil which you think, you are strengthening it and feeding it; and so you are making your brother worse instead of better. But generally the evil is not there, and you have only fancied it; and then your wicked thought tempts your brother to do wrong, for if he is not yet perfect you may make him that which you have thought him.
(3) You fill your own mind with evil thoughts instead of good; and so you hinder your own growth, and make yourself, for those who can see, an ugly and painful object instead of a beautiful and lovable one.
Not content with having done all this harm to himself and to his victim, the gossip tries with all his might to make other men partners in his crime. Eagerly he tells his wicked tale to them, hoping that they will believe it; and then they join with him in pouring evil thought upon the poor sufferer. And this goes on day after day, and is done not by one man but by thousands. Do you begin to see how base, how terrible a sin this is? You must avoid it altogether. Never speak ill of any one; refuse to listen when any one else speaks ill of another, but gently say: "Perhaps this is not true, and even if it is, it is kinder not to speak of it."
Then as to cruelty. This is of two kinds, intentional and unintentional. Intentional cruelty is purposely to give pain to another living being; and that is the greatest of all sins — the work of a devil rather than a man. You would say that no man could do such a thing; but men have done it often, and are daily doing it now. The inquisitors did it; many religious people did it in the name of their religion. Vivisectors do it; many schoolmasters do it habitually. All these people try to excuse their brutality by saying that it is the custom; but a crime does not cease to be a crime because many commit it. Karma takes no account of custom; and the karma of cruelty is the most terrible of all. In India at least there can be no excuse for such customs, for the duty of harmlessness is well-known to all. The fate of the cruel must fall also upon all who go out intentionally to kill God's creatures, and call it "sport." Such things as these you would not do, I know; and for the sake of the love of God, when opportunity offers, you will speak clearly against them. But there is a cruelty in speech as well as in act; and a man who says a word with the intention to wound another is guilty of this crime. That, too, you would not do; but sometimes a careless word does as much harm as a malicious one. So you must be on your guard against unintentional cruelty It comes usually from thoughtlessness. A man is so filled with greed and avarice that he never even thinks of the suffering which he causes to others by paying too little, or by half-starving his wife and children. Another thinks only of his own lust, and cares little how many souls and bodies he ruins in satisfying it. Just to save himself a few minutes' trouble, a man does not pay his workmen on the proper day, thinking nothing of the difficulties he brings upon them. So much suffering is caused just by carelessness — by forgetting to think how an action will affect others. But karma never forgets, and it takes no account of the fact that men forget. If you wish to enter the Path, you must think of the consequences of what you do, lest you should be guilty of thoughtless cruelty.
Superstition is another mighty evil, and has caused much terrible cruelty. The man who is a slave to it despises others who are wiser, tries to force them to do as he does. Think of the awful slaughter produced by the superstition that animals should be sacrificed, and by the still more cruel superstition that man needs flesh for food. Think of the treatment which superstition has meted out to the depressed classes in our beloved India, and see in that how this evil quality can breed heartless cruelty even among those who know the duty of brotherhood. Many crimes have men committed in the name of the God of Love, moved by this nightmare of superstition; be very careful therefore that no slightest trace of it remains in you.
These three great crimes you must avoid, for they are fatal to all progress, because they sin against love. But not only must you thus refrain from evil; you m u s t b e active in doing good. You must be so filled with the intense desire of service that you are ever on the watch to render it to all around you — not to man alone, but even to animals and plants. You must render it in small things every day, that the habit may be formed, so that you may not miss the rare opportunity when the great thing offers itself to be done. For if you yearn to be one with God, it is not for your own sake; it is that you may be a channel through which His love may flow to reach your fellow-men.
He who is on the Path exists not for himself, but for others; he has forgotten himself, in order that he may serve them. He is as a pen in the hand of God, through which His thought may flow, and find for itself an expression down here, which without a pen it could not have. Yet at the same time he is also a living plume of fire, raying out upon the world the Divine Love which fills his heart.
The wisdom which enables you to help, the will which directs the wisdom, the love which inspires the will — these are your qualifications. Will, Wisdom and Love are the three aspects of the Logos; and you, who wish to enroll yourselves to serve Him, must show forth these aspects in the world.”

