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by Listen to Ben 's teaching from ACIM Gather on PalTalk, May 26, 2007
Click the audio icon to activate the control;
then click Play. Lecture notes follow for First hour and Second hour. White Hot Truth II Listen to Ben 's teaching from ACIM Gather on PalTalk, June 1, 2007
White Hot TruthThese are only lecture notes, not a transcriptIntroduction
The following is a true story, amazing as it will sound. There once was an aspiring pupil who wanted to study under the great yogi Babaji, teacher of Lahiri Mahasaya, teacher of Sri Yukteswar, teacher of Paramahansa Yogananda. Babaji at the time was teaching a small group of pupils high up in the Himalayas, and so this pupil took the long and hard journey to reach him and ask to become his pupil. When he finally arrived in Babaji’s presence and asked Babaji to accept him as a new pupil, Babaji said, “I will accept you if you will never fail to immediately do exactly what I tell you to do without any hesitation whatsoever. Otherwise I will not be able to accept you as a pupil. The pupil replied that he wanted more than anything to be his pupil and so he would certainly do whatever was asked of him. The place where they were was near the edge of a cliff that plunged straight down several hundred feet at the bottom of which were very large boulders. Babaji said to him, “Jump off the cliff.” And the pupil, without any hesitation, immediately did as he was asked and jumped off the cliff, falling several hundred feet to a mangled death. Babaji then instructed his other pupils to go down the mountain and collect the pupil’s broken body and bring it back up to where they were. Upon doing so, Babaji then brought him back to life and healed all his broken bones and injuries. The pupil was then accepted into Babaji’s group of pupils and after a few years of Babaji’s teaching became himself a great yogi.
To totally accept Truth to the extent that it then becomes impossible for you to any longer believe anything at all that is contrary to Truth, is, to the ego, every bit as terrifying as being told to jump off a cliff to certain death. This is because total acceptance of Truth would result in the certain annihilation of the ego – the vivid fact that Truth is the only possible existence would expose the utter nothingness of the ego.
The impossibility of the ego’s existence is made clear when the exclusive nature of Truth’s existence is totally understood and accepted. The ego’s fear of Truth is hence a fear of death. But the fear is deeply repressed and only comes into evidence by anesthetizing, distorting, and obscuring your innate and inherent God-given ability to understand what Truth actually is, making sure that any and all ways in which the true nature of Truth is revealed to you results only in diluted and ambiguous ideas about Truth that you find yourself unable to believe or understand even though you think that you really want to.
As a result, most of the illusion that prances contrary to Truth continues to remain in predominant evidence in your life, and the ego remains safe from annihilation. In the context of the analogy of Babaji’s new pupil, rather than jumping off the cliff, you convince yourself that you are sincerely following Babaji’s instructions by carefully climbing down the cliff so as to safely arrive at the bottom, believing that your action is a much wiser interpretation of Babaji’s instructions than leaping to your death.
You continue to study Truth, convinced of your sincerity because you have cleverly contrived to employ ego-friendly fragments of Truth to improve various aspects of life, thinking this constitutes spiritual progress, and unaware of the Divine Inheritance you’re abdicating.
So that is the way the ego will continue to try to prevent you from understanding and accepting the fullness of what Truth really is. But now that the ego’s scheme is out in the open, you can avoid being duped by it, and can engage your God-given ability to understand and accept Truth without allowing ego interference to derail it. The ego will still try to sabotage you by inventing new schemes intended to escape your notice, but if you remain alert and attentive you will be able to avoid these as well. Identified as awareness instead of as the ego, the ego’s fear vanishes, and it returns to the nothingness from whence it came.
It will be well worth it, because the reward is nothing less than Heaven Itself. Full acceptance of Truth results in total dissolution of all illusion, unveiling full awareness of the Heavenly Reality that the illusion had concealed. A Course In Miracles, together with Holy spirit Guidance, reveals the simplicity of Truth with sufficient depth and clarity to evoke, awaken and engage an understanding of Truth adequate enough to open your awareness to receive Truth’s Revelation of Itself. It is this that the “White Hot Truth” talk will unfold and elucidate.
