“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

However, aside from being in outright conflict with the theory of evolution [and the idea of an ancient universe], the beliefs of the creationists do pose a number of questions that are quite intriguing from our joint viewpoint. My statement doesn’t mean that Jane and I endorse creationism just because we question the doctrines of evolution. We think that either one of those belief systems is much too inadequate to explain reality in any sort of comprehensive way.

Your now (underlined), or present moment, is a psychological platform. It seems that the universe began with an initial burst of energy of some kind (the “big bang”). Evolutionists cannot account for its cause. Many religious people believe that a god exists in a larger dimension of reality, and that he created the universe while being himself outside of it. He set it into motion. Many individuals, following either persuasion, believe that regardless of its source, the [universe]¹ must run out of energy. Established science is quite certain that no energy can now be created or destroyed, but only transformed (as stated in the first law of thermodynamics). Science sees energy and matter as being basically the same thing, appearing differently under varying circumstances.

Instead, consciousness formed matter. As I have said before, each atom and molecule has its own consciousness. Consciousness and matter and energy are one, but consciousness initiates the transformation of energy into matter. In those terms, the “beginning” of your universe was a triumph in the expansion of consciousness, as it learned to translate itself into physical form. The universe emerged into actuality in the same way (underlined), but to a different degree, that any idea emerges from what you think of as subjectivity into physical expression.

(10:02 P.M. “That was short, but I don’t care,” Jane said right after coming out of her trance state. “I thought that was what there was tonight. I never stop when there’s more, like you’d turn off a faucet.”

But as I type this material two evenings later [on Friday], I can note that Jane didn’t paint at all. Instead she continued to work on her own God of Jane. She also finished reading the book on creationism, and at my request today wrote a page or so about her reactions to it. Her little essay is given as Note 2. Then see Note 3 for my own comments about evolution as I discussed that subject in Volume 2 of “Unknown” Reality.)

I had finished Appendix 12 for Volume 2 of “Unknown” Reality by August 1977. I’d devoted the piece to a study of the establishment theory of evolution versus ideas Seth, Jane, and I have on that theme, and noted that I’d accumulated much information from a number of sources. I’ve amassed much more data by now, of course. Perhaps, I thought when putting together the Preface for Dreams, I just wanted to use some of our later material in the new book.

Yet most of what I wrote in Appendix 12 is still valid, to my mind, even though I’ve always wanted to expand (and expound?) upon all of it. There are a few things I’d put somewhat differently now, given the advantage of a couple of years’ hindsight, but Jane and I don’t really want to revise the material. We’d rather let it stand as is, representing our best knowledge and feeling of that time, including the way we put to use Seth’s own information on the subject. If that “best knowledge” was groping and imperfect, then so be it. I think it most interesting that the theory of evolution is now challenged by those who, like Jane and I, simply want to know whether it has a basis in scientific fact; and that it’s also come under virulent attack by those who generally believe in fundamentalist religions. The controversy over whether evolution ever really happened—and/or is happening—is far from resolved, whether in scientific, religious, or lay terms.