“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

(This is the first regular session since May 12. There were many factors behind the long layoff: Jane’s sheer need for rest; problems and questions of our own that we had wanted to deal with, but had put off for a long time; some work with others; a vacation; and the acquisition of several more rooms across the hall from our original apartment. Jane held ESP classes for some of this time, though, and gave a few sessions within that format.

These ideas become the driving themes of these religious dramas of which I have spoken. The actors may “return,” time and time again, in different roles. In any given historic religious drama, therefore, the actors may have already appeared on the historic scene in your past, the prophet of today being the traitor of the past drama.

The inner self alone, at rest, in meditation, can at times glimpse portions of these inner realities that cannot be physically expressed. These values, intuitions, or insights are given each to each according to his understanding, and so the stories told about them will often vary.

The third personality, mentioned many times by me, has not in your terms yet appeared, although his existence has been prophesied as the “Second Coming” (Matthew 24). Now these prophecies were given in terms of the current culture at that time, and therefore, while the stage has been set, the distortions are deplorable, for this Christ will not come at the end of your world as the prophecies have been maintaining.

(9:20.) He will not come to reward the righteous and send evildoers to eternal doom. He will, however, begin a new religious drama. A certain historical continuity will be maintained. As happened once before, however, he will not be generally known for who he is. There will be no glorious proclamation to which the whole world will bow. He will return to straighten out Christianity, which will be in a shambles at the time of his arrival, and to set up a new system of thought when the world is sorely in need of one.

(9:25.) By that time, all religions will be in severe crisis. He will undermine religious organizations — not unite them. His message will be that of the individual in relation to All That Is. He will clearly state methods by which each individual can attain a state of intimate contact with his own entity; the entity to some extent being man’s mediator with All That Is.

Now there will be several born before that time who in various ways will rearouse man’s expectations. One such man has already been born in India, in a small province near Calcutta, but his ministry will seem to remain comparatively local for his lifetime.

(“There were three men whose lives became confused in history and merged, and whose composite history became known as the life of Christ…. Each was highly gifted psychically, knew of his role, and accepted it willingly. The three men were a part of one entity, gaining physical existence in one time. They were not born on the same date, however. There are reasons why the entity did not return as one person. For one thing, the full consciousness of an entity would be too strong for one physical vehicle. For another, the entity wanted a more diversified environment than could otherwise be provided.

(“The entity was born once as John the Baptist, and then he was born in two other forms. One of these contained the personality that most stories of Christ refer to…. I will tell you about the other personality at a later time. There was constant communication between these three portions of one entity, though they were born and buried at different dates. The race called up these personalities from its own psychic bank, from the pool of individualized consciousness that was available to it.”

(10:05.) All personalities have free will and work out their own challenges. The same applied to Saul. The organizational “distortions,” however, were also necessary within the framework of history as events are understood. Saul’s tendencies were known, therefore, at another level. They served a purpose. It is for this reason, however, that he will emerge once again, this time to destroy those distortions.

Now he did not create them on his own, and thrust them upon historical reality. (Jane paused, a hand to her eyes.) He created them in so far as he found himself forced to admit certain facts: In that world at that time, earthly power was needed to hold Christian ideas apart from numberless other theories and religions, to maintain them in the middle of warring factions. It was his job to form a physical framework; and even then he was afraid that the framework would strangle the ideas, but he saw no other way.

His was the portion that was to deal with physical reality and manipulation, and so these qualities were strong in him. To some extent they overruled him. When the historical Christ “died,” Paul was to implement the spiritual ideas in physical terms, to carry on. In so doing, however, he grew the seeds of an organization that would smother the ideas. He lingered after Christ, [just] as John the Baptist came before. Together the three spanned some time period, you see.

Paul also represented the militant nature of man, that had to be taken into consideration in line with man’s development at the time. That militant quality in man will completely change its nature, and be dispensed with as you know it, when the next Christ personality emerges. It is therefore appropriate that Paul be present.

(10:27.) In the next century, the inner nature of man, with these developments, will free itself from many constraints that have bound it. A new era will indeed begin — not, now, a heaven on earth, but a far more sane and just world, in which man is far more aware of his relationship with his planet and of his freedom within time.

Now you may take a break in time.

(3. For the same reason Seth wouldn’t say more at this time concerning the Indian religious figure, and the to-be-born African who would work in Indonesia.)

Human personality will reap benefits that now would seem unbelievable. An open-ended consciousness will imply far greater freedom. From birth, children will be taught that basic identity is not dependent upon the body, and that time as you know it is an illusion. The child will be aware of many of its past existences, and will be able to identify with the old man or woman that in your terms it will become.

(11:02.) Many of the lessons “that come with age” will then be available to the young, but the old will not lose the spiritual elasticity of their youth. This itself is important. But for some time, future incarnations will still be hidden for practical reasons.

(11:20.) For the first time, therefore, it will break through the earthly concepts of personality, liberating personality. It will have the ability to show these diverse effects as it chooses. There will be many who will be afraid to accept the nature of their own reality, or to be shown the dimensions of true identity.

(11:25. I asked for a break on the chance that more information might come through for the chapter. Jane said she couldn’t remember any of the data given since last break. She’d had no sense of time passing while in trance.