{"id":1426,"date":"2020-06-24T22:10:10","date_gmt":"2020-06-24T22:10:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/religionoflight.org\/ns\/lightofgod\/?p=1426"},"modified":"2020-06-24T22:10:10","modified_gmt":"2020-06-24T22:10:10","slug":"lectionary-readings-for-thursday-june-25th-2020","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/religionoflight.org\/ns\/lightofgod\/2020\/06\/24\/lectionary-readings-for-thursday-june-25th-2020\/","title":{"rendered":"Lectionary Readings for Thursday, June 25th, 2020"},"content":{"rendered":"

Book of the Arc of Bon Chapter 23, Chapter 24<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Chapter 23<\/span><\/p>\n

1. Chine spake Jehovih’s words, saying: They have sought after pleasure, and after thee, O
\nearth! They have bowed down to men, to the king and the rich man, and now, behold
\ntheir misery! The king said: Come serve me. Take thy spear, and thy strong bow and
\narrow, and come with me. I will show thee great delights; thou shalt slaughter my
\nenemies; and I will give thee wages.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

2. And they ran to serve the king; yea, they washed their hands in the blood of My
\ninnocent ones. Because the king said: Brave! Good slaughterer! Then were they pleased,
\nhighly recompensed!
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

3. I have said: Ye are on the wrong road; serve only Me, for I am Good Delights.
\nBecause ye slay one another, the land will not be tilled; ye are hungered and
\nragged. And they queried: What will Jehovih give for wages? More than the king?
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

4. Herein is thy weakness, O man! Thou sayest: Wait a little while, I will serve the man
\nfirst; and afterward Jehovih.<\/span>
\n
\n<\/span>5. What profit hast thou in thy brother’s death? With all his treasures of gold and silver,
\nwhat hast thou?
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

6. Behold, even they that choose Me and My ways, thou wilt not suffer to live in peace.
\nBecause they say: My Creator is my King; Him will I serve. The king saith: Go for them;
\nslaughter them! They put Jehovih higher than me!
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

7. And thou sayest: It is a good and wholesome thing to serve the king, and kill his
\nenemies. To serve my country by killing men, this is great glory!
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

8. But the voice of My beloved rose up to Me; My lambs fleeing before the wolves, and
\ndriven away from My goodly pastures. Behold Me, I am come to them, to the lovers of
\npeace and virtue and loving kindness. My hand is stretched over them in great power; My
\nword is given unto them, and is not dead.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

9. I will call them together; they shall again hold up their heads and rejoice because of My
\nPresence.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

10. After Jehovih’s voice came to Chine he traveled far and near; and because of
\nhis wonderful wisdom, men of great learning and even kings sent for him. And wherever
\nhe went he preached after the same manner, for peace and love, and against war.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

11. For three years Chine traveled, proclaiming the Creator above all else in heaven and
\nearth. And then he rested one hundred and forty days, sleeping like a young child, saying
\nnaught more than a child would say.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

12. Then came a change upon Chine; he was as a new man in the world, and not as a God.
\nAnd he rose up, saying: My Father, Creator of men, calleth me. I hear His voice. It is like
\na burning fire in my soul, moving me. Not with pain, but with great power. He saith:
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

13. Chine, My Son! Chine, My Son! My house is on fire! My little ones are burning. Go
\nthou, Chine, to them. They are in fear and trembling; they know not what way to turn.
\nThe kings of the earth have outlawed them; they are hunted down, and are famished. Go
\nthou to them, O Chine! For that end created I thee alive in the world; thou shalt be My
\nVoice unto them.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

14. Chine said: Jehovih saith: Who can overcome the fire when he remaineth in the
\nhouse? He goeth outside where there is water. Call thou My people out of the house of
\nMy enemies. Give them a well spring of clean water; they are parched up and athirst. Say
\nto them: Jehovih liveth! His love aboundeth; come ye to My fountains that are not dried
\nup. Come ye and hear the covenant of My Son, Chine.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

