10/7/66

First of all, I’ll take your letters. I have two tonight that I think should thrill you; one from a gentleman, he’s here, and one from a lady, and she is here. His will fit a perfect side of what I want to discuss tonight, and hers will fit the other side perfectly. I asked you to share with me your experiences because they do encourage everyone. I do not need, personally, I do not need encouragement; I’ve experienced scripture. But everyone who has not experienced scripture needs encouragement.

So we start, first of all, with his. I make the statement that imagining creates reality and I mean that seriously. That man should live as if it were true, just as if it were true—I don’t care what it is, the most incredible thing in the world—as if it were true. And if he is faithful to that assumption and lives in that state, it will come to pass…of that I’m convinced and I know from personal experience. But to have it shared with me by those who come here when they tell me their stories… So here is his story. He said, “Sitting in an office, I was bored, and I thought there certainly must be a more pleasant way of earning twice what I earn, there must be. So I made the decision right there and then that I would earn twice what I have now. I did it for a few days, and then after a few days there’s not a thing changed in my world, I wondered if this thing is right?

“Well, again remembering my decision I stopped it right there and then and re-enacted the scene, not wondering what I would do. I didn’t really specify what the job was I would do, simply that I was earning twice what I was at the moment earning. Then, two weeks later, a man that I had known for three years and I have seen him weekly…and suddenly he began to urge upon me to come and work for him. He’d never done that before. He was insistent and when he mentioned a salary it was exactly twice what I was earning. So I worked for him. While working for him, again I said to myself, now this thing has worked…and so, why should I work? Why not have an income equal to all that I need without this so-called work.

“And so, this is what I did. I imagined that I went down to my postal box and I took out the letters…there were the usual things, correspondence and bills and things…but I saw an unidentified envelope. On my way back, I simply stopped and embraced and touched the trees that I so love on my way home. Then I opened it and I found a check for the amount that I thought I would need for a long, long non-working period. Then I saw on my balance sheet from the bank that added to what was there. And that’s what I did. But I did it every night as I went to sleep. Well, two weeks later seeing no evidence of this whatsoever, I said to myself, you know, are you going mad? I mean this thing may be completely stupid”— and then he said to me in a little aside—“as I once thought that you were.”

Well, he’s not the only one who thought that I was mad. He’s not the only one that thought that the one who awoke to scripture is mad. You read that in the 10th of John, when one makes the statement that “no one takes my life; I lay it down myself. I have the power to lay it down and the power to lift it up again.” Then said those who heard, “What must we listen to him for? Why, he has a devil and is mad; why listen to him (verses 18,19)?” Read it in the 10th of John, “He is mad; why listen to him?” Well, in New York City, in 1939, on 49th Street there was a little bookshop and I would go there daily and browse around and spend hours. I loved the two little ladies who ran it…they were well advanced in years. And they took a huge big picture of me and they sat it in the window. I had no books at the time, but it was a bookstore, so they simply put the picture in the window. There was no reason for it, but they wanted to put the picture in the window. I came…as I came, two ladies were on the street looking into the window, and one said to the other, “Do you know who he is?” This one was a visiting cousin or sister or someone but a relative; and she said no. “Well, he is the mad mystic on 47th Street. You should hear him!” said this one…and I’m right behind them, hearing it. “You should hear him. You know what he tells people? Your consciousness is God. You say ‘I am,’ he says, ‘that’s God.’ Can you imagine that!” said one to the other. And then she said, “He also tells you that imagining creates reality. Now isn’t that the silliest thing in the world? You must go hear him some night.” Well, that was it, back in 1939.

So in this little aside he said, “As I once thought you were mad. But, two weeks later, after I did this night after night, and then I dropped it, I kept a date with a friend that I had made months and months ago. It was a dear old friend of mine and I kept this date and went up and spent a few days with him. While I was there, he had just inherited a sum of money from an unknown relative and urged upon me the amount that I had seen, and I took it. Here was the sum of money to the very dollar that I had seen in my account. He urged it upon me, so I took it. Now, here I am doing the things I’ve wanted to do all of my life, without effort, enjoying every moment…out on the beach, doing all these things…without going to work. And someone calls, one I had never seen, and he asks me to come and work for him. Well, I said that I was so enjoying the kind of a life that I’m living now I don’t want to work for anyone. But he was so persistent that he insisted that I would come. He also urged me to bring some of my work. I thought, well, I’ll take it… I’ll take the work now. So that day I went down to see him with some of my work.” What he does, I haven’t the slightest idea. I do not know whether he is an artist, in this department, that department or what. But he said in his letter, “He asked me to bring some of my work, so I took it down. He was more enthusiastic than ever in employing me, and said to me, ‘I want to show it right now. Not only show your work but I want to show you to my chief client.’ So we went right away to see the chief client.

