ON LOVE; PART DCXXX
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GoodWill IS Love in Action
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FIRST IS THE GREAT COMMANDMENTS:
“The first of all the commandments is, Hear, O Israel; The Lord our God is one Lord: And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength: this is the first commandment. And the second is like, namely this, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. There is none other commandment greater than these” (Mark 12:29-31).ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ
WHAT THEN IS LOVE?
In a general sense love is benevolence, good will; that disposition of heart which inclines men to think favorably of their fellow men, and to do them good. In a theological sense, it includes supreme love to God, and universal good will to men.ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ
PLUS THE EVER IMPORTANT AND HIGH IDEAL TAUGHT TO US BY THE CHRIST:
“Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them” (Matthew 7:12)
We change our lead sayings today from the dual presentation of the Great Commandments as they appear in the Gospels of Matthew and Mark to the singular presentation above along with some explanatory ideas of just what IS this Love, as its meaning is too much tied to that carnal understanding of Love. This presentation has appeared many times in our blog, both as a part of various essays and as our Quote of the Day, and it sets for us the reality of Love as we present this in our writing and as the Master and His apostles intended this to be understood. As we approach The Festival of GoodWill, the Festival of the Christ, the third of the Three Spiritual Festivals which we discuss every year, it IS important that we understand the reality of Love and its relationship to GoodWill which IS the banner line at the top of every essay: GoodWill IS Love in Action.
In this short phrase IS the reality of Love as it should permeate our every action; this sense of GoodWill must be our attitude toward ALL men as this IS the reality of the Love that the Master teaches us. In the reality of the Master’s teaching that “Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself” there IS the essence of GoodWill and one need NOT KNOW his neighbor in order to have this attitude as this should be the attitude of every man toward ALL men. And the Master DOES NOT leave us wondering what this should mean as He offers us what has come to be KNOWN as the Golden Rule; here, in His words that say “all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them” IS both the reality of self-love and the understanding of who IS the neighbor. The neighbor IS plainly men and in this world we should see every man, woman and child in the Earth; there IS NO special criteria offered here by the Master who, in the final analysis, IS Love as it IS presented from God to the man in the world. And self-love can be see in these words as we reflect upon how we would like to be treated; as we KNOW how it IS that we would be treated….what should be done for us and to us as men in the world.
Can we see the depth of these simple words which have eluded men though misunderstanding and misinterpretation? NOT that these ARE NOT clear, but through the selfishness of men who choose to see themselves as above others, and this is a malady that afflicts every class or division of humanity. While men in the world see Love as that emotional attraction and attachment to others, to things and even to ideas, they also let these same emotions and thoughts build castles of protection for their own feelings and sense of being so that ALL others to whom there IS NO attraction or attachment stand outside. This IS human nature, and this IS the first reality of illusion and glamour as this afflicts mankind; this IS the vanity of which Paul tells us that besets ALL men.
Understanding this IS the reality of the aspirant and the disciple and accomplishing this IS the Way of the disciple as there IS naught in the Life of man who strives that IS NOT a part of this attitude of Love. Here again men ARE NOT left to wonder the reality and the effect of this attitude of Love as we read the amplifying and clarifying words of the apostles who tell us that: “For all the law is fulfilled in one word, even in this; Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself” (Galatians 5:14). Can we see here how that this says the same thing to us as the Master’s words that “There is none other commandment greater than these“. The Apostle Paul tells us in another place that “love is the fulfilling of the law” (Romans 13:10) and the reality here IS found that in this attitude of Love, this expression of GoodWill, that a man could NOT DO anything that IS contrary to the law.
And the Apostle James makes this even clearer as he expands upon the idea of “love thy neighbour as thyself“, not in his own words only but in expressing the intent of the Master’s words in a concise statement. James says that “If ye fulfil the royal law according to the scripture, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself, ye do well: But if ye have respect to persons, ye commit sin, and are convinced of the law as transgressors” (James 2:8-9). While men should be able to see this clearly in the Master’s words “love thy neighbour as thyself” in combination with the Golden Rule, we KNOW from history and even current events that he DOES NOT and, unfortunately, we KNOW that men have NOT seen the added light offered here by James either. In this idea of having NO “respect to persons” we can eliminate ALL things that separate man from man….ALL are seen in the same Light. ALL of these ideas on Love ARE the work of the aspirant and the disciple; that these should be his attitude and his expression and that this IS what must be shown to others in the teaching of every man who Truly strives toward the Kingdom of God. And we should remember here that the greatest teaching that we can offer to the world IS our own example of Love in action.