15. I swear to Thee, O Jehovih, Thou my Almighty! I will have no other God but Thee,
\nThou Creator! All Light, Most Glorious! Thou art my King! Holy, Holy, Ever Present! O
\nmy Captain, my All Highest Captain! I salute Thee in the Rising Sun! In the High Noon,
\nmost Mighty! And in the sweet Setting Sun!
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

16. I know nothing but Thee; to Thee I swear this my most solemn oath, O Jehovih! Call
\nThou up Thy angels, holy and most wise; Thy recording angels! They shall hear my
\ncovenant unto Thee, My Creator! They shall write it in the books of heaven, O my
\nMaster! And whilst the sun standeth, and the moon and the earth and the stars, my oath
\nunto Thee shall stand up against me:
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

17. Thou only shalt be my King; Thou only shalt be my God and Heavenly Ruler. All
\nother kings I forswear, and all other Gods and captains and great rulers: None of them
\nwill I bow down to or worship, forever. I, Chine, have spoken.<\/span>
\n
\n<\/span>18. I swear unto Thee, Thou Great Spirit, Thou art my bond to the end of the world. I
\nwill not war nor abet war; to peace forever am I sworn. And though they impress me
\nand torture me, or slay me outright, they shall not force me; I will not draw one drop
\nof blood in any man or woman or child whom Thou hast created alive on the earth.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

19. I swear unto thee, Thou All Person, Who art so large that the earth and sun and stars
\nwould not fill the hollow of Thy hand; to be like unto Thee, O Jehovih. Fair dealing unto
\nall men, as Thou wouldst; good, forgiving and without anger, forever. And equally in all
\npossessions with Thy chosen, O Jehovih.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

20. To raise them up that are cast down; to deliver the afflicted and helpless; to render not
\nevil, nor the fruit of anger, unto any man, forever, O Jehovih. And good to them that
\nabuse me; and in my actions steadfast in Thy course, my Creator.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

21. In my blood do I covenant with thee; by the veins in my flesh make oath forever. To
\nwed not out of Thy Order, the Hi-tspe. Blood of the blood of Thy chosen shall be my
\nheirs and my heirs after me, forever.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

22. Hear me, O Jehovih: I make a new covenant; it shall be written upon the firmament of
\nheaven. I will do good with all my might; the tears of the suffering poor shall be as
\nscalding blood in my veins; I will not sit down and rest, nor take my ease, nor hold
\npossessions whilst they are in want.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

23. Prick me, O my Father in heaven; sharpen my conscience keener than a sword; drive
\nme to labor for the poor and afflicted, give me no rest, but whilst I am doing good unto
\nthem.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

24. O that my covenant were set with swords, pointing every way; that I could find no
\npeace but in serving Thee, my Creator, Ormazd. And I were pure and strong and wise and
\nswifter than life and death, and as unfailing.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

25. And that my oath reached unto thy chosen, and they heard me; that my voice was
\nsweet unto them, and enticing like an early love.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

26. That they would come forth from their hiding places, Thy faithful children, and be not
\nafraid.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

27. I would go to them as a lover, and bow my head down to them for their long
\nsuffering, and their faith unto Thee, Jehovih.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

28. As a father that has lost his son and found him again, I would take them in my arms,
\nThy worshippers, Thou All One, Everlasting Spirit.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

29. As a rose-bush trampled in the mire; how they have been scourged, O Jehovih. Poor
\nunto death, and ragged and scattered. But I would wash them clean, and give them new
\nsoil; their voices in song and praise should gladden the whole earth.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

Chapter 24<\/span>
\n<\/span>1. The great cities of the ancients in Jaffeth were destroyed by Joss (Te-in) and his evil
\nspirits, who inspired mortals to war. And for the most part, it was a land of ruins, but
\nthousands of cities, standing beside the broken walls, were spread over the entire breadth
\nof the land.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

2. Jehovih spake to Chine, saying: Now is a good time for My chosen. Behold My
\nenemies, the idolaters; know thou them by their soldiers. They are weak now. They pant
\nwith the labor of their great battles. Let My people come out of their quarters and hold up<\/span>
\ntheir heads.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