Table of Contents
1. Renunciation of the ego
T-15.IV.6. The reason this course is simple is that Truth is simple. 2 Complexity is of the ego, and is nothing more than the ego's attempt to obscure the obvious.
T-22.II.6. This is a crucial period in this course, for here the separation of you and the ego must be made complete. 6 Now must you choose between yourself and an illusion of yourself. 7 Not both, but one. 8 There is no point in trying to avoid this one decision. 9 It must be made.
2. Orientation to Truth
T-23.II.2. The <first> chaotic law is that the Truth is different for everyone.
W-pI.rVI.in.3.8 no form of exercise is urged, except a deep relinquishment of everything that clutters up the mind, and makes it deaf to reason, sanity and simple Truth.
W-pII.14.3.7 We are concerned only with giving welcome to the Truth.
LESSON 106. Let me be still and listen to the Truth.
LESSON 251. I am in need of nothing but the Truth. W-pII.251.1. I sought for many things, and found despair. 2 Now do I seek but one, for in that one is all I need, and only what I need. 3 All that I sought before I needed not, and did not even want. 4 My only need I did not recognize. 5 But now I see that I need only Truth. 6 In that all needs are satisfied, all cravings end, all hopes are finally fulfilled and dreams are gone. 7 Now have I everything that I could need. 8 Now have I everything that I could want. 9 And now at last I find myself at peace.
M-12.3.7 Do not forget that Truth can come only where it is welcomed without fear.
W-pI.66.10. You will listen to madness or hear the Truth. 6 On one side stand all illusions. 7 All Truth stands on the other. 8 Let us try today to realize that only the Truth is true.
T-7.XI.5.7 Nothing is so easy to recognize as Truth. 8 This is the recognition that is immediate, clear and natural. 9 You have trained yourself not to recognize it, and this has been very difficult for you.
3. Scope and Embrace of Truth
Salvation, forgiveness, atonement, healing, holy spirit, love, true perception, spiritual vision, vision of Christ, miracles, right-mindedness = Truth
C-4.3.2 5 For true perception is a remedy with many names. 6 Forgiveness, salvation, Atonement, true perception, all are one. 7 They are the one beginning, with the end to lead to oneness far beyond themselves. 8 True perception is the means by which the world is saved from sin, for sin does not exist. 9 And it is this that true perception sees.
W-pI.152.3. Salvation is the recognition that the Truth is true, and nothing else is true.
W-pI.99.1. Salvation and forgiveness are the same.
T-3.V.9. Forgiveness is the healing of the perception of separation.
T-3.I.7. The Atonement itself radiates nothing but Truth.
T-5.II.4.2 The Holy spirit is the radiance that you must let banish the idea of darkness.
T-5.II.2. 5 The Holy spirit is God's Answer to the separation; the means by which the Atonement heals
T-5.III.2. The Holy Spirit is the idea of healing.
T-2.VI.7.8 Perfect love is the Atonement.
T-3.III.5. 3 When you love someone you have perceived him as he is, and this makes it possible for you to know him.
T-12.VIII.7. 11 For it is the function of Love to unite all things unto itself, and to hold all things together by extending its wholeness.
T-2.III.4. Spiritual vision literally cannot see error, and merely looks for Atonement.
T-13.VIII.2.7 …the vision of Christ beholds everything in light.
T-3.I.7. The Atonement itself radiates nothing but Truth. 8 The Atonement is therefore the perfect lesson. 11 You are released from all errors if you believe this.
T-3.II.3.4 The miracle perceives everything as it is. 5 If nothing but the Truth exists, right-minded seeing cannot see anything but perfection.
T-3.V.8.3 Truth can only be known. 4 All of it is equally true, and knowing any part of it is to know all of it.
4. The Primacy of Truth
Truth is God because God is Truth. Truth is Love because Love is Truth. Truth is Perfection because Perfection is Truth. Truth is Oneness because Oneness is Truth.