“Now, when I walked into that place I instantly knew that I was here before. The wall panel against which I leaned…I had been here before. I know not physically, but I have been here before. The window through which I looked was exactly that same window through which I looked, not in my physical body, but I looked through that. The tree or the plant”—he used the word plant or tree…I think it was tree because undoubtedly he’s an artist of some kind, but he said “the plant that I saw was the exact plant that I had seen. Every thing was perfect as I had seen it, but not physically. The man himself was the man that I saw. I took the job, and now I daily talk with that man in that office against that paneled room, looking at that same plant through that same window.

“So then, when I came back I remembered—and this is the great lesson that it taught me—I remembered that sitting one day at my desk my mind wandered and in my Imagination I wandered into that office and I looked through that window. I saw that man, I saw that plant, I saw it. Now this is my conclusion: Imagining creates reality in the most determined, definite manner man could ever imagine. It’s not only the intentional imaginal act that does it, man is living by this all through the moments of time. Every moment he is living by it whether or not he knows it or cares to know it. Whether or not he believes it or wants to believe it, he can’t avoid this principle that imagining is creating reality. And it is not only the intentional imaginal act but every imaginal act, for I did not do that intentionally.”

Now he said, “I have a plant growing in my living room. It’s the most luxurious thing you could see and every nurseryman tells me it just can’t, it just cannot thrive under these conditions. Why is it thriving? I simply went forward in my Imagination and saw it thriving, and here is the thing simply taking over the living room, and all the nurserymen telling me it just can’t do it.” Well now, if there is evidence for a thing, what you or I think about the matter is not important. What does it matter what anyone thinks if I produce the evidence? Well, here we have the evidence.

Well, I can’t thank him enough for that letter…these heavenly stories that I can share with you. He doesn’t need to encourage me I assure you I know it, I know it from experience. I don’t care what a man has done if he knows this wonderful principle of God he can set himself free. God is the forgiving being. If God held things against us, who on earth could escape? God is forgiving—I don’t care what a man has done—if you know God’s law. But, you have to operate God’s law. We are the operant power, because God became man that man might become God. In becoming man he had to forget that he was God. And then as man, the law contained within himself…and then someone comes up who hears it, who experiences it, and then he shares it and tells it. Then the deaf ear and the blind eye know it can’t be, but he tells it anyway. He tells it just as he told me. Whether we care to hear it, whether we believe it or not, makes no difference, we’re living by it anyway.

So his wonderful conclusion—and you must bear this in mind—it’s not only the intentional imaginal act, all imaginal acts work. So morning, noon and night we are imagining. You can’t stop it. Can you stop it? Night after night when I go to bed and suddenly the eye opens from within, I know where I am, I know it, where I see a world that isn’t this world. And all I have to do, like someone…I don’t drive a car but I know how it must feel like to men who drive cars. I simply press something in my head. I don’t put my foot on it or my hand on it. It’s all intensity. I simply imagine it, and as I imagine it, off I go where I’m contemplating. And I see it. I step right into it…it’s just as real as this…right into it. The whole energy, it’s in one’s wonderful Imagination. One’s Imagination is life itself; it animates everything in this world. Suddenly the eye opens. This inner eye is always open when I go to bed. And then world after world after world…and only one thing you want to do. Maybe some nights I don’t feel like doing it, so I don’t; other nights it’s interesting and when I see it I simply, I call it intensifying what I’m seeing. As I intensify it, this peculiar motion and off you go; you shoot like a meteor right into this world that you see. And there you are. Then you explore…the whole thing you explore.

