Chapter 5
Man said: What, then, shall I believe? If great learning has not proven anything real; if science is based on falsehood, and if there are no natural laws, shall I not give up my judgment? Whatever is at variance with my judgment, shall I not turn away from it?
It has been said: The soul of man never dies. No one can know this, except Jehovih.
It has been said: Jehovih is a person. No one can know this, for His magnitude is incomprehensible.
I can say what man’s mortal body is made of. Is the soul of man made of oxygen or hydrogen? Give me light that is real.
Jehovih said: My divisions are not like man’s divisions. Behold, I create one thing within another. Neither space, place, time nor eternity stands in My way. The soul is es.
Man inquired: If the dwelling-place for the spirits of the dead is up in the firmament, how is it created? What does it rest upon?
And how does the soul of man dwell in heaven? If the es-man has feet and legs, how does he walk?
Do his arms change into wings? Or does he ride on lightning bolts?
God said: Already your soul goes in that direction, but it cannot take your body with it. Your corporeal judgment cannot cope with spiritual things.
As thought travels, so is it with the spirit of the dead. When you have quit your corporeal body, behold, your spirit will be free; wherever you desire to go, you shall go.
Nevertheless you shall go only as thought goes [i.e., without substance –ed.]. And when you have arrived at the place, you shall fashion, from the surroundings, your own form, hands and arms, and feet and legs, perfectly.
The Gods build not only themselves, but plateaus for the inhabitation of millions and millions of other souls risen from the earth.
Man said: Alas, me! Why was I born in darkness?
Why was I not created knowing all things from my youth up?
Why did the Creator not send His angels to be with me every day, to satisfy my craving for light from the Almighty?
Kosmon answered: If you had not craved for light, you would not be delighted to receive light. If you had been created with knowledge, you could not be an acquirer of knowledge.
If the Creator had given you angels to be always giving you light, then they would be slaves.
Liberty is the boon of men and angels; the desire for liberty causes the soul of man to come out of darkness.
Whoever feels that he has no need of exertion, does not grow in spirit. He has no honor on the earth or in its heavens.
Man said: This is my comfort: Man today is not as foolish as the ancients were.
They worshipped before idols of stone and wood.
They built temples and pyramids so costly that they ruined themselves.
Seffas said: O vain man! In the same day you abuse the ancients, you send your son to college, and make him study the ancients.
Your standing armies hold the nations of the earth in greater misery than the temples and pyramids did. And as to drunkenness, dissolute habits and selfishness, you are worse than the ancients.
God said: O man, turn from the dead past; learn from the Ever Living Present!
What more is your wisdom for the raising up of the poor and the distressed, than what the ancients had?
Because you hold up a book and say: Behold a most sacred and holy book! Is this better than for the ancients to say: Behold a sacred and holy temple!
Seffas said: Consider the established things; in one age one thing; in another age another thing.
To make man break away from all the past, and live by the Light of the Ever Present, is this not the wisest labor?