Explorations
Christian Science
Bible Lessons
October 30,1898
ADAM AND FALLEN MAN.
- Section 4 -
Question 14. - What is man? ADAM = That which is not the image and likeness of good, but a material belief, opposed to the one Mind, or Spirit. + (Mortals are not immortals) Mortals are not fallen children of God. They never had a perfect state of being, which may subsequently be regained. They were, from the beginning of mortal history, "conceived in sin and brought forth in iniquity." Mortality is finally swallowed up in immortality. Sin, sickness, and death must disappear to give place to the facts which belong to immortal man. 550:15 Chapter 15: Genesis
(Stages of existence) Error of thought is reflected in error of action. The continual contemplation of existence as material and corporeal - as beginning and ending, and with birth, decay, and dissolution as its component stages - hides the true and spiritual Life, and causes our standard to trail in the dust. If Life has any starting-point whatsoever, then the great I AM is a myth. If Life is God, as the Scriptures imply, then Life is not embryonic, it is infinite. An egg is an impossible enclosure for Deity. 522:12-18 Chapter 15: Genesis (The two records) This second record unmistakably gives the history of error in its externalized forms, called life and intelligence in matter. It records pantheism, opposed to the supremacy of divine Spirit; but this state of things is declared to be temporary and this man to be mortal, - dust returning to dust. (Erroneous representation) In this erroneous theory, matter takes the place of Spirit. 555:16-27 Chapter 15: Genesis (The origin of divinity) Searching for the origin of man, who is the reflection of God, is like inquiring into the origin of God, the self-existent and eternal. Only impotent error would seek to unite Spirit with matter, good with evil, immortality with mortality, and call this sham unity man, as if man were the offspring of both Mind and matter, of both Deity and humanity. Creation rests on a spiritual basis. We lose our standard of perfection and set aside the proper conception of Deity, when we admit that the perfect is the author of aught that can become imperfect, that God bestows the power to sin, or that Truth confers the ability to err. | ||||||||
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