Transfer of Training

Beloved One,

The experience of joy comes to a willing mind that has given up all
attempts to make exceptions to the miracle. Only exceptions
block the awareness of ever Present miracle mindedness. Today look
at some ideas I shall offer to clarify transfer of training as
described in A Course In Miracles. This clarification will have
tremendous benefits for anyone desiring to experience the State of
Mind I call Enlightenment.

Many have heard of the teaching from the Bible in Corinthians: Love
does not possess. This world of time-space, made by the ego, is a
construct of possession. Everything and everyone that makes up
distorted perception is the result or outcome of the desire to
possess. To be free of limits of any kind, therefore, it is
imperative to expose and release the concept of possession from the
mind entirely. There is no such thing as partial forgiveness or
partial healing, and no such thing as partial possession. Either
the mind believes in possession and experiences the illusion of
imprisonment, or the mind has forgiven or released the concept of
possession and is naturally free and whole. There can be no
compromise or middle ground or balance with the release of
possession. If you believe you can actually possess anything you
have allowed your mind to be possessed by error or illusion.
Freedom is nothing more than the escape from concepts, and all ego
concepts rest on the assumption of possession. Once this error is
abandoned, all errors vanish immediately.

Think awhile on what seems to attract so much attention in the
world: the body. What plans do you make that does not involve the
comforts and conveniences and care of the body. You treat it like
it is your home, a valued treasure in a world of transient images.
Yet the body is nothing more than a temporary learning device that
you can use awhile to expand your perception beyond its current
limits. That is all. The mind can be mind free that no longer sees
itself as in a body, firmly tied to it and sheltered by its
presence. Without the concept of possession you would not believe
that you can even possess a body. Yet you believe far more than
the body as a possession, you have identified yourself with the body
and therefore see yourself as temporary and transitory. How can
there be consistency and stability at all if your identity is in
constant flux and change? And this self-concept "identity" seems to
change and be as instable as the things with which it has surrounded
itself. No stability is possible in an impossible situation, and
this world of time-space is just that ? an impossible situation.
Everyday the deceived and untrained mind concerns itself with
survival of the body, and the state of this mind seems often
stressful and at times angry, fearful, and guilty. Though these
conditions of mind are illusions, they seem very real to a mind that
believes in the error of possession. Possession is a synonym for
the ego, for the ego desires to get and has no awareness of True
Giving, Which is the natural attribute of Spirit. Only the mind can
be freed and it can only be freed through the peace of forgiveness
(the release of illusion). How simple is Salvation.

To experience freedom of mind trust in the Holy Spirit is a basic
requirement. Without this trust in the Holy Spirit the spiritual
journey will seem like an intellectual endeavor or an impossible
undertaking or a sorrowful, intense series of trials and
temptations. What is temptation but the wish to make illusions
real? And who will Awaken to God's eternal Love who still values
the illusions of the ego? As you answer the Call to Awaken and be
glad the Purpose of forgiveness becomes strengthened in awareness
and the need for the concerns and the dramas surrounding the body
will fade away. Thus it can accurately be said that without trust
in the Holy Spirit and devotion to this Purpose the Awakening will
seem to be delayed until there is a willingness to trust. As you
develop trust in the Holy Spirit it can accurately be said that all
perceived problems will disappear from awareness, and with
acceptance of the Atonement it is certain that "problems" will
never "return" again.

Since the topic is transfer of training our brief discussion will
eliminate aspects of this world that seem most problematic for they
are all the same. All of the aspects I will discuss are based on
the concept of possession, and therefore the Answer or Solution will
always be as simple as the release of this erroneous concept. Trust
in the Holy Spirit undoes the concept of possession, and as
possession dissolves away only the Light of Spirit remains in
awareness. The Light of the Spirit simply Is, so when the obstacles
have been removed the Light shines unobstructed in awareness. The
Light of Love is perfect Oneness, and there is nothing lacking or
incomplete in perfect Oneness. This is the Unity and Purity of
Heart that Christ radiates forever Being God's Love.

In the time-space cosmos this Love has been temporarily forgotten
and pushed out of awareness. The sleeping mind has therefore
experienced a kind of amnesia about the Kingdom of Heaven and seems
preoccupied with bodies, environment, food, clothing, shelter,
entertainment, competition, betterment, pleasure, attack, economic
advancement, education, and striving for progress or destruction in
a variety of ways and forms. These pursuits leave the mind mired in
an unnaturally stressful state that is highly busy and exceptionally
unproductive. Productivity and Creativity are synonymous, yet the
makings and the strivings of the ego have nothing to do with true
Creativity. The imaginations and goals of the ego are all of linear
time-space and serve only to perpetuate the illusion of linear time-
space.