So here, sitting idly at his desk…and what he does I don’t know…but he’s at his desk…some creative work. Maybe he’s a draftsman, maybe he’s a painter, maybe he’s a designer, I don’t know. From what the letter would imply, maybe he designs. But, his mind wandered and he wandered into this place, and while there all of a sudden he’s leaning against the wall and looks through the window. He sees the plant and he sees the man. Then two weeks later, this thing is happening. Now he said, “I know that you are teaching the truth, the law, and thank you for having taught me how to use it.” Well, I thank him as profusely, if not more so than he thanked me, for having shared with me that I can share with you these wonderful stories.

Now we go to another aspect of this “Free or Slave.” We’re all slaves. There is one born of woman, the woman called Hagar in the Bible. And every mother…my mother was called Wilhelmina, but she is Hagar. My wife is called…her name is Catherine Willa, she is Hagar; she bore a child. So every womb that brings into this world a child, that’s Hagar in the Bible. There is another one called Sarah, and she is from above, and she brings them into freedom; Hagar brings them into slavery. So all who came in through the womb of woman we are enslaved in this world, everyone. While we are in this world as slaves…and let me quote you this passage from scripture, in the Book of Genesis…“Abram fell into a deep sleep. While he slept, there was a great and grave darkness that descended upon him. The Lord said to him, ‘Your descendants shall be sojourners in a land that is not theirs, and they will be slaves there. They will be enslaved for four hundred years; and then after that, they shall come into a great inheritance’”…after the four hundred years (Gen.15:12).

In Hebrew…it’s the greatest tongue in the world, really…but it’s not a tongue to use among people; it’s a mystery tongue. No language expresses the mysteries like the Hebrew tongue, none. Every letter has not only a numerical value but a symbolical value. He tells Abram, who is disturbed because he doesn’t have an heir…he said, “A child born in my household who is born of a slave will be my heir.” And the Lord said, “No, your own son will be your heir” and he laughed because he was an hundred years old and Sarah was ninety, and it had ceased to be with her after the manner of women (Gen.17:16). So you take it as a normal story. It isn’t that story at all. When we come to the New Testament, I’ll show you the passage that interprets this wonderful story of the Old…but for four hundred years.

Now the same story is told in the next book, the Book of Exodus, and he makes it four hundred and thirty. Four hundred and thirty years the children of Israel…and on that very day the Lord watched and brought the entire host out of Egypt, on that very day…four hundred and thirty (Ex.12:40). In the Book of Genesis it’s four hundred. Now, four hundred has the symbolical value of the sign of the cross. It’s the last letter of the Hebrew alphabet, Toph. You can spell it T-a-u. My old teacher used to call it Toph, but it’s T-a-u on ___(??). It’s the 22nd letter. He said he was a hundred years old…and it’s Qoph. Qoph has the symbol of the back of the Skull. That is the symbol of Qoph. The sign of the cross…we’re all on the cross; this is the cross, there is no other cross. No wooden cross, no little tree the world talks about. Forget all this silliness that people talk about Christ on that kind of a cross. The universal Christ is on this cross, your body. This is where Messiah, which is God himself, is crucified. I know! I know from experience; I am not speculating. So here, this is the cross, the four hundred years, and as long as I appear in the flesh I wear the cross. At the end of my journey, not four hundred years as you and I measure time, when this is no more; for the glory of my heavenly inheritance cannot become actual, or at least it’s not realized in us or in me until I take this thing off. Only when this is off can I really realize my heavenly inheritance, as promised in scripture, at the end of the four hundred years.

Well now, why the thirty? Thirty is the price paid for a slave. The unfree person’s price was thirty shekels of silver. They paid thirty shekels of silver for him. To whom did they pay it? They paid thirty shekels of silver. We’re told in Exodus, if an ox gored an animal—which is the ox the symbol of Christ—should butt, gore or kill a slave, then the owner of the animal must pay to the owner of the slave thirty shekels of silver. That is the price of the unfree person. Everyone here is worth thirty pieces of silver. And when the message of Christ comes into the world and so goads you—for thirty is Lamed in Hebrew, and it’s an ox-goad, that’s the symbol of thirty. The twelfth letter is Lamed and its symbol is an ox-goad. So, when you are goaded to give up your traditional concepts and move from a God of tradition into the God of experience by the goading of truth as it hits you—for Christ is truth, he said, “I am the truth”—so when the truth comes and hits you and you are shaken loose from your traditional concepts to accept what he is sharing with you, well, then you have been gored, you have been butted by Christ…and thirty pieces are paid (Ex.21:32). Now, he doesn’t say to whom it is paid. He took the thirty pieces and no one would receive it…threw it into the temple, into the assemblage. But who took it? They fought yes…the place of blood, whose blood?—the blood of God. That’s the price paid for the individual who is so goaded that he is hurt. He has to relinquish his claim to all the past that he believed in and follow now the new concepts, the new interpretation of God’s words. So he brings it to man.

