Lectionary Readings for Sunday, June 30th, 2019

Holy Memorial Day

God’s Book of Ben Chapters 3 and 4

Chapter 3

1. Man said: Behold, I have struggled hard all my days, and met many crosses and losses.
To provide my son that he shall fare better, this is goodness.

2. Uz said: Vain man! Thou understandest not the creations. Thy trials, thy losses and
crosses, have built up thy soul. To provide thy son that he shall have no trials, nor losses
nor crosses, will not be good for him. This will not be goodness. Give him experience.

3. Man said: Then I will teach him to sin not. To tell no lies; to steal not; to preserve his
body pure. This is goodness.

4. Uz said: What canst thou do, that is not a sin? What canst thou teach, that is not
falsehood?

5. Thou paintest a picture, and sayest: Behold, this is my farm! In this thou utterest
falsehood. Thou givest a book to thy son, saying: Here is a good book! This is also false.
Can paper be good? Thou sayest: Here is a book of wisdom! This is also false. Wisdom
dwelleth not in paper.

6. How, then, canst thou teach thy son to tell no lies, since no man can speak without
lying?

7. God said: One only is Truth, Jehovih. All else are false. One only is without sin,
Jehovih. All else do sin every day.

8. Man said: To understand the laws of the universe, this is great wisdom.

9. Es inquired: What is a law of the universe?

10. Man said: That an apple will fall to the ground.

11. Uz said: By my hand the apple rotteth; the earth to the earth; but moisture flieth
upward.

12. Jehovih said: By My touch the substance riseth up out of the earth and becometh an
apple. Sayest thou, law is My opposite?

13. Man said: Why, then, there are two laws: one to make the apple rise up and grow on a
tree, and one to make it fall down again.

14. Is this the creation? One law to pull one way, and another law in another way?

15. Can one law make one rose red, and another law make another rose white? One law
make one man good, and another law make another man bad?

16. Jehovih said: I make no laws. Behold, I labor with Mine own hands. I am everywhere
present.

17. Es said: All men may be likened unto green fruit, and on the way toward ripeness.

18. What more is man’s earth life than a tree? It hath its winters and summers for a
season, and then the end cometh.

19. Jehovih said: Behold, I created light and darkness, and one followeth the other.

20. I give dan to the earth for a season, and then I rain down ji’ay for a season. Even so
created I the soul of man; to-day, light and joyous; to-morrow in gloom and melancholy.

21. Man inquired: How can I know if a thing be of God or if it be of nature? What is
Jehovih more than natural law?

22. Corpor answered: What is nature, O man? Why wilt thou use a name for the members
of my body?

23. Behold, the trees are mine; the mountains and valleys; the waters and every living
thing, and everything that liveth not; they are me.

24. Why sayest thou nature? Now I say unto thee, the soul of all things is Jehovih; that
which thou callest nature is but the corporeal part.

25. Man said: I mean the laws of nature. Certain combinations under certain conditions
give the same result. This is law.

26. God said: What hast thou gained by the word law, instead of the word Jehovih? If that
that doeth a thing, doth it of its own accord, then it is alive, and wise withal. Therefore it
is Jehovih.

27. If it do it not of itself, then it is not the doer, but the instrument. How, then, can law
do anything? Law is dead; and the dead do nothing.

28. Within atmospherea, wark becometh organic and falleth to the earth.

29. Wark in etherea becometh an a’ji’an cloud, and shattered.

30. Men make laws, as betwixt themselves; these laws are rules governing action, but
they are not action itself.

31. Jehovih is action. His actions are manifested in things thou seest. He is Light and
Life. All His things are a complete whole, which is His Person.

Chapter 4

1. Man said: What, then, shall I believe? If great learning have not proven anything real;
if science is based on falsehood, and if there be no natural laws, shall I not give up my
judgment? Whatever is at variance with my judgment, shall I not turn away from it?

2. It hath been said: The soul of man never dieth. No one can know this, save Jehovih.

3. It hath been said: Jehovih is a person. No one can know this, for His magnitude is
incomprehensible.

4. Is the soul of man made of oxygen or hydrogen? Give me light that is real. I can say of
what man’s mortal body is made.

5. Jehovih said: My divisions are not as man’s divisions. Behold, I create one thing within
another. Neither space, nor place, nor time, nor eternity standeth in My way. The soul is
es.

6. Man inquired: If the dwelling-place for the spirits of the dead be up in the firmament,
how is it created? What resteth it upon?

7. And how dwelleth the soul of man in heaven? If the es-man hath feet and legs, how
doth he walk?

8. Hath his arms changed into wings? Or rideth he on the lightnings?

9. God said: Already goeth thy soul thitherward, but it can not take thy body with it. Thy
corporeal judgment can not cope with spiritual things.

10. As thought traveleth, so is it with the spirit of the dead. When thou hast quit thy
corporeal body, behold thy spirit will be free; whithersoever thou desirest to go thou shalt
go.

11. Nevertheless thou shalt go only as thought goeth. And when thou hast arrived at the
place, thou shalt fashion, from the surroundings, thine own form, hands and arms, and
feet and legs, perfectly.

12. The Gods build not only themselves, but plateaux for the inhabitation of millions and
millions of other souls risen from the earth.

13. Man said: Alas, me! Why was I born in darkness?

14. Why was I not created knowing all things from my youth up?

15. Why did not the Creator send His angels with me every day, to satisfy my craving for
light from the Almighty?

16. Kosmon answered: Hadst thou not craved for light, thou hadst not been delighted to
receive light. Hadst thou been created with knowledge, thou couldst not be an acquirer of
knowledge.

17. Had the Creator given thee angels to be forever giving thee light, then they would be
slaves.

18. Liberty is the boon of men and angels; the desire for liberty causeth the soul of man to
come out of darkness.

19. Whoso feeleth that he hath no need of exertion, groweth not in spirit. He hath no
honor on the earth or in the heavens thereof.

20. Man said: This is my comfort. Man nowadays is not so foolish as the ancients.

21. They worshipped before idols of stone and wood.

22. They built temples and pyramids so costly that they ruined themselves.

23. Seffas said: O vain man! In the day thou abusest the ancients, thou sendest thy son to
college, and enforcest him to study the ancients.

24. Thy standing armies hold the nations of the earth in misery greater than did the
temples and pyramids. And as for drunkenness and dissolute habits, and for selfishness,
thou art worse than the ancients.

25. God said: O man, turn thou from the dead past; learn from the Ever Living Present!

26. What is thy wisdom for the raising up of the poor and the distressed, more than was
that of the ancients?

27. Is it better for thee to hold up a book and say: Behold a most sacred and holy book!
than for the ancients to say: Behold a sacred and holy temple!

28. Seffas said: Consider the established things; in one age one thing; in another age
another thing.

29. To make man break away from all the past, and live by the Light of the Ever Present,
is this not the wisest labor?