The linear time-space cosmos of distortion is a game. The only way
the game becomes consistently happy is when you allow the Holy
Spirit to Interpret the game from the lofty Perspective of non-
judgment. Possession is a belief (the ego) which seemed to set the
game of time-space in motion. The game cannot be won or lost. The
game can only be forgiven or Observed in a beneficent way. The game
is in the mind, though the ego projects a world which seems to be
the game. It is not. The game cannot be forgiven or Observed
Correctly until you realize that the game is in the mind. Economics
are therefore in the mind. Sexuality is in the mind. War is in the
mind. Competition, attack, defense, education, entertainment,
pleasure, suffering, bodies, striving, etc. are all games that the
sleeping mind is toying with. The game of time-space is only a game
in the mind and has no reality whatsoever. It is a game of belief
and has no real Substance or Spirit. The only thing necessary to be
free of the linear time-space game is to stop playing the game and
trust in the Holy Spirit for absolutely everything. Absolutely
everything. If you open to experiencing the Holy Spirit as the
Provider you can open to experiencing our Self as Christ as God as
the Creator. The Way is very simple, and it is only the ego that
obscures the Way, the Truth, and the Life.

I dedicated my "life" to experiencing the peace that passeth the
understanding of the world. It has turned out wonderful. The whole
world is now a miracle to me, and it feels like a happy fairytale.
Drama has been replaced by Certainty, striving has been replaced by
rest, depression and boredom have been replaced by joy and freedom,
loneliness has been replaced by intimacy of shared Purpose, and I am
happily in Love with God and everything and everyOne. So peacefully
Present am I, there is no longer an expectation that people, places,
events, or things be any different than they Are. By Grace I live
in the Heart of God, serenely unaffected by the journey that never
was. "How" did this awareness seem to happen? I trust the Holy
Spirit absolutely. The Holy Spirit is the "How," the means and the
End together as One. There is nothing left to search for, nothing
left to attain. There is no problem to solve and nowhere to go.
There is nothing left to do. Enlightenment is a Present experience.
Here are some lyrics from a song that Madonna sings that I am
listening to right now:

?the spell has been broken, I Loved You so
Freedom comes when you learn to let go (of possession)
Creation comes when you learn to say no (to possession)

You were my Lesson I had to learn (forgiveness)
"i" was a fortress You had to burn (dissolve)
Pain is a warning that something's wrong
I pray to God that it won't be long
I want to go Higher
There's nothing left to try
There's no place left to hide
There's no greater power than the power of good-bye (to possession)
The spell has been broken, I Loved You so
You were my Lesson I had to learn (forgiveness)
"i" was a fortress
There's nothing left to lose
There's no more heart to bruise
There's no greater power than the power of good-bye (to possession)
There's nothing left to try
There's no place left to hide
There's no greater power than the power of good-bye (to possession)
Freedom comes when you learn to say no (to possession)
Creation comes when you learn to let go (of possession)
There's nothing left to try
There's no place left to hide
There's no greater power than the power of good-bye (to possession)
Freedom comes when you learn to say no (to possession)
Creation comes when you learn to let go (of possession)
Learn to say good-bye (to possession)
Yearn to say good-bye (to possession)
There's nothing left to try
There's no more places to hide
There's no greater power than the power of good-bye (to possession)
There's nothing left to lose
There's no more heart to bruise
There's no greater power than the power of good-bye (to possession)

Love Always,

David

Two Types of Ego Errors

There are two main categories of ego errors, and clarification about
these categories makes exposing and releasing them very
straightforward.
Our Purpose is to simplify forgiveness and
Awakening, and this is accomplished as disguises and distractions
are laid aside.
The first category of ego errors I shall call
metaphysical errors and the second category I will call transfer of
training errors.
Metaphysical errors always involve level confusion
or seeing causation in form.
Transfer of training errors always
include the attempt to make exceptions to the miracle.
By this I
mean that any exception to right-mindedness or clarity about
causation being solely of the mind is also an attempt to deny the
Guidance of the Holy Spirit.
The ego, which seems to exist and make
distorted perception, is undone by the miracle.
By making no
exceptions the Atonement, or complete forgiveness, dispels the ego
entirely.

The ego's complexity makes A Course In Miracles a difficult course
for most of its students and teachers, yet Wisdom reveals the
simplicity of ACIM.
If you understand that the ego is death and that a synonym for the ego is reciprocity, then you will grasp that reciprocity is death.
By reciprocity I mean giving in order to get something in return.
True Giving, as God Gives, asks for nothing.
For Wholeness has no needs or desires and therefore simply radiates
and extends.
Human beings cannot understand Wholeness, for the
persona is the mask drawn over the Wholeness of Being.
The personality self thinks it has an autonomous existence and searches
and strives to become a better self with better conditions and
circumstances, not seeing the mask of the cosmos as a mask. Persons
never reach Divine Silence, for the construct can never know what it
was made to hide.
Yet Silence is the natural State of Divine Mind
and can only be accepted exactly as It Is.

