Last week we discussed the ideas of the world and what happens when those ideas are tempted to be used as a philosophy or as a means of self-improvement. This week we will attempt to study the world and what happens when one uses the ideas of the Teaching. THE IDEAS OF THE WORLD as we saw, which you have been experimenting and checking to find out for yourself if this is what makes up the world, are four ideas:

1. The idea that there are IDEALS of what ought to be and what should be which are different from what is.

2. That there is the idea of SELF-IMPROVEMENT to bring about the ideal.

3. There is the belief in SIGNS, WONDERS and DEMONSTRATIONS. Signs that one has achieved some self-improvement, that one has come closer to realizing the ideal. It may just happen some week when one feels pretty good and, of course, that is accepted as positive thinking or whatever other means or that one has been tolerant of other people, so things were better.

4. Then the fourth one was BLAMING which is to find something to blame when the ideal isn’t realized and, of course, the signs and wonders are to take credit for it when something like the ideal happens in one’s existence.

Now the Teaching starts off with four ideas. These ideas are very precise.

1. The first one is SELF-KNOWING. We have been working at self-knowing since we started several weeks ago. Knowing the self, without condemning or justifying, without trying to improve it, just to be aware of the self. To be aware of the conditioning, to be aware of the automatic mechanical behavior of the self and of the split in the self, the contradiction in the self. A going one way to gain the ideal and B going another way to gain the ideal and the war experienced between these two, the constant conflict much of which is called “thinking.” Now it says SELF KNOWING, not self-knowledge. Self-knowing never ends. It is always observing everything and reporting accurately to X.

2. The next idea of the School is FAITH. Faith does not mean agreeing to some ideology or some belief and it does not mean strong belief. It means the ability to make up the mind. Sometime ago we saw that there is seeing what is and seeing the value of it. That is to make up the mind and then X always operates upon that. Whatever one sees as true or the fact and sees the value of whatever one saw as true or fact then there is an action that is known as Truth. Somewhere it says: “Where two or more are gathered together, there I am in the midst.” And, of course, these two are value and what-is are joined together in the form of a cross. Then whatever one sees as being true and sees the good in that, or the value in it, the worthwhileness of it, then there is action upon it and that is faith on one level. We will discuss another level of faith another time. But that is the first level of faith. One cannot force faith. It is something one experience’s and that experiencing depends upon having self-knowing from moment to moment.

3. The next idea of the Teaching is GRACE. Grace is somewhat defined as the recipient of undeserved good or gifts and, of course, all things that are seen as worthwhile are recognized as a gift of X; that X does all the work. That it is something one experiences. It’s not something one can do or say I’m experiencing or I am gaining grace unless one is giving undeserved good. But you’ll find that that is very difficult if not almost impossible. So the recipient is seeing that one has tremendous gifts. You know we’re all very, very rich if we stop to think of it.

Now we won’t experience it from this but let’s take a look. What would you take for the gift of sight? You can see things. You don’t know how it works. You have no idea how two little pieces of human flesh pick up and record impressions. Those little ones don’t see; they are only the cameras. Something sees within and throws a picture up for awareness to experience. What would you take for that? Would you take $100,000 and let somebody have both eyes or cut the nerves to the eyes? Would you take a million? Would you take 20 million? What would you take to have someone destroy your hearing, the ability to hear, that great gift of picking up sound waves and transmitting them into intelligent sounds, thoughts, conceptions, and viewpoints? What would you take for the ability to sense touch, what would you take for it? And above all, what would you take now and let someone take your life, destroy your existence and have the body for experimental purposes five years and three days from now? Would you take a million, 20 million dollars, would you take a billion? You have all you want for five years and four days and then it ends. Have we done anything to receive these great gifts or are they simply undeserved goods of various sorts that we have? That is something of the conception of grace. You will experience being the recipient of grace someday, but now we can only intelligently see what it might be.

4. The fourth idea of the School and of the Teaching is AGAPE, which means and translated into the English word, LOVE.

However, there are four ancient words translated into the one English word love.

1. One word is PIA, which means children. One has a feeling toward children, towards family. One has that love but so does a dog and so do many other mammal creatures. We don’t know about the others but we can observe that mammals have this love for their offspring. So they have pia along with the human being. It is something that just happens. It doesn’t come from effort or anything else. It is just that a child is born and you have an urge to protect it, defend it, and care for it.

2. The next sort of love word that has been translated into the English word love is EROS. It is the mating attraction and it, too, just happens. We also see it in other mammals and possibly all sorts of other creatures, sub-mammal. It just happens, it is the mating instinct, the mating desire. It is shared among many living creatures.

3. Then there is simply approval. It was from the word PHILO. It means, I approve of you or I approve of a piece of furniture. One says, “I just simply love that piece of furniture,” meaning, they very decidedly approve of it, or “I simply love that house,” they approve of it. Now, apparently all sorts of living creatures have things they approve of and things that do not appeal to their taste. So they have philo also and that is definitely with their associates.

4. Then there is that fourth word, the one that is used in all esoteric literature. It is called love in the English translation but it is referred to as AGAPE. It has also been translated into English as CHARITY and it has nothing to do with caring for the poor even though that may be one small aspect of it. Agape means, to see that what everyone is doing, including self, ever has done, or ever will do, that at the moment of doing, it seems either right or proper or justified. Now as long as one is conditioned much of the behavior is because one sees it as justified. “He did thus and so, therefore, I can do so and so.” To the enlightened person, the one who has practiced SELF KNOWING, who has experienced being, never justifies any behavior or any attitude. One simply sees what is at the moment seems right or proper because of the situation of what is and what is of value in it. Agape is understanding the other person; it is understanding the person that one has been, all the conditioned states. One has love, AGAPE. It has also been called, “one has charity.” I think it was the writer Paul, one great teacher, in addressing some communications to his students, said: Even though he did all the wonderful things in the world and had all manners of gifts, he had the gift of healing, he had the gift of prophecy, could foretell and speak out great truths, and that even though he practiced all manner of giving such as even giving his body to be used for research or for being burned up as a sacrifice, that if he had all these things and he could speak in the tongues of men and angels and he could speak every known language in the world, that if he had all of that and did not experience AGAPE, he was as tinkling brass, worthless little tinkling bell, some little ornament that hangs in the wind to chime just for amusement. Because without this AGAPE, without experiencing it and really having all the ways of living it, experiencing it and being it, one is as nothing.

SELF-KNOWING is the one thing a person can do. The other three ideas are something that one experiences as an outcome of self-knowing over a long period of time and over a period of valuing. However, they are the very fundamentals of the Teaching. SELF-KNOWING, FAITH, GRACE and LOVE. And that love is not the love of the world, which is tolerance. That grace is not having something to say when things didn’t go well such as, “It is the will of God.” It does not say that God is a capricious being. And faith is the ability to make up ones mind, the ability to see the fact and the value of the fact without any clutter of what ought to be or what should have been or what should be or what is the right thing. It sees what is with what light one has and sees the value of it with what light one has. As one continues self-knowing, one is having more and more light. The self was completely dark, was an unexamined, unexplored area. Using self-knowing, self-observation, one has thrown a light on that self that is constantly trying to be non-disturbed and is in conflict as how to gain that with the various methods of complaining, pleasing, putting on a front, blaming or what have you. This is beginning to throw a light into the self. So the more light one has the more one expe