Page 84 of 109 from the full (copy and pastable) text of
“At the Feet of the Master” 
by J. Krishnumurti:
https://archive.org/stream/atfeetmaster00krisgoog/atfeetmaster00krisgoog_djvu.txt

Easier to read format (page 84 of 109):
https://ia802708.us.archive.org/11/items/atfeetmaster00krisgoog/atfeetmaster00krisgoog.pdf

Re: Krishnamurti’s “At the Feet of the Master(s)”
Begins at section #172
http://www.ascension-research.org/The_Masters_and_the_Path_by_Charles_W_Leadbeater.htm

Wednesday, March 11, 2020

Though There Is Evil, There Is No Devil ‘per se’

“Evil — That which is not of God; unreality; error thought; a product of the fallen human consciousness; negation.
Evil is a parasite. It has no permanent life of itself; its whole existence depends on the life it borrows from its parent, and when its connection with the parent is severed nothing remains. In Divine Mind there is no recognition of evil conditions. Such conditions have no basis of reality. They are conjurations of a false consciousness. Apparent evil is the result of ignorance, and when Truth is presented the error disappears.
There is but one presence and one power, God omnipotent. But man has the privilege and freedom of using this power as he will. When he misuses it he brings about inharmonious conditions. These are called evil. Evil appears in the world because man is not in spiritual understanding. He has not learned that all is Mind; neither has he conformed to the law of Mind, with the result that inharmony appears in his body and affairs. He can do away with evil by learning rightly to use the one Power. If there were a power of evil, it could not be changed.

Overcoming Evil — Evil must be overcome with good. We must dwell in the good so wholly that all the substance of our thoughts and our being is given over to the promotion of the good. This is a mental process in which all negation (evil) is denied while creative, fearless affirmation of God's perfect good is steadfastly adhered to.

Devil: The mass of thoughts that has been built up in race consciousness through many generations of earthly experiences and crystallized into what may be termed human personality, or carnal mind, which opposes and rejects God.
The "devil" is a state of consciousness adverse to the divine good. Other names for this state of consciousness are the Adversary, carnal mind, the accuser, and the old man. There is no personal devil.

God is the one omnipresent Principle of the universe, and there is no room for any principle of evil, personified or otherwise.

The “devil” is overcome by denying “his” existence and by affirming universal Christ love for God and all men. The devils that we encounter are fear, anger, jealousy, and other similar negative traits, and they are in ourselves. Christ gives us the power to cast out these devils, thereby cleansing our consciousness.
The "devil" signifies the mass of thoughts that have been built up in consciousness through many generations of earthly experiences and crystallized into what may be termed human personality, or carnal mind. Another name of the "devil" is sense consciousness; all the thoughts in one that fight against and are adverse to Truth belong to the state of mind that is known as the Devil. 

Satan, sa'-tan (Heb.)--lier in wait; an adversary; an enemy; hater; accuser; opposer; contradictor.
The same as the Devil, the Adversary, the Evil One, and the like (Job. 1:6-12; Matt. 4:10).
Satan is the "Devil," a state of mind formed by man's personal ideas of his power and completeness and sufficiency apart from God. Besides at times puffing up the personality, this satanic thought often turns about and, after having tempted one to do evil, discourages the soul by accusing it of sin. Summed up, it is the state of mind in man that believes in its own sufficiency independent of its creative Source.
Rebellion against God under hard experiences is another form of this "hater." The personality that disbelieves in God and acknowledges no law save that of man is satanic.

When the seventy returned, saying, "Lord, even the demons are subject unto us in thy name," Jesus said, "I beheld Satan fallen as lightning from heaven" (Luke 10:17, 18).
Heaven is conscious harmony. When this harmony is invaded by a thought adverse to the divine law, there is Satan, and "war in heaven." When the Christ declares the Truth, error thought falls away; that is, Satan falls from heaven as lightning.
Lightning is a force that gathers and explodes and wastes its energy because it is not in harmony with the universal equilibrium. This well illustrates the mind that believes itself an independent and unrelated creation. When this kind of thought is allowed full sway in a man's consciousness, he becomes so egotistical and self-opinionated that he destroys himself. Thus error is its own destruction.
The Greek word that is translated "devil" in Luke 4:1-13 means accuser or the critical one. Personality describes the meaning more fully than any other word in the English language.
Satan--The Adversary, the great universal negative whose power is derived from the unlawful expression of man's own being. The serpent as "Satan" is sensation suggesting indulgence in pleasures beyond the law fixed by creative Mind.

Demon is an evil spirit; that is, a ruling consciousness that dethrones the normal reason.”
[Then understand that such are man’s creations of the astral plane. As such, remember to not feed energy into such so as to avoid inflating the negativity.
Turn away from darkness and into the Light.
>Resist not evil (Matthew 5:39).
>That which you ‘resist’ (exert force in opposition) persists.]

Summary: One cannot say,
”The devil made me do it”. 

Note: Spiritual Metaphysics is the view that reality is ‘spiritual’ at it's core, not physical.

Search: ‘spiritual metaphysics’