There have been many books written about A Course In Miracles that
reflect the personal interpretations of their 'authors.'
Everything you read, hear, or watch presents an opportunity for discernment,
and you will know the Holy Spirit's Peaceful Interpretation by the
experience of peace.
Until the peace of mind is a consistent experience be assured that one of the two ego categories of errors mentioned above is still being valued and chosen.
And this means that something of the world still holds value and attraction to
the sleeping mind.
A Course In Miracles calls this the attraction of guilt, pain, and death.
No one in their right mind chooses guilt, pain, and death, for these are always wrong minded
decisions.
What we shall do together in Purpose is expose these faulty decisions and show that they offer nothing that you want.
A decision is a conclusion based on everything that you believe.
Believe in linear time and all your decisions will be faulty
ones.
Release the belief in linear time and Awakening from the dream is assured and certain.

First there must be a metaphysical context for what I am speaking
about.
Meta means beyond, and our context for understanding and meaning will always be beyond the physical.
Time is a linear construct that has no reality whatsoever, yet before it will
disappear from awareness it must be turned around and viewed from a
healed Perspective.
Let me use an analogy from geometry as an example.
If you look upon a line from anywhere outside the line you
see a line.
Observed from within the line there is no line, there is only a point.
Similarly, observed from ego time appears to be a very long line.
Yet Observed from the Holy Spirit time is only a point and that point was over long ago.
To the Holy Spirit the past is over.
To the ego the past continues on and on and stretches into
billions of years as it judges time.
To the Holy Spirit the cosmos was a singular point of terror, a tiny tick, a mad idea that was
Corrected immediately and therefore is gone.
To the Holy Spirit Present Love remains All that is real and true.

The definition of being asleep and dreaming a distorted cosmos of
time/space is the belief that time is not over and gone.
This is the belief that the separation from God is current and also in some
very strange way valuable.
For if the past was not valued it would no longer be remembered and called forth in awareness. The illusion of linear time is the calling forth of an ancient instant that has
no reality or existence.
There is an analogy that may serve as a helpful example.
When you look at stars at night you are perceiving burning gases that have long since burned out, and yet looking at a perception that still seems to be present.
The same can be said with everything specific you perceive in the cosmos.
Workbook lesson number 7 states: "I see only the past."
This lesson is followed with "My mind is preoccupied with past thoughts."
And this lesson is followed with "I see nothing as it is now."
In fact the first 15 lessons of A Course In Miracles Workbook are an introduction to
the new Perspective of time I am sharing with you now.
These lessons can only have meaning if you are willing to release the ego's linear perspective of time and the things of time:

In the Light of what I have just shared with you, let us review Workbook lessons 51-53, which are review lessons of the first 15 lessons in the ACIM Workbook:

LESSON 51.

The review for today covers the following ideas:

W-pI.51.1. (1) Nothing I see means anything.

2 The reason this is so is that I see nothing, and nothing has no meaning.
3 It is necessary that I recognize this, that I may learn
to see.
4 What I think I see now is taking the place of vision.
5 I must let it go by realizing it has no meaning, so that vision may take its place.

W-pI.51.2. (2) I have given what I see all the meaning it has for me.
2 I have judged everything I look upon, and it is this and only this I see.
3 This is not vision.
4 It is merely an illusion of reality, because my judgments have been made quite apart from reality.
5 I am willing to recognize the lack of validity in my judgments, because I
want to see.
6 My judgments have hurt me, and I do not want to see according to them.

W-pI.51.3. (3) I do not understand anything I see.
2 How could I understand what I see when I have judged it amiss?
3 What I see is the projection of my own errors of thought.
4 I do not understand what I see because it is not understandable.
5 There is no sense in trying to understand it.
6 But there is every reason to let it go, and make room for what can be seen and understood and loved.
7 I can exchange what I see now for this merely by being willing to do so.
8 Is not this a better choice than the one I made before?

W-pI.51.4. (4) These thoughts do not mean anything.
2 The thoughts of which I am aware do not mean anything because I am
trying to think without God.
3 What I call "my" thoughts are not my
real thoughts.
4 My real thoughts are the thoughts I think with God.
5 I am not aware of them because I have made my thoughts to take
their place.
6 I am willing to recognize that my thoughts do not
mean anything, and to let them go.
7 I choose to have them be
replaced by what they were intended to replace.
8 My thoughts are meaningless, but all creation lies in the thoughts I think with God.

W-pI.51.5. (5) I am never upset for the reason I think.
2 I am never upset for the reason I think because I am constantly
trying to justify my thoughts.
3 I am constantly trying to make them
true.
4 I make all things my enemies, so that my anger is justified
and my attacks are warranted.
5 I have not realized how much I have
misused everything I see by assigning this role to it.
6 I have done this to defend a thought system that has hurt me, and that I no
longer want.
7 I am willing to let it go.

LESSON 52.

