The Light of Life

Moses at the Well of Be'er (Dura)

“In him was life, which life was the light of men... That was the
true Light which enlightens every man who comes into the world.”
John 1: 4, 9

Daniel Drumm
 The angels of peace weep bitterly. The roads are ruined,
and no one travels the Way. The covenant is made void.
Isaiah 33: 7-8
Author’s Note
What the concept of the Logos - theologically translated as the Word - meant in Christ’s day, and the relation
Greek philosophy had to Christianity, can be read in a brief selection from the Cliff Notes to the New Testament
before the main text is read. It is included at the start of the appendix. Otherwise it might be felt that the statements
made in the text about Light and Reason don’t relate to Christianity. It is strange that later centuries have practically
erased the role that reason (logos) and the mind or understanding (nous) play in connecting man to the Logos. The
Logos was known anciently as Reason, or the acting Ideas, Order, or Intelligence of God. The claim that Jesus was
God was made primarily because John said in the opening lines of his Gospel that Jesus was the Logos, a concept
from Greek philosophy. Other quotes like, “Why do you call me good? There is One who is good and He is God”
(Mt 19:17; Mk 10:18; Lk 18:19), coupled with Jesus’ claim that he was not blaspheming when he called himself
the Son of God, because everyone who is taught by the Spirit is a Son of God (Jn 10: 32-36; Rom 8:14,16; Jn 6:45;
Heb 8: 6-13; Psalm 82: 1, 6-7) argue against it. So what the Logos meant in Greek philosophy, and in Philo, called
the Thirteenth Apostle, whose ideas helped shape early Christian thought, is important to understand.
“God is Truth, and his shadow is Light.” Philo, who was familiar with this saying of Plato’s, called the Logos
the shadow of God; and the Apostle John identified the Logos as “the true Light which enlightens everyone com-
ing into the world.” The Logos was conceived as “apportioned into an infinite number of parts in humans” (Philo:
Her. 234-236), with the reasoning capacity of the human mind being a portion of the all-pervading Divine Logos.
The mind itself was a special gift to humans from God and has a divine essence (from Hillar’s notes on Philo in the
appendix p.22).
In the Various Notes section (p.21) which follows the Cliff Notes In the appendix are statements from different
religious and noetic traditions that amplify the text, and indicate that other traditions than the Christian are similarly
aware of many things Jesus and the Apostles taught.
Following that are the ideas of a Jewish philosopher of Christ’s time, Philo (20 B.C.-50 A.D.), with whom Paul and
John seem familiar (p.22). His ideas form an extraordinary link between Jewish and Greek thinking, and perhaps
helped enable the Apostles to communicate to their varied audiences. If Jesus’ words about manna are accurately
reported they sound unaccountably like Philo’s. Philo attempted to relate Greek philosophy with Jewish revelation
and was influential in early Christian thinking. He was even called the 13th Apostle. The selections on Philo includ-
ed in the notes are by Marion Hillar, from the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
Following the notes in the appendix every Biblical reference cited in the text is included in full (p.24). They
are arranged in order and in columns so you can flip back and forth to the text. Following that are a few specific
Biblical references that concern overcoming death (p.29).

Daniel Drumm
February 25, 2007

"The greatest Church Fathers attest... there is... an ontological link or bond (sungeneia)
connecting the human present with the divine future. As Zizioulas, discussing Justin
Martyr, summarizes: 'The permanent sungeneia between God and man through the
medium of nous leads us to take the idea of logos, employed by Justin in a christologi-
Daniel Drumm © 2007

cal sense, as the bond between God and the world, between truth and the mind. Christ,
as the logos of God, becomes this very link between truth and the mind, and the truth of
philosophy is nothing less than part of this logos."' - Edward Moore, STD, PhD

Please send any questions or comments to Humata@aol.com. Include “Light of Life” in the subject header.

Frontispiece: Moses at the Well of Be’er- from Dura (Europas), detail of the wall-painting from the Synagogue at Dura.
Columbia University Art Database, http://www.mcah.columbia.edu/cgi-bin/dbcourses/item?skip=1340

 “For God has not given us the spirit of fear; but
that of power, and of love, and of a sound mind.” 2 Tim 1:7
Preface
Christianity no longer really has a way to establish grounds for knowledge that derives from the divine, that
includes what we call objective knowledge. Not that works psychologically and philosophically, and can stand
side by side with science. As a result many churches have become faith or feeling based, filled with hope, love and
belief, but not knowledge. Few Christians would consider religion an equal with science in obtaining knowledge
or facts, despite their disagreement with science’s interpretation of them. Western religion has lost its philosophical
and noetic roots in our culture. Yet with religion that hasn’t divorced insight from practice such as Yoga, Vedanta or
Buddhism it is an odd fact that western science itself, and physics in particular, has opened a dialogue to compare
its knowledge and thinks it may even have something to learn- from men who merely sit in meditation. Scientists
like Bohm and Sheldrake have even incorporated elements from these knowledge based religions’ explanations of
reality into their theories.
The following points to markers in the Bible that establish the grounds for knowledge as divine in origin. It
needs to be described what has lead to the elimination of the philosophical views that expressed those grounds orig-
inally, but truthfully the psychological descriptions here go beyond the old philosophical forms. They come from
examining the nature of thinking and knowing directly. Meditation or thinking if developed by the means indicated
are considered more than capable of demonstrating what is being described. The claim is that the nature of focus-
sing Light, or the noetic clarity of the mind, which is what thinking that produces knowledge or understanding is, is
the same in essence for everyone and the facts about it are discoverable by anyone who examines their own experi-
ence. It is possible to demonstrate the action of Light directly, at least to yourself, and requires no belief.
This is not intended to convince an atheistic or scientistic audience. It most likely would not even though it rests
on the unexplained but universal experience of the nature of thinking itself, and not on religious or biblical asser-
tions. It is intended to address a religious one, though, because it is modern religion that no longer believes think-
ing can lead to actual knowledge of the divine or to a knowledge of the world that does not contradict its beliefs.
Christianity has abandoned the field of knowledge to science and secular thought. Science already believes that
thinking can lead to its goals, even if it will not look at how it does so, subjectively, and pretends that objectivity is
established by externals, and not by the Light of mind. It is religion that does not believe in the connection between
truth and the mind. However if God is the Real, the Real is never absent from any of its creations; nor is it absent
now from the mind of man, its greatest creation.
So the divine ends up partitioned by religion from life and its problems, and is represented only as a set of feel-
ings, experiences and beliefs that are made to shape or influence thought and action from the outside as it were.
That is not real faith, nor does it fulfil the command to love God with one’s mind. Reality and the Spirit are then
considered as unrelated rather than entwined, and in such religion the aim of life inevitably becomes something
outside of or beyond life and the present moment. Spirit is not seen as the active and acting Cause of all forms of
life. And spirituality is not understood as entering man’s knowledge and creative endeavors as a light inspiring from
within, already whole and holy, transforming the ego from its roots up. Instead it is viewed as a set of “holy” con-
cepts and assertions to which the ego, the intellect, the emotions, and even the Spirit must adapt. That view is the
hallmark of the carnal man who, separated from God, sees adaptation of his self-concept and not the transformation
of his being as what demonstrates Spirit.
What interprets the Bible is the state of the feeling and desiring soul, expressing through the sense mind, or the
mind of the Spirit. The contention between these two views is symbolized by the Pharisees’ and Christ’s deeply dif-
ferent interpretations of the spirit and intent of the Scripture. Spirituality to Christ means it is always the quality of
heart or mind that makes the connection with the Light, always, and not mere adherence to the Law, belief in a doc-
trine, or submission to an authority. In this lies the freedom of the Sons of God, and that freedom is the whole point
of Paul’s repeated message of the difference between the Old Covenant (or testament) and the New; and of the Old
Daniel Drumm © 2007

Adam and the New. Where this freedom is not understood understanding itself is under a cloud, and a veil is upon
the heart, no matter what the authority claimed for what is believed. (2 Corinthians 3:6-18) Following Christ or
turning to the Light means thinking, feeling and becoming true and good, for we are to become like him in act and
thought. When we do we become intimately involved in Christ’s being, and that brings us to life; whereas simply
wearing and declaring a belief leaves our hearts unchanged and the light of our being unbirthed.

Daniel Drumm

 The Light of Life
Love and Light
In the New Testament loving God never means bowing to a powerful personality simply because he is more
powerful and important than we are. God does not support arrogance in anyone. If God really were egotistical and
lorded his strength over the weak, as he seems to in Job, he would contradict his own being, which is the Good (Lk
18:19) and the True, making him an affront to his own justice. (Job 34: 10-12,17) John’s first epistle says instead that
“God is Love” (1 Jn 4:8,16), love being the root and substance of all good. This replaces the idea of a vengeful, arro-
gant tribal god, with the divinely caring Father of Jesus; who is a Father to all men. In the same epistle John also
says, “God is Light” (1 Jn 1:5), light being that which illumines what is true. That isn’t mentioned as often, perhaps
because Light is less familiar than Love. We must ask though what these words mean, if we want to know what to
worship, and what it means to worship. These words Love and Light define what God is, according to the Bible,
and they are the indicators there of the nature of what we call God. Most other descriptions are of powers, attributes
or actions. There is one other defining statement, however, given by himself: that he is “I am”- as if essence or
being were life and existence - and he was the “I” position, or conscious awareness, of existence itself. (Ex 3:14)
What then does it mean to love God with our whole heart, mind and soul, as the first of Jesus’ Two Great
Commandments asks? It means to love Light and Love and Life, as these are the Real, and are how the Whole,
which God is, expresses itself. But what does it mean to love Light, Life and Love? It can only mean to value them,
and valuing means using, being and expressing them. This is what keeping the Lord’s Word would have to mean,
as his Word is not the words in a book, but the Light and Love behind them, which are Life. (Jn 14:23; Jn 15:10; Jn
6:63) This is the same Light and Love by which the worlds were made, and upon which we live. (Jn 1:1-4; Mat 4:4) It
is this Word which will never pass away, or be changed by the changing translations and opinions of men. To keep
that Word is Life, and the Life of God is eternal.
The Lord’s Word is real love and living light, experienced within you where God’s Kingdom actually is. (Lk
17:21) Light is what enables us to understand anything. It is intelligence itself, and is what illumines our understand-
ing. According to John, the Logos in Whom “was life, which life was the light of men” is “the true Light which
enlightens all who come into the world.” (Jn 1:4, 9) God is conscious intelligence, or in other words, light and truth.
Love, on the other hand, which John also says God is, is an expression of the unity of all existence. That which
seems separated by bodies, like hearts and minds, is not separate in him. God is conscious of, and is conscious as,
the oneness of all Being. Therefore Love is his commandment to us: to acknowledge our deep relatedness to oth-
ers and share our being with them. This is the harmony working beyond and behind all forms. When these two,
intelligence and love, express directly in your relations, not as beliefs or concepts, but as active powers, you will
then have, as the Bible puts it, life in you and life more abundantly. (Jn 10:10) John’s epistle makes clear that simple
acceptance of a doctrine or dogma is not what is meant by this, for he says plainly that if you do not dwell in love
toward others, you do not love God; nor do you know God; nor, despite whatever you believe or have been told,
have you been born again. (1 Jn 4:20-21; 1 Jn 4:7-8; 1 Jn 2:9-11)
To love your neighbor as yourself, the second of the Two Great Commandments, does not mean loving only
your spouse, relatives, and friends; or just those who are nice to you; or who believe or think like you. Spiritual
publicans do that much (Mat 5:41-48); and such love does not form Christ, or the love of all in you, nor give access
to the Light. Dwelling in Love has nothing to do with converting your neighbor to your doctrinal views, using every
means necessary to have them agree with you. (Heb 8:10-11) Legalistic wrangling over scripture and dogma marked
Daniel Drumm © 2007

the sects of Paul’s time too, but Paul repeatedly teaches that Love is what is real to him, not the Law. (Rom 13:8)
He himself will eat meat, or not eat meat; set aside circumcision; become a Greek to a Greek, or a Jew to a Jew,
because the external trappings of convention and culture that divide men are as nothing to him. He seeks to reach
the love and light in another and wake those, not simply make their views mirror his (2 Tim 5-6, 14). Love sees what
is real in others, and everything else through that. As Martin Buber puts it, “Love is a cosmic force. For those who
stand in it and behold in it, men emerge from their entanglement in busy-ness, and the good and the evil, the clever
and the foolish, the beautiful and the ugly, one after another become actual and a You for them.” - from I and Thou
(and consider 1 Jn 4:12). This is the Name under which when two or more are gathered God is present. (Mat 18-20) 
What is Light?
In his first epistle John relates what anointing by Light means: “The anointing which you have received of him
abides in you, and you need not that any man teach you: but as the same anointing teaches you of all things, and
is truth... even as it teaches you, so you will abide in him.” (1 Jn 2:27) As the Light shows you internally what is
true, you abide in him by comprehending, and then acting on what the Light shows you. The Light that enlight-
ens everyone will show you what things are, because it is truth, and is present in you. Light is living clarity that
reveals, experienced as inspiration, insight and knowledge, when you think to know or understand. The source is
hidden from you, but responds when you ask, seek, or wonder - when you truthfully want to know. It responds to
your internal questions when focused with desire. Thinking is an internal asking which tries to see or understand.
If instead your “asking” is just telling the Light what you want according to your preferences or prejudice, desiring
to see what you already think, or get what you want, rather than caring what the Light which illumines all things
will show an honest question, then the Light will allow you to believe any delusion you desire. At least within your
own mind and until your actions, which affect others, require a correction through reaping what you sow. Fairness
gives no one the right to affect another against their will, unless that will is itself unfair, or delusional. If instead you
allow the sense of what is real intuited in honesty and genuineness to win over imagination the Light, which estab-
lishes objectivity internally and externally, will relate what is inside to what is outside, because it dwells in both.
This is the Light you use in thoroughly honest thinking and in all creative thinking. It is available to all men
through simple honestness (ask, seek and knock Mat 7: 7-12). There is no real genius, ultimately; just a more con-
scious and intelligent use of the Light. Anyone at any time can remove the impediments they have created to using
it in their own form of asking. The Light does not require belief, as its use and development are direct and respon-
sive to sincerity, desire, honesty, and focus. It is God’s omniscience put at your disposal, but you must want the
answers. The Light always preserves the freedom of the individual; it will not interfere with free choice, desiring
that men grow through the law of their own thinking and asking. The Light is available to show the truth about
anything if the truth is wanted. When the mind understands this and uses Light appropriately, recognizing its real
nature, the mind grows in reality, strength, creativity and wisdom. The Light itself is unattached to and unaffected
by what is done with it. Yet it affects what uses it.
This Light, the Life of the Logos, teaches you of all things, because it is truth, as John says. It shows all things
as they are- that is its function. The Light of Truth is what illumines every mind that comes into the world, accord-
ing to its asking. Truth is not a concept of any sort. Truth is the living Light that shows you what is true. That is
what Truth does. It is not a single startling fact to which all things conform. It is the Divine Light of consciousness.
Truth connects what is real in you to what is real outside you. The proof is that this is what any focused thinking
which leads to understanding already does. Focusing the light of awareness through interest and honesty is how
we discover the truth about the world and ourselves. Mind is the functioning of spiritual matter. It is the only thing
in existence that can use Light. When you develop the mind and then true it, the Light leads to seeing and hearing
without illusions.
Thinking is inner seeing, as understanding is inner, or spiritual, hearing. When you think, you know because of
previous experience that if you strongly desire to understand something, the focus of something internal provides
you answers by means of a light, or clarity. This comes in response to your effort. This increased clarity is experi-
enced in thinking, or focused awareness that is asking, not in passive everyday awareness that simply meanders in
unfocused light. You know and have experienced the psychological reality of all this. You just need to look when
you are really thinking to see the action of the Light. Everyone thinks about something. It doesn’t matter what it is
Daniel Drumm © 2007