Now we are told, “This is an allegory” in Paul’s first letter. Now there’s no one in scripture that was more Hebraic than Paul. He tells you, “I am of the tribe of Benjamin. I am a son of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin. A Roman by citizenship, but I am the Hebrew of Hebrews.” He was the one person who persecuted everyone who taught as I speak this night. And then it came to him, and he had the experience, he had the revelation. And there is no one in scripture, and no one throughout the centuries, who has been a greater proselyter of this Way than Paul. He dwarfs everyone. You can’t put anyone in the same category with Paul. And so his first letter—which is now a confession, it’s really a biography—to the Galatians…and he’s now explaining this passage. He said, Abraham had two sons, one by a slave, born according to the flesh—that’s you and I—and one by a free woman, born according to the Promise. Now he said, “This is an allegory.” It’s stated quite clearly in the Bible, “It’s an allegory.” Well, what is an allegory? Look up the definition. It’s simply a story told figuratively or symbolically that needs interpretation, so that when it’s told the hearer or the reader of the story must discover the fictitious character of the story and learn its lesson.

Now he tells us, one is from below and one is from above. Well, I’ve experienced both. I don’t recall my birth from my physical mother’s womb. I know I called her mother. I’m convinced I did come from the womb of my mother that I loved dearly. I’m convinced that she raised me and nursed me at her own breast. In those days we didn’t have other things other than the breast of woman, so I nursed her. And she loved me dearly to the very moment she closed her eyes, and she still does. I meet her. So I came out of her womb. I was a slave; she bore me into slavery, that’s Hagar.

I didn’t know who the other one was until it happened to me, on the morning of July the 20th, l959, when I came out of the other womb, and she is from above, right out of my own skull. When I rose within myself, resurrected, and came out as though one who is being born, to find the entire, wonderful symbolism of scripture unfolding before me, and I am the chief actor in the drama. But all the things mentioned they are present—the three men, the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, everything is present…out of the woman from above. So we’re told, the one from above she bears us into freedom; the one from below bears us into slavery. As it was in the days of old so it is today: They are enemies. But what does the scripture say? Cast out the woman, the slave and her offspring; and he shall not inherit with the child that is born free (Gal.4:22-31)…entirely different world altogether.

Now he comes back, and he makes the statement, speaking now of the true Abraham—not a person as you are, as I am—but he said that Abraham has to bring forth Christ. And the promise was made unto Abraham and to his offspring. Not offsprings, referring to many, but to your offspring, referring to one: “To your offspring, which is Christ” (Gal.3:16). So in the same letter he said, “I labor with you until Christ be formed in you” (Gal.4:19). Christ be formed in you? Yes. Well, who is he? He is God the Father. He is forming himself in me as me, and when he forms himself in me as me, I bring him forth. Christ as myself, I am he. God laid himself down within me to sleep, and as he slept he dreamed a dream…he dreamed that he is I. And when he woke, he was I. How did I know that I am he? Only through the revelation of his Son, David, who in the Spirit called me, Father. When David in the Spirit called me, Father…and he said to David, “Thou art my Son; today I have begotten thee,” so when his only begotten Son called me, Father, I then knew who I was. There is no other way that I could ever know it. So I tell you in this way.