Today's review covers these ideas:

W-pI.52.1. (6) I am upset because I see what is not there.
2 Reality is never frightening. 3 It is impossible that it could
upset me. 4 Reality brings only perfect peace. 5 When I am upset, it
is always because I have replaced reality with illusions I made up.
6 The illusions are upsetting because I have given them reality, and
thus regard reality as an illusion. 7 Nothing in God's creation is
affected in any way by this confusion of mine. 8 I am always upset
by nothing.

W-pI.52.2. (7) I see only the past.

2 As I look about, I condemn the world I look upon. 3 I call this
seeing. 4 I hold the past against everyone and everything, making
them my enemies. 5 When I have forgiven myself and remembered Who I
am, I will bless everyone and everything I see. 6 There will be no
past, and therefore no enemies. 7 And I will look with love on all
that I failed to see before.

W-pI.52.3. (8) My mind is preoccupied with past thoughts.

2 I see only my own thoughts, and my mind is preoccupied with the
past. 3 What, then, can I see as it is? 4 Let me remember that I
look on the past to prevent the present from dawning on my mind. 5
Let me understand that I am trying to use time against God. 6 Let me
learn to give the past away, realizing that in so doing I am giving
up nothing.

W-pI.52.4. (9) I see nothing as it is now.

2 If I see nothing as it is now, it can truly be said that I see
nothing. 3 I can see only what is now. 4 The choice is not whether
to see the past or the present; the choice is merely whether to see
or not. 5 What I have chosen to see has cost me vision. 6 Now I
would choose again, that I may see.

W-pI.52.5. (10) My thoughts do not mean anything.

2 I have no private thoughts. 3 Yet it is only private thoughts of
which I am aware. 4 What can these thoughts mean? 5 They do not
exist, and so they mean nothing. 6 Yet my mind is part of creation
and part of its Creator. 7 Would I not rather join the thinking of
the universe than to obscure all that is really mine with my pitiful
and meaningless "private" thoughts?

LESSON 53.

Today we will review the following:

W-pI.53.1. (11) My meaningless thoughts are showing me a meaningless
world.
2 Since the thoughts of which I am aware do not mean anything, the
world that pictures them can have no meaning.
3 What is producing
this world is insane, and so is what it produces.
4 Reality is not insane, and I have real thoughts as well as insane ones.
5 I can therefore see a real world, if I look to my real thoughts as my
guide for seeing.

W-pI.53.2. (12) I am upset because I see a meaningless world.
2 Insane thoughts are upsetting.
3 They produce a world in which
there is no order anywhere.
4 Only chaos rules a world that represents chaotic thinking, and chaos has no laws.
5 I cannot live in peace in such a world.
6 I am grateful that this world is not real, and that I need not see it at all unless I choose to value it.
7 And I do not choose to value what is totally insane and has no meaning.

W-pI.53.3. (13) A meaningless world engenders fear.
2 The totally insane engenders fear because it is completely
undependable, and offers no grounds for trust.
3 Nothing in madness is dependable.
4 It holds out no safety and no hope.
5 But such a world is not real.
6 I have given it the illusion of reality, and have suffered from my belief in it.
7 Now I choose to withdraw this belief, and place my trust in reality.
8 In choosing this, I will escape all the effects of the world of fear, because I am
acknowledging that it does not exist.

W-pI.53.4. (14) God did not create a meaningless world.
2 How can a meaningless world exist if God did not create it?
3 He is the Source of all meaning, and everything that is real is in His
Mind.
4 It is in my mind too, because He created it with me.
5 Why should I continue to suffer from the effects of my own insane
thoughts, when the perfection of creation is my home?
6 Let me remember the power of my decision, and recognize where I really
abide.

W-pI.53.5. (15) My thoughts are images that I have made.
2 Whatever I see reflects my thoughts.
3 It is my thoughts that tell me where I am and what I am.
4 The fact that I see a world in which there is suffering and loss and death shows me that I am seeing only the representation of my insane thoughts, and am not allowing my
real thoughts to cast their beneficent light on what I see.
5 Yet God's way is sure.
6 The images I have made cannot prevail against Him because it is not my will that they do so.
7 My will is His, and I will place no other gods before Him.



What is being undone in the Great Awakening is the perception of
linear time and the identification with a linear identity that is of
the ego's making.
Guilt, although an illusion, seems real in awareness as long as you perceive yourself as part of linear time.
The Holy Spirit stirs the sleeping mind so that it may first Observe
the cosmos and experience identity from the Perspective of Wholeness
in the Present, and then gently Awaken unto Eternity.
A happy dream of forgiveness precedes the gentle Awakening unto Pure Oneness.

The Holy Spirit returns to awareness the power of the mind and the
all-inclusiveness of the mind.
The awareness of power and inclusiveness go together, since only the ego's insane attempt to
judge and compare and project blocks this vastness and inclusiveness
from awareness.
To reject is to judge against, and this produces the optical delusion of consciousness I call distorted perception.
Inclusiveness is the forgiven world, and everything of the cosmos is perceived from the Present Healed Perspective of the Holy Spirit.