about, as thinking, which is focusing the Light, is fundamentally the same act in all people. That itself is a remark-
able fact that few have ever looked at. When you really need to know something you don’t hesitate, for you already
know how to get answers. Especially when you want something badly, and have to think to get it. You must focus
Light to get it.
The Light is what responds to thinking when you ask, seek or knock, but it reveals only to the degree of your
actual desire to know, and only to your level of readiness. It is what you have always posed questions to internally
when you have thought to know anything. The Light will reveal what things are to themselves when you honestly

want to know that. Thinking is nothing more than this activity of asking questions internally, however you do that,
and trying to see; focusing in a way to get answers. Focus is interest brought to a point by the desire to know.
You ask questions of yourself when you think - and it makes no difference to the process that you do so, actu-
ally making it easier - but you are who doesn’t know. You do not already have the knowledge you seek. Thinking
is your act, but what is it that enlightens your mind when you do? It is not your mind. Your mind is what makes the
effort to know: it is open, receptive, and asking... but asking of what? Your mind is also what understands when you
receive, and it is affected, even changed in its spiritual substance by the Light it receives. Either one very superior
level inside you is affecting another, or one very superior being is. As even the atheistic philosopher Nietzsche says,
still faithful in this to the Spirit, “One receives. One doesn’t ask who gives.” But consider this... if it is the Logos
itself you ask to show you, and the Light is pure intelligence or divine omniscience, then you have the potential for
knowing the truth about anything whatsoever. Consider the implications of that faith and possibility, and what you
may have given up by leaving your Father’s hearth to feed on husks, or the opinions of men.
You get answers when you think (or meditate) qualified by the form and light your mind puts the question
in. Because you obtain answers through your ability to temporarily experience oneness with the Light, which is
what knowing is, you do not think of the Light as different from you. You do not realize that the knowledge you
obtain comes from the brief union with the Light, which illumination is, no matter how small the degree of it.
Oneness occurs when you focus the Light. It takes place when you are open, real (honest and truthful), impersonal
(no respecter of personalities over life, fact, or meaning) and desire to see, be and know what is true. The Light
responds when you ask, which simply means desiring to know. More Light is shed on what you are trying to see
when you focus your interest on the point of what you are considering, and try to see what is essential, or signifi-
cant, or true about it. Focusing your inner question on the point focuses Light, and the Light opens through that
point into knowledge of your subject.
The Light behind your answer comes from a level so far beyond your present level, or the level of the ques-
tion, that the answer can, when the focus is clean like that described above, flood the mind with a completely new
understanding or solution. It can instantaneously show everything true about it, relating to it, and developing from
it. A survey of great discoverers and thinkers, cited by Eckhart Tolle in A New Earth, quoted that description, that
insight would come in great mental breakthroughs, and flood the mind with understanding. Sometimes it also comes
later than when the mental effort was made to see, or after sleep, or at an unexpected moment. The reason is that
the depth or complexity of what is sought is so new, or different from the previous mental context of the “asker”,
that one must be prepared over time to receive the answer. The desire to know beyond what is already understood,
like a scientist, a thinker, or a spiritually focused person wants to know, sometimes involves carrying that desire,
and developing one’s thought over weeks, months, even years, like a miniature pregnancy. The Light represents an
actual potential to know all things, because it will show what is essential, true or real about anything it is asked to
illumine. At the same time it exposes illusions. It gives knowledge itself. In fact enlightenment itself is a condition
in which no egoic resistance is present in the relationship one has with the Light, and so knowing is direct- free of
craving, prejudice, one’s conditioning or ignorance. This has also been called oneness with God.

The Sense-mind, Intelligence and Love.

Light is the intelligence of all understanding. The Light in response to interest and focus will give insight into
how to make a painting beautiful as readily as how to make a gun, for even at the level of the sensory intellect it
leaves you free to ask what you like. That is because people must learn to value and develop their intellect before
Daniel Drumm © 2007

they can learn to use it rightly. But to the real mind, that is, to the deeper intuition or understanding, the Light will
also show the cataracts of preference and prejudice on the sense-mind’s eye. This sense-mind is ideally intended to
be the focus faculty for the real mind- a neutral, unfeeling hand that holds steady whatever the mind wants to look
upon, and that which translates light into act. But most often it is the cause of the mind’s fall. It is unfeeling and
only perceives the surfaces of things. It works with form and abstractions from form, with what the senses show,
and with words- but not with underlying principles or ideas, unless they concern form. If it is made to do so despite
its incapacity - and it is made to do so all the time - it carnalizes meanings or strips them of their living essence so

that it can grasp them. Then it works with them mechanically as if they were objects. It is analytical, taking things
apart to work with them, or it makes things dead to “understand” them. Its action is to isolate and separate, as if
everything and every problem it considered were a form that could be fitted together or taken apart. It cannot won-
der, nor synthesize its understandings through essences, but like a computer can only tabulate, and compare appear-
ances through association (i.e. this is like that) - for it can perceive neither essences nor life. When it tries to work
with ideas it substitutes mechanical logic and authorities for pure thinking, or a direct knowing with Light. This
carnal mind is essentially an identification that arises when the soul identifies with the body, with the point of view
of the mind of the body, and with the personality that arises from these. Then one acts for the body, the passions, for
feelings and desires, and not for intelligence and love. Objects and how they feel become strangely important and
substantial, as feeling fills them out, and desire hungers for them; while what causes them or what they are in them-
selves recedes.
The real mind is what focuses meaning and comprehends. When the mind and the sense-intellect (the shining
mind and the chattering mind of Taoism) are brought together in the pursuit of knowledge conceptual intuition
is born. But the ego or earthly man normally uses the carnal intellect as its prop and ally; not for knowledge but
to deal with things unfeelingly. The intellect or sense-mind has this virtue, that it can view desire and emotion
unmoved, allowing the real mind sufficient breathing space to see and consider; but this virtue is more often used to
suppress, not to acknowledge or work with feelings and desires. When the intellect is used to work with issues and
matters beyond itself this is how evil arises, especially if it is acting at the whim of the ego or unbalanced emotion.
It then cuts off feeling, empathy and the sense of relation. In that case its focus and intent become fed by an intense,
unconscious drive. It deals with all things as if they were mechanical and unfeeling like itself, able to slice through
bodies or issues as if they were so much butcher’s meat. But it has no motive of its own, being unaware as a self.
It is the soul of feeling and desire that chooses and uses the minds based on what it most wants. And the soul may
identify with the sense-mind or the mind of the Spirit. The Pharisees are the Bible’s imagery for what the carnal
mind regularly does with the things of the Spirit.
The Light will show what Love is, and what it is not. It gives intuitions of your real relations with things and
others. Or it can bring to the surface the emotion causing a habit, and show how such a contraction of life is
released. Your heart’s knowledge must include the warmth and depth of love to understand the greater dimension
of what is Good. The way loving a child teaches love unselfishness. The Light that the sense-intellect accesses
allows for any and all discovery, based simply on right asking, and not necessarily on right being. Honesty will
solve much, and through the development of the morality that honesty and truthfulness are, will reconnect the intel-
lect to the real mind - but without Love the mind plows a barren field. Put differently, despite the fact that the sun
is brightest in winter, the earth is cold because its axis is turned away from the sun’s warmth. Nothing can grow
or live then, and everything returns to the root. But come spring the hemisphere leans back into relation; light and
warmth combine, and everything comes to life and grows. The light of the intellect needs the love of the heart to
grow into the actual Light of Life.
It is Love that allows Light access and entry to whatever it is considering and trying to understand, and
Knowledge itself is the union spiritually with the subject or object known. Similarly, love without what is true is
blind, selfish, sentimental, and foolish; a psychic whirlpool of feelings and desires, and not the One who is Good.
(Luke 18:19) It takes love and light for life to take root in the Real, and reach upward.

The Light of Life

Daniel Drumm © 2007

“For the bread of God is he that comes down from heaven, and gives life to the world.” (Jn 6:33) and the
“Kingdom of God is within you” (Lk 17:21) indicate these are psychological realties spoken of, as God is a Spirit
and can only be worshiped in spirit and in truth. (Jn 4:24) When it is said that God is Light and Love what is referred
to are spiritual and internal facts and states, not external ones, despite the fact these ultimately cause all external
realities, and support and indwell them. The union of Light and Love within you is entry into the Kingdom of
God. This is Life, and the water of Life, and Life is Spirit. (Jn 4:14) The bread, water, and wine, which are poetical
emblems for light, life, and love, Christ meant to be used and absorbed by us, literally. John 4:32 and John 6:57
10
make clear he was not referring to an external sacrament here. In the same way that Jesus was literally fed by, and
lived by his Father, he states that the use of his Light and Love will transform us, and give us eternal life. (Jn 6: 51-
58) And he clarifies in this passage this eating - the most primitive form of oneness or union - is not meant physi-
cally but spiritually. For it is the spirit that quickens and changes the inner being, not what the body consumes. (Jn 6:
63) Light and Love are real food, or as he puts it, meat and drink indeed. (Jn 6:55) These are what God’s being actu-
ally is, and we are to live upon God’s being.
“Except you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. Who eats my flesh
and drinks my blood has eternal life... He that eats my flesh and drinks my blood dwells in me and I in him. As the
living Father has sent me, and I live by the Father, so he that eats me will live by me.” (Jn 6: 45-63) Light is the liv-
ing Bread, the Body of Christ we are to absorb and use to attain eternal life, just as Love is the Wine or the Blood
of Christ, and not any carnal symbols for them. This is literally true. The Life within these, in you, is the Life of
the Logos, without which you can neither love nor think nor act. (Jn 15:1-5; Jn 6:33, 51 ; Jn 1: 4, 9) This is the spiri-
tual Bread that comes down from heaven. (Jn 6:32) For even manna, or the physical bread that came down from the
heaven, that the fathers ate in the desert, still they died. But whoever eats this Bread will not die. (Jn 6:50-51) This
Light feeds, elevates and transforms the soul insofar as you inquire into the Real, and don’t merely use it for dis-
tracted and disconnected desire. “Blessed is he that shall eat bread in the kingdom of God.” (Lk 14:15)
“Who is made, not after the law of a carnal commandment, but after the power of an endless life.” (Heb 7:16)
Despite the fact this is a description of Melchisadek, and Jesus after him, it is also the goal and promise for all of
Jesus’ teaching (Heb 6:20). Paul says in Romans: “But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell
in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead will also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwells in you.”
(Rom 8:11) It does not say that you must be dead, or in heaven for your body to be quickened, only that the Spirit
dwell in you. The churches interpret that resurrection means something that happens to us after we die, but if sin
is death as Paul says, and death is overcome by dying to sin, how is it that those in the hells they picture also have
eternal life? “For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace... if you live after the
flesh you will die, but if through the Spirit you will mortify the deeds of the body, you will live.” (Rom 8: 6,13) “For
the first man is of the earth, earthy. The second is of the Lord from heaven.” (1 Cor 15:47)
The spirit is not born when the body is born, not according to the passage “Where were you when I laid the
foundations of the earth... when the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy.” (Job
38:4,7). Here God is speaking to the personality of Job, the earthly man, but is reminding the Son of God that he
wanted to come to earth when the foundations of the earth were laid. In John 10:32-36, Jesus defends himself
against the charge of blasphemy by saying he is a son of God, and had not their scriptures indicated that all those
unto whom the light of God came were gods? Paul also says, “For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are
the sons of God... The Spirit itself bears witness with our spirit that we are the children of God.” (Rom 8:14,16)
The quotes, “Dust thou art, and to dust thou shalt return,” and “It is appointed unto man once to die, and then the
judgement,” (Heb 9:27) are warnings to the earthly man, the son of man not God. For the Bible also says, “You are
gods, and all of you are children of the Most High. But you shall die like men.” (Psalm 82:6-7) “Then shall the dust
return to the earth as it was: and the spirit shall return unto God who gave it.” (Ecc 12:7) The spirit was not born at
physical birth, but already existed when the foundations of the earth were laid; nor does it die at death. So continu-
ing life after the death of the body is not what is meant by resurrection- the Son of God already lives forever. It is
the servant, the son of a man, the earthly man, the creature, who puts on incorruption, not the spirit. ( Jn 8: 32-36;
Rom 8:18-21, 23) But if the body is resurrected and given eternal life for those who are evil, then are Paul, John,
Daniel Drumm © 2007

