Being a Soul in the Elder Sonship - A dialog
Student A: If Creation is wired the way that error is an option, its not eternal Creation, and its not of God. There seems to be the oxymoron of a tiny 'mad idea creeping into eternity'. (How can perfect Creations conceive of something less and mis-create?)
Student A: If Creation is wired the way that error is an option, its not eternal Creation, and its not of God. There seems to be the oxymoron of a tiny 'mad idea creeping into eternity'. (How can perfect Creations conceive of something less and mis-create?)
“Into eternity, where all is one, there crept a tiny mad idea at which the Son of God remembered not to laugh. In his forgetting did the thought become a serious idea and possible of both accomplishment and real effects. Together, we can laugh them both away and understand that time cannot intrude upon eternity.” (OrEd.Tx.27.79)
Student B: You'll probably hate this answer, but I put it out for your consideration anyway. I think God had complete freedom to be stark, raving mad had He chosen to be. But why would He? Instead, I think He chose to be absolute love, the highest kind of communication raised to the highest degree, and eternally fixed as that and nothing else. By doing this, He made Himself totally and unshakably sane, and He made the Souls He created unshakably sane also. But He was left with no understanding of insanity--His mind simply cannot even consider insanity. Hence, He did not create the Holy Spirit to protect the Sonship from thinking of separation in the "is creating" part, the part which has the freedom to consider anything at all, except as a response to an actual block in communication. God, in other words, could not protect us from thinking of the opposite of good because He can't--He chose to make that impossible. Complete creative freedom meant that we could. The Holy Spirit was created in such a way that he can't either, but his primary function is not creation. Angels, where ever they came from, are protective rather than creative also.
The bottom line is that since God literally cannot conceive of evil, He could not protect us except as a response.
Student C: I don’t understand how Student A thinks that error is not an option for creation since we all obviously did make some temporary (not eternal error).
Student B: I don't think error is an option for creation, but I don't think what we are experiencing is creation. Error cannot be an option for creation because what is created is an idea in the mind of God. But the Course tells us we should not confuse "what has been created with what is being created." (OrEd.Tx.3.5) This is a distinction of key importance. The world we see and experience has not been created, it's being considered. It is being created, but someone got the bright idea of projecting some of ourself into what is being created. Since it's not an idea in the mind of God, that means we can experience what is outside of that mind, and be in some sense independent and self-creating. The trouble is, having done that we discover it is an idea with problems, and that was inevitable because the bright idea arose as a false solution to fear.
Student A: If error is an option of Creation/Co-Creation/Expansion we're left with an infinite potential for more error. I think that's the ego's dream, but not what ACIM teaches. What am I missing here?
Student B: Two things:
(1) Error is not and cannot be an option for creation. It can be considered and believed in, but not created.
(2) Error can be protected against only by something which is immune from error, but understands what it is. That something is the Holy Spirit, which only arose as a response to error since God cannot conceive of error and so did not protect the Elder Sonship, the first Souls directly created, from error. The rest of the Sonship always has the protection of the Holy Spirit, which is the eternal function of the Holy Spirit.
Student B: You'll probably hate this answer, but I put it out for your consideration anyway. I think God had complete freedom to be stark, raving mad had He chosen to be. But why would He? Instead, I think He chose to be absolute love, the highest kind of communication raised to the highest degree, and eternally fixed as that and nothing else. By doing this, He made Himself totally and unshakably sane, and He made the Souls He created unshakably sane also. But He was left with no understanding of insanity--His mind simply cannot even consider insanity. Hence, He did not create the Holy Spirit to protect the Sonship from thinking of separation in the "is creating" part, the part which has the freedom to consider anything at all, except as a response to an actual block in communication. God, in other words, could not protect us from thinking of the opposite of good because He can't--He chose to make that impossible. Complete creative freedom meant that we could. The Holy Spirit was created in such a way that he can't either, but his primary function is not creation. Angels, where ever they came from, are protective rather than creative also.
The bottom line is that since God literally cannot conceive of evil, He could not protect us except as a response.
Student C: I don’t understand how Student A thinks that error is not an option for creation since we all obviously did make some temporary (not eternal error).
Student B: I don't think error is an option for creation, but I don't think what we are experiencing is creation. Error cannot be an option for creation because what is created is an idea in the mind of God. But the Course tells us we should not confuse "what has been created with what is being created." (OrEd.Tx.3.5) This is a distinction of key importance. The world we see and experience has not been created, it's being considered. It is being created, but someone got the bright idea of projecting some of ourself into what is being created. Since it's not an idea in the mind of God, that means we can experience what is outside of that mind, and be in some sense independent and self-creating. The trouble is, having done that we discover it is an idea with problems, and that was inevitable because the bright idea arose as a false solution to fear.
Student A: If error is an option of Creation/Co-Creation/Expansion we're left with an infinite potential for more error. I think that's the ego's dream, but not what ACIM teaches. What am I missing here?
Student B: Two things:
(1) Error is not and cannot be an option for creation. It can be considered and believed in, but not created.
