“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

(Last Thursday, Jane and I received from Prentice-Hall our first copies of the German translation of Seth Speaks. Prentice-Hall authorized this venture by a foreign publisher well over a year ago, but we didn’t know just when we’d see books within the two-year limit set for publication. This occasion signals the first appearance of the Seth material in another language, and we’re happy to note that the translator, with whom Jane exchanged just a couple of letters, did an excellent, painstaking job. The publisher, Ariston Verlag, is actually located in Geneva, Switzerland; German is one of the four national languages of that country.

(In addition, we expect that later this year the Dutch translation of Seth Speaks will be published — but again, we don’t know just when this will happen. We hope these two editions will lead to the publication of Seth’s material in other languages.

(At the end of the 852nd session I mentioned a letter Jane had received last month from a professor of physics, and that in a recent nonbook session Seth had come through with a partial answer to some of the professor’s questions. This afternoon Jane reread the letter, and wondered if Seth might give more material in reply; as she worked on Heroics she did get a line or two from Seth, commenting on that possibility. My main reason for presenting the excerpts that follow is the same as it’s been on other occasions: Seth’s material fits into Mass Events very well. Nor do I want to wait an indefinite time before he may incorporate similar information in a book — even this one. Neither does Jane. In general, then, tonight Seth discusses questions many correspondents have asked; but specifically, his material is a continuation of an answer to some of the professor’s questions. I know that eventually I’ll mail to that gentleman whatever insights Seth gives us.

Now: Earlier today, Ruburt wondered if I might dictate more in reply to your scientist’s letter. As he wondered, I very briefly responded to the effect that since we come from such different perspectives, it is actually quite difficult to give your scientist what I would consider a full response. I could dictate a reply that would satisfy him well enough, but it would (pause) perhaps be the more distorted the more it was geared for his understanding.

The universe expands, as I have said before, as an idea expands; and as sentences are built upon words, in your terms, and paragraphs upon sentences, and as each retains its own logic and continuity and evidence within that framework, so do all the portions of the universe appear to you also with the same cohesiveness (dash) — meaning continuity and order. Any sentence is meaningful. It seems to fall in order by itself as you say it. Its order is obvious. That one sentence is (underlined) meaningful because of its organization of letters, or if it is spoken, its organization of vowels and syllables. It makes sense, however, not only because of the letters or vowels or syllables that are used within it, but because of all of the letters or vowels or syllables that it excludes.

The same applies to your universe. It has meaning, coherence and order not only because of those realities that are obvious to you, and that appear, but also because of those inner realities that are “unspoken,” or hidden. I am not speaking merely of hidden variables, in scientific terms, nor am I saying that the universe is an illusion, but a psychological reality in which “objectivity” is the result of psychological creativity.

(Pause.) It is not just that your view of reality is relative to your position within the universe, but that the universe itself is different according to your position within it, and that spiritual or psychological rules apply. The universe deals with different kinds of order, perceptions, and organizations, each dependent upon the others, yet each separate in its own domain.

(Pause.) In your realm of reality, there is no real freedom but the freedom of ideas, and there is no real bondage except for the bondage of ideas (intently), for your ideas form your private and mass reality. You want to examine the universe from the outside, to examine your societies from the outside. You still think that the interior world is somehow symbolic and the exterior world is real — that wars, for example, are fought by themselves or with bombs. All of the time, the psychological reality is the primary one, that forms all of your events.

It is not to say that you cannot understand the nature of the universe to some extent, but the answers lie in the natures of your own minds, in the processes of individual creativity, in studies that ask questions like: “Where did this thought come from? Where does it go? What effect does it have upon myself or others? How do I know how to dream, when I have never been taught to do so? How do I speak without understanding the mechanisms? Why do I feel that I have an eternal reality, when it is obvious that I was physically born and will physically die?”