I have offered many words and writings in the seeming trail of the Awakening mind, and they are all made available freely for the benefit of everyOne.
Enlightenment is all-inclusive, and therefore everyone is with Me now!
I give thanks to the Holy Spirit for lighting the way and for the constant reminders of Love & Peace.
The Holy Spirit uses gatherings and posts as opportunities to shine the Light of Awakening and to expose and release the errors of the ego that seemed to be hidden from awareness. I invite all 'seekers' and 'students' and 'teachers' to join Me in our shared Purpose of
complete forgiveness.
Forgive the past and let it go, for it is gone.
Only a Blessing remains, and the Big Picture is readily available to behold right now.

Blessings of Peace.

May you have a Merry Christmas this Holy Instant & Forever.

Love,

David

David's Hoffmeister's New Book

CLick on http://christ-jes.us/.

Ten Step Guide to Enlightenment

Beloved One,
The Holy Spirit offers this 10 step Guide to Enlightenment that can be used as a Guideline for spiritual practice.
Awakening Mind is a symbol that expresses Divine Principle in action:
1. Volunteers- Awakening Mind does not involve the concept of membership and therefore relies entirely upon volunteers for every aspect of the ministry. Volunteers receive no financial compensation and no perks or tangible rewards for their devotion to Awakening. The benefits given & received are entirely Spiritual & always purely and simply a State of Mind.
2. Non-profit- Awakening Mind is completely non-profit. The Purpose for the ministry is experiencing Present Inner Peace through forgiveness and thus there is no incentive to grow larger or attain money or power or possessions or property. Present peace is content with the Present Moment and therefore unconcerned with the past or future.
3. Intuitive- Awakening Mind encourages everyone to develop intuitive listening to their Inner Guide and to trust and depend upon this Guidance for decisions in everyday living. How one feels is a barometer for discerning that which is intuitively helpful, and peace is its own reward.
4. Divine Providence- Awakening Mind nurtures the awareness and experience that trust would settle every problem now. Trust in the Holy Spirit & Christ is the means Given by God to Answer every seeming problem that arises in perception. Participants in the ministry are always referred and directed to the Voice for God within and toward the recognition that God is the Creator & Source & Provider.
5. Non-judgment- All comparisons & opinions & assumptions naturally give way to Intuitive Guidance as a practical Alternative to conflict. Guidance is always respected and following Inner Guidance is always encouraged. The outcome of listening to and following the Holy Spirit & Christ is always peace, love, happiness, freedom, & joy. There need not be any exceptions to trusting Inner Guidance and living a life of integrity and honesty and harmony.
6. Generosity- To give is to receive. Awakening Mind honors the Divine Law of Love. Freely you have received, now freely give. Giving is an attitude that extends Love and continuously receives and experiences Love extending. Love knows no lack or scarcity or deprivation. Love is an Abundant State of Mind that is whole and completely Shared.
7. No private thoughts- Awakening Mind is the experience of Union, a Unified Mind in which there is no secret kept apart from Spirit. Everything is openly revealed in the Light of Truth. Love has nothing to hide and is forever openly revealed exactly As It Is. Only the Thoughts of God can be shared, and there is nothing else to share.
8. No people pleasing- Awakening Mind advocates always following Inner Guidance and accepting complete responsibility for one's state of mind. Conformity to `external authority' or unconscious beliefs is never authentic or helpful on the spiritual journey. The laws of the land need not be broken if one follows the Inner Guidance of the Holy Spirit, and impeccable integrity is the certain outcome of yielding to the Holy Spirit for all decisions. `Holy Spirit decide for God for me' is our constant prayer of gratitude, and it is very practical. This yielding to the Spirit offers immediate results.
9. No control over the world- With total responsibility for one's state of mind also comes the realization that there is nothing to control in this world. The Observer is One with everything and now all things are perfect exactly As Is. Atonement is a state of perfect Acceptance. Such is the happy dream of forgiveness, the forgiven world.
10. Peaceful Experience- Awakening Mind is an experience that transcends all specific concepts.
Divine Silence simply Is.
Simply do this:
Be still, and lay aside all thoughts of what you are and what God is; all concepts you have learned about the world; all images you hold about yourself.
Empty your mind of everything it thinks is either true or false, or good or bad, of every thought it judges worthy, and all the ideas of which it is ashamed.
Hold onto nothing.
Do not bring with you one thought the past has taught, nor one belief you ever learned before from anything.
Forget this world, forget this course, and come with wholly empty hands unto your God.
Love Always,
David
Foundation for the Awakening Mind
335 Random Drive
New London, North Carolina 28127
http://awakening-mind.org
608-268-7746

Two Links

should maybe on the roll
http://acim-search.miraclevision.com/ searchable ACIM
http://www.unitedbeings.com/acim/