5. The Importance of Understanding Truth
Understand, accept, discover, recognize, trust, realize, look for, be aware of, want, express, manifest, teach, enjoy, be grateful for, learn, discern, contemplate, follow, embrace, commit to, stand on, perceive, know, see, choose, translate into, appreciate, welcome, invest in, embrace, follow, enjoin, think, feel, rest in, listen to, believe, hear, acknowledge, affirm, invite, surrender to, love, experience, practice TRUTH.
W-pI.161.4. One brother is all brothers. 2 Every mind contains all minds, for every mind is one. 3 Such is the Truth. 4 Yet do these thoughts make clear the meaning of creation? 5 Do these words bring perfect clarity with them to you? 6 What can they seem to be but empty sounds; pretty, perhaps, correct in sentiment, yet fundamentally not understood nor understandable. 7 The mind that taught itself to think specifically can no longer grasp abstraction in the sense that it is all-encompassing.
T-7.VII.10 9 There is only one way out of the world's thinking, just as there was only one way into it. 10 Understand totally by understanding totality.
T-14.VIII.4. There is no substitute for Truth. 2 And Truth will make this plain to you as you are brought into the place where you must meet with Truth. 3 And there you must be led, through gentle understanding which can lead you nowhere else. 4 Where God is, there are you. 5 Such is the Truth.
T-14.II.2. 7 Offer your faith to Me, and I will place it gently in the holy place where it belongs. 8 You will find no deception there, but only the simple Truth. 9 And you will love it because you will understand it. (The word understanding occurs 586 times in ACIM)
T-7.V.9. As you can hear two voices, so you can see in two ways. 2 One way shows you an image that you will never Love. 3 The other shows you only Truth, which you will Love because you will understand it.
T-14.VI.1. The journey that we undertake together is the exchange of dark for light, of ignorance for understanding. 2 Nothing you understand is fearful.
T-14.XI.14. 7 Make way for peace, and it will come. 8 For understanding is in you, and from it peace must come.
T-15.X.9. 6 Salvation is simple, being of God, and therefore very easy to understand.
T-9.V.6. 2 When God said, "Let there be light," there <was> light. 4 Healing is not mysterious. 5 Nothing will change unless it is understood, since light <is> understanding.
T-11.II.2. Healing thus becomes a lesson in understanding, and the more you practice it the better teacher and learner you become.
III. Reason and the Forms of Error T-22.III.1. The introduction of reason into the ego's thought system is the beginning of its undoing, for reason and the ego are contradictory. 2 Nor is it possible for them to coexist in your awareness. 3 For reason's goal is to make plain, and therefore obvious. 4 You can <see> reason. 5 This is not a play on words, for here is the beginning of a vision that has meaning. 6 Vision is sense, quite literally. 7 If it is not the body's sight, it <must> be understood. 8 For it is plain, and what is obvious is not ambiguous. 9 It can be understood. 10 And here do reason and the ego separate, to go their separate ways. T-22.III.2.3 For reason sees through errors, telling you what you thought was real is not. 8 Thus does the ego damn, and reason save.
T-21.VI.7.10 For reason, kind as is the purpose for which it is the means, leads steadily away from madness toward the goal of Truth.
T-21.VI.8. 6 Listen to Him Who speaks with reason, and brings your reason into line with His. 7 Be willing to let reason be the means by which He would direct you how to leave insanity behind.
6. Following the Holy Spirit’s Logic into Truth
T-14.in.1. 8 Let us now follow the simple logic by which the Holy spirit teaches the simple conclusions that speak for Truth, and only Truth.