Now, the other wonderful letter came to me from this lady. She said, “It is my habit when I retire I always have a pad at my night table and a pencil. Well, this morning I got up and got Dusty off to school and then I went back to make the beds. As I went into the bedroom to make the beds, I looked and here there was writing on the pad. At the moment I did not recall having written anything on that pad. Then I read it, and these are the words, ___(??) quote, ‘A voice said, I moved into the womb of woman until it was time.’ End of quote. Now she said, “I don’t recall the words, but I do recall after having read it that I was disturbed in the night to write. But I did not recall the words until I read them, and I still don’t recall having written those words, but it’s my hand, and I wrote them during the night. ‘I moved into the womb of woman until it was time.’” She moved into the woman from above until it was time. May it not be too long before she is brought forth. She’s been having some marvelous experiences, and may be as far as I’m concerned. But I have no knowledge when. I wish it could be tonight, but I do not know. He said, “No one knows. No, not even the Son, only the Father.” What Father?—the Father in her. The fathers sleep in us; the Elohim sleeps in all of us. And then the Elohim who sleeps in us is forming himself and bringing himself out. That is called bringing Christ into being.

So, the free or the slave? If you know God’s law, as this gentleman does, you can be as free as the wind. Just imagine the gentleman sitting at his desk, contemplating doubling his income, and out of the nowhere a man he’s seen weekly for three years is the instrument through which the doubling comes. Well, in spite of that, he wants something more. He doesn’t want to work; just wants to live, without working. And so he goes and keeps a date made months before, and the man said, “I’ve just received an inheritance from an unknown relative and you must share it with me.” In spite of his protests, he urges upon him, and he accepts it, a check for the amount, the exact amount that he over a period of two weeks had taken from his letterbox…as he opened up this unidentified letter, and saw a check in that amount and saw the balance. If that was added to what he had, that would be the balance.

And now, why work? And so he takes off and doesn’t work. Enjoys the beach and spends the entire summer on the beach, doing nothing, when a call comes from one he had never seen, urging upon him to, “Please come and see me…you must work for me.” And he said, “I’m enjoying life. I love what I’m doing. I don’t want to work.” Well, he kept on urging and urging, and said, “Please bring some of your work.” So, he thought that I’ll go. So he takes down some of his work. Now the man becomes more enthusiastic than ever, and insists on taking him right away to show not only his work but to show him. He’s a handsome fellow, thirty-eight years old, and here he is taken into this place…who is the chief client of this man. The man likes him and he instantly begins to work for him. And day after day he is in communication with this man in that office that he saw when he simply idly moved into while sitting at his desk.

But what he brings out I think that is something that is fantastic. Aside from knowing this law, he said, not only the intentional imaginal act produces itself in an experience, the unintentional. Every imaginal act is producing itself into this world, whether or not you want to hear it or whether or not you believe it, makes no difference. It is still producing itself in the world, therefore, why not become intentional about it? Why not take the helm and steer the ship like this? We’re all at sea as it were; and we are either drifting or we can take hold of that helm and really go towards the port we want to be. It’s entirely up to us.

So I repeat that imagining creates reality. The greatest steps forward in this world were made by men and women who imagined as if it were. That’s what they did. They simply imagined things as if they were. And they rebuilt a world based upon the imaginal acts of these bold spirits that imagined as if it were. When man begins to imagine as if things were as he would like them to be, he breaks the bond. For he’s a bond, he’s a slave. Until he knows how to imagine and actually lives by it and applies it, he remains a slave in this world until that moment in time comes when that from above is born. Well then, whether he has it or doesn’t have it, he is set free. That’s the real freedom that comes to man.

But until that fantastic freedom comes to man, let him in the world of the slaves learn God’s law; for we are enslaved for four hundred years…as long as we wear the cross, the Toph. Until I take this cross off I cannot really grasp the fantastic inheritance that is mine. I’ve inherited that which is untarnished, unsoiled, that is forever, a fabulous inheritance that is God himself. But as long as I wear the cross I can’t. I have really no desire at the moment to drop it. If it came this night, it’s perfectly alright, I move right into my inheritance. But as Paul said, I should desire to be with Christ; that is better by far. But for your sakes the need is far greater that I stay on in the body (Phil.1:23). He had inherited the entire fabulous world, but for the sakes of those he will stay on in the body.

