“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

“If you remember what I said about the way in which the universe expands, that it has nothing to do with space, then you may perhaps dimly perceive the existence of a psychic pyramid of interrelated, ever-expanding consciousness that creates, simultaneously and instantaneously, universes and individuals that are given—through the gifts of personal perspective—duration, psychic comprehension, intelligence, and eternal validity.

“There is no such lapse in many other personality structures. Events are simultaneously perceived. Reactions are also nearly instantaneous in your terms. Growth and challenge are provided not in terms of achievement or development in time, but instead in terms of intensities. Such a personality is able not only to react to and appreciate Event A, say, in your present time, but to experience and understand Event A in all of its ramifications and probabilities.

“Obviously such personalities need far more than the neurological systems with which you are presently equipped. Your own neurological system is physical, but it is based upon your own inner capabilities as of ‘now.’ It is the materialization of an inner psychic framework. Many other personality structures do not need a materialized perceptive framework such as this, but an inner psychic organization is always present.

“Your time—past, present, and future—as you conceive it, would be experienced entirely as present to many of these personalities. However, your past, present, and future would be experienced entirely as past to still other personality structures.

“Imagine past, present, and future then as a single-line delineation of experience in your terms; the line, however, continuing indefinitely. Other personality structures from other dimensions could then, theoretically, observe it from an infinity of viewpoints. However, there is much more than this. The single line [representing physical experience] is merely the surface thread along which you seem to travel. It is all of the thread that you perceive, so when you envision other dimensions you are forced to think in terms of observers far above the thread, looking down upon it from any given viewpoint.

“Now, there are personalities developed enough to do this. Each act of leaping, so to speak, forms a new thread. Following through with our analogy, imagine yourself Self A. We will start you off in physical reality on Thread A, though you have already traversed many other threads to get where you are.

“All That Is retains memory of that state, and it serves as a constant impetus—in your terms—toward renewed creativity. Each self, as a part of All That Is, therefore also retains memory of that state. It is for this reason that each minute consciousness is endowed with the impetus toward survival, change, development, and creativity. It is not enough that All That Is, as a primary consciousness gestalt, desires further being, but that each portion of It also carries this determination.

“It is conceivable, then, that It has evolved, in your terms, so long ago that It has forgotten Its origin, that It has developed from still another Primary which has—again, in your terms—long since gone Its way. So there are answers that I cannot give you, for they are not known anywhere in the system in which we have our existence. We do know that within this system of our All That Is, creation continues and developments are never still. We can deduce that on still other layers of which we are unaware, the same is true.

“It then purposely gave them more and more detail, and yearned toward this diversity and grew to love that which was not yet separate from itself. It gave consciousness and imagination to personalities while they still were but within Its dreams. They also yearned to be actual.

“In Its massive imagination, It understood the cosmic multiplication of consciousness that could not occur within that framework. Actuality was necessary if these probabilities were to be given birth. All That Is saw, then, an infinity of probable, conscious individuals, and foresaw all possible developments, but they were locked within It until It found the means.

“All That Is, therefore, ‘lost’ a portion of Itself in that creative endeavor. All That Is loves all that It has created down to the least, for It realizes the dearness and uniqueness of each consciousness which has been wrest from such a state and at such a price. It is triumphant and joyful at each development taken by each consciousness, for this is an added triumph against that first state, and It revels and takes joy in the slightest creative act of each of Its issues.

“The motivating force is still All That Is, but individuality is no illusion. Now in the same way do you give freedom to the personality fragments within your own dreams and for the same reason. And you create for the same reason, and within each of you is the memory of that primal agony—that urge to create and free all probable consciousness into actuality.

“I have been sent to help you, and others have been sent through the centuries of your time, for as you develop you also form new dimensions, and you will help others.

In other words, the whole frame of reality according to Seth includes far more than reincarnation and development within the physical system that we know. We have many sessions dealing with the nature of other realities, and sessions on “cosmology” that can’t be included in this book because of the space requirements. One of the most important points, I think, is that God is not static Himself. Whole blocks of Seth material discuss the potentials and makeup of consciousness as it is manifested in molecules, man, and pyramid energy gestalts. All of these are intimately connected in a cosmological web of activity. But as Seth says, “Even this overall pyramid gestalt is not static. Most of your God concepts deal with a static God, and here is one of your main theological difficulties. The awareness and experience of this gestalt constantly changes and grows. There is no static God. When you say, ‘This is God,’ then God is already something else. I am using the term ‘God’ for simplicity’s sake.

“Entities, being action, always shift and change. There is nothing arbitrary about their boundaries. Some personalities can be a part of more than one entity. Like fish, they can swim in other streams. Within them is the knowledge of all of their relationships.

“Any personality can become an entity on its own. This involves a highly developed knowledge of the use of energy and its intensities. As atoms have mobility, so do psychological structures.

“There is no personal God-individual in Christian terms,” Seth says, “and yet you do have access to a portion of All That Is, a portion highly attuned to you. … There is a portion of All That Is directed and focused within each individual, residing within each consciousness. Each consciousness is, therefore, cherished and individually protected. This portion of overall consciousness is individualized within you.

“The personality of God as generally conceived is a one-dimensional concept based upon man’s small knowledge of his own psychology. What you prefer to think of as God is, again, an energy gestalt or pyramid consciousness. It is aware of itself as being, for instance, you, Joseph. It is aware of itself as the smallest seed. … This portion of All That Is that is aware of itself as you, that is focused within your existence, can be called upon for help when necessary.

“This portion is also aware of itself as something more than you. This portion that knows itself as you, and as more than you, is the personal God, you see. Again: this gestalt, this portion of All That Is, looks out for your interests and may be called upon in a personal manner.

“This psychic gestalt may sound impersonal to you, but since its energy forms your person, how can this be?

In another session, Seth explained it this way: “You are cocreators. What you call God is the sum of all consciousness, and yet the whole is more than the sum of Its parts. God is more than the sum of all personalities, and yet all personalities are what He is.

“The responsibility for your life and your world is indeed yours. It has not been forced upon you by some outside agency. You form your own dreams, and you form your own physical reality. The world is what you are. It is the physical materialization of the inner selves which have formed it.” But if God cannot be objectified, what about Christ? Seth says that he did not exist as one historic personage. “When the race is in deepest stress and faced with great problems, it will call forth someone like Christ. It will seek out and indeed from itself produce the very personalities necessary to give it strength. …

“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.”

“You have been given free will. Within you there are blueprints; you know what you are to achieve as individuals and as people, as a race, as a species. You can choose to ignore the blueprints. Now: Using your free will, you have made physical reality something quite different than what was intended. You have allowed the ego to become overly developed and overly specialized. In many respects, you are in a dream. It is you who have made the dream too vivid. You were to work out problems and challenges, but you were always to be aware of your own inner reality, and of your nonphysical existence. To a large extent you have lost contact with this. You have focused so strongly upon physical reality that it becomes the only reality that you know.

“When every young man refuses to go to war, you will have peace. As long as you fight for gain and greed, there will be no peace. As long as one person commits acts of violence for the sake of peace, you will have war. Unfortunately it is difficult to imagine that all the young men in all of the countries will refuse to go to war at the same time. And so you must work out the violence that violence has wrought. Within the next hundred years that time may come. Remember, you do not defend any idea with violence.