Genesis (3:22, 24) and Revelations (2:7) contradicted. Redemption is of the body, after the mind and heart are reborn
in Christ. (Rom 8:23)
The word sleep is what the New Testament uses when it refers to someone who has died, saying they have fallen
asleep, or are asleep in Christ. (Jn 11: 11-14) By contrast, to be dead or to refer to the dead means, in biblical terms,
that a person’s spiritual consciousness is buried in their body (“Let the dead bury the dead.”). This means they are
not aware as the spirit, but live as the creature, identified psychologically with the animal body that the spirit inhab-
its and makes human. When the spirit lives as the body, and not for intelligence and love, it is dead spiritually. It is
unconscious as a Son, and is a prodigal living on husks, unaware how to re-ascend to heaven, which it came down 11
from. It is walking in darkness at noonday. The body is necessary, and important, but it is not identity.
It is the body, and the personality of the body, which together the Bible calls the old Adam, that die. This cor-
ruptible, if it does not put on incorruption by the power of the Spirit (1 Cor 15:53-54), is the son of man unto whom it
is appointed once to die, and then the judgment. Only by the Spirit dwelling in you is death of the body overcome,
is judgment overcome, and “the creature itself shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious
liberty of the children of God.” (Rom 8:21; Jn 8:51) Overcoming death means overcoming physical death, which Jesus
demonstrated, acquiring a Body of Light that could be touched and felt by all. [Various Notes, notes 2-4] “Now this I say
brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the Kingdom of God; neither does corruption inherit incorruption. But
behold, I show you a mystery: we shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed.” (1 Cor 15: 50-51)
The resurrection of the dead means overcoming physical death, for “I tell you of a truth, there be some stand-
ing here, which shall not taste of death, till they see the kingdom of God.” (Lk 9:27) Nor will they will taste it after,
if death is swallowed up in victory. Death is the backdoor into heaven. Melchisadek lives, and is made after the
power of an endless life, without beginning or end of days, capable of appearing physically like he did to Abraham.
So also Jesus, made a high priest after the Order of Melchisadek, did to his Apostles, eating fish, letting himself
be touched, and afterward appearing to upwards of 500 people. If this is not true, then as Paul puts it, your faith is
vain, and Christ is not risen from the dead. Nor is he the firstfruits of them that slept, or those who have already
died.
If Christ, “who is a quickening Spirit”, makes you alive, how is it we die, if we are not still in Adam? “For as in
Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive,” (1 Cor 15:22) Spiritual “death” causes physical death, for in
Adam, that is, in identification with the carnal man, all die. (Rom 8:6) This is the Fall, “for the sting of death is sin,
and the strength of sin [ie to kill] is the Law.” (1 Cor 15:56 ); and the Fall is a choice we are continually making, else
we would not die. (James 1:15). Rising from actual death as Jesus and Lazarus did only makes the point dramatically
that death does not exist for the Spirit. These were demonstrations that death has no power over the Spirit.
You do not die physically to overcome death, for the Spirit, who is as (or is, or is of, in some translations) the
Lord from heaven, is immortal; but if the Spirit dwell in you “he that raised up Christ from the dead will also quick-
en your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwells in you.” (Rom 8:11). Rising from actual death as Jesus and Lazarus
did only makes the point dramatically that death does not exist for the Spirit. It is not necessary to die physically to
overcome death; only that the Spirit dwell in you. That was only a demonstration that death has no power over the
Spirit. Nor must we think it robbery to be equal with Jesus. (Phil 2: 5-6) Everything Jesus did we can do, according
to his own words - and Jesus overcame physical death, eating fish and being touched in the physical, not the heav-
enly, world. (Jn 14:12)

The Old and New Covenant

Spirituality is living as the spirit, as the “heavenly man”. (1 Cor 15:47) According to the Bible, this heavenly man
is elohim, a god in the midst of whom Yave Elohim judges. (Jn 10: 34; Psalm 82:1, 6-7) What such living means is to
become richly conscious, manifesting love and light, and to have abundant, even eternal life. To live as the spirit
means to establish real relationships with things and others (love); and to think and act based on honesty and truth-
fulness (light). These two, intelligence and love, are the true and the good. They relate to each other, and perfect
each other, for “whoever keeps his word [or light], in him truthfully is the love of God perfected”. (1 Jn 2: 5) “He
that says he is in the light and hates his brother is in darkness even now. He that loves his brother abides in the
light, and there is no occasion of stumbling in him.” (1 Jn 2:9-10)
Daniel Drumm © 2007

By contrast, mainstream religion’s initial address to people is quite often about fear: fear of God, fear of the
unknown, fear of the uncontrollable, and fear of the afterlife. It even calls the spirit of fear in man, wisdom. Many
of religion’s teachings and beliefs are based on a negative, fearful view of God and his wrath. Much of its activities
and some of its doctrines are designed to avert or overcome the fear which religion intentionally arouses to inter-
est people in its views. This approach is really the First Covenant from the Old Testament, which Hebrews Chapter
8 criticizes, and then has God himself set aside. It’s author says, “But now hath [Jesus] obtained a more excellent
ministry, by how much also he is the mediator of a better covenant, which was established upon better promises.
12
For if that first covenant had been faultless, then should no place have been sought for the second.” (Heb 8: 6-7) The
old covenant was based upon fear of God, upon the Law, the Prophets, and on Commandments that proscribe and
condemn. This was the covenant about which Hebrews says, “For there is truthfully an annulling of the command-
ment that went before, for its weakness and unprofitability. For the Law made nothing perfect; but the bringing of
a better hope did, by which we draw near to God.” (Heb 7: 18-19) Paul says there is a literal veil over the mind and
heart of anyone who looks backward to what has been done away with. (2 Cor 3: 6-18; also Ga 4:21-31) Fear prevents
understanding of the good news of the Gospel, that Love and Light have replaced the Law, and our life is hid in
Christ. You cannot love and be open to what you must placate and fear, no matter what you may force your lips to
say.
Love and Light are the New Covenant Jesus brokered for us. In that Covenant, God’s laws, or eternal ideas, are
written in all men’s hearts and minds. They are perceived there as the moral intuitions of Light and Love, in tablets
of the heart, and not in books or on tablets of stone. He says: “Not according to the covenant that I made with their
fathers in the day when I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt [which covenant is the Law,
the Prophets and the Commandments]... For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those
days, says the Lord: I will put my laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts... and they shall not teach
every man his neighbor, or his brother saying, Know the Lord: for all shall know me from the least to the great-
est.” (Heb 8:6-11; Jer 31:30-34; Heb 10: 16; 2 Cor 3:3-8; 2 Cor 3:13-18) The writer of Hebrews says plainly that the time
Jeremiah was predicting is present now, and that the New Covenant Jesus established for us can perfect us, whereas
the Law could not. “The law and the prophets were until John: since that time the kingdom of God is preached, and
every man presses into it.” (Lk 16:15-17) He repeatedly states that the Old Covenant was ineffective, and is ended. At
the end of the chapter in which he quotes Jeremiah’s words, saying they are already fulfilled, he says, “In that [God]
says, a new covenant, he has made the first old. Now that which decays and waxes old, is ready to vanish away.”
(Heb 8:13)

The Light as the Logos

In the writings of Plato the term logos is translated as reason or meaning. Reason was viewed as a fundamental
order; as sanity, balance, and proportion; and as the comprehension of identity through essence. The Logos of Philo,
Heraclitus, and the Stoics, was understood as the divine Reason, or as God, and was related to Plato’s divine Ideas:

“To say just how much of the New Testament was influenced... by Greek conceptions is difficult, but such influences are rec-
ognized readily in the doctrine of the Logos, which may be translated as Word or Reason... For Heraclitus, the Logos was a kind of
cosmic order, or divine justice, that presides over the destinies of a changing world. Whenever either of two opposite forces operat-
ing in the world oversteps its bounds, the Logos ensures that a proper balance is restored. Light and darkness, heat and cold, wet and
dry, male and female, like all other pairs of opposites, are thus kept in proper relation to one another. Nor is the work of the Logos
confined to the physical aspect of nature, for it affects the moral order as well. Whenever the requirements of justice are violated,
either by individuals or by nations, the Logos acts in a compensatory manner, punishes the evildoers, and restores the proper balance
of things. Plato regarded the Logos, or Reason, as the divine element that is present in human beings. Its demand for harmony among
the elements, including those in human nature, provides the key to the real meaning of the good life” - from Cliff Notes to the New
Testament.

It was to these ideas that the Apostles John and Paul were referring when they explained that it was the incarna-
tion of the Logos itself in Jesus to their Jewish and Gentile audiences. Man’s reason is the rational light of the mind.
Through thinking the mind reaches in its considerations beyond the personal and the particular, to the impersonal
Daniel Drumm © 2007

and the universal. It can even lift it’s understanding to the World Mind and see reality through that. In philosophy,
the breakthrough by thinking into the higher mind of the heavenly man is termed Pure Reason. That there was a
relation between man’s reason (logos), or the light of his mind (nous), and Reason itself, was understood by the
early church Fathers. Augustine, for instance, says that the image of God in man is not a corporeal image, but is the
understanding itself:

“The God-image in us reveals itself through “prudence, justice, moderation, virtue, wisdom and discipline.” St. Augustine dis-
tinguishes between the God-image which is Christ and the image which is implanted in man as a means or possibility of becoming 13
like God. The God-image is not in the corporeal man, but in the “anima rationalis” [rational mind, or soul], the possession of which
distinguishes man from animals. “The God-image is within, not in the body. . . Where the understanding is, where the mind is, where
the power of investigating truth is, there God has his image.” Therefore we should remind ourselves, says Augustine, that we are
fashioned after the image of God nowhere save in the understanding. “But where man knows himself to be made after the image
of God, there he knows there is something more in him than is given to the beasts.” From this it is clear that the God-image is, so
to speak, identical with the “anima rationalis”. The latter is the higher spiritual man, the “homo coelestis” [or heavenly man] of St.
Paul.” (1 Cor. 15:47) - from Aion, by Carl Jung.

The translation in the Bible of Logos as the Word tends to obscure that early Christianity’s understanding of the
Logos provided a link between truth and mind. The tendency of religion to strip knowledge of its claim to con-
nection with divinity has allowed instead the claims of feeling based, faith-only teachings of later centuries to go
unchallenged. It has helped promote “...the doctrine,” as Hegel put it, “which has now become a prejudice, that it is
impossible to know God.” Hegel continues,

“Following this doctrine we now contradict what the Holy Scripture commands as our highest duty, namely, not only to love but
also to know God. We now categorically deny what is written, namely, that it is the spirit that leads to truth, knows all things, and
penetrates even the depths of divinity. Thus, in placing Divine Being beyond our cognition and the pale of all human things, we gain
the convenient license of indulging in our own fancies. We are freed from the necessity of referring our knowledge to the True and
Divine. On the contrary, the vanity of knowledge and the subjectivity of sentiment now have ample justification. And pious humility,
in keeping true recognition of God at arm’s length, knows very well what it gains for its arbitrary and vain striving.” - from Hegel’s
lecture Reason in History.
Secular attempts to make the competing voices of different religions politically equal are not the source of rela-
tivism in our culture. Those efforts are attempts at fairness. The source of relativism lies in what denies that reason
or knowledge is meaningful; that is, denies that there can be direct insight into facts by the mind, through internal
asking, using the Light of God made available to thinking. This denial makes knowledge relative, by denying that
the Light of God is what illumines the mind of man, and thereby asserting that truth cannot be known. But Jesus
said, “Ye shall know the Truth, and the Truth shall make you free.” (Jn 8:32)

Knowledge and Religion

In feeling based, faith-only religions, since there is no longer any divine source for objectivity, such religion’s
“truths” are also irrational and relative. It is the Light that establishes all objectivity. Even if you claim a divine
source like the Bible for your belief, it is still a set of thoughts to you. You must use your mind to understand what
its expressions mean; just as anyone who explains it to you also must. If you insist that all understanding and divine
experience must conform to scripture to be considered true, it is nonetheless to your reasoning about scripture that
you have it conform. That reasoning is based upon your understanding of and experience of the divine. Provided
you don’t simply parse the letter of scripture as the Pharisees did by the carnal intellect, building a tower of inter-
pretation based on whatever doctrine and dogma are considered traditional. The difference between Jesus’ open,
flexible and loving interpretation of scripture, and the Pharisees’ fear-based version of the same words, illustrates
the difference between the sense-mind’s treatment of spiritual matters, and the Christ mind’s. One is ego-based,
legalistic, and essentially negative, while the other is intuitive and based on life. Jesus always sets aside any view
that is not love, treating scripture as a tool but never as the Spirit itself, even going so far as to call it “your law”
more than once, and not his. (Jn 8:17; 10:34) Something given in it because of the hardness of a people or a period’s
heart may be changed, or set aside, without breaking the scripture, according to Love. And some sayings are only
Daniel Drumm © 2007

for those who can receive or understand them rightly. (Mat 19:4-11)
The science of establishing the link to the Logos through self-knowledge and insight slipped away from the
churches as the possibility of knowing God or the divine through the light of the mind was denied. If we have no
access through knowledge to the divine, to what underlies, causes and supports all things, then ultimately knowl-
edge of any sort is impossible as there is no relation to what is actual or real through understanding. Feeling alone
cannot support knowledge; and faith without any knowledge is merely imagination. The capacity for mind to know
truth cannot be established, including any truths belief asserts, if it has no access, no comprehension, and no con-
scious relation to the divine. Or, if truth is rooted in the divine, but is not itself knowable, how can anyone know 14
that what they believe is true? How is any explanation or understanding trustworthy, if comprehension itself is
untrustworthy? By doing this religion became vulnerable to atheistic science, having only faith and feeling now,
without reason or knowledge, to contend against what science tangibly demonstrated it could accomplish with
Light, mind and reason- irrespective of its beliefs. Simply by honest methodology and strong asking, with an ideal-
ism, at least originally, to relieve the suffering of man.
God doesn’t care what a man says he believes if in fact he worships in spirit and in truth. The Father has need of
such, especially if he works and thinks to benefit his neighbor. What that man values in his heart and mind, because
it is God and not a concept of God, will lead him to the knowledge that is union with God eventually - because he
honors what is real. Such “worship” fulfills the requirements of the New Covenant, by closing the gap between
knowing and doing, seeing essence as spiritual meaning, and treating others as equal to oneself. By contrast, the
worship of a concept-idol, whether of God or man, leads to whatever the motive for that worship really is. God pon-
ders the heart, or the essence of the man, and not the changing thoughts and opinions of men.
The modern confusion of tongues in religions that declare they are all the “same faith” and the “One Way” is
unavoidable since they are based on unillumined feeling and desire, human tradition, and the carnal intellect. These
are at war with the spirit, just as they were in Christ’s time. To these the Mind of the Spirit and the motive of love
are foolishness. (1 Cor 2:14) Feeling and desire without the Light have no capacity for understanding in themselves.
In Buddhism they are called winds, and are termed irrational because they cannot comprehend or discern- they sim-
ply feel and want. Religion based only in feeling, or in beliefs or assertions that are not understood, is not founded
on using Light (thinking/unselfish prayer/meditation), on awareness (direct knowledge), on love (conscious, not
instinctual union), or on the transformations of character wrought by these. Hence they are not founded on a rela-
tion with the Holy Spirit or the Logos. Instead doctrines of men are simply applied like bandages to the body of
men’s thoughts.
Faith is quite often seen as the verbal or sense-mind’s acceptance of a set of assertions deemed absolute by the
church, or the pastor of the church, and worse, are believed without further inquiry into any deeper meaning than
the literal, intellectual examination of the letter of it. The “truth” is arrived at by textual, linguistic and historical
analysis, guided by the religious tradition examining. Or the text is treated as inerrant, and as entirely complete and
self contained, so that whatever the mortal mind can reason from this position is accepted as biblical. But all such
efforts are the fleshly mind, and rely upon formal, not intrinsic, reasoning, on emotion, and on belief in authori-
ties. Such faith is not a result of knowledge produced by the divine nature of man, through experience of the Light
that illumines that nature’s understandings (Job 32:8), or through contact with the One who is Good itself (Mk 10:18).
Instead many religionists, because the ego is based in fear, and the intellect is based in the ego, believe that God is a
wrathful spirit. Their faith really amounts to believing that Jesus will save them - but from God apparently - if they
only say and believe he will. There are many who say that Jesus is Lord, but for them this means a fundamentally
fear-based bending-of-the-neck which is taken for piety, and such piety for spirituality. Unfortunately, there is a
clear rejection by God of that view in Isaiah 58, and the whole of Jesus’ manner and approach refutes it.
The light of the mind is no longer seen as linked to God through the Good and the True. And how many
Christians believe that the New Covenant that Jesus established is the discernment of the Real through the heart and
mind of man? (Heb 10:16) Or that the Kingdom of God is actually and literally within? Or that we are to become
perfect, or complete, as our Father in Heaven is perfect and complete? Many churches’ teachings have instead
become hieratic assertions of the bigness of God, and the unworthiness of man; their dogma is the letteralism of the
sense-bound intellect, rather than the spirit of divine intuition (as in Meister Eckhart’s sermons); and their worship
Daniel Drumm © 2007