Ken Wapnick on the Urtext

The Urtext and the Early Chapters of the Text of A Course in Miracles
By Kenneth Wapnick
(Excerpts from the introduction to the 32-part cassette tape series entitled: "Classes on the Text of A Course in Miracles")
Let me say a few words about the relationship of the early chapters of the text to what Helen had originally taken down.
Briefly -- since most of you know the story -- Helen had written down the dictation from Jesus in notebooks.
She used shorthand -- her own particular version that combined various well-known methods with her own variations.
She then dictated what she had written down to Bill Thetford, who typed it out.
What Bill typed out is what we usually refer to as the urtext.
The word "ur" comes from the biblical story of Abraham, who was born in Ur of the Chaldees. Basically it is used to symbolize the beginning of something.
So when we speak of an urtext, we mean the first version of a manuscript.
Thus there are famous urtexts of Shakespeare's works and many other literary masters.
With regard to A Course in Miracles, we used that term to denote what Bill had typed, the original typed manuscript that was based on Helen's notebooks.
Helen then retyped the manuscript of the text twice.
And then there was the penultimate version, which was the version I saw when I met Helen and Bill.
That is the version Helen and I edited into the finished copy -- the published copy.
What Helen originally heard and wrote down in her notebooks, and was largely recorded in the urtext, contained a lot of personal material.
During the early weeks of the scribing, Helen was quite nervous about what was happening.
I think it was not so much about what she was taking down, although that certainly made her uncomfortable, but rather it was about the very process of all of this coming from Jesus.
And I also think that her discomfort was connected with her experience of her relationship with Jesus -- the closeness of it -- a relationship that was impossible for her to ignore at this point, since she was basically hearing his voice all the time now.
I would also say that her hearing during these early weeks was not very good.
An example that I have always used that I think still best expresses what happened is this: If you are away from your home for quite some time and then come back, when you turn on a water faucet, the water usually runs dirty -- especially if it is an older house.
There is rust and other kinds of minerals that do not belong there.
And as the water runs, it takes a while for all of these impurities to wash out and the water to run clean again.
In one sense, I think this is what happened with Helen.
She had not used her scribal ability for a long, long time.
In one of her visions that antedated the Course, she saw herself come upon a piece of machinery in a rowboat that was beached on shore.
She described the machinery as "an ancient sending and receiving set," which she later understood -- when the Course began -- to be a symbol of this ability to receive the messages from Jesus in her mind and then to send them, in terms of writing them down.
In fact, in a vision the stranger appears, and after a while Helen recognizes him as Jesus.
This "stranger" said to her, "Don't do anything with this yet. You're not ready."
So it was obvious that some preparation had to occur within Helen in order to allow her to hear as clearly and as purely as she later did.
But that was not the case at the beginning.
So she wrote down things that are frankly wrong.
A number of these things Jesus would later correct.
The style was very awkward and clumsy.
Again, as I just mentioned, interspersed with the actual teaching was a great deal of personal material that Jesus was giving to help Helen accept what was happening, to help her relationship with Bill.
There were messages for Bill, and messages that really were an attempt to help them not only with their relationship, but with other relationships in their lives.
There also was material that was an attempt to help them bridge the gap between the very conservative, psychoanalytic psychology that they both believed and the psychology of the Course.
Consequently, there was material on Freud and some on Jung, Rank, and other neo-Freudians. Then there was material on mental illness and mental retardation, which was Helen's field. Moreover, Bill was very much involved with Edgar Cayce, having begun to read him when Helen started to have all of her experiences in the spring of 1965.
Bill was very taken by Cayce and read a great deal of him. He then had Helen read Cayce, and actually took her, in spite of her objections and protests -- almost literally yelling and screaming -- to Virginia Beach to meet Hugh Lynn Cayce, who was Edgar Cayce's son.
So there is a lot of Cayce material in the early pages, as well as the Cayce style.
The Cayce material, for those of you who do not know it, contains some rather brilliant teachings, but written in a very archaic, awkward style.
It is not very pretty writing. Some of that awkwardness in phraseology and terms can be found in these early scribings of Helen.
When Helen dictated this to Bill, she basically dictated everything she had taken down with some very, very personal exceptions -- material that was personal.
Then she and Bill edited out what clearly did not belong.
And Jesus was very clear to them that anything of a specific or personal nature did not belong in these "notes," which was his term for what he was giving Helen.
So what we now have in the published version has all the personal material taken out. The material that was really meant only for Helen and Bill -- about Cayce and Freud, for example -- was taken out, because it did not belong there.
B ut, unfortunately, what is still there has some of the awkwardness of phrasing and style, as well the gaps that were left when the personal material was taken out.
The early scribing was not basically Jesus standing in Helen's ear with a microphone and dictating this.
It was much more of a dialog where Jesus would say something, Helen would ask a question, Jesus would answer it.
They would go off on a tangent.