3. Say thou unto them, O Chine, there is no Joss, no Ho-Joss, no Te-in, no Po, no Po-Tein, to make you afraid. And whilst the enemy resteth, bid My sons and daughters arise! They shall inhabit the land that is spoilt, and cause it to bloom and bring forth abundantly.
\nCall up My outlawed race; the enemy is sick of his wounds; his heart is ashamed and
\ndisconsolate, he is cast down.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

4. Chine went to A’shong and gathered up many converts, descendants of the Faithists,
\nthe pure Brahmins, the line of Zarathustra, the people of the Great All One, who accepted
\nnot Gods and Lords. And he established them, and invented plows and mattocks for
\ndigging the ground; for these implements had been lost and destroyed, hundreds of years,
\nand no man knew how to make them.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

5. Chine said unto them: This is a good philosophy; wait not till ye are well fed and
\nclothed before ye bow down your heads at the altar of Jehovih. When ye have prayed and
\nsung before Him, then go forth into the field to work. And He will bless you.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

6. Remember the heathen, they say: First provide the natural body, and then the spirit. But
\nI say unto you, Jehovih created them both together. And he who saith: First provide the
\nnatural body, never looketh to his spirit afterward.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

7. In all things give ye precedence to the spirit; as the Creator is over all His works, so
\nshould the spirit of man be over man’s works, and over his corporeal body also.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

8. Herein laid the foundation of the wisdom of your forefathers, the Zarathustrians. For
\nthe heathen and idolater, who labor for self, what are they but servants unto the flesh?
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

9. Some people labor for the raising of the spirit, which is purity, and love, and goodness,
\nand justice; such people are on the right road to become a great people. But when they
\nstrive, every man for himself, such people are beginning to fall.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

10. Her boundaries may be large, and her people increasing, but she hah a canker worm
\nwithin, that soon or late will let her down suddenly.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

11. Two extremes meeting are always dangerous: great wealth, and extensive poverty. It
\nnot only devolveth on the rich to give their substance to the poor, but they shall go
\namongst them, teaching them and lifting them up.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

12. He who doeth not this, consider how vain it is for him to pray to Jehovih. His prayer
\nriseth not upward. Let him himself first answer the poor. This is the opening of his own
\nsoul, so Jehovih can reach him.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

13. Remember thou that all men have judgment, and that they should be perfected to see
\nthings from their own standpoint, and not from thine. Consider, then, how unjust it is to
\nfoist thy opinions on any man, uncalled for.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

14. Chine established families of the chosen, but limited them to two hundred; and to
\neach family he gave one priest. But he gave privilege to four thousand people to dwell in
\none city.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

15. Chine said: Ye have been afflicted with Gods; I was sent into the world by the Creator
\nto deliver you unto liberty in the family. I am only a man. I have no authority in myself.
\nJehovih, the Creator, dwelleth freely in me. Ye can attain the same.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

16. Because He is within me, this shall be called Chine-land. There is a time for this. My
\nname is as a post to mark the time when the Creator began His temple of peace, which
\nshall extend over all these people.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

17. Jehovih saith: Why will man be vain of himself? Verily have I not created one man on<\/span>
\nthe face of the earth that is himself. He is made up of all oddities, soul and body.
\nConsider his flesh; whence he received it and sustaineth it. Not so much as one hair on
\nhis head is of his own making; neither is it made out of new material, but hath been used
\nover and over forever.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

18. Even so is his mind not his own; not even his simplest thought; but he is made up of
\nborrowed things from beginning to end, for so I created him.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

19. He imagineth I, Who created him, am nothing; but even his imagination he picked up
\nfrom someone else. He gathereth a little here, and a little there, and then proclaimeth what
\nhe knoweth.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

20. Chine said: One man saith: I am normal; neither angels or mortals rule over me! Yet
\nhe hath only boasted as a crazy man, who will say the same thing. Another saith: Behold
\nmy wisdom! the highest of angels course through me. Yet he knoweth not whether it be
\ntrue or not. Neither do any of them know the fountain head. For if an angel say it, the
\nangel himself is made up of borrowed knowledge.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