has devolved to rote flattery of a massive ego, expressing a fundamental fear of God, and not love of the Good. The
tongues of their several inspirations have become a Babel, and not a Pentecost, and every sect argues with the other
the meaning of what neither understands anymore. Belief is not salvatory until it reaches the Light. You must know
God in spirit and in truth to actually worship him. Otherwise you worship your own thought... a mental idol of him.

The Logos and the Holy Spirit

In John 10:34 Jesus indicates parenthetically that the scriptures were written by the “word” of God coming unto
15
one of the prophets. This can only be interpreted as an internal communication of light and understanding that was
translated into words by the mind of the prophet. It does not refer to some already written book spoken of as the
Word of God. This is a higher form of inspiration, or revelation, and is accomplished through the Light of the Holy
Spirit. The Holy Spirit communicates to the heart and mind of man as the Logos does, but the Holy Spirit is more
man’s experiential teacher in whatever environment he finds himself. It’s lessons concern learning through relation-
ship to undo the ego and let go, and through love to enter the life of things. The Logos on the other hand commu-
nicates directly to, and through, the light of man’s knowing, reason and self-knowledge. Both reveal. Both are One.
But one communicates to the inner thinking world of man, as the Light of insight. The other communicates to his
inner feeling world as a Presence, but teaches primarily through his outer relationships. In this way man is aided in
all realms (the three worlds, or heavens). However, this discussion is about the Logos as the Light. The Holy Spirit
as Love is already taught by the churches, often out of profound experience, and has been for centuries. The Holy
Spirit teaches feeling and desire, or the psychic soul, transformation through forgiveness and learning to love, really
love, without fear. It teaches one to intuit life directly, and to engage the wholesomeness of Being, concretely, in
situation after situation. It does this in terms the psychic soul can understand by constructing events experienced
entirely for these learnings. The Logos on the other hand instructs the understanding of the heart and mind directly,
based upon the individual effort to see, know, love and understand. Knowledge and Being are one, but the paths to
them can seem very different for a while.
Early Christian teachers thought, as Greek philosophy did, that there was a link through the mind with the Logos
[Various Notes, notes 1]. The Apostles would have known this when they claimed the Logos was incarnated as Jesus. That
claim was an odd, and a new claim to the Jews and Gentiles of their audience, but that the link in man to the Logos
was through self-knowledge, understanding itself, and rational thought, was not. Clement of Alexandria stated “He
who knows himself, knows God.” Clement was echoing the saying “Know Thyself” from Greek philosophy, writ-
ten over the entrance to the Oracle at Delphi, and taught by Socrates. That phrase was considered by the Greeks to
be the epitome of their philosophy and wisdom, as it was by the Hindus where the teaching most likely came from,
as Hindu teachers came back from India with Alexander’s armies. Even the word that Christ used for Father, Abba,
sounds like the Pali word for the real Self, Atta. Both sayings are also echoed in the Gospel of Thomas, the source
text of which may even predate the so-called “Q-document” used to write the Gospels: (3) “If you know yourselves
you will be known, and you will know that you are Sons of the Living Father. But if you do not know yourselves,
you are in poverty, and you are that poverty.” It is possible that references to self-knowledge as a path were deleted
or obscured in the public texts because they did not lend themselves to institutionalization. Given Jesus’ statements
about an inner teaching reserved for those prepared to receive it, such alterations would not necessarily have been
looked upon as problematic. I have read that Jerome claimed he altered the Gospel of Matthew because it was too
esoteric.

Religion and Spirituality

Preaching the idea that the light of one’s own heart and mind, or the individual reason of man, are what connect
him to the Logos, doesn’t make control or consensus easy. That was Iraeneus’ objection, and why he insisted sal-
vation could only come through the Catholic Church via its sacraments. The original heresy hunter, he treated any
Christian system of thought based upon individual knowledge, revelation or relation with God, as Gnosticism and
heresy. If every man can know God through his own heart and mind and you need not that any man teach you, then
what is the role of the churches? How is agreement even possible? If men are to be guided by reason, or the Light,
Daniel Drumm © 2007

rather than by fear, how are people to be motivated when so few think deeply, and care little about love? These are
very practical problems.
The fact is religion is not a search for truth, which search is an individual dialogue with Light, but for brother-
hood. That is its real purpose. It is where the practical work of building culture can be done with other like-minded
individuals. Religion’s method and purpose is to create consensus agreements that form a recognizable and moral
culture, where men and women can live in the light of the understandings they receive. Its purpose is to create
brotherhood, if those understandings are truly enlightened. But for this very reason, that religion seeks to establish
16
agreement, and not insight; harmony, and not knowledge of what is Real; community, and not direct experience of
God, it cannot be what, in the individual, searches for truth. The experience of truth is the intuition of God’s Ideas
in one’s heart and mind, through his Light, and the experience of his Love. Religion is where what is known and
experienced of these, encounters the daily world. It is conservative because it seeks to create, and then maintain, a
form of culture and community in which spiritual relations can express. Insight and revelation however are always
ongoing and developmental, not because God necessarily changes, but man’s understanding does. If religions cul-
tivated an inner circle of individuals whose efforts were to bring Light and revelation to the community, a balance
might be struck to raise the real knowledge of religion. What the consensus agreement chose would be integrated
into the mainstream of religion, and the rest would be treated as valid but auxiliary teaching for varying tempera-
ments. This would be practicable if direct experience were held up as the ideal, and religion’s intention was to lead
the social orders to that and not away from it. Old age for many would become the time of life reserved for direct
spiritual experience, and the development of the individual. A time when religion itself would fall away, like scaf-
folding, to enable the always individual approach to God.
The trouble is that those in authority usually seek to guide and control what the consensus is. When control is
the goal it is easier to preach to people what they must believe to be saved, and make clear that deviation in think-
ing from consensus leads to terrible consequences. That however is not spiritual consensus. It is one person, or
some small group, and the actual level of their understanding, that interprets reality, or God, or scripture to those
not in authority. The claim is made, even if it remains unsaid, that it is God’s thinking, or some special authority’s,
and not their own that is being put forward. As if they were simply telling you what God’s “Word” is or says. The
fact is they have used their own intellect and feeling to establish and justify their views. So again, it is the Light the
mind uses that discerns here. And, as ever, if it is not an open, truthful and sincere asking, then prejudice, prefer-
ence, desire, and expectation color the result. The quality of one’s relation to the Light is primary, even in groups,
and establishing it should be taught as far more important than any absorption of views. In other words honesty,
love and truthfulness should be taught as what actually links man to the spirit, and not concepts.
Those in authority will often promote doubt and fear in whomever they wish to control; and will often censure
thinking, extol faith, and deny the capacity of the mind to reach God. This is because what is to be believed can be
crafted and directed with certain ends in mind, and the promotion of belief inclines people to follow, not question.
Thinking is treated badly then, as if it were only carnal and intellectual, and not as linked to the divine, which the
real mind is, through honesty and truthfulness. The faith one is asked to have is really faith in a minister’s personal-
ity or point of view, or the tradition he follows. It is really faith in that person’s understanding or some other author-
ity’s interpretation of the meaning of what all truthfully can read for themselves, in a Bible most everyone agrees
gives no clear exposition of reality itself. [Various Notes, note 5]
God will let any person make a mistake because you are to always be left free. There are none who are incom-
plete who are inerrant. Even the Apostles did not understand Jesus’ teaching, and were vacillating and fearful even
after Pentecost, as when Paul upbraids Peter and Barnabas for being both (see A History of Christianity by Paul Johnson,
p.5). The Light itself takes pains not to intrude on, or to interfere with your sense of self despite the fact that it is
closer to you than breath, remaining invisible except to what is like itself. By trying to understand, by making mis-
takes, by seeking to get real knowledge through asking more sincerely and honestly, you establish a living relation
to the Light. And to Love. Not to a book, an experience, or the say-so of others. Incidentally, God’s Love is his
Will, in the same way that your love and your will are the same thing. What you love, secretly or openly, that you
do. With God though, his love is real love, and he gives unselfishly what is true and what is good to the one loved,
Daniel Drumm © 2007

based on knowledge, enabling them to grow. It is not just an affection which attaches him, or which blindly seeks
union.
God has said directly, in the very book being used to tell others to know the Lord, not to tell others to know the
Lord, or be told by them, for his laws are written in every person’s heart and mind, and no longer in books or rituals
or forms. After Jesus entered as high priest all now know God directly, from the least to the greatest. (Heb 8: 6-13; 2
Cor 3:3, 7-8) What it is that all know and believe in is some form of Love and Light internally. It may be unrecog-
nized as God, but it is the actual yardstick of their effort nonetheless, on which they rely, and for which they seek.
Everyone can find rightness matching their responsibility in the tablets of the heart. Everyone who is truthful wor- 17
ships God in spirit. Everyone who loves, knows God and is born of him. (1 Jn 4:7) These are the commandments of
the New Covenant, the doing of which lead to the Light, and the Light to transformation. The old commandments
are preparation for them, but they cannot transform you.
Jesus is the high priest of the New Covenant, and not of the ancient religious forms that are passing away. Much
in present day Christianity is inappropriate. Jesus is no object for cheerleading, or for flattering his self-importance
or personality, like some old pagan potentate. All such ego he overcame and let die, so that he could express and
be the Light. The Light relates directly and without superiority. If the desire for acclaim died in him, what is left to
respond to external praise? Love certainly doesn’t seek it. Jesus also rebuked his Apostles, who desired the author-
ity and power of the Old Testament prophets, for thinking him a prophet like Elias to visit punishment on whoever
disagreed with him, making it plain he will have nothing to do with a spirit of wrath. (Lk 9: 54-56) That he is One
with Love... has this ever been believed?

The Spirit of the Commandments

If you stifle your conscience by accepting the beliefs of others out of fearfulness or doubt, you do not fulfill the
first of the Two Great Commandments, to love God with your whole heart, mind, and soul, for you are not being
truthful. Loving God with your mind means using it, using Light, and honoring what it shows you until through
the development of honesty and truthfulness you know, and know that you know. The Spirit itself bears witness
with your spirit. Instead, by allowing others to think and ask for you, you are being expedient, if not cowardly, and
expediency is a cardinal value of the earthly man. An expedient man will not take up any cross for what is true, and
fears to disagree or stand alone. The acceptance of a belief system, which is simply a set of thoughts that you regard
as truth, does not make you spiritual no matter what the nature or original source for those beliefs. Especially if you
have merely adopted them, and have not won through to them by your own efforts. Thoughts are things you can
have, like a book or a vase. They do not in themselves involve you in the Light of God, not intimately like insight,
intuition or revelation do. You can have the “right” thoughts, and even repeat them on demand, but remain unaf-
fected in your heart. Hence you remain in your sins. “Whoever commits sin”, no matter what he says he believes,
“is the servant of sin. And the servant abides not in the house forever. But the Son abides forever.” (Jn 8: 34-35)
Spirit is life, identity and meaningfulness. Spirit develops the greater you, called the Son, and to the Son all of
the Sons of God are of importance. They are of infinite importance, else Jesus would not have made them the cor-
nerstone of love in the Two Great Commandments that replace the Law and the Prophets for a Christian: to love
God with your whole heart, mind and soul, and to love your neighbor as yourself. “For how can you love God
whom you cannot see, if you cannot love your fellow man, whom you can?” (1 Jn 4:20)
Spirit intends a sane and reasonable world through sane and reasonable relations. This has never been and never
will be accomplished by any form of fear, control, threat, brainwashing, or coercion, whether subtle, silent, or
blatant. The means are the end as far as Spirit is concerned. There cannot be an excuse for trying to force others
to believe as you do. Not if you have been warned not to by the book you use for the authority to do so, and espe-
cially not if the Light itself refuses to do so with any man. Without the expression of love, which coercion of any
kind negates, the Kingdom of God cannot manifest on earth. Everyone agreeing to some doctrine or other is not the
Kingdom of God, nor is it even religion. Living from Light and Love is.
The Old Testament Commandments and the Scripture are fingers pointing toward the Real, but are not the Real
itself. The two Great Commandments to love God and man given by Jesus and Hillel, and originally by Moses,
which involve direct relation with Light and Love internally, are the “better hope” of St. Paul. This hope is based
Daniel Drumm © 2007

upon bringing the heavenly man forward into awareness, through the transformations love and truth work in the
personality, or earthly man, “until Christ be formed in you.” (Ga 4:19) If you have faith in God and in his Light to
reveal truth your awakening connection to that Light, or the Kingdom of God within you, will “teach you of all
things.” Asking means the humility of admitting you don’t know something, and the truthfulness of your asking
opens the door.