(2) Error can be protected against only by something which is immune from error, but understands what it is. That something is the Holy Spirit, which only arose as a response to error since God cannot conceive of error and so did not protect the Elder Sonship, the first Souls directly created, from error. The rest of the Sonship always has the protection of the Holy Spirit, which is the eternal function of the Holy Spirit.
[See: “When the Atonement is complete and the whole Sonship is healed, there will be no call to return, but what God creates is eternal. The Holy Spirit will remain with the Sons of God to bless their creations and keep them in the light of joy.” (OrEd.Tx.5.20) ]
Student A: You seem to be saying God gave His Creation more Freedom than Himself, the ability to mis-create?
Student B: No, I'm saying God defined Himself to be incapable of mis-creation. He could have chosen to be insane, but instead chose to be rock-solid sane, incapable of ever thinking an insane thought. But He had that potential before so defining Himself.
Student A: Very very interesting. So the "Elder Sonship" is kind of a beta version, and God had to take the bugs out of the software.
Student B: I don't know that I like the idea of being part of a beta release, but we are told both that the Holy Spirit was created as a response to the separation, and that he keeps our creations protected. Still, isn't being a Soul in the Elder Sonship kind of cool?
Student C: My understanding wasn't that we WANTED to be insane. It was the consequence, however, of our dissociation.
Student B: And our dissociation was a consequence of terror, induced by the shock of God vetoing a request. This raised the question of whether God was something other than love, giving rise to fear, love's opposite.
Urtext (numbered re-typing ur-typescript 2337-2338): "You who believe that God is fear made but ONE substitution. It has taken many forms, because it was the substitution of fragmentation for wholeness. It has become splintered and subdivided and divided again, over and over, that it is now almost impossible to perceive it once was one, and still IS what it was. That ONE error, which brought truth to illusion, infinity to time, and life to death, was all you ever made. Your whole world rests upon it. Everything you see reflects it. And every special relationship which you have ever made is PART of it. You have expressed surprise at hearing how VERY different is reality from what YOU see. You do not realize the magnitude of that ONE error. It was so vast and so COMPLETELY incredible, that from it, a world of total unreality HAD to emerge. What else COULD come of it? Its fragmented ASPECTS are fearful enough, as you begin to LOOK at them. But nothing you have seen BEGINS to show you the enormity of the ORIGINAL error, which seemed to cast you out of Heaven, to shatter knowledge into meaningless bits of disunited perceptions, and TO FORCE YOU TO FURTHER SUBSTITUTIONS.
Student A: You seem to be saying God gave His Creation more Freedom than Himself, the ability to mis-create?
Student B: No, I'm saying God defined Himself to be incapable of mis-creation. He could have chosen to be insane, but instead chose to be rock-solid sane, incapable of ever thinking an insane thought. But He had that potential before so defining Himself.
Student A: Very very interesting. So the "Elder Sonship" is kind of a beta version, and God had to take the bugs out of the software.
Student B: I don't know that I like the idea of being part of a beta release, but we are told both that the Holy Spirit was created as a response to the separation, and that he keeps our creations protected. Still, isn't being a Soul in the Elder Sonship kind of cool?
Student C: My understanding wasn't that we WANTED to be insane. It was the consequence, however, of our dissociation.
Student B: And our dissociation was a consequence of terror, induced by the shock of God vetoing a request. This raised the question of whether God was something other than love, giving rise to fear, love's opposite.
Urtext (numbered re-typing ur-typescript 2337-2338): "You who believe that God is fear made but ONE substitution. It has taken many forms, because it was the substitution of fragmentation for wholeness. It has become splintered and subdivided and divided again, over and over, that it is now almost impossible to perceive it once was one, and still IS what it was. That ONE error, which brought truth to illusion, infinity to time, and life to death, was all you ever made. Your whole world rests upon it. Everything you see reflects it. And every special relationship which you have ever made is PART of it. You have expressed surprise at hearing how VERY different is reality from what YOU see. You do not realize the magnitude of that ONE error. It was so vast and so COMPLETELY incredible, that from it, a world of total unreality HAD to emerge. What else COULD come of it? Its fragmented ASPECTS are fearful enough, as you begin to LOOK at them. But nothing you have seen BEGINS to show you the enormity of the ORIGINAL error, which seemed to cast you out of Heaven, to shatter knowledge into meaningless bits of disunited perceptions, and TO FORCE YOU TO FURTHER SUBSTITUTIONS.
Call it not sin, but madness, for such it was, and so it still remains. Invest it not with guilt, for guilt implies it was accomplished IN REALITY. And, above all, BE NOT AFRAID OF IT. When you seem to see some twisted form of the original error rise to frighten you, say only, 'God is NOT fear, but love,' and it will disappear."
Student D: The way your comment reads to me, is that you are a member of that Elder Sonship. Is that correct? If so, may I ask you, how do you know?
Student B:
(1) Because the Holy Spirit arose as a response to the separation I am involved in.
(2) Because the Holy Spirit will protect my creations from falling into error, but did not so protect me.
~0o0~
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