21. Chine said: I saw a great mathematician one day, and he said: There are no Gods, nor
\nLords, nor angels, nor any All Person. Everything is void. He showed me a book he had,
\nand I asked: Who made the book? He said: I made it; nay, I made not the cloth, nor the
\nbinding; I mean, I made the philosophy that is in the book; nay, I made not the
\nphilosophy, but found it; nay, it was not lost; I mean I led myself to find the philosophy;
\nnay, a man cannot lead himself; I mean that I searched and found what was new to me.
\nSo, but little of that book was his, after all.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

22. I saw three angels standing beside that man, and they were laughing at him. If I had
\nasked the angels, they might have said: Nay, the thoughts were ours. And had I looked
\nfurther I had seen angels back of them, claiming the same things. Yet, even such are not
\nthe highest.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

23. Wherefore I say unto you: All things come from an All Highest, name ye Him what ye
\nwill. He who saith: Jehovih spake to me: He is the nearest the mark of all. For all good
\nknowledge that cometh to man, is Jehovih’s word to that man. Whether it come by an
\nangel or by another man, or by the commonest corporeal thing, it is nevertheless from the
\nAll Highest.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

24. For which reason bow ye not down in worship to man nor angels, but only to the
\nHighest, Jehovih, for He is the Figure-head and Pinnacle of the All Highest conceived of.
\nAnd in contradistinction, the all lowest; the foot of the ladder, call ye darkness and evil,
\nand wickedness, and sin, and death and satan.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

25. Attribute not to men or angels this or that, for they themselves are not first causes nor
\nresponsible but in part; but attribute all good, high, best and wise things unto Jehovih; and
\nall evil, dark, wicked, low things to satan.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

26. By these terms ye shall make plain to one another what ye mean; and it is an easy
\nmatter to look into your own souls and comprehend as to which of these two ye most
\nincline.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

27. The soul may be likened unto a vine, which can be trained either upward or
\ndownward. And if ye desire to know if a vine be up or down, look ye for the fruit, and not
\nto the fragrance. Some men pray much, but as to good works they are like a vine without
\nfruit, but with plenty of fragrance.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Book of the Arc of Bon Chapter 23, Chapter 24 Chapter 23 1. Chine spake Jehovih’s words, saying: They have sought after pleasure, and after thee, O earth! They have bowed down to men, to the king and the rich man, and now, behold their misery! The king said: Come serve me. Take thy spear, … [Read more…]<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[49],"tags":[46,40,39,34,36,35,38,33,41,31,32,47,50,48,44,45,43,42],"class_list":{"0":"entry","1":"post","2":"publish","3":"author-lightofgod","4":"post-1426","6":"format-standard","7":"category-lectionary-readings","8":"post_tag-calendar","9":"post_tag-daily-readings","10":"post_tag-eloih","11":"post_tag-faithism","12":"post_tag-faithist-church","13":"post_tag-faithists","14":"post_tag-jehovih","15":"post_tag-kosmon-era","16":"post_tag-lectionary-readings","17":"post_tag-oahspe","18":"post_tag-oahspe-bible","19":"post_tag-observances","20":"post_tag-religion-of-light","21":"post_tag-sabbath","22":"post_tag-united-covenant","23":"post_tag-united-covenant-of-light","24":"post_tag-yeshua","25":"post_tag-yoshu"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/religionoflight.org\/ns\/lightofgod\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1426","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/religionoflight.org\/ns\/lightofgod\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/religionoflight.org\/ns\/lightofgod\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/religionoflight.org\/ns\/lightofgod\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/religionoflight.org\/ns\/lightofgod\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1426"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/religionoflight.org\/ns\/lightofgod\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1426\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1427,"href":"https:\/\/religionoflight.org\/ns\/lightofgod\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1426\/revisions\/1427"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/religionoflight.org\/ns\/lightofgod\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1426"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/religionoflight.org\/ns\/lightofgod\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1426"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/religionoflight.org\/ns\/lightofgod\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1426"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}