18
The Real
Knowledge, when it is considered equivalent to Being, is the capacity to know or see into something: to com-
prehend. It is not the memorization of facts or thoughts, or any aggregate of those, which you neither penetrate,
nor integrate, but simply regurgitate. Knowledge is Union. The Light uses all of your experiences to educate you,
including the ideas and writings of men and religions. They are not to replace your own connection with the Light,
since the real point is to develop in you the mind of Christ. (1 Cor 2:9-16)
In Patanjali this mind is called Soul Vision and it is the aim of Yoga. In philosophy it is called Pure Reason and
in Buddhism, Rigpa. The super-consciousness of the heavenly man is the view of the third heaven Paul mentions,
which Plato speaks of as formless: “Without color or shape, that cannot be touched; reason alone, the soul’s pilot,
can behold it, and all true knowledge is knowledge thereof.” It is the Causal plane of Shankara and the Dharmakaya
of Buddhism. The Hall of Wisdom according to Mahayana, it is described as the “indestructible fount of omni-
science... wherein all shadows are unknown, and where the light of truth shines with unfading glory.” - from Book of
the Golden Precepts, trans by H.P.Blavatsky as The Voice of the Silence.
Reality is viewed for the first time from that level, with that mind. The doctrines, dogmas, beliefs and authorita-
tive voices of any particular time period are a picturing of God by each race’s level of awareness, and rarely reach
beyond the understandings of the first or second heaven. That is why there is such a gulf in the understanding of the
different countries, centuries, and even between the books of the Bible, in how they see God.
God is Pure Intelligence and Love, and that is the Real. God is known through your inner core, expressing his
Life and Kingdom through you, and is not something separate from you. You can’t separate the within of you,
from you. You can bring love and light into expression, and let these transform you into what is real and eternal- as
Lincoln put it, into “our better angel.”
If the Kingdom of God is within you then consciousness, or the simple fact of being conscious, prior to every-
thing else, is a direct expression of God. You are that. You cannot be different from it if, as the Bible says, that is
what you are within. Being conscious is the ground upon which everything else within you depends, prior to all
thinking, feeling and experiencing, for if you are not conscious no other psychological act is possible. Becoming
conscious that you are conscious then, is a clearing act. Just as seeing the conscious one in another is a way to reach
toward the Divine in them, looking for that which is essential and real in them, prior to their identifications with
habits, preferences and prejudices. Being conscious means “with Knowing”. What you identify yourself with or as
distorts that innate ability. Consciousness is prior to life, as we now know it, and represents the highest aspect of
Deity. By virtue of being conscious we share in the knowledge and being of God.
God is the Real, and the Light is that which shows you things as they are. Honesty with facts leads to substance.
All facts derive from the Ground of Being, so they must eventually lead to knowledge of its nature and the means
of its expression. Faith is then the intuitive extension of one’s knowing, its implications and direction, into the yet
unknown, much like a hypothesis, or a prediction of the behavior of a system does, based on known laws. A little
knowledge often leads away from God; but a great deal leads back. The Light will show us what we wish to know,
if we will learn how to know, and honor the real nature of our minds. Honesty is the fundamental working principle
of the mind, without which its basic function to see things as they are and work with them as it sees them is pre-
vented. Truthfulness is how transformation is embodied.

Christos
Nothing real can separate us from the Life that the Light and Love of God express. Only fear can, distorting our
Daniel Drumm © 2007

hope and estranging our love. Fear of God, and fear of our fellow man express themselves in a contraction from
life, from events, and from others. It is a contraction of the heart which causes us to be afraid of others, and not
know they are terrified as well. A person believes themself vulnerable and mortal when they identify spiritually with
the body, conscious as the personality of the body’s life, and not of it. The fear at the root of this idea of self, that of
an earthly conditioned ego, capable of dying, is an emotional and moral collapse from the heavenly man or woman.
This fear is our satan, and all that really opposes a Christian of the New Covenant, given that any form of evil only
reaches us through that.
19
 This collapse and inferiorization of self causes withdrawal emotionally and leads to possession by one’s own
attached mind states, appetites and energy. People become mere ideas or images to you; blips on your radar, and not
real relations. There is a recoil from openness, engagement, freed feeling, and radiance. A recoil from Life. Events
and experience are then no longer how the living Father communicates the path of growth, but are something fear
and distorted desires manipulate to pleasurable or consoling ends.
Re-cognition or identification with the Son or Daughter of God you are, through the Light and Love of God,
transforms your manifested energy, just as identification with the body, and feeling and desiring as the personal-
ity of the body, lowers it. This is the Fall, and the Fall is a choice you are continually making. Choose to ascend
through the Light and Love of God by being intelligence and love in relation, and you will arise. Ascension is moral
and spiritual, and not a matter of space and time.
The Light shows us what it true; we need only listen and look. But we must be truthful with what we see, oth-
erwise the Light will wait until we are asking, to show us what is actually there. Similarly, if we are authentic in
our being, and open our hearts unselfishly, we will see others for the first time, and feel directly. We then discover
the Love that underlies the happenings of all our lives; that enfolds the sorrowful selves who appear here as fearful
caricatures of their real selves; the Love which weaves the fabric of all life’s relations. If our life expresses intelli-
gence as sanity and love as fearlessness, in all of our relations, “then will our light break forth like morning, and our
health spring forth speedily.” (Isa 58:8) We will call, and he will answer.

Daniel Drumm

Daniel Drumm © 2007

20
Notes:
Cliff Notes to the New Testament:
On Greek Philosophy in the New Testament
http://www.cliffsnotes.com/WileyCDA/LitNote/id-85,pageNum-8.html
The influence of Greek philosophy was widespread through-
out the Greco-Roman world. The Greek language was used by
educated people, Greek-inspired schools of philosophy were
established in leading cities of the Roman Empire, and the writ-
ings of the Old Testament were translated into Greek by the sev-
enty scholars whose work was known as the Septuagint version
of the Hebrew Scriptures. The influence of Greek ideas can be
seen in many instances of New Testament writing, especially in
those parts of the literature that attempt to interpret the Christian
religion of people whose prior experience was in a Gentile rather
than a Jewish environment. Such attempts are true to a consider-
able ex--tent in the Pauline letters and also in the Gospel of John.
In both of these instances, the writings were addressed to com-
munities composed of Gentile and Jewish Christians. Therefore,
these authors necessarily had to use language with which the
people to whom they were writing were familiar and could read-
ily understand. Greek influences can be noted, too, in other parts
of the New Testament, although they are not as conspicuous
there as they are in the writings of Paul and John.
To say just how much of the New Testament was influenced
either directly or indirectly by Greek conceptions is difficult,
but such influences are recognized readily in the doctrine of the
Logos, which may be translated as Word or Reason; in ethical
conceptions having to do with the conflict between flesh and
spirit; and in the belief in immortality.
When the author of the Fourth Gospel, commonly known as
the Gospel of John, begins his account of Christianity by saying
“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God,
and the Word was God,” he uses a concept that had long been
familiar to students of Greek philosophy. The Word, or Logos,
which was the term used by the Greeks, has a long and interest-
ing history. One finds it in the writings of Heracleitus, one of
the Pre-Socratics whose work appears to have had consider-
able influence on the philosophies of Plato and Aristotle. For
Heracleitus, the Logos was a kind of cosmic order, or divine
justice, that presides over the destinies of a changing world.
Whenever either of two opposite forces operating in the world
oversteps its bounds, the Logos ensures that a proper balance is
restored. Light and darkness, heat and cold, wet and dry, male
and female, like all other pairs of opposites, are thus kept in
proper relation to one another. Nor is the work of the Logos
confined to the physical aspect of nature, for it affects the moral
order as well. Whenever the requirements of justice are violated,
either by individuals or by nations, the Logos acts in a compen-
satory manner and punishes the evildoers and thus restores the
proper balance of things. Plato regarded the Logos, or Reason,
as the divine element that is present in human beings. Its demand
for harmony among the elements, including those in human
nature, provides the key to the real meaning of the good life.
In Stoicism more than in any other branch of Greek phi-
losophy, the doctrine of the Logos was emphasized. The Stoic
philosophers identified Reason with God. They did not conceive
of it as having an existence apart from the world; they believed
that it permeates every part of the world. By virtue of the Logos,
or Reason, the world is a cosmos rather than a chaos. Reason
is present in the minds of humans, and knowledge is possible
because the rational element in human nature is akin to the
Reason that exists in nature, the only difference being that in
the former case, Reason becomes conscious of itself. So far as
humanity is concerned, Reason functions to give guidance and
direction to the activities of life. Because all humans are rational
beings, a common bond exists between them, and this bond was
recognized by the Stoics as the basis for their belief in the uni-
versal brotherhood of humanity. Reason operating in the lives of
human beings made possible the realization of what constituted
for them the real meaning of the good life.
The Stoic ideal is expressed in the words “life according
to nature,” which means a life directed by the rational element
that is present in both nature and humanity. This ideal can be
achieved by bringing one’s feelings and desires under the control
of Reason, which the Stoics believed was a real possibility for
any normal human being. Epictetus, a well-known Stoic writer,
describes this way of life in his essay “Things within our Power
and Things not within our Power.” The individual has power
over his own inner attitudes. He can govern his own spirit, con-
trol his temper, and follow the path of duty rather than yield
to his feelings or be led by his emotions. On the other hand,
circumstances arise over which there is no control. Some things
that happen are inevitable, and the wise person will accept them
without fear or complaint. The apostle Paul reflects this ideal
when he writes in one of his letters, “I have learned, in whatso-
ever state I am, there to be content.”
Closely related to the concept of the Logos, or Reason, is the
notion of conflict between flesh and spirit, an idea that pervades
the whole structure of Greek philosophy and is illustrated in
the teachings of Plato, who held that the world of ideas, or the
realm of the spirit, constitutes reality. This realm is eternal and
unchanging. In contrast, the world that is experienced through
the senses is a changing and unstable one. We could not have
any knowledge concerning such a world except for the unchang-
ing ideas that participate in it. The presence of these ideas, which
are copied or imitated in particular things, gives to them the
appearance of reality. But when ideas are embodied or imitated
in material things, the result is always somewhat inferior to the
original. In other words, matter is the source of corruption and
deterioration.
Ideas conceived in this way are something more than a basis
for the existence of particular things: They are also ideals or
Daniel Drumm © 2007
standards of perfection, thus making it possible for particular
things to be evaluated in terms of their approximation to the
ideal. To call an object good means that it is a close approxima-
tion to the ideal, one that is as nearly like the ideal as it is pos-
sible for a physical object to be. In a similar way of thinking, a
person is morally good who conforms to the pattern of the ideal
as much as it is possible for a human being to do. Centuries after
Plato, Christians illustrated this point when they said of Jesus
21
of Nazareth, “The Word became flesh and made his dwelling
among us.” Jesus is regarded as an embodiment of the ideal. He
is the ideal man, the standard according to which the goodness of
any other human being is to be judged.
For the Greeks, the source of goodness is spirit, and evil has
its roots in matter. Because a human being is composed of both
matter and spirit, a struggle is constantly going on within one’s
own nature. The conflict between good and evil that takes place
in the life of an individual is a conflict between the desires of
the flesh and the demands of the reason, which is the ruling part
of one’s spiritual nature. The Greek idea of a good mind and an
evil body was never accepted by Jews, who teach that man is
created in the image of God. Body, soul, and spirit constitute a
unit that is good. Evil entered the world with the Fall of man and
infected all of the elements in his nature, including his mind and
his body. The apostle Paul was brought up in the Jewish tradi-
tion, and nothing indicates that he ever abandoned the notion of
original sin. Nevertheless, in writing to Gentile Christians, he
frequently uses the language of Greek philosophy. For example,
in the Epistle to the Galatians, he writes, “So I say, live by the
Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the sinful nature.
For the sinful nature desires what is contrary to the Spirit, and
the Spirit what is contrary to the sinful nature. They are in con-
flict with each other. . . . But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy,
peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and
self-control.” - from the Cliff Notes to the New Testament
Various Notes:
“Christ consciousness produces a new creature, a spiritual
state of being. It is not for the purpose of patching up the old
man, or producing more harmonious material conditions. Christ
consciousness is the means by which God, in His-Her Principles
of Being, fashions the child of Light, in which there will be no
more sin, sickness, sorrow, or death. This state of being appears
at the end of mortality as the fruit of Christ’s progression in
Time. Christ consciousness is the identification of Christ within
the organism of one suitable to function the Principles of Being.
It ultimates in producing the Body of Christ, the spiritual state of
being.” - from Steps in the Way, Vol. 1, by Ida Mingle
“The Body of Light is the supreme realization of Dzogchen.
Its function is different from that of a Sambhogakaya manifesta-
tion, because a being in a Body of Light can communicate and
actively help other beings. It is as if the physical body, its mate-
rial substance having been absorbed into its luminous essence,
continues to live as an aggregation of the elements in their subtle
aspect.”- from Dzogchen: the self-perfected state, pp. 39-40, by
Namkhai Norbu
“A mahatma may decide to keep a body- the form body of
the physical- in which he can communicate with and be seen
by humanity. Then he overcomes in his physical body time and
death in the physical world by immortalizing the form of the
physical body, not physical matter as such. He puts the body
through a course of training and provides it with particular foods
which he gradually diminishes in quantity. The body increases
in strength and gradually throws off its physical particles, but
maintains its form. This continues until all the physical particles
have been thrown off and the body of form stands, the con-
queror of death, in the physical world where it may be seen by
men, though it lives in the form-desire world and is known as
an adept, an adept of a higher order. This body is the one which
has been spoken of in theosophical teachings as “nirmanakaya.”
- from Adepts, Masters, and Mahatmas by Harold Percival.
“What man of good sense can ever persuade himself that
there were a first, a second, and a third day, and that each of
these days had a night when there were yet neither sun, moon,
nor stars? What man can be stupid enough to believe that God,
acting the part of a gardener, had planted a garden in the east,
that the tree of life was a real tree, and that its fruit had the vir-
tue of making those who eat of it live forever?” - Origen, from
Thomas Paine’s answer to the Bishop of Landaff
“To comprehend what is, is the task of philosophy, for what
is is reason... To recognize reason as the rose in the cross of the
present and thus to delight in the present- this rational insight
brings us that reconciliation with actuality which philoso-
phy grants those who have once been confronted by the inner
demand to comprehend.” - from the preface of Philosophy of
Right by Hegel
“...From passion comes confusion of mind, then loss of
remembrance, the forgetting of duty. From this loss comes the
ruin of reason, and the ruin of reason leads man to destruction.
But the soul that moves in the world of the senses and yet keeps
the senses in harmony, free from attraction and aversion, finds...
that the God in himself is the same God in all that is... that I
am the heart of all.” - from the Bhaghavad Gita, trans by Yogi
Ramacharaka
“’Know Thyself.’ This is what Hinduism stands for. This is
the quintessence of Hinduism... The Hindu religion has no spe-
cific founder. It is based primarily on the soul-stirring utterances
of the rishis, the seers. A seer is one who visions the Truth, and
communes with the Truth. If you want to define Hinduism, you
can do so with the help of a monosyllable: Love. This Love is
all-embracing and ever-growing. A staunch Hindu will say, “I
can live without air, but not without God.” - from Yoga and the
Spiritual Life, by Sri Chinmoy
“In his dialogue Phaedrus (247 BC) Plato envisions a jour-
ney by a soul to the outermost boundary of the cosmos, and
then gives us a glimpse of what the soul would see if for a brief
moment it were able to “look upon the regions without.” “Of that
place beyond the heavens,” says Plato, none of our earthly poets
has yet sung, and none shall sing worthily. But this is the manner
of it, for assuredly we must be bold to speak what is true, above
Daniel Drumm © 2007
all when our discourse is upon truth. It is there that true being
dwells, without color or shape, that cannot be touched; reason
alone, the soul’s pilot, can behold it, and all true knowledge is
knowledge thereof.” - from The Cosmic Mysteries of Mithras, by
David Ulansey, Author of The Origins of the Mithraic Mysteries
(Oxford University Press, 1991)
“The knowledge of God... is not the knowledge of, or aware-
ness of a great Being, but the expression through human instru- 22
mentality of the divine omniscience.” - Alice Bailey tion caused by the latter I have found to be too weak to be of real
importance. Through the larger part of my life the thought-world
"Like a thread passing through each of the atmospheres and
has naturally dominated the sensation-world so that sensation
connecting with physical man, there is that which relates each to
had come to mean little more than small waves do to an ocean
the other and by means of which the mind in its physical body
liner. The issue then lay between thought-consciousness and
may become aware of each and of all its atmospheres and adjust
Transcendant-Consciousness while the rest, I found, could be
itself in its proper relationship to each atmosphere. The mind
neglected. Now, within a process or manifold, a given phase or
in the physical body is at one end of the thread; the underly-
aspect may be isolated for special attention without stopping
ing individual "I am" is at the other end. To the incarnate mind
the process or eliminating the balance of the manifold. This is a
there seems to be no other end than that at which it is; or else,
familiar technique in scientific and philosophic thinking. When
if it thinks there is a spiritual end it does not consider how that
I recalled this fact and applied it, I found at once a really effec-
end is to be reached. The end which is in the physical can reach
tive method of meditation. In fact, I realize, I have done this
the spiritual end. The way to reach it and unite the ends is by
for many years [Wolff had been a Professor of Mathematics at
means of thought. Thought is not the way, but thought makes or
Stanford] without regarding it as a meditative technique. It was
prepares the way. The way is the thread. Thought travels along
by applying this method of isolation of the essential element
this thread and discovers it and inspirits it. The thread itself is
in the midst of a complex, without trying to restrain the other
that which is conscious through all atmospheres. Thinking about
components, that [my transcendental experience] was effected.”
it is the beginning; being conscious is the opening of the way.
- from Experience and Philosophy by Franklin Merrell-Wolff
By continuing to think about it and by extending the conscious
(State University of New York’s press)
principle, the incarnate mind becomes conscious of itself and
conscious of its higher self at the other end of the conscious
principle, and in course of continued effort the ends will become Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy: On Philo
one. - from “Converstations with Friends” by Harold Percival (by Marion Hillar)
“There dwells within us all this potential which allows us http://www.iep.utm.edu/p/philo.htm
to awaken into buddhahood and attain omniscience.... When, [Note: Philo fuses Jewish with Greek ideas, and was likely dis-
at some future point, we do attain buddhahood, that subtle con- cussed in Jewish religious circles during Christ’s time. Jesus
tinuum of our awareness will awaken to a state of omniscience speaks of manna as if he were referring to Philo. Many of Paul
called dharmakaya.” - from Dzogchen, by H. H. the Dalai Lama and Johns’ ideas, and the identification of Jesus with the Logos,
seem to have come from contact with ideas derived from Philo]
"Both the pituitary body and pineal gland are organs for the
soul of man. But whereas the pituitary body is that center which
Philo believed that man’s final goal and ultimate bliss is in
is used directly by the human mind in all things requiring men-
the “knowledge of the true and living God” (Decal. 81; Abr. 58;
tal operations, the pineal gland is the organ by which the higher
Praem. 14); “such knowledge is the boundary of happiness and
and more divine individuality of man is related. The pituitary
blessedness” (Det. 86). To him, mystic vision allows our soul to
body is used in all ratiocinative processes and mental operations
see the Divine Logos (Ebr. 152) and achieve a union with God
requiring the activity of the reasoning faculties. The pineal gland
(Deut. 30:19-20; Post. 12)... He adheres to the Platonic picture
is used when direct knowledge of a thing is to be obtained. The
of the souls descending into the material realm and that only the
pineal gland is the organ through which is brought to the human
souls of philosophers are able to come to the surface and return
understanding that knowledge and wisdom which is complete in
to their realm in heaven (Gig. 12-15). Philo adopted the Platonic
itself, self-evident, without the process of reasoning. The pineal
concept of the soul with its tripartite division. The rational part
gland is the organ which is used consciously and intelligently
of the soul, however, is breathed into man as a part of God’s
by one possessed of spiritual understanding and wisdom. This
substance. Philo speaks figuratively “Now, when we are alive,
applies to the spiritually wise. To ordinary mankind the pituitary
we are so though our soul is dead and buried in our body, as if in
body is used without his immediate knowledge in the same man-
a tomb. But if it were to die, then our soul would live according
ner that he may think but does not know how he thinks. In the
to its proper life being released from the evil and dead body to
ordinary man the pineal gland is a present witness to the pos-
which it is bound” (Op. 67-69; LA 1.108).
sibilities of the future Divinity of mankind. But at present it is
as silent as the tomb." - from “Converstations with Friends” by According to Philo, man’s highest union with God is limited
Harold Percival to God’s manifestation as the Logos... The Greek, metaphysi-
Daniel Drumm © 2007

