Man, His Nature and Individuality

Written by REV. G. A. KRATZER and published in The Christian Science Journal, December 1909

We learn from Science and Health (p. 468) that '"man is not material; he is spiritual." We might have learned as much from the Bible, but we did not until Mrs. Eddy pointed the way. Jesus said to the woman of Samaria.' "God is a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit." So God's man must be spiritual, else the above statement requires an impossibility, for a material sense cannot worship in spirit; that is, spiritually. Again, we read that "God created man in his own image;" hence, if God is Spirit, man must be spiritual rather than material. In the second account of the creation, however, we are told that "the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground;" and this doctrine, that God created man materially, is taught or implied in many other parts of the Bible. In consequence of these teachings, the common belief among religious people has been that God created man both spiritually and materially: that while he is upon the earth man is primarily material and only secondarily spiritual, but that by the process of death he ceases to be material and becomes wholly spiritual.

By earnest study and prayer, Mrs. Eddy reached that spiritual illumination which enabled her to discern between the true and the false. She saw that in truth God creates man spiritually and the universe spiritually, and that is the only way they were and are created. She discovered that mortal belief which is a delusive consciousness of matter and evil, regards man and the universe as material; but, though material things seem to be realities, they have only the status of a false sense. This theory may seem very fanciful at first thought; but Mrs. Eddy and thousands of her followers have put it to the practical test, and find that it is demonstrably true in healing the sick, reforming the sinful, and removing discordant conditions of various kinds. Furthermore, in Science and Health, Mrs. Eddy has shown how, as rational creatures, we can deny material evidence and understand and believe that man and the whole creation are spiritual, and not at all material; that all which is real is good, and that there is not in reality any evil; and she has shown how this truth can be understandingly and scientifically applied by the intelligent believer to the healing of disease and the casting out of sin. The import and application of the "scientific statement of being," above quoted, that "man is not material; he is spiritual," is rapidly dawning on human thought.

We learn from Science and Health that God is the only substance; other names for God being Life, Truth, Love, Mind, Spirit, which are substance, being identical with God. We learn that man himself is not substance, but the offspring, reflection, or idea of substance, or God. (See Science and Health, p. 301.) To express the relation of man to God, the word "reflection" has been selected by Mrs. Eddy, and her wisdom in this is seen when we think how happily it conveys the idea that man is a perfect likeness of God, and yet is not substance. One's reflection in a mirror is a perfect likeness of him, and of his every motion and expression, yet the reflection has no substance. In so far, however, as the word reflection would suggest that there is some substance outside of God to reflect Him, as the mirror is outside of the person it reflects, it does not adequately express the teaching of Christian Science. Mrs. Eddy says, "The universe reflects and expresses the divine substance or Mind: therefore God is seen only in the spiritual universe and spiritual man, as the sun is seen in the ray of light which goes out from it" (Science and Health, p. 300).

The figure of the sun and its ray is an excellent one for expressing certain phases of the relation of man to God. The sun perfectly images itself forth on every side by means of its rays, yet the sun is not in its rays. So, to carry out the figure, God is spiritually "self-luminous," and the "light" that He gives forth is spiritual man and the spiritual universe. If, in using the sun as an illustration, we think of the sun as Mind, and think of the sun's rays as ideas or emanations of Mind, and if further we think of these emanations of Mind as capable of being conscious of the thoughts, feelings, will, and consciousness of the Mind which emanates them, and capable of having no other consciousness, we get a glimpse of the nature of the real, the spiritual man, and of his relation to God. The real man can hold no thought, no feeling, no will, which is apart from or contrary to the thought, feeling, and will of God.

The real man thus expresses or perfectly reflects divine intelligence, divine Love, divine will. The real man is a spiritual emanation of God, surcharged with the divine thought, love, and consciousness, knowing as God knows, choosing as God chooses, giving out the love which God bestows upon him. So the real man is continually conscious of the love, life, harmony, health, strength, serenity, knowledge, joy, and peace of divine Mind; and in his consciousness there is nothing that is unlike God, good. God being harmonious, there can be no inharmony or competition among His ideas or children. There can be no hatred, malice, jealousy, envy, revenge, or antagonism between the children of God. This thought, held in realization, will cause the mortal claims of hatred, envy, and the like to vanish; and the thought of the one Mind, held to and realized, will clear up a business difficulty where the lack of success is due to competition.