Sometimes Jesus would reprimand her, gently and lovingly, for going on a tangent as a way of not dealing with this material.
Removing those passages, though, left a gap, so that we had to fill that gap with minor words. But it does not read well because of these factors.
The Introduction as we now have it was not part of the original dictation. The Course began with: "This is a course in miracles. Please take notes."
And then on to: "The first thing to remember about miracles is that there is no order of difficulty among them."
Within a few weeks Helen was complaining to Jesus about this impossible material he was dictating to her, saying to him, "I'm assuming this is an elective course," a clear reference to what happens in universities when there are certain classes that are required of all students. For example, every student has to take a foreign language, math, or science, or history -- whatever.
And then there are other courses that are elective -- that a student can elect to take. So she was being a little cute and said, "I assume this is an elective course."
And his response was just as cute: "No, it is not an elective course, it is a required course."
Then he went on with: "Only the time you take it is voluntary."
That is what those next sentences mean in the Introduction.
It was not meant to suggest that everybody in the entire world had to take A Course in Miracles.
What was meant was that for Helen and for Bill it was a required course, because this is what they asked for.
Remember they asked for another way of relating.
Well one could not ask for a better answer to that question -- to have been given a better way of relating to another person: without judgment, condemnation, criticism, attack, etc.
Again, the text as it is now, was not necessarily dictated word for word.
This pertains largely to the first four to five chapters. I might also mention that at the beginning there were not fifty miracle principles.
In fact there were not fifty right in a row, the way they appear now.
There would be a statement of a miracle principle, and then a discussion.
And, again, the discussion could sometimes go a little far afield.
Not far afield from what was helpful to Helen, but certainly far afield from the teaching.
Some of the material that is now in Chapter 1, in the sections after the first fifty principles, was originally part of the miracle principles themselves -- part of the discussion.
When we finally did the editing, when I saw it, I think there were fifty-three principles. They had gotten them down to fifty-three.
And then Bill had the idea that there should be fifty, because fifty is a nice, round number.
So that is why there are fifty principles.
The three that were taken out were not lost, they were just reabsorbed in the material. They were just restated.
I mention this again because so many people have a kind of sacrosanct view of the Course -- that every word is absolutely holy and sacred and cannot be touched.
That was not the way Helen felt about it. She was very clear about not changing any of the important words. But the "that's" and the "which's," -- the "dese, the dems, the doses," as we used to say in Brooklyn -- were obviously not important to the teaching, and so she did make those kinds of changes.
Most of these changes, again, only happened at the beginning. So what we had at that point we all felt was exactly the way Jesus wanted it -- that the material that did not belong was not left in.
The problem still was that the first four chapters frankly just did not read well. As the text moves on, the writing becomes more and more beautiful, and the last half of the text is filled with passage upon passage in wonderful blank verse.
This is not the case in the first four chapters, however.
And Helen was always very ashamed of them. In fact, when anyone in the early days would want to see the Course -- and she would show the Course to very, very, very few people (and she wouldn't show them the whole Course) -- she would just show the really beautiful, rhapsodic, ecstatic passages.
And she was always rather ashamed of this early part, so much so that when we were going through it and editing it, I said to her, "You know, it would save us both a lot of time if you asked Jesus to just re-dictate the first four chapters."
I did not really think she would do that, and she did not think she could stand it again. So the first four chapters are as they are.
Despite everything I've been saying, they still are remarkable in what they contain.
The ideas don't flow nicely one from the other, as one finds later, but the ideas and statements here are incredible in terms of containing the entirety of the thought system of the Course, even if it is not necessarily expressed nicely, and at times even obtusely.
So there is still a kind of a treasure field here for us to mine, but Helen would just like me to apologize to everyone if the writing is not up to what is found later.
THE EARLY MANUSCRIPT OF "A COURSE IN MIRACLES" GIVEN TO HUGH LYNN CAYCE By Kenneth Wapnick, Ph.D.
In light of the misinformation circulating about the early manuscript of A Course in Miracles -- referred to as the "Hugh Lynn Version" -- I believe clarification is required.
Let me begin by presenting the facts that relate to the history of that early manuscript.
I am here summarizing what I have already detailed in my book Absence from Felicity: The Story of Helen Schucman and Her Scribing of A Course in Miracles, and in more succinct fashion in the preface to the pamphlet Errata for the Second Edition of A Course in Miracles. Helen took down her internal dictation in stenographic notebooks, using her own version of shorthand, and dictated these notes to Bill.
Helen intentionally omitted some material while dictating to Bill, who typed Helen's dictation. We later termed this the "Urtext," a word usually used to denote the original manuscript of a later published literary work.
At that time, Helen and Bill were in occasional contact with Hugh Lynn Cayce, son of the renowned psychic Edgar Cayce, and President of the Association for Research and Enlightenment in Virginia Beach.
Helen valued his opinion and he was most interested in her work.
