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Satan or Maya is the Cosmic Magician who produces multiplicity of forms to hide the One Formless Verity. In God’s plan and play (lila), the sole function of Satan or Maya is to attempt to divert man from Spirit to matter, from Reality to unreality.
“The devil sinneth from the beginning. For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil” (I John 3:8). That is, the manifestation of Christ Consciousness, within man’s own being, effortlessly destroys the illusions or “works of the devil.”
“So when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?”12
The human mind, like the phenomenal world that it cognizes, is in perpetual flux and can yield no finalities. Intellectual satisfaction is not the highest goal. The seeker of God is the real lover of vidya, unchangeable truth; all else is avidya, relative knowledge.
Reflect on this
Scriptural allegory is baffling to literal minds.
“Whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God.”16 To become the friend of God, man must overcome the devils or evils of his own karma or actions that ever urge him to spineless acquiescence in the mayic delusions of the world.
A human being falsely identifies himself with his physical form because the life currents from the soul are breath-conveyed into the flesh with such intense power that man mistakes the effect for a cause, and idolatrously imagines the body to have life of its own. Man’s conscious state is an awareness of body and breath.
All great prophets have remained silent when requested to unveil the ultimate secrets. When Pilate asked: “What is truth?”28 Christ made no reply. The large ostentatious questions of intellectualists like Pilate seldom proceed from a burning spirit of inquiry. Such men speak rather with the empty arrogance that considers a lack of conviction about spiritual values29 to be a sign of “open-mindedness.”
“To this end was I born, and for this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness unto the truth. Everyone that is of the truth heareth my voice.”30 In these few words Christ spoke volumes. A child of God “bears witness” by his life. He embodies truth; if he expound it also, that is generous redundancy.
Truth is no theory, no speculative system of philosophy, no intellectual insight. Truth is exact correspondence with reality. For man, truth is unshakable knowledge of his real nature, his Self as soul. Jesus, by every act and word of his life, proved that he knew the truth of his being — his source in God. Wholly identified with the omnipresent Christ Consc...
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The Chinese mystic Lao-tzu rightly taught: “He who knows, tells it not; he who tells, knows it not.” The final mysteries of God are not “open to discussion.” The decipherment of His secret code is an art that man cannot communicate to man; here the Lord alone is the Teacher.