T-14.II.2. The Holy spirit, begins His lesson in simplicity with the fundamental teaching that <Truth> is true. 2 This is the hardest lesson you will ever learn, and in the end the only one. 3 Simplicity is very difficult for twisted minds. 4 Consider all the distortions you have made of nothing; all the strange forms and feelings and actions and reactions that you have woven out of it. 5 Nothing is so alien to you as the simple Truth, and nothing are you less inclined to listen to. 6 The contrast between what is true and what is not is perfectly apparent, yet you do not see it. T-14.II.3. 2 To those unhappy learners who would teach themselves nothing, and delude themselves into believing that it is not nothing, the Holy spirit says, with steadfast quietness: 3 The Truth is true. 4 Nothing else matters, nothing else is real, and everything beside it is not there. 5 Let Me make the one distinction for you that you cannot make, but need to learn. 6 Your faith in nothing is deceiving you. 7 Offer your faith to Me, and I will place it gently in the holy place where it belongs. 8 You will find no deception there, but only the simple Truth. 9 And you will love it because you will understand it. (586)
7. The Joyous Lessons Founded on Truth
T-14.II.6.2 …begin to learn the joyous lessons that come quickly on the firm foundation that Truth is true. 3 For what is builded there <is> true, and built on Truth. 4 The universe of learning will open up before you in all its gracious simplicity.
T-14.II.8.4 Where everything is clear, it is all holy. 5 The quietness of its simplicity is so compelling that you will realize it is impossible to deny the simple Truth. 6 For there is nothing else. 7 God is everywhere, and His Son is in Him with everything. 8 Can he sing the dirge of sorrow when this is true?
8. Bringing Illusions to Truth
T-14.II.7. 2 Truth <is> true. 4 What else could ever be, or ever was? 5 This simple lesson holds the key to the dark door that you believe is locked forever. 6 You made this door of nothing, and behind it <is> nothing. 7 The key is only the light that shines away the shapes and forms and fears of nothing. 8 Accept this key to freedom from the hands of Christ Who gives it to you, that you may join Him in the holy task of bringing light. 9 For, like your brothers, you do not realize the light has come and freed you from the sleep of darkness.
W-pI.152.3. Salvation is the recognition that the Truth is true, and nothing else is true.
T-31.I.1. How simple is salvation! 2 All it says is what was never true is not true now, and never will be. 3 The impossible has not occurred, and can have no effects. 4 And that is all. 5 Can this be hard to learn by anyone who wants it to be true? 6 Only unwillingness to learn it could make such an easy lesson difficult. 7 How hard is it to see that what is false can not be true.
T-3.II.6. The way to correct distortions is to withdraw your faith in them and invest it only in what is true. 3 If you are willing to accept what is true in everything you perceive, you let it be true for you. 4 Truth overcomes all error. 5 If you perceive truly you are cancelling out misperceptions in yourself and in others simultaneously. 6 Because you see them as they are, you offer them your acceptance of their Truth so they can accept it for themselves. 7 This is the healing that the miracle induces.
T-3.IV.6. light abolishes darkness merely by showing you it is not there. 7 Truth will always overcome error in this way.
W-pI.122.13. see the changeless in the heart of change; the light of Truth behind appearances.
T-14.IX.2. Bringing the ego to God is but to bring error to Truth, where it stands corrected because it is the opposite of what it meets. 2 It is undone because the contradiction can no longer stand. 3 How long can contradiction stand when its impossible nature is clearly revealed? 4 What disappears in light is not attacked. 5 It merely vanishes because it is not true.
T-14.IX.3. Merely by being what it is, does Truth release you from everything that it is not. 2 The Atonement is so gentle you need but whisper to it, and all its power will rush to your assistance and support.
M-6.1. Healing is always certain. 2 It is impossible to let illusions be brought to Truth and keep the illusions.
T-2.VI.7. The first corrective step in undoing the error is to know first that the conflict is an expression of fear. 2 Say to yourself that you must somehow have chosen not to Love, or the fear could not have arisen. 3 Then the whole process of correction becomes nothing more than a series of pragmatic steps in the larger process of accepting the Atonement as the remedy. 4 These steps may be summarized in this way: 5 Know first that this is fear. 6 Fear arises from lack of Love. 7 The only remedy for lack of Love is perfect Love. 8 Perfect Love is the Atonement.
M-8.6. 9 The one answer to all illusions is Truth.
T-16.VII.10. Remember that you always choose between Truth and illusion;
W-pI.138.4. You need to be reminded that you think a thousand choices are confronting you, when there is really only one to make. 2 And even this but seems to be a choice. 3 Do not confuse yourself with all the doubts that myriad decisions would induce. 4 You make but one. 5 And when that one is made, you will perceive it was no choice at all. 6 For Truth is true, and nothing else is true. 7 There is no opposite to choose instead. 8 There is no contradiction to the Truth. T-1.VI.1:6 A sense of separation from God is the only lack you really need correct..