And these ideas from James’ Epistle bring us back to our discussion where we left off with the last saying from the fourth chapter. This IS one that sums up for us most ALL of his words and especially those words which it immediately follows regarding first the nature of a Life that IS focused upon the world, that this IS in opposition to the things of God, then that a man should NOT act in a sense of pride where he sees himself above others and in this view sees others below himself. We should note here that to see others as such and to harbor such thoughts IS the equivalent to speaking against another in the same way that thinking lustfully on a woman IS the equivalent to adultery in the Master’s view which IS of course the way of God and the fullness of the intent of the law. James speaks in this chapter about the ‘godliness’ of being humble and of the error of being proud as we define it here and how that this attitude of pride IS judgment to see another as inferior IS to judge him. None of these things are seen in doctrines that deal ALL too literally with James’ words and see them as a number of separate thoughts. James goes on to speak of the plans and the schemes of the man in the world and how that these ARE in the end futile. He offers us the view of being ready from the perspective of caring about one’s worldly existence over the things of God which can result in one’s failure to take advantage of the opportunity presented to Truly find the Kingdom and the fullness of discipleship; he tells us that a man DOES NOT KNOW the time of his own demise. Our current sayings that we discuss above are:
“Speak not evil one of another, brethren. He that speaketh evil of his brother, and judgeth his brother, speaketh evil of the law, and judgeth the law: but if thou judge the law, thou art not a doer of the law, but a judge. There is one lawgiver, who is able to save and to destroy: who art thou that judgest another? Go to now, ye that say, To day or to morrow we will go into such a city, and continue there a year, and buy and sell, and get gain: Whereas ye know not what shall be on the morrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapour, that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away. For that ye ought to say , If the Lord will, we shall live, and do this, or that. But now ye rejoice in your boastings: all such rejoicing is evil. Therefore to him that knoweth to do good, and doeth it not, to him it is sin” (James 4:11-17).
In the end here James returns to the idea of being humble and being proud by showing that pride, which shows clearly in boasting even if this IS ONLY in thought, IS evil or, as we frame this, against the ways of God. We should see this idea as well as the reality of the idea of being ready as the Master presents this in the Parable of the Rich Fool which we discussed two posts back. There the man IS concerned only with his self and the things of the self in the world and, at the same time, has this same boastful attitude in his own musings and in his plans and schemes. ALL of this from James should be seen in the Light of the previous words saying to the aspirant and the disciple to whom he writes to: “Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and he shall lift you up” (James 4:10). And it IS to the aspirant and the disciple, the True seeker and the man who Truly strives, that we find the end note here saying: “Therefore to him that knoweth to do good, and doeth it not, to him it is sin“. There IS a reality here that MUST NOT be missed.
It IS here that we should realize that the audience to which the apostle writes DOES KNOW the Truth of the Good, the Beautiful and the True, the Good things of God, as they are opposed to the things of the world. We should understand that not only DOES the man who strives KNOW this from his very striving, but that this IS also the message of this epistle as James tells him what IS Good; and this from the beginning ideas on temptation through the ideas just above on the planning and the scheming of the man in the world. And, this IS most clear in his words on Love and in the reality of his sayings that most clearly say “that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God” (James 4:4). As aspirants and as disciples we DO KNOW these things because we strive and we seek and while the reality of James’ words may dawn on us as we read them and about them, this dawning IS but our own Souls showing accord with his words. That we DO NOT think about these subjects in James’ terms DOES NOT mean that we DID NOT realize their Truths; it IS because a man DOES KNOW the reality of the Good, the Beautiful and the True, and realizes this over the selfish nature of the personality, that he comes to be one who Truly strives. For the aspirant and the disciple and the man who Truly strives there IS no other reality than that he KNOWS. And we should understand that James’ words here ARE NOT that a man DO bad, it is that he fails to DO Good. For him it IS this failure that IS sin; this failure IS the man’s continued focus upon the things of the world.
And for the man on the fringe this IS NOT any different as while he may NOT KNOW the specifics of what to DO as Good, he DOES KNOW the generalities of Love as the Master presents this and, as we say at the top of today’s essay, to express this Love sincerely IS to keep ALL of the words of the Lord. And the same IS True for the man who may “seem to be religious” but who uses doctrine as a wedge against the Truth; the man who understands the reality of Love but at the same time uses doctrines that dilute this reality to cover for his failure to express it, must also see himself in this reality of sin. One can pretend that he DOES NOT KNOW the Truth but to whom IS he pretending? In his own heart, his own consciousness, he DOES KNOW. Finally there are those who are so deluded by the ways of the world and the teachings that are contrary to the Truth, both religious and secular, that they DO NOT see the reality of the nature of doing Good; these are NOT free from this reality that the apostle writes for us….these ARE focused in the world and the self and are in sin as well as this sense of focus IS the very definition of this word.