It has been said that it will rob life of much of its charm if we ever attain a state of consciousness in which all men think, feel, and will the same. But do not husband and wife become happier, and love each other more, as they grow to think and feel alike, and to have similar tastes? Is it not the same with all who are thrown closely together? While their thoughts and tastes are widely at variance, they are not happy together; but as they come to be more of one mind, they enjoy each other better. So in the perfect harmony of spiritual being, there is perfect joy.

Christian Science teaches that the real, spiritual man is immortal; that he was never born, and that he will never die; that he always was and always will be; that, since God does not change. His image and likeness, the spiritual man, does not change. To mortal sense, the Bible in many places teaches or implies that man's individual life commences with the physical event called birth, and religious people have taken their beliefs from this class of Bible passages rather than from those which represent man as spiritual and Godlike.

Jesus was the human representative of the real man. He said of himself. "Before Abraham was. I am." St. John says of him. "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God." Speaking of his spiritual selfhood, Jesus said, "I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end," showing clearly that he existed before human birth. We read with regard to Melchisedec, king of Salem, that he was "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." What is here set forth with regard to Christ and with regard to Melchisedec is unquestionably true with regard to man, and this readily appears when we think earnestly and logically of man's relation to God. No one would venture to say that God was ever a child or a youth, or that He ever grows old, and since God does not change, His image and likeness, or reflection, cannot change; hence it is not the real, spiritual man who is born, grows up, and dies. The real, spiritual man, who is the image and likeness of God, must be one who is the forever reflection of God: hence, coexistent and coeternal with God.

Christian Science also teaches that the man who seems to be born, to grow to maturity, to decay and die, the mortal man who seems to be subject to evil as well as good, is not a real man, but has only the status of a dream. That which is real, of God, cannot change or be destroyed, and so mortal man cannot be real. It is only the spiritual man who is real. This statement with regard to the nature of mortal man, when the facts that go to support it are learned, and thought has some opportunity to become habituated to the idea, is seen to be correct, and to be supremely significant. The doctrine with regard to the nature of man, as above set forth, lies at the basis of all treatment of the sick and sinful in Christian Science, and without this understanding the mighty works that are done in Christian Science could not be done. This understanding proves itself to be true by the practical works that flow from it.

This teaching with regard to the nature of man is likely to raise some questions in the mind of any one who has not a considerable acquaintance with the teachings of Christian Science. For instance, he may be led to inquire, If I always existed, why have I no memory of a former state of existence? And if I shall continue to exist, shall I, after I pass through the change called death, have any memory of what transpired in this life?

It would seem that the mortal dream-life commences for each of us with the event called birth, and possibly there will be one or more stages of dream-existence, beyond the present one. If a man could take account of himself while in the dream state, he would not be warranted in doubting that he had lived before the dream commenced, because he could not remember any farther back than the commencing of the dream. It is very rarely that one remembers in the dream of one night what seemed to occur in the dreams of preceding nights. The continuity of his thought-life is not in the successive dream states, but in the waking state. Says our Leader. "If we live after death and are immortal, we must have lived before birth, for if Life ever had any beginning, it must also have an ending, even according to the calculations of natural science" (Science and Health, p. 429).

Once commenced, this dream-life has more or less continuity of dream-consciousness until the end,—until we completely awaken in God's likeness. The seeming event called death unquestionably interrupts the communication between mortals on this side of that event and mortals on the other side, but from this it does not necessarily follow that those on the other side have no memory of what transpired before death. It is necessary that they should have a memory of what had previously transpired in order to make progress in getting out of the mortal dream. It is apparent, however, that after a human being has wholly attained to the consciousness of spiritual manhood, by waking completely from the mortal dream condition, even the memory of false sense will have passed away.

Mortal man is not a sleeping immortal, but a false sense of being; and as Paul says, this mortal must "put on immortality," the false sense be put away from human consciousness, so that God's eternal man may appear.