cal concept of the Logos is in sharp contrast to the concept of

“Concerning Meditative Technique: The form of meditation
that I have found effective differs substantially from that gener-
ally given in the manuals on meditation. Repeatedly I have tried
stopping thought and closing out the senses, but the artificial
state thus effected was barren of results. Heretofore, the rich
values have come to me through or while thinking. I finally took
this fact as a key and abandoned all effort to stop thought or to
interfere with the reports of sensation. In any case, the distrac-
a personal God described in anthropomorphic terms typical of
Hebrew thought. Philo made a synthesis of the two systems and
attempted to explain Hebrew thought in terms of Greek philoso-
phy by introducing the Stoic concept of the Logos into Judaism.
In the process the Logos became transformed from a metaphysi-
cal entity into an extension of a divine and transcendental anthro-
pomorphic being and mediator between God and men.
23
 The Logos is the Bond of the universe and mediator extended
in nature. The Father eternally begat the Logos and constituted
it as an unbreakable bond of the universe that produces harmony
(Plant. 9-10). The Logos, mediating between God and the world,
is neither uncreated as God nor created as men. So in Philo’s
view the Father is the Supreme Being, and the Logos as his chief
messenger, stands between Creator and creature. The Logos is
an ambassador and suppliant, neither unbegotten nor begotten as
are sensible things (Her. 205). Wisdom [Sophia], the Daughter of
God, is in reality masculine because powers have truly masculine
descriptions, whereas virtues are feminine. That which is in the
second place after the masculine Creator was called feminine,
according to Philo, but her priority is masculine; so the Wisdom
of God is both masculine and feminine (Fug. 50-52). [Meaning
Philo is saying the Logos and Sophia are one]
Philo’s doctrine of the Logos is... clearly the second indi-
vidual in one God as a hypostatization of God’s Creative
Power-Wisdom... Earthly wisdom is but a copy of this celestial
Wisdom. It was represented in historical times by the tabernacle
through which God sent an image of divine excellence as a rep-
resentation and copy of Wisdom (Lev. 16:16; Her. 112-113). The
Divine Logos never mixes with the things which are created and
thus destined to perish, but attends the One alone. This Logos is
apportioned into an infinite number of parts in humans, thus we
impart the Divine Logos. As a result we acquire some likeness to
the Father and the Creator of all (Her. 234-236)....
The reasoning capacity of a human mind is but a portion of
the all-pervading Divine Logos. Mind is a special gift to humans
from God and it has divine essence, therefore, as such, it is
imperishable. By receiving this humans received freedom and
the power of spontaneous will free from necessity (Deus. 47)...
The immortal part of the soul comes from the divine breath of
the Father/Ruler as a part of his Logos.
Philo’s Model of Creation
Though Philo’s model of creation comes from Plato’s
Timaeus, the direct agent of creation is not God himself
(described in Plato as Demiurge, Maker, Artificer), but the
Logos. Philo believes that the Logos is “the man of God” [the
universal human or Adam Kadmon] (Conf. 41) or the shadow of
God [Note: Plato said“God is Truth, and his shadow is Light”,
and John identifies the Logos with Light] that was used as an
instrument and a pattern of all creation (LA 3.96).
The Logos converted unqualified, unshaped preexistent mat-
ter, which Philo describes as “destitute of arrangement, of qual-
ity, of animation, of distinctive character and full of disorder
and confusion,” (Op. 22) into four primordial elements: For it is
out of that essence that God created everything, without indeed
touching it himself, for it was not lawful for the all-wise and all-
blessed God to touch materials which were all misshapen and
confused, but he created them by the agency of his incorporeal
powers, of which the proper name is Ideas, which he so exerted
that every genus received its proper form (LA 1.329).
Intermediary Power
The fundamental doctrine propounded by Philo is that of
Logos as an intermediary power, a messenger and mediator
between God and the world. And the father who created the
universe has given to his archangel and most ancient Logos a
pre-eminent gift, to stand on the confines of both, and separate
that which had been created from the Creator. And this same
Logos is continually a suppliant to the immortal God on behalf
of the mortal race, which is exposed to affliction and misery;
and is also the ambassador, sent by the Ruler of all, to the sub-
ject race. And the Logos rejoices... saying “And I stood in the
midst, between the Lord and you” (Num. 16:48); neither being
uncreated as God, nor yet created as you, but being in the midst
between these two extremities, like a hostage, as it were, to both
parties (Her. 205-206).
When speaking of the high priest, Philo describes the Logos
as God’s son, a perfect being procuring forgiveness of sins and
blessings: “For it was indispensable that the man who was con-
secrated to the Father of the world (the high priest) should have
as a paraclete, his son, the being most perfect in all virtue, to
procure forgiveness of sins, and a supply of unlimited blessings”
(Mos. 2.134). Philo transforms the Stoic impersonal and imma-
nent Logos into a being who was neither eternal like God nor
created like creatures, but begotten from eternity. This being is a
mediator giving hope to men and who “was sent down to earth.”
God, according to Philo, sends “the stream of his own wis-
dom” to men “and causes the changed soul to drink of unchange-
able health; for the abrupt rock is the wisdom of God, which
being both sublime and the first of things he quarried out of his
own powers.” After the souls are watered they are filled with the
manna which “is called something which is the primary genus
of everything. But the most universal of all things is God; and in
the second place is the Logos of God” (LA 2.86). Through the
Logos of God men learn all kinds of instruction and everlasting
wisdom (Fug. 127-120). The Logos is the “cupbearer of God ...
being itself in an unmixed state, the pure delight and sweetness,
and pouring forth and joy, and ambrosial medicine of pleasure
and happiness” (Somn. 2.249). This wisdom was represented by
the tabernacle of the Old Testament which was “a thing made
after the model and in imitation of Wisdom” and sent down to
earth “in the midst of our impurity in order that we may have
something whereby we may be purified, washing off and cleans-
ing all those things which dirty and defile our miserable life,
full of all evil reputation as it is” (Her. 112-113). “God therefore
sows and implants terrestrial virtue in the human race, being an
imitation and representation of the heavenly virtue” (LA 1.45).
Manna
God sends “the stream” from his Wisdom which irri-
gates God-loving souls; consequently they become filled with
“manna.” Manna is described by Philo as a “generic thing” com-
Daniel Drumm © 2007
ing from God. It does not come from God directly, however: “the
most generic is God, and next is the Logos of God, the other
things subsist in word (Logos) only” (LA 2.86). According to
Philo, Moses called manna “the most ancient Logos of God (Det.
118).” Next Philo explains that men are “nourished by the whole
word (Logos) of God, and by every portion of it ... Accordingly,
the soul of the more perfect man is nourished by the whole word
(Logos); but we must be contented if we are nourished by a por-
tion of it” (LA 3.175-176). And “the Wisdom of God, which is 24
the nurse and foster-mother and educator of those who desire
incorruptible food... immediately supplies food to those which
are brought forth by her... but the fountain of divine wisdom is
borne along, at one time in a more gentle and moderate stream,
and at another with greater rapidity and a more exceeding vio-
lence and impetuosity.... (Det. 115-117
Eternal Creation
Philo denies the Aristotelian conclusion coming, according to
him, from the superficial observation that the world existed from
eternity, independent of any creative act. “For some men, admir-
ing the world itself rather than the Creator of the world, have
represented it as existing without any maker, and eternal, and as
impiously and falsely have represented God as existing in a state
of complete inactivity” (Op. 7). He elaborates instead his theory
of the eternal creation (Prov. 1.6-9), as did Proclus (410-485
C.E.) much later in interpreting Plato. Proclus brilliantly demon-
strated that even in the theistic system the world though gener-
ated must be eternal, because the “world is always fabricated... is
always becoming to be.”  Proclus believed, as did Philo, that the
corporeal world is always coming into existence but never pos-
sesses real being. Thus God, according to Philo, did not begin to
create the world at a certain moment, but he is “eternally apply-
ing himself to its creation” (Prov. 1.7; Op. 7; Aet. 83-84).
On Philo: Biography
Philo of Alexandria (20 B.C.E.-50 C.E.)
Philo of Alexandria, a Hellenized Jew, is a figure that spans
two cultures, the Greek and the Hebrew. When Hebrew mythi-
cal thought met Greek philosophical thought in the first century
B.C.E. it was only natural that someone would try to develop
speculative and philosophical justification for Judaism in terms
of Greek philosophy. Thus Philo produced a synthesis of both
traditions developing concepts for future Hellenistic interpreta-
tion of messianic Hebrew thought, especially by Clement of
Alexandria, Christian Apologists like Athenagoras, Theophilus,
Justin Martyr, Tertullian, and by Origen. He may have influ-
enced Paul, his contemporary, and perhaps the authors of the
Gospel of John (C. H. Dodd) and the Epistle to the Hebrews
(R. Williamson and H. W. Attridge). In the process, he laid the
foundations for the development of Christianity in the West and
in the East, as we know it today. Philo’s primary importance is in
the development of the philosophical and theological foundations
of Christianity.
Scriptural References in the Text
All selections KJV unless noted otherwise.
Job 32:8
8 But there is a spirit in man: and the inspiration of the Almighty giveth
them understanding.
2 Tim 1:7
7 For God has not given us the spirit of fear; but that of power, and of
love, and of a sound mind.
John 1:4, 9 (Young’s Literal Translation)
4 In him was life; and the life was the light of men....
9 He was the true Light, which doth enlighten every man, coming to the
world;
1 Corinthians 2: 9-16
9 But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have
entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them
that love him.
10 But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit: for the Spirit sear-
cheth all things, yea, the deep things of God.
11 For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man
which is in him? even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit
of God.
12 Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which
is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God.
13 Which things also we speak, not in the words which man’s wisdom
teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth; comparing spiritual things with
spiritual.
14 But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for
they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are
spiritually discerned.
15 But he that is spiritual judgeth all things, yet he himself is judged of
no man.
16 For who hath known the mind of the Lord, that he may instruct him?
but we have the mind of Christ.
Luke 18:19
19 And Jesus said unto him, Why callest thou me good? None is good,
save one, that is, God.
2 Corinthians 3:6-18
6 Who also hath made us able ministers of the new testament; not of the
letter, but of the spirit: for the letter killeth, but the spirit giveth life.
7 But if the ministration of death, written and engraven in stones, was glo-
rious, so that the children of Israel could not steadfastly behold the face of
Moses for the glory of his countenance; which glory was to be done away:
8 How shall not the ministration of the spirit be rather glorious?
9 For if the ministration of condemnation be glory, much more doth the
ministration of righteousness exceed in glory.
10 For even that which was made glorious had no glory in this respect, by
reason of the glory that excelleth.
11 For if that which is done away was glorious, much more that which
remaineth is glorious.
12 Seeing then that we have such hope, we use great plainness of speech:
13 And not as Moses, which put a veil over his face, that the children of
Israel could not steadfastly look to the end of that which is abolished:
14 But their minds were blinded: for until this day remaineth the same veil
untaken away in the reading of the old testament; which veil is done away
in Christ.
15 But even unto this day, when Moses is read, the veil is upon their heart.
16 Nevertheless when it shall turn to the Lord, the veil shall be taken
away.
17 Now the Lord is that Spirit: and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there
is liberty.
18 But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the
Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the
Spirit of the Lord.
Job 34: 10-12, 17
10 Therefore hearken unto me ye men of understanding: far be it from
God, that he should do wickedness; and from the Almighty, that he should
commit iniquity.
11 For the work of a man shall he render unto him, and cause every man
to find according to his ways.
Daniel Drumm © 2007
12 Yea, surely God will not do wickedly, neither will the Almighty pervert
judgment.
17 Shall even he that hateth right govern? And wilt thou condemn him
that is most just?
1 John 4:8, 16
8 He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love....
16 And we have known and believed the love that God hath to us. God is
love; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him.
25
1 John 1:5
5 This then is the message which we have heard of him, and declare unto
you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all.
Exodus 3:14
14 And God said unto Moses, I AM THAT I AM: and he said, Thus shalt
thou say unto the children of Israel, I AM hath sent me unto you.
John 14:23
23 Jesus answered and said unto him, If a man love me, he will keep my
words: and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make
our abode with him.
John 15:10
10 If ye keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love; even as I
have kept my Father’s commandments, and abide in his love.
John 6:63
63... the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life.
and persecute you;
45 That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he
maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the
just and on the unjust.
46 For if ye love them which love you, what reward have ye? do not even
the publicans the same?
47 And if ye salute your brethren only, what do ye more than others? do
not even re publicans so?
48 Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is
perfect.
Hebrews 8:10-11
10 For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after
those days, saith the Lord; I will put my laws into their mind, and write
them in their hearts: and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a
people:
11 And they shall not teach every man his neighbor, and every man his
brother, saying, Know the Lord: for all shall know me, from the least to the
greatest.