In the end it IS ALL men whose focus is in the world an the things of the world that ARE expressing the nature of sin and this, again, is regardless that he commits NONE of those offenses that ARE considered by men as sin. The man who DOES commit such offenses may be in greater sin if we can say it this way but ALL who DO NOT live in accord with the Truth of Love, which includes ALL of Life, are those who DO sin. It IS unfortunate that the meaning of this word, as well as the common meaning of evil, has been hijacked by men who cover for their error by according these words only to those who offend; this has been True since the beginning and in this human tendency we should be able to see the vanity that Paul tells us of and the sense of pride that we have been reading about in James. Most importantly, the reality of these ideas of sin and evil can be found in the Master’s words as He uses them in describing the focus of a man in the world and this same sense of failure that we see here in James. We can assume that when Jesus tells one that He has healed to “sin no more” (John 5:14) that this man was in some way a sinner, a man who offended in the common idea of sin, but we have no True knowledge of this save for doctrine. Can we see the idea here that should this man who IS healed seek God and strive after the Kingdom, that in this he IS accommodating the Master’s injunction to him that he “sin no more“.
We will continue with our thoughts in the next post.
| Aspect |
Potency |
Aspect of Man |
In Relation to the Great Invocation |
In relation to the Christ |
|
GOD, The Father |
Will or Power |
Spirit or Life |
Center where the Will of God IS KNOWN |
Life |
|
Son, The Christ |
Love and Wisdom |
Soul or Christ Within |
Heart of God |
Truth |
|
Holy Spirit |
Light or Activity |
Life Within |
Mind of God |
Way |
Note on the Quote of the Day
This daily blog also has a Quote of the Day which may not be in any way related to the essay. Many of these will be from the Bible and some just prayers or meditations that may have an influence on you and are in line with the subject matter of this blog. As the quote will change daily and will not store with the post, it is repeated in this section with the book reference and comment.
As we approach the Wesak Festival at the Full Moon of May, it seems appropriate that we post the Great Invocation as our Quote of the Day. Wesak IS the Festival of the Buddha and it IS said that on this day the Buddha returns to us and stands with the Christ to help to focus the attention of men of GoodWill on the Truth of the Plan of God, the Plan that can come to fruition in the expression of the Light and Love and Power in the world of men.
From the point of Light within the Mind of God
Let light stream forth into the minds of men.
Let Light descend on Earth.
From the point of Love within the Heart of God
Let love stream forth into the hearts of men.
May Christ return to Earth.
From the centre where the Will of God is known
Let purpose guide the little wills of men–
The purpose which the Masters know and serve.
From the centre which we call the race of men
Let the Plan of Love and Light work out
And may it seal the door where evil dwells.
Let Light and Love and Power restore the Plan on Earth.
This prayer is a part of our Prayers and Meditations section and there is much information about it there and in our discussion of it in the Quote of the Day section of In the Words of Jesus parts 128-132
The above Invocation or Prayer does not belong to any person or group but to all Humanity. The beauty and the strength of this Invocation lies in its simplicity, and in its expression of certain central truths which all men, innately and normally, accept—the truth of the existence of a basic Intelligence to Whom we vaguely give the name of God; the truth that behind all outer seeming, the motivating power of the universe is Love; the truth that a great Individuality came to earth, called by Christians, the Christ, and embodied that love so that we could understand; the truth that both love and intelligence are effects of what is called the Will of God; and finally the self-evident truth that only through humanity itself can the Divine Plan work out.
Like the Lord’s Prayer, this invocation is a World Prayer which is as all that a prayer is intended to be. It is a prayer for the uplifting of the Human Family out of the mire of materialism and selfishness. The Lord’s Prayer asks nothing for the individual praying it but asks that its benefits be for US and for WE which is why it was given by the Christ as a prayer and as a model over 2000 years ago. This invocation is also attributed to the Christ who, as He promised, has never left us; He, through channels that we do not readily understand, has Himself instructed His disciples to distribute this prayer and to encourage its use as a world prayer and as an aid in preparing the world for His return.
The first three stanzas of this prayer should be understood as reflecting the effective potencies of the Trinity which is God and which, when brought down to an individual level, the Trinity which is Man. His Will, His Love and His Light we should seen as the Potent Powers of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.