And no one really knows the nature of his end; it isn’t recorded in scripture. Tradition in the churches, they have all these messed up things. They have him martyred, they have him murdered, hasn’t a thing to do with it. The churches have made such a mess. Now they have Jesus down to five feet, three inches, a little fella…something they found a few hundred years ago, fifteen hundred years after a so-called event. I was on TV one night with a chap just like that, and he brought this strange little picture…and he’s an archeologist. Can you see the words of scripture, “It has pleased God to keep these things from the wise and the prudent and revealed them unto babes.” For such was his greatest riddle. All of these wise men with all the ___(??) in the world, and he has a vision, a voice of reason, speaks with authority in his church, and now he’s got him down to five feet three inches because that’s what the shroud, this stupid little thing. What shroud? Christ never walked the earth as the world teaches it. I’m speaking of a cosmic Christ…a wholly supernatural being that is buried in man…a universal God…not some little thing that came out. A universal Christ, the cosmic Christ, is buried in man, and it’s wholly supernatural and they’re trying to make it a thing of flesh. Paul warned the Galatians against it: “Are you so foolish? Having begun with the Spirit, are you ending with the flesh?” (Gal.3:1). But they read it and they don’t see; they have ears and they hear it not. You will never know that you are he until the Son appears and his Son calls you, Father. Then you will know you are he.

So here, this night free or slave? I tell you you can be anything you want to be, I don’t care what the world will tell you. Don’t ask if it’s possible. You may think it’s mad. And many think tonight, as he once did, and the little ladies on 49th Street did, “He’s mad as a hatter.” Well, they haven’t put me away so far. No, I’m not mad. I see worlds that no one sees. I see these characters and they are eternal. I commune with these states and I commune with the occupants of those states, like Blake. I commune with Blake. We’re separated by two hundred years, but we’re so closely woven in the tapestry of time, so closely woven. So that I meet these characters that seemingly are so far in the distant time but they’re not. Not to me they are not. Night after night, as I lie on my bed, suddenly I’m seeing what I shouldn’t see…not on my bed. All I have to do is actually intensify a rhythm that I am feeling within, intensify it. It’s so easy. Off you go, right into what you see, and then you explore. See worlds just like this, solidly real, and you’re teaching people.

I go and I teach and teach and teach. Wherever I go I’m always teaching, telling them the Word of God. And they wait for me. I have crowds waiting for me, and I come and I teach them. It’s not something that suddenly happens, I go and I teach them, then I return here. So not only teaching here, I am teaching all over. No matter where I go I’m doing the work of God. For when he embraced me and sent me, at that moment of the embrace when I saw the risen Christ and I became one with him; at that moment I was an apostle. So I could say with Paul to whoever would question me, “Am I not free? Am I not an apostle? Have I not seen Jesus our Lord?”—the one qualification for apostleship. Wasn’t an apostle one who was first called, embraced, incorporated into the body of the risen Christ and sent. Not only sent here. As you’re told in scripture there are others that I must talk to. And the others are not necessarily in New York City or in San Francisco, where I’ll be going this coming year, no, there are worlds within worlds within worlds, and they wait for me. And I go and I teach them.

Now that may seem as mad as a hatter, doesn’t make any difference to me. I’ll show you I am not mad. If this is madness, well, I’m not worried. But I tell you it pays off in enormous dividends, if you will know the Word of God and live by it, just live by it. It never fails you. When he faltered twice, the first time he faltered he caught himself and instantly he said, “I made that decision, so I’ll go right back to it.” And then it worked. The second time he faltered he thought he was mad, thought he was losing his mind, and thought that maybe Neville has lost his, too. And he seemingly forgot it, forgot the whole thing, but a few days later he kept the date made months before. When he made it, the man hadn’t come into the inheritance…only a few days before. So he goes and the man urges upon him, presses upon him, a check equal to the amount. He knew then he wasn’t mad…and I wasn’t…the one who taught him the law, I wasn’t either. So he came back, took off for the beach, why work? And while basking in the sun, enjoying every moment of time, the phone from one he had never seen just urging upon him to come and bring some of his work.

Now he knows the law. I hope he will never forget it. And you, who have not experienced it to that degree, I hope you’ll start applying it to that degree. No matter what doubts may come into your mind, throw them out, you’ve done it! Not only the intentional act works; all the unintentional imaginal acts are just as creative. So when the unexpected little annoyances happen, they couldn’t happen by themselves. They were brought into being by an imaginal act that is now forgotten. They can remain in being only as long as they are supported by that imaginal act, and when they cease to receive that support they vanish. That’s law.

Now let us go into the Silence.