John 1:1-4 Romans 13:8

1 In the beginning was the Logos, and the Logos was with God, and the 8 Owe no man any thing, but to love one another: for he that loveth anoth-
Logos was God. er hath fulfilled the law.
2 The same was in the beginning with God.
3 All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made 2 Timothy 5-6, 14
that was made. 5 When I call to remembrance the unfeigned faith that is in thee, which
4 In him was life; and the life was the light of men. dwelt first in thy grandmother Lois, and thy mother Eunice; and I am per-
suaded that in thee also.
Matthew 4:4 6 Wherefore I put thee in remembrance that thou stir up the gift of God,
4 But he answered and said, It is written, Man shall not live by bread which is in thee by the putting on of my hands...
alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God. 14 That good thing which was committed unto thee keep by the Holy
Ghost which dwelleth in us.
Luke 17:21
21 Neither shall they say, Lo here! or lo there! For behold, the kingdom of 1 John 4:12
God is within you. 12 No man hath seen God at any time. If we love one another, God dwell-
eth in us, and his love is perfected in us.
John 1:4, 9 - see above
Matthew 18:20
John 10:10 20 For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in
10 I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more the midst of them.
abundantly.
1 John 2:27  - see above
1 John 4:20-21
20 If a man say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar: for he that Matthew 7: 7-12
loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he 7 Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it
hath not seen? shall be opened unto you:
21 And this commandment have we from him, That he who loveth God 8 For every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to
love his brother also. him that knocketh it shall be opened.
9 Or what man is there of you, whom if his son ask bread, will he give
1 John 4:7-8  him a stone?
7 Beloved, let us love one another: for love is of God; and every one that 10 Or if he ask a fish, will he give him a serpent?
loveth is born of God, and knoweth God.  11 If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children,
8 He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love. how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things to
them that ask him?
1 John 2:9-11  12 Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you,
9 He that saith he is in the light, and hateth his brother, is in darkness even do ye even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets.
until now.
10 He that loveth his brother abideth in the light, and there is none occa- Luke 18:19 - see above
sion of stumbling in him.
11 But he that hateth his brother is in darkness, and walketh in darkness, John 6:33
Daniel Drumm © 2007

and knoweth not whither he goeth, because that darkness hath blinded his 33 For the bread of God is he which cometh down from heaven, and
eyes. giveth life unto the world.