9. The Truth about one’s Self
T-12.VII.12. When you look within and see me, it will be because you have decided to manifest Truth. 2 And as you manifest it you will see it both without and within. 3 You will see it without <because> you saw it first within.
W-pII.224.1. My true Identity is so secure, so lofty, sinless, glorious and great, wholly beneficent and free from guilt, that Heaven looks to It to give it light. 2 It lights the world as well. 5 This is reality, and only this. 6 This is illusion's end. 7 It is the Truth.
W-pI.95.10. Let all these errors go by recognizing them for what they are. 2 They are attempts to keep you unaware you are one Self, united with your Creator, at one with every aspect of creation, and limitless in power and in peace. 3 This is the Truth, and nothing else is true. 4 Today we will affirm this Truth again, and try to reach the place in you in which there is no doubt that only this is true.
10. Letting Truth Correct All Errors in my Mind
LESSON 107. Truth will correct all errors in my mind. W-pI.107.1. What can correct illusions but the Truth? 2 And what are errors but illusions that remain unrecognized for what they are? 3 Where Truth has entered errors disappear. 4 They merely vanish, leaving not a trace by which to be remembered. 5 They are gone because, without belief, they have no life. 6 And so they disappear to nothingness, returning whence they came. W-pI.107.2. Can you imagine what a state of mind without illusions is? 2 How it would feel? 3 Try to remember when there was a time,--perhaps a minute, maybe even less--when nothing came to interrupt your peace; when you were certain you were loved and safe. 4 Then try to picture what it would be like to have that moment be extended to the end of time and to eternity. 5 Then let the sense of quiet that you felt be multiplied a hundred times, and then be multiplied another hundred more. W-pI.107.3. And now you have a hint, not more than just the faintest intimation of the state your mind will rest in when the Truth has come. 2 Without illusions there could be no fear, no doubt and no attack. 3 When Truth has come all pain is over, for there is no room for transitory thoughts and dead ideas to linger in your mind. 4 Truth occupies your mind completely, liberating you from all beliefs in the ephemeral. 5 They have no place because the Truth has come, and they are nowhere. 6 They can not be found, for Truth is everywhere forever, now. W-pI.107.4. When Truth has come it does not stay a while, to disappear or change to something else. 2 It does not shift and alter in its form, nor come and go and go and come again . 3 It stays exactly as it always was, to be depended on in every need, and trusted with a perfect trust in all the seeming difficulties and the doubts that the appearances the world presents engender. 4 They will merely blow away, when Truth corrects the errors in your mind. W-pI.107.5. 5 Today belongs to Truth. 6 Give Truth its due, and it will give you yours. 7 You were not meant to suffer and to die. 8 Your Father wills these dreams be gone. 9 Let Truth correct them all. W-pI.107.7. We do not ask for what we do not have. 2 We merely ask for what belongs to us, that we may recognize it as our own. 3 Today we practice on the happy note of certainty that has been born of Truth. 4 The shaky and unsteady footsteps of illusion are not our approach today. 5 We are as certain of success as we are sure we live and hope and breathe and think.
11. Resting in Truth
LESSON 109. I rest in God. W-pI.109.2. 3 "I rest in God." 4 This thought has power to wake the sleeping Truth in you, whose vision sees beyond appearances to that same Truth in everyone and everything there is. 5 Here is the end of suffering for all the world, and everyone who ever came and yet will come to linger for a while. 6 Here is the thought in which the Son of God is born again, to recognize himself. W-pI.109.3. "I rest in God." 2 Completely undismayed, this thought will carry you through storms and strife, past misery and pain, past loss and death, and onward to the certainty of God. 3 There is no suffering it cannot heal. 4 There is no problem that it cannot solve. 5 And no appearance but will turn to Truth before the eyes of you who rest in God. W-pI.109.4. This is the day of peace. 2 You rest in God, and while the world is torn by winds of hate your rest remains completely undisturbed. 3 Yours is the rest of Truth. 4 Appearances cannot intrude on you.
