Reliving the Separation
I’ve been getting some pushback on some of the teachings from A Course in Miracles I present, as some run contrary to that which is presented by orthodox teachers of the Course. When the typical student hears something that runs contrary to a group mindset it is common to automatically reject it without trying to see the reason and thought behind it. I assure you that the ideas I present are not only logical, but supported by the Course itself, for sometimes one must carefully examine the wording to get the full truth.
The problem with the idea of ideas and thought being eternal is that this would include the mad idea of separation and students just want everything wrapped up neat and clean and not ever think of having the problem again. BUT if it is true that the mad idea repeats it will be important to know, for whatever is true is a piece of the whole picture that will be needed at some time or another.
That said let us look again at a key passage.
“Time really, then, goes backward to an instant so ancient that it is beyond all memory, and past even the possibility of remembering. Yet because it is an instant that is relived again and again and still again, it seems to be now.” M-2.4
The first sentence tells us that time goes back to an “instant” extremely ancient past all memory and “In that unholy instant time was born, and bodies made to house the mad idea and give it the illusion of reality. And so it seemed to have a home that held together for a little while in time, and vanished. For what could house this mad idea against reality but for an instant?” T-20.VI.8
The mad idea then was given a home with the illusion of reality for an “instant” and then vanished, but not completely “For we but see the journey from the point at which it ended, looking back on it, imagining we make it once again; reviewing mentally what has gone by.” W-pI.158.3
This aligns with the second sentence of our first quote: “Yet because it is an instant that is relived again and again and still again, it seems to be now.” M-2.3
This brings up a question rarely asked by students, but to me it is the elephant in the room.
If the separation ended long ago then why are we still experiencing it.?
If there is to be “no Call to return” T-5.I.5. then why have we returned and decided to relive the separation?
Why are we of our own free will reliving the separation “again and again and still again”?
Why are recalling the instant of the separation and reliving it when we are told that we will not even remember it in heaven after we return?
“You will not remember change and shift in Heaven. You have need of contrast only here.” T-13.XI.6 “Memory, like perception, is a skill made up by you to take the place of what God gave in your creation.” T-28.I.2 “Nothing that you remember now will you remember. “T-19.IV.D.6
Seemingly contrary to that the Course says “What happened long ago seems to be happening now.” M-2.3
The conundrum comes down to this. On one hand we are told the separation came and went long long ago. A total solution was created by God and we are safe at home with no call to return. It is as if nothing happened for the separation was not a part of the true reality in heaven.
On the other hand, it speaks of “that one instant still called back, as if it could be made again in time. You keep an ancient memory before your eyes.” T-26.V.5
If the dream of separation was a nightmare that any sane Son would not want to repeat then why are we now of our own free will in the dream repeating it?
Since we have free will we had to choose to dig up an old memory and relive it. That would really be madness for someone who suffered great pain in the separation.
The answer to all this is quite simple.
In an ancient interval there was one eternal instant in heaven where the thought of separation occurred. After God rejected the idea, then part of the Sonship went ahead with the it. Immediately God created a plan of Atonement to bring the Sons back. After a long cycle of time, but just an instant in heaven, the world disappeared, the prodigal son returned which was “So very long ago, for such a tiny interval of time, that not one note in Heaven’s song was missed.” T-26.V.5
But fast forward to another cycle where we are and “is that one instant still called back, as if it could be made again in time. You keep an ancient memory before your eyes.” T-26.V.5
So here is what I present. There is no contradiction here because indeed the instant wherein the idea of separation occurred passed long ago, but nothing is lost in heaven and every instant that ever occurred there can be accessed and experienced. Sons of God who never experienced the world of time and space recalled this instant and decided to experience it.
Who are these Sons who did not participate in the initial separation, but are reliving it now?
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