“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

During the last couple of weeks David hadn’t made his regular trips up the hill, but Jane and I were so busy that that fact nearly escaped us. Last Thursday morning, then, we were really shocked when Doris, who is also a teacher and a friend from those apartment-house years, called to tell us that David was in the hospital—that he was to undergo triple-bypass heart surgery the next day. Jane and I couldn’t believe it. We’d thought David was in excellent health. He’d taken up jogging some time ago and was now running 15 miles at a time, three days a week. As he lay in the hospital, David asked Doris why this was happening to him, when he’d tried to take care of himself, help others, and “do everything right.”

Seth talked about illness and suffering in general this evening, and about David in particular. I’m presenting excerpts from the generalized part of his material, but none about David himself. We have no idea of pressing Seth’s personal information upon David; doing that would be an invasion of his privacy. Tonight’s material, however, adds to our understanding of subjects like free will and choosing, good and evil, sickness and health, and reflects upon many questions people have asked us over the years.

I spoke about the quality of life, and it is true to say that in at least many centuries past, if men and women may have died earlier, they also lived lives of fuller, more satisfying quality—and I do not want to be misinterpreted in that direction.

One man might use it to achieve success. One might use it to achieve failure. A person might use it as a means of showing pride or humility, of looking for attention or escaping it. Illness is often another mode of expression, but nowhere does science mention that illness might have its purpose, or its groups of purposes, and I do not mean that the purposes themselves are necessarily derogatory. Illnesses are often misguided attempts to attain something the person thinks important. [Sickness] can be a badge of honor or dishonor—but there can be no question, when you look at the human picture, that to a certain extent, but an important one, suffering not only has its purposes and uses, but is actively sought for one reason or another.

Most people do not seek out suffering’s extreme experience, but within those extremes there are multitudinous degrees of stimuli that could be considered painful, that are actively sought. Man’s involvement in sports is an instant example, of course, where society’s rewards and the promise of spectacular bodily achievement lead athletes into activities that would be considered most painful by the ordinary individual. People climb mountains, willingly undergoing a good bit of suffering in the pursuit of such goals.

I do not want any of this to appear too simplistic, but we must begin somewhere in this kind of discussion…. This is far from the entire story [of illness], but it is enough for this evening’s saga. When you can, encourage your fine wife to follow your example in determining not to worry. It should be the first commandment.

“I don’t remember much of that,” Jane said, “but I’ve got the feeling that Seth meant the material to defuse some of my own thoughts lately—that there isn’t any answer for all of the pain and suffering in the world—that the whole thing is so vast that you can’t say or do anything that will be of much use to anyone….”

1. Seth certainly touched upon a question that’s loaded with ethical and legal dilemmas; many of these have grown out of recent scientific advances in genetics. Some moral philosophers, medical geneticists, physicians, lawyers, and religious leaders believe that those who carry genes for serious genetic diseases do not have the right to reproduce. Others of similar background maintain just the opposite—that the right to recreate one’s kind is inalienable. Questions abound involving amniocentesis (examination of the fluid in the womb to detect genetic defects in the fetus); therapeutic abortion; artificial insemination; reproduction by in vitro fertilization; embryo transfer (surrogate motherhood); the responsibilities of the legal, medical and religious communities; whether mentally retarded, genetically defective people should receive life-prolonging medical treatment, and so forth. Years are expected to pass before our legal system alone catches up with the scientific progress in genetics—but, ironically, continuing advances in the field are bound to complicate even further the whole series of questions.