Chapter 27 – 3. Beyond All Symbols
Power cannot oppose. For opposition would weaken it, and weakened
power is a contradiction in ideas. Weak strength is meaningless, and power
used to weaken is employed to limit. And therefore it must be limited and
weak, because that is its purpose. Power is unopposed, to be itself. No
weakness can intrude on it without changing it into something it is not. To
weaken is to limit, and impose an opposite that contradicts the concept that
it attacks. And by this does it join to the idea a something it is not, and make
it unintelligible. Who can understand a double concept, such as “weakened
power” or “hateful love”?
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You have decided that your brother is a symbol for a “hateful love,” a
“weakened power,” and above all, a “living death. “And so he has no
meaning to you, for he stands for what is meaningless. He represents a
double thought, where half is cancelled out by the remaining half. Yet even
this is quickly contradicted by the half it cancelled out, and so they both are
gone. And now he stands for nothing. Symbols which but represent ideas
that cannot be must stand for empty space and nothingness. Yet nothingness
and empty space can not be interference. What can interfere with the
awareness of reality is the belief that there is something there.
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The picture of your brother that you see means nothing. There is nothing to
attack or to deny; to love or hate, or to endow with power or to see as weak.
The picture has been wholly cancelled out, because it symbolized a
contradiction that cancelled out the thought it represents. And thus the
picture has no cause at all. Who can perceive effect without a cause? What
can the causeless be but nothingness? The picture of your brother that you
see is wholly absent and has never been. Let, then, the empty space it
occupies be recognized as vacant, and the time devoted to its seeing be
perceived as idly spent, a time unoccupied.
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An empty space that is not seen as filled, an unused interval of time not seen
as spent and fully occupied, become a silent invitation to the truth to enter,
and to make itself at home. No preparation can be made that would enhance
the invitation’s real appeal. For what you leave as vacant God will fill, and
where He is there must the truth abide. Unweakened power, with no
opposite, is what creation is. For this there are no symbols. Nothing points
beyond the truth, for what can stand for more than everything? Yet true
undoing must be kind. And so the first replacement for your picture is
another picture of another kind.
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As nothingness cannot be pictured, so there is no symbol for totality.
Reality is ultimately known without a form, unpictured and unseen.
Forgiveness is not yet a power known as wholly free of limits. Yet it sets no
limits you have chosen to impose. Forgiveness is the means by which the
truth is represented temporarily. It lets the Holy Spirit make exchange of
pictures possible, until the time when aids are meaningless and learning
done. No learning aid has use that can extend beyond the goal of learning.
When its aim has been accomplished it is functionless. Yet in the learning
interval it has a use that now you fear, but yet will love.
Â
The picture of your brother given you to occupy the space so lately left
unoccupied and vacant will not need defense of any kind. For you will give
it overwhelming preference. Nor delay an instant in deciding that it is the
only one you want. It does not stand for double concepts. Though it is but
half the picture and is incomplete, within itself it is the same. The other half
of what it represents remains unknown, but is not cancelled out. And thus is
God left free to take the final step Himself. For this you need no pictures
and no learning aids. And what will ultimately take the place of every
learning aid will merely be.
Â
Forgiveness vanishes and symbols fade, and nothing that the eyes have ever
seen or ears have heard remains to be perceived. A power wholly limitless
has come, not to destroy, but to receive its own. There is no choice of
function anywhere. The choice you fear to lose you never had. Yet only this
appears to interfere with power unlimited and single thoughts, complete and
happy, without opposite. You do not know the peace of power that opposes
nothing. Yet no other kind can be at all. Give welcome to the power beyond
forgiveness, and beyond the world of symbols and of limitations. He would
merely be, and so He merely is.
Power cannot oppose. For opposition would weaken it, and weakened
power is a contradiction in ideas. Weak strength is meaningless, and power
used to weaken is employed to limit. And therefore it must be limited and
weak, because that is its purpose. Power is unopposed, to be itself. No
weakness can intrude on it without changing it into something it is not. To
weaken is to limit, and impose an opposite that contradicts the concept that
it attacks. And by this does it join to the idea a something it is not, and make
it unintelligible. Who can understand a double concept, such as “weakened
power” or “hateful love”?
Â
You have decided that your brother is a symbol for a “hateful love,” a
“weakened power,” and above all, a “living death. “And so he has no
meaning to you, for he stands for what is meaningless. He represents a
double thought, where half is cancelled out by the remaining half. Yet even
this is quickly contradicted by the half it cancelled out, and so they both are
gone. And now he stands for nothing. Symbols which but represent ideas
that cannot be must stand for empty space and nothingness. Yet nothingness
and empty space can not be interference. What can interfere with the
awareness of reality is the belief that there is something there.
Â
The picture of your brother that you see means nothing. There is nothing to
attack or to deny; to love or hate, or to endow with power or to see as weak.
The picture has been wholly cancelled out, because it symbolized a
contradiction that cancelled out the thought it represents. And thus the
picture has no cause at all. Who can perceive effect without a cause? What
can the causeless be but nothingness? The picture of your brother that you
see is wholly absent and has never been. Let, then, the empty space it
occupies be recognized as vacant, and the time devoted to its seeing be
perceived as idly spent, a time unoccupied.
Â
An empty space that is not seen as filled, an unused interval of time not seen
as spent and fully occupied, become a silent invitation to the truth to enter,
and to make itself at home. No preparation can be made that would enhance
the invitation’s real appeal. For what you leave as vacant God will fill, and
where He is there must the truth abide. Unweakened power, with no
opposite, is what creation is. For this there are no symbols. Nothing points
beyond the truth, for what can stand for more than everything? Yet true
undoing must be kind. And so the first replacement for your picture is
another picture of another kind.
Â
As nothingness cannot be pictured, so there is no symbol for totality.
Reality is ultimately known without a form, unpictured and unseen.
Forgiveness is not yet a power known as wholly free of limits. Yet it sets no
limits you have chosen to impose. Forgiveness is the means by which the
truth is represented temporarily. It lets the Holy Spirit make exchange of
pictures possible, until the time when aids are meaningless and learning
done. No learning aid has use that can extend beyond the goal of learning.
When its aim has been accomplished it is functionless. Yet in the learning
interval it has a use that now you fear, but yet will love.
Â
The picture of your brother given you to occupy the space so lately left
unoccupied and vacant will not need defense of any kind. For you will give
it overwhelming preference. Nor delay an instant in deciding that it is the
only one you want. It does not stand for double concepts. Though it is but
half the picture and is incomplete, within itself it is the same. The other half
of what it represents remains unknown, but is not cancelled out. And thus is
God left free to take the final step Himself. For this you need no pictures
and no learning aids. And what will ultimately take the place of every
learning aid will merely be.
Â
Forgiveness vanishes and symbols fade, and nothing that the eyes have ever
seen or ears have heard remains to be perceived. A power wholly limitless
has come, not to destroy, but to receive its own. There is no choice of
function anywhere. The choice you fear to lose you never had. Yet only this
appears to interfere with power unlimited and single thoughts, complete and
happy, without opposite. You do not know the peace of power that opposes
nothing. Yet no other kind can be at all. Give welcome to the power beyond
forgiveness, and beyond the world of symbols and of limitations. He would
merely be, and so He merely is.