Truth is true, and nothing else is true, and the Truth is that God is all there is. I move beyond the words and thoughts now and in these next few moments of silence I allow myself to feel what it feels like for God to be all there is.
12. The Truth about the World
LESSON 132. I loose the world from all I thought it was. W-pI.132.1. What keeps the world in chains but your beliefs? 2 And what can save the world except your Self? 3 Belief is powerful indeed. 4 The thoughts you hold are mighty, and illusions are as strong in their effects as is the Truth.
C-3.8. How lovely does the world become in just that single instant when you see the Truth about yourself reflected there.
W-pII.3.5. Let us not rest content until the world has joined our changed perception. 2 Let us not be satisfied until forgiveness has been made complete. 3 And let us not attempt to change our function. 4 We must save the world. 5 For we who made it must behold it through the eyes of Christ, that what was made to die can be restored to everlasting life.
T-12.I.10. If you would look upon love, which <is> the world's reality, how could you do better than to recognize, in every defense against it, the underlying appeal <for> it? 2 And how could you better learn of its reality than by answering the appeal for it by giving it?
13. Experiencing Truth Beyond Words and Thoughts
T-23.in.6. Nothing around you but is part of you. 2 Look on it lovingly, and see the light of Heaven in it. 3 So will you come to understand all that is given you. 4 In kind forgiveness will the world sparkle and shine, and everything you once thought sinful now will be reinterpreted as part of Heaven. 5 How beautiful it is to walk, clean and redeemed and happy, through a world in bitter need of the redemption that your innocence bestows upon it! 6 What can you value more than this? 7 For here is your salvation and your freedom.
W-pII.in.1. Words will mean little now. 3 For now we seek direct experience of Truth alone.
I now know that Truth is Heaven. I now know that nothing but Truth exists. I now know that Truth is awareness, so direct experience of awareness is direct experience of Truth. I now move beyond all words and thoughts to experience Truth directly.
Let there by Truth and Truth alone. And there is Truth and Truth alone. Let there be Oneness and Oneness alone. And there is Oneness and Oneness alone.
14. Crown Mysteries
completeness, perfection, harmony, oneness, love, illumination, wisdom, ecstasy, freedom, peace, happiness, fulfillment, kindness, abundance, innocence, holiness, immortality
15. Translation of the World
I. Statement of Being (Absolute Truth):
Truth is that which is so. That which is not Truth, is not so. Therefore, Truth is all there is. The awareness that is right now seeing Truth to be All, must be itself the Truth that it’s seeing, because if it were something else other than Truth, it would have to be not Truth and hence wouldn’t exist. So, Awareness, or Mind, is the Truth that is all there is. Now, that which is all there is, is therefore entire. That which is entire is therefore total. That which is total is therefore complete. That which is complete is therefore whole. That which is whole is therefore one. That which is one is harmonious and Loving, for oneness is both the nature of harmony and the “action” of Love. That which is harmonious and Loving is perfect. That which is perfect is absolute. That which is absolute is infinite. And that which is infinite is everpresent and eternal. So, Truth is all, entire, total, complete, whole, one, harmonious, Loving, perfect, absolute, infinite, everpresent, eternal awareness or Mind being all there is. All of which is what God is, and why God is all there is besides which there can be absolutely nothing else.
II. Statement of Beliefs:
1. The world is physical and material.
2. The world is external to me
3. The world is filled with conflict and suffering.
III. Arguments:
1. Since Truth is all there is, and truth is awareness, all that the world can be is awareness.
2. Since Truth is all there is, all that the world can be and all that I can be is Truth. Therefore I and the world are the oneness of Truth.
3. Since Truth is all there is, all that the world can be is the joy and harmony of Truth.
IV. Summary:
The world is my awareness of the oneness, joy and harmony of Truth
V. Conclusion:
The world is oneness, joy and harmony
VI. Let the world be oneness, joy and harmony.
VII. And the world is oneness, joy and harmony
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