For that reason, Helen shared the material with him to secure his advice and comments.
In 1972, Helen and Bill gave to Hugh Lynn a copy of what was then the completed manuscript. This is what has been called the "Hugh Lynn Version."
It was made clear to Hugh Lynn that Helen and Bill were providing these pages for his personal review and comments, and that the manuscript was not to be shared with others except for his son, Charles Thomas.
Hugh Lynn died in 1983, but Charles Thomas Cayce, current President of the A.R.E., recalls conversations in which this point -- so central to Helen's feelings of privacy -- was understood by all parties involved.
After seeing some of the early and later chapters of the text, Hugh Lynn commented to Helen and Bill that he thought that perhaps more than one source was involved, presumably since the writing styles were so discrepant, especially when one compared the early scribing -- what now roughly constitutes the first four chapters of the text --with what came later.
Hugh Lynn's observation goes to the heart of the matter of the editing, and how and why it proceeded.
Again, Absence from Felicity [chapter 12] goes into this in more detail, so that interested readers may wish to consult it if they so choose.
There are two relevant issues here, and they bear on what Helen and Bill (and later I) came to refer to as Helen's "scribal uncertainty" or "pedagogical caution" in introducing a thought system that was so alien to the world's thinking:
1) The early months of the dictation -- again, we are speaking of what are now roughly the first four chapters of the text -- were experienced by Helen as a dialogue or conversation between her and her inner Voice, which she identified as Jesus, in which the actual Course material itself was only a portion of the dictation.
Personal material -- meant only for Helen and Bill -- was part of what she had written down, and it was her very specific guidance that this was not to be included in the published version. This personal material also included many references to psychologists and various psychological issues and subjects, which were also not meant for the public, but rather were to help Helen and Bill make the bridge between their psychological understanding and that of the Course.
2) In addition to the interspersal of the personal material and discussion of various psychological issues with the Course teaching, there is the issue of Helen's scribal uncertainty and pedagogical caution.
These interferences certainly affected her writing during this period.
I provided one such example in Absence from Felicity, where the story of the so-called "celestial speed-up" message is recounted.
This "explanation," which Helen never said came specifically from Jesus, but rather was "given" her, speaks of people losing more than they were gaining, necessitating a "celestial speed-up" in which certain people were being called back --including Helen and Bill -- to lend their talents on behalf of the "plan."
Helen later insisted upon removing this inconsistent material.
Therefore, what was taken out of the original material was meant to be taken out by Helen, as instructed by her Voice, since it detracted from the actual teaching message of A Course in Miracles, and could have seemed to contradict that message, thus confusing its students.
Helen and Bill had removed most of this material by the time I saw the early manuscript.
However, Helen felt that additional material needed to be removed for the published edition. Helen made these deletions and changes and did not truly consider them to be important, as they were never meant to be part of the published Course. [Emphasis added.]
Further, obvious editorial revisions were also necessary -- punctuation, paragraphing, capitalization, etc. -- all of which are documented in my book.
I might also add that the editing that Helen and I completed was Helen's work.
Any thought that it was I who did the editing could only be held by someone who clearly did not know Helen.
As I have said many, many times, Helen was extraordinarily protective of A Course in Miracles, and would not have allowed anything to be done with the material without her approval.
Indeed, during our long period of editing, I functioned more or less as Helen's secretary, implementing the changes that she wished.
Again, anyone who knew Helen (and Bill), would appreciate the fact that A Course in Miracles, as it is published, reflects the guidance that she followed and then implemented.
Therefore, readers of the published Course (especially now that the second edition includes the earlier inadvertent typing omissions) can rest assured that they have before them in the published edition the expression of what was given to Helen by her inner Voice, the true teachings of A Course in Miracles.
Therefore, even though Helen's guidance was to eliminate both the personal material and confusing language from the final edition, the published Course clearly is intended to be read and studied by all students of A Course in Miracles.
All of us at the Foundation for A Course in Miracles and Foundation for Inner Peace earnestly hope that Helen's fervent wish for privacy will be honored and respected by all Course students. This can only be accomplished if the early manuscript of A Course in Miracles remains unpublished.
In summary:
1) The early manuscript provided to Hugh Lynn Cayce was the incompletely edited combination of the notebooks, Urtext, Helen's first retyping, and the first complete draft (1972).
2) This manuscript was given to Hugh Lynn Cayce by Helen for comment only, with the understanding that it would not be shown to the general public.
3) After 1972, Helen, with my assistance as well as Bill's, personally revised the manuscript to ensure that the final (published) version of A Course in Miracles had eliminated:
a - personal guidance and information meant only for her and Bill
b - contradictory or confusing metaphysical and psychological concepts that she had introduced, especially in the first four chapters of the text
c - various other similar material, including awkward, confusing, or inconsistent language

sent by David Hoffmeister http://groups.yahoo.com/group/AwakeningInChrist/