Matthew 5:41-48 Luke 17:21 - see above

41 And whosoever shall compel thee to go a mile, go with him twain.
42 Give to him that asketh thee, and from him that would borrow of thee John 4:24 
turn not thou away. 24 God is a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit
43 Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and and in truth.
hate thine enemy.
44 But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do John 4:14
good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, 14 But whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never 26
thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water
springing up into everlasting life.
John 4:32
32 But he said unto them, I have meat to eat that ye know not of.
John 6:57
57 As the living Father hath sent me, and I live by the Father: so he that
eateth me, even he shall live by me.
John 6: 51-58 - see below
John 6:63
63 It is the spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing: the words
that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life.
John 6:55
55 For my flesh is meat indeed, and my blood is drink indeed.
John 6:45-63 NIV
45 It is written in the Prophets: ‘They will all be taught by God.’ Everyone
who listens to the Father and learns from him comes to me.
46 No one has seen the Father except the one who is from God; only he
has seen the Father.
47 I tell you the truth, he who believes has everlasting life.
48 I am the bread of life.
49 Your forefathers ate the manna in the desert, yet they died.
50 But here is the bread that comes down from heaven, which a man may
eat and not die.
51 I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of
this bread, he will live for ever. This bread is my flesh, which I will give for
the life of the world.
52 Then the Jews began to argue sharply among themselves, How can this
man give us his flesh to eat?
53 Jesus said to them, I tell you the truth, unless you eat the flesh of the
Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you.
54 Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will
raise him up at the last day.
55 For my flesh is real food and my blood is real drink.
56 Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me, and I in
him.
57 Just as the living Father sent me and I live because of the Father, so the
one who feeds on me will live because of me.
58 This is the bread that came down from heaven. Your forefathers ate
manna and died, but he who feeds on this bread will live for ever.
59 He said this while teaching in the synagogue in Capernaum.
60 On hearing it, many of his disciples said, This is a hard teaching. Who
can accept it?
61 Aware that his disciples were grumbling about this, Jesus said to them,
Does this offend you?
62 What if you see the Son of Man ascend to where he was before!
63 The Spirit gives life; the flesh counts for nothing. The words I have
spoken to you are spirit and they are life.
John 15:1-5
1 I am the true vine, and my Father is the husbandman.
2 Every branch in me that beareth not fruit he taketh away: and every
branch that beareth fruit, he purgeth it, that it may bring forth more fruit.
3 Now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you.
4 Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself,
except it abide in the vine; no more can ye, except ye abide in me.
5 I am the vine, ye are the branches: He that abideth in me, and I in him,
the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do nothing.
John 6:33, 51
33 For the bread of God is he which cometh down from heaven, and
giveth life unto the world.
51... This bread is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.
John 1:4, 9 - see above
John 6:32
32 Then Jesus said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Moses gave
you not that bread from heaven; but my Father giveth you the true bread
from heaven.
John 6: 50-51
50 But here is the bread that comes down from heaven, which a man may
eat and not die.
51 I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of
this bread, he will live for ever.
Luke 14:15
15 And when one of them that sat at meat with him heard these things, he
said unto him, Blessed is he that shall eat bread in the kingdom of God.
Hebrews 6:20
20 Whither the forerunner is for us entered, even Jesus, made an high
priest for ever after the order of Melchisedec.
Hebrews 7:16
Who is made, not after the law of a carnal commandment, but after the
power of an endless life.
Romans 8:11
But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he
that raised up Christ from the dead will also quicken your mortal bodies by
his Spirit that dwells in you.
Romans 8:6,13
6 For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life
and peace...
13 For if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die: but if ye through the Spirit do
mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live.
Job 38:4,7
4 Where wast thou when I laid the foundations of the earth? Declare, if
thou hast understanding....
7 When the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted
for joy?
John 10:32-36
32 Jesus answered them, Many good works have I shewed you from my
Father; for which of those works do ye stone me?
33 The Jews answered him, saying, For a good work we stone thee not;
but for blasphemy; and because that thou, being a man, makest thyself God.
34 Jesus answered them, Is it not written in your law, I said, Ye are gods?
35 If he called them gods, unto whom the word of God came, and the
scripture cannot be broken;
36 Say ye of him, whom the Father hath sanctified, and sent into the
world, Thou blasphemest; because I said, I am the son of God?
Romans 8:14, 16
14 For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God...
16 The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children
of God:
Psalm 82:6-7
6 You are gods, And all of you are children of the Most High.
7 But you shall die like men.
Daniel Drumm © 2007
Ecclesiastes 12:7
7 Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was: and the spirit shall
return unto God who gave it.
James 1:15
Then when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin: and sin, when it is
finished, bringeth forth death.
John 8:32-36
32 And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.
33 They answered him, We be Abraham’s seed, and were never in bond- 27
age to any man: how sayest thou, Ye shall be made free?
34 Jesus answered them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Whosoever com-
mitteth sin is the servant of sin.
35 And the servant abideth not in the house for ever: but the Son abideth
ever.
36 If the Son therefore shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed.
Romans 8:18-21, 23
18 For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to
be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us.
19 For the earnest expectation of the creature waiteth for the manifestation
of the sons of God.
20 For the creature was made subject to vanity, not willingly, but by rea-
son of him who hath subjected the same in hope,
21 Because the creature itself also shall be delivered from the bondage of
corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God....
23 And not only they, but ourselves also, which have the firstfruits of the
Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption,
to wit, the redemption of our body.
Genesis 3:22, 24
And the LORD God said, Behold, the man is become as one of us, to
know good and evil: and now, lest he put forth his hand, and take also of the
tree of life, and eat, and live for ever... he drove out the man.
Revelation 2: 7
7 He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches;
To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the tree of life, which is in the
midst of the paradise of God.
Romans 8:21, 23 - see above
John 11:11-14 (NIV)
11 After he had said this, he went on to tell them, “Our friend Lazarus has
fallen asleep; but I am going there to wake him up.”
12 His disciples replied, “Lord, if he sleeps, he will get better.”
13 Jesus had been speaking of his death, but his disciples thought he
meant natural sleep.
14 So then he told them plainly, “Lazarus is dead.”
1 Corinthians 15: 53-54
53 For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put
on immortality.
54 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.
Hebrews 9:27
27 And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment:
Romans 8:21
21 Because the creature itself also shall be delivered from the bondage of
corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God.
John 8:51
51 Verily, verily, I say unto you, If a man keep my saying, he shall never
see death.
Luke 9:27
27 But I tell you of a truth, there be some standing here, which shall not
taste of death, till they see the kingdom of God.
1 Corinthians 15:12-22
12 Now if Christ be preached that he rose from the dead, how say some
among you that there is no resurrection of the dead?
13 But if there be no resurrection of the dead, then is Christ not risen:
14 And if Christ be not risen, then is our preaching vain, and your faith is
also vain.
15 Yea, and we are found false witnesses of God; because we have testi-
fied of God that he raised up Christ: whom he raised not up, if so be that the
dead rise not.
16 For if the dead rise not, then is not Christ raised:
17 And if Christ be not raised, your faith is vain; ye are yet in your sins.
18 Then they also which are fallen asleep in Christ are perished.
19 If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most mis-
erable.
20 But now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the firstfruits of
them that slept.
21 For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the
dead.
22 For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive.
Philippians 2:5-6
5 Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus:
6 Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with
God.
John 14:12
12 Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me, the works that
I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do; because I go
unto my Father.
1 Corinthians 15:47 (NIV)
47 The first man was of the dust of the earth, the second man from heav-
en.
[Note: In Adam all die, or return to dust “because dust thou art, and to
dust thou shalt return.” Gen 3:19 “It is appointed unto man once to die,
and then the judgment.” Heb 9:27 But Psalm 82: 1, 6-7 says: “God hath
stood in the company of God, In the midst God doth judge... I- I have said,
`Gods ye [are], And sons of the Most High- all of you, But as man ye die”-
Young’s Literal Translation. What dies as a man is the spirit’s identification
with and as the earthly man; the body; the human animal or creature- as
contrasted with the heavenly man, or son of God, who is as the Lord from
heaven. Ecclesiastes 12:7 says “Then shall the dust return to the earth as it
was: and the spirit shall return unto God who gave it.” In Christ, the second
Adam, all are made alive, for he is a quickening spirit. It is the heavenly
man buried in the tomb of the body who wakes from the dead. The one who
came down from heaven, is the one who ascends back up to it. The dust of
Adam, the creature, must put on incorruption when the Spirit overcomes
death. See Romans 8:18-21, 23 above.]
John 10:34
34 Jesus answered them, Is it not written in your law, ‘I said, Ye are
gods?’
Psalm 82: 1, 6-7 (NKIV)
1 God stands in the congregation of the mighty; He judges among the
gods...
6 I said, “You are gods, And all of you are children of the Most High.
7 But you shall die like men
1 John 2:5
5 But whoso keepeth his word, in him verily is the love of God perfected:
hereby know we that we are in him.
1 John 2:9-10
“He that says he is in the light and hates his brother, is in darkness even
now. He that loves his brother abides in the light, and there is no occasion of
stumbling in him.”
Hebrews 8
Daniel Drumm © 2007
1 Now of the things which we have spoken this is the sum: We have such
an high priest, who is set on the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in
the heavens;
2 A minister of the sanctuary, and of the true tabernacle, which the Lord
pitched, and not man.
3 For every high priest is ordained to offer gifts and sacrifices: wherefore
it is of necessity that this man have somewhat also to offer.
4 For if he were on earth, he should not be a priest, seeing that there are
priests that offer gifts according to the law:
5 Who serve unto the example and shadow of heavenly things, as Moses
was admonished of God when he was about to make the tabernacle: for, See,28
saith he, that thou make all things according to the pattern shewed to thee in
the mount.
6 But now hath he obtained a more excellent ministry, by how much also
he is the mediator of a better covenant, which was established upon better
promises.
7 For if that first covenant had been faultless, then should no place have
been sought for the second.
8 For finding fault with them, he saith, Behold, the days come, saith the
Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with
the house of Judah:
9 Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day
when I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt; because
they continued not in my covenant, and I regarded them not, saith the Lord.
10 For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after
those days, saith the Lord; I will put my laws into their mind, and write
them in their hearts: and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a
people:
11 And they shall not teach every man his neighbor, and every man his
brother, saying, Know the Lord: for all shall know me, from the least to the
greatest.
12 For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their
iniquities will I remember no more.
13 In that he saith, A new covenant, he hath made the first old. Now that
which decayeth and waxeth old is ready to vanish away.
Hebrews 7: 18-19
For there is truthfully an annulling of the commandment that went before,
for its weakness and unprofitability. For the Law made nothing perfect; but
the bringing of a better hope did, by which we draw near to God.
2 Corinthians 3:6-18 - see above
Galatians 4:21-31
21 Tell me, ye that desire to be under the law, do ye not hear the law?
22 For it is written, that Abraham had two sons, the one by a bondmaid,
the other by a freewoman.
23 But he who was of the bondwoman was born after the flesh; but he of
the freewoman was by promise.
24 Which things are an allegory: for these are the two covenants; the one
from the mount Sinai, which gendereth to bondage, which is Agar.
25 For this Agar is mount Sinai in Arabia, and answereth to Jerusalem
which now is, and is in bondage with her children.
26 But Jerusalem which is above is free, which is the mother of us all.
27 For it is written, Rejoice, thou barren that bearest not; break forth and
cry, thou that travailest not: for the desolate hath many more children than
she which hath an husband.
28 Now we, brethren, as Isaac was, are the children of promise.
29 But as then he that was born after the flesh persecuted him that was
born after the Spirit, even so it is now.
30 Nevertheless what saith the scripture? Cast out the bondwoman and
her son: for the son of the bondwoman shall not be heir with the son of the
freewoman.
31 So then, brethren, we are not children of the bondwoman, but of the
free.
Hebrews 8:6-11 -see above
Jeremiah 31:30-34
30 But every one shall die for his own iniquity: every man that eateth the
sour grape, his teeth shall be set on edge.
31 Behold, the days come, saith the LORD, that I will make a new cov-
enant with the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah:
32 Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day
that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt; which
my covenant they brake, although I was an husband unto them, saith the
LORD:
33 But this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel;
After those days, saith the LORD, I will put my law in their inward parts,
and write it in their hearts; and will be their God, and they shall be my
people.
34 And they shall teach no more every man his neighbor, and every man
his brother, saying, Know the LORD: for they shall all know me, from the
least of them unto the greatest of them, saith the LORD: for I will forgive
their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.
Hebrews 10:16
16 This is the covenant that I will make with them after those days, saith
the Lord, I will put my laws into their hearts, and in their minds will I write
them.
2 Corinthians 3:3-8
3 Forasmuch as ye are manifestly declared to be the epistle of Christ min-
istered by us, written not with ink, but with the Spirit of the living God; not
in tables of stone, but in fleshy tables of the heart.
4 And such trust have we through Christ to God-ward:
5 Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think any thing as of our-
selves; but our sufficiency is of God;
6 Who also hath made us able ministers of the new testament; not of the
letter, but of the spirit: for the letter killeth, but the spirit giveth life.
7 But if the ministration of death, written and engraven in stones, was
glorious, so that the children of Israel could not steadfastly behold the face
of Moses for the glory of his countenance; which glory was to be done
away: 8 How shall not the ministration of the spirit be rather glorious?
2 Corinthians 3:13-18 - see above
Luke 16:15-17
15 And he said unto them, Ye are they which justify yourselves before
men; but God knoweth your hearts: for that which is highly esteemed among
men is abomination in the sight of God.
16 The law and the prophets were until John: since that time the kingdom
of God is preached, and every man presseth into it.
17 And it is easier for heaven and earth to pass, than one tittle of the law
to fail.
Hebrews 8:13 - see above
1 Corinthians 15:47 - see above
John 8:32 - see above
John 8:17
17 It is also written in your law, that the testimony of two men is true.
John 10:34 - see above
Matthew 19:4-11
4 And he answered and said unto them, Have ye not read, that he which
made them at the beginning made them male and female,
5 And said, For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall
cleave to his wife: and they twain shall be one flesh?
6 Wherefore they are no more twain, but one flesh. What therefore God
hath joined together, let not man put asunder.
7 They say unto him, Why did Moses then command to give a writing of
divorcement, and to put her away?
8 He saith unto them, Moses because of the hardness of your hearts suf-
fered you to put away your wives: but from the beginning it was not so.
9 And I say unto you, Whosoever shall put away his wife, except it be for
fornication, and shall marry another, committeth adultery: and whoso mar-
rieth her which is put away doth commit adultery.
10 His disciples say unto him, If the case of the man be so with his wife,
it is not good to marry.
11 But he said unto them, All men cannot receive this saying, save they to
Daniel Drumm © 2007
whom it is given.
1 Corinthians 2:14 - see above
Job 32:8- see above
Mark 10:18
18 And Jesus said unto him, Why callest thou me good? There is none
good but one, that is, God.
Isaiah 58: 1-12 29
 1 Cry aloud, spare not, lift up thy voice like a trumpet, and shew my
people their transgression, and the house of Jacob their sins.
2 Yet they seek me daily, and delight to know my ways, as a nation that
did righteousness, and forsook not the ordinance of their God: they ask of
me the ordinances of justice; they take delight in approaching to God.
3 Wherefore have we fasted, say they, and thou seest not? Wherefore have
we afflicted our soul, and thou takest no knowledge? Behold, in the day of
your fast ye find pleasure, and exact all your labours.
4 Behold, ye fast for strife and debate, and to smite with the fist of wick-
edness: ye shall not fast as ye do this day, to make your voice to be heard on
high.
5 Is it such a fast that I have chosen? A day for a man to afflict his soul?
Is it to bow down his head as a bulrush, and to spread sackcloth and ashes
under him? Wilt thou call this a fast, and an acceptable day to the LORD?
6 Is not this the fast that I have chosen? To loose the bands of wickedness,
to undo the heavy burdens, and to let the oppressed go free, and that ye
break every yoke?
7 Is it not to deal thy bread to the hungry, and that thou bring the poor that
are cast out to thy house? When thou seest the naked, that thou cover him;
and that thou hide not thyself from thine own flesh?
8 Then shall thy light break forth as the morning, and thine health shall
spring forth speedily: and thy righteousness shall go before thee; the glory
of the LORD shall be thy reward.
9 Then shalt thou call, and the LORD shall answer; thou shalt cry, and he
shall say, Here I am. If thou take away from the midst of thee the yoke, the
putting forth of the finger, and speaking vanity;
10 And if thou draw out thy soul to the hungry, and satisfy the afflicted
soul; then shall thy light rise in obscurity, and thy darkness be as the noon
day:
11 And the LORD shall guide thee continually, and satisfy thy soul in
drought, and make fat thy bones: and thou shalt be like a watered garden,
and like a spring of water, whose waters fail not.
12 And they that shall be of thee shall build the old waste places: thou
shalt raise up the foundations of many generations; and thou shalt be called,
The repairer of the breach, The restorer of paths to dwell in.
Hebrews 10:16 -see above
John 10:34 - see above
Hebrews 8:6-13 - see above
2 Corinthians 3:3, 7-8 - see above
1 John 4:7- see above
Luke 9:54-56
54 And when his disciples James and John saw this, they said, Lord, wilt
thou that we command fire to come down from heaven, and consume them,
even as Elias did?
55 But he turned, and rebuked them, and said, Ye know not what manner
of spirit ye are of.
56 For the Son of man is not come to destroy men’s lives, but to save
them. And they went to another village.
John 8:34-35
34 Jesus answered them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Whosoever com-
mitteth sin is the servant of sin.
35 And the servant abideth not in the house for ever: but the Son abideth
ever.
1 John 4:20
20 If a man say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar: for he that
loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he
hath not seen?
Galatians 4:19
19 My little children, of whom I travail in birth again until Christ be
formed in you....
1 Corinthians 2:9-16 - see above
Supplemental References: On Immortality
James 1:15
Then when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin: and sin, when it is
finished, bringeth forth death.
Romans 6:23
For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life.
1 Corinthians 15:56
The sting of death is sin; and the strength of sin is the law.
1 John 3:9
Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin; for his seed remaineth in
him: and he cannot sin, because he is born of God.
From the Chaldaic writings of the Hebrews given before the Egyptian
bondage: “On those overcoming all weaknesses and abolishing all sin from
their lives, death has no claim.” - Rabbi Bendovan, a Levite record keeper.
1 Corinthians 15:26
26 The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death.
John 8:51 (NIV)
51 I tell you the truth, if anyone keeps my word, he will never see death.”
Luke 9:27 (also quoted in Mk 9:1; Mt 16:28)
27 But I tell you of a truth, there be some standing here, which shall not
taste of death, till they see the kingdom of God.
John 6:48-51 (NIV)
48 I am the bread of life.
49 Your forefathers ate the manna in the desert, yet they died.
50 But here is the bread that comes down from heaven, which a man may
eat and not die.
51 I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of
this bread, he will live forever. This bread is my flesh, which I will give for
the life of the world.”
1 Corinthians 15:42-55
42 So also is the resurrection of the dead. It is sown in corruption; it is
raised in incorruption:
43 It is sown in dishonor; it is raised in glory: it is sown in weakness; it is
raised in power:
44 It is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. There is a natural
body, and there is a spiritual body.
45 And so it is written, The first man Adam was made a living soul; the
last Adam was made a quickening spirit.
46 Howbeit that was not first which is spiritual, but that which is natural;
and afterward that which is spiritual.
47 The first man is of the earth, earthy; the second man is the Lord from
heaven.
48 As is the earthy, such are they also that are earthy: and as is the heav-
enly, such are they also that are heavenly.
49 And as we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the
image of the heavenly.
50 Now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the king-
dom of God; neither doth corruption inherit incorruption.
51 Behold, I shew you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, but we shall all
be changed,
52 In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trum-
pet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be
changed.
53 For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put
on immortality.
54 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.
55 O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?
John 11:25-26
25 Jesus said unto her, I am the resurrection, and the life: he that believeth
in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live:
26 And whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die. Believest
thou this?
[Note: If you abide in the Vine, his Word or Light, you shall never die.
He was not referring to a life after death, or a later resurrection, for he was
speaking to Martha right before he raised Lazarus. Lazarus was one on
whom death had no claim. If he were simply demonstrating the power of the
Spirit to raise the dead in a later physical resurrection, why would he tell
Martha the living would not die?]

Hebrews 11:5
5 By faith Enoch was translated that he should not see death; and was not
found, because God had translated him: for before his translation he had this
testimony, that he pleased God.

Hebrews 7: 1, 5-17
1 For this Melchisadek... 3 Without father, without mother, without
descent, having neither beginning of days, nor end of life; but made like
unto the Son of God; abideth a priest continually...
5 And verily they that are of the sons of Levi, who receive the office of
the priesthood, have a commandment to take tithes of the people according
to the law, that is, of their brethren, though they come out of the loins of
Abraham:
6 But he whose descent is not counted from them received tithes of
Abraham, and blessed him that had the promises.
7 And without all contradiction the less is blessed of the better.
8 And here men that die receive tithes; but there he receiveth them, of
whom it is witnessed that he liveth....
11 If therefore perfection were by the Levitical priesthood, (for under it
the people received the law) what further need was there that another priest
should rise after the order of Melchisadek, and not be called after the order
of Aaron?
12 For the priesthood being changed, there is made of necessity a change
also of the law.
13 For he of whom these things are spoken pertaineth to another tribe, of
which no man gave attendance at the altar.
14 For it is evident that our Lord sprang out of Judah; of which tribe
Moses spake nothing concerning priesthood.
15 And it is yet far more evident: for that after the similitude of
Melchisadek there ariseth another priest,
16 Who is made, not after the law of a carnal commandment, but after the
power of an endless life.
17 For he testifieth, Thou art a priest for ever after the order of
Melchisadek.

Genesis 3:22, 24
And the LORD God said, Behold, the man is become as one of us, to
know good and evil: and now, lest he put forth his hand, and take also of the
tree of life, and eat, and live for ever... he drove out the man.

Revelation 2: 7
7 He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches;
To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the tree of life, which is in the
midst of the paradise of God.