“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

(2. Something about Jane’s Turkish life. Seth mentioned this in the last deleted session. I wondered if there could be clues there related to Jane’s symptoms.

(3. Something about my Roman life in the first century AD. Although Seth discussed reincarnation in the last regular session, he gave nothing on that life per se. I was curious.

(On file: see “A Life in the Talmud,” New York Times Magazine for September 11, 1977, on oral history of Jews as well as the Talmud itself.)

You were great riders, horses being wealth, and collectors of fine gold ornaments. Ruburt was just, as he understood justice. To some extent he felt it a comedown to be born as a woman (as Jane). He also played down physical abilities, for toward the end of that life he became hungry for knowledge, and wondered at his own unbridled use of power.

He accepted you as a mate and teacher, however, and put such weight upon your words because in that old context you were a male. You both decided to use power indirectly, however, to affect your civilization through thought rather than through combat. In early years Ruburt found it difficult even to contradict you, even while he insisted upon his own independence of mind, and upon his use of his abilities. At times, however, you refused to lead in this life when circumstances might have warranted a more active role at particular times, because in that previous life you would not buck Ruburt, and because you also were more cautious this time about the use of personal power.

(10:16.) You had excelled, as he had, in all areas of that experience—as warriors, religious leaders, chieftains. In this life, therefore, you always felt sorry for those you felt could not achieve, and often held back your own abilities or criticisms for that reason.

You have been hard on yourselves, for you were used to the instant recognition of your peers, and accepted none as your superiors. In this life you concentrated upon the search for knowledge—and even in that particular past life, power was important only because it was considered the gift to believers from God, and therefore the natural result of knowledge.

All of that occurred in the background in which you chose an artistic ability that did not fit into the accepted male role, and Ruburt possessed a drive that did not fit the feminine picture, either. You quite concurred with the attitudes involved. Each of you dislike fanatics because you were once so fanatical. Ruburt went to battle with all of his men, and only as he grew older did he begin to wonder at his own motives, or the beliefs that were the structure of his life.

You also questioned. You set up a system of balances so that you would think before using your power. This was overdone, however. On the other hand it was reassuring now because in that other life you were afraid of your own impetuosity, together, and had to know you could control it while using your abilities. You have each controlled it. There is no need then to further show yourselves that you can indeed be understanding and compassionate leaders. In that joint venture it made little difference which of you accepted the role that would in one way or another prevent the both of you from misusing power, for the one role would be passive while the other was active.

In that life women were expected to be decorative, and most of all compliant, so in his relationship to you, when Ruburt felt decorative or compliant, he felt you would have no use for him. You each decided to have no children— you, of course, as well as Ruburt. Your children are the people you influence, help, and guide.

In any case, in the context of this discussion, had you not married Ruburt, you would have remained single, or possibly married to a woman who also would not want children. You were both used to the idea of attaining knowledge and influencing minds. In the Turkish life that meant following Allah and the dictates of holy battle. Now you know that no wars are holy, only regrettable.

In that life you did not understand, however, the true independence of men’s minds. You went overboard, trying to influence their minds, and not influencing their minds at the same time in this life, lest they follow you blindly.

In connection with the Turkish life, you decided upon certain handicaps this time. You were the adored sons of a Turkish chieftain, following the social patterns of your times, gifted at birth with power and position.

In this life Ruburt chose poverty as a background, a mother who was not physically fit, a broken family. You chose parents who in their way were culturally deprived, ignorant of fine music or literature, and temperamentally poles apart. Then you chose a prime ability, not overly valued by society. When the two of you took up together for the reasons given, you decided upon a further handicap, though you had not specifically chosen one.

You were the elder this time, where before you were the younger. Ruburt looked up to you in those days as once you looked up to him. There is no need for a handicap of any kind. You both also had from other existences strong drives toward privacy and secrecy. The television program you saw about monasteries and privacy to some extent applies here, for in the hurly-burly of medieval life there was no privacy for thought.