Home Listen to this article Return to Articles previous / next article

Genesis without Mist

The first chapter of Genesis describes spiritual creation from Elohim's perspective. The divine I or Us created evidence of one perfect Mind - "male and female created he them" (Gen 1:27). "And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good" (Gen 1:31).

Beginning in the next chapter, however, a second story of creation unfolds as a saga of mankind's attempt to explain how God made him a flawed mortal. "Whatever indicates the fall of man or the opposite of God or God's absence, is the Adam-dream, which is neither Mind nor man, for it is not begotten of the Father" (SH 282:28). As presented, this second record is false because it has been infused with mortal beliefs; however, the truth is discernable by removing the mask of error. "If you wish to know the spiritual fact, you can discover it by reversing the material fable, be the fable pro or con, - be it in accord with your preconceptions or utterly contrary to them" (SH 129:7). Mary Baker Eddy called this method of discovery "Truth by inversion."

Mist:
"There went up a mist from the earth, and watered the whole face of the ground" (Gen 2:6).

In Science, all form and action proceeds from Spirit with infinite clarity. "The creations of matter arise from a mist or false claim, or from mystification, and not from the firmament" (SH 523:7). Is it possible for obscurity, ignorance, and confusion to be real when Spirit contradicts it? No! Therefore, the statement, "there went up a mist from the earth," must be stricken from the record because it never happened (Gen 2:6). As corroborators of Truth, we may observe error, but we bear witness to truth. Only truth is validated and recorded.


Lord God:
"And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground" (Gen 2:7). Lord God is almost always a figurehead of mortal mind. "The Jewish tribal Jehovah was a man-projected God, liable to wrath, repentance, and human changeableness. The Christian Science God is universal, eternal, divine Love" (SH 140:23). Lord God or Jehovah must be replaced in the narrative with divine Mind, for only infinite intelligence can record man's history accurately. Watered dust is not the medium for molding God's idea.

Two Trees:
"The tree of life also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of knowledge of good and evil" appear to be in strange juxtaposition, as if to tempt mortal man with contraries: infinite life, which he believes is unapproachable and impossible on the one hand, and good and evil, which he knows all too well but does not like to admit on the other (Gen 2:9). The mystery of the text is solved if we know that perfect God has no contrary attachments and neither do His perfect trees. The words "and evil" must be erased in order to identify the second tree correctly. The two trees are thus identified as the tree of Life, of which one freely eats, and the tree of knowledge of Good, by which one understands how infinite Life lives us and every idea in spiritual creation. Knowledge of Good is akin to knowledge of salvation, which Mrs. Eddy identifies as Christian Science. Right in the midst of the charade of material creation stands the two anointed ones - Christ and Christian Science! There are many scriptural symbols that reference these Life witnesses: the two great lights, the two olive trees, the two olive branches through which the two golden pipes empty the golden oil out of themselves, and the bridegroom and the bride.

Adam and Eve:
"The Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept: and he took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh instead thereof; And the rib, which the Lord God had taken from man, made he a woman, and brought her unto the man" (Gen 2:21-22).In the false history, Adam - "the usurper of Spirit's creation, called self-creative matter" - was hypnotized into believing that he originated Eve (SH 580:17). Then, while still in his deep sleep, he and his Eve imagined "that the human race originated materially instead of spiritually, - that man started first from dust, second from a rib, and third from an egg" (SH 585:25). Without divine direction, earth's authors tried to substitute their dream for the facts of spiritual creation. By replacing their observations with God's directive, a perfect man appears at the right time and in the proper order. "Let there be light: and there was light" commences spiritual creation (Gen 1:3). In other words, shining the light of understanding precedes God's manifestations. In the twelfth chapter of Revelation, it is the woman clothed with the sun who brings forth the man child that is "caught up unto God, and to his throne" (verse 5). Therefore, Womanhood (Christian Science or the Comforter) is the light of understanding that brings man, the individual "I AM" and beloved of God, into view.

In verse twelve of Christ and Christmas, Mary Baker Eddy reaffirms the proper order of creation as Mind, mother, man.

  For Christian Science brings to view
The great I Am, -
Omniscient power, - gleaming through
Mind, mother, man.

Mind thinks, mother understands, and man appears as the highest expression of Godlikeness - the one who comprehends all things, even infinite Life, Truth, Love. Creation has no mist, limitation, or finity. When we know the truth, we are free indeed and shall never again be tempted to return to the garden of ignorant bliss.

George Denninger ©

Home Listen to this article Return to Articles previous / next article