The Nazarene

And it was Jesus, formerly of Nazareth.

This, then, was Jesus; that on earth was called the Christ. I should now understand it all. Power and majesty lay all around him, but it was simply the power of great love and wisdom evenly balanced. It is needless for me to say that there were two forms, male and female, which constituted the one Angel; and this was so of all that were present, for there were no spirits at this table. Jesus was a beautiful, bright and shining angel as were all the others. I was eager to talk with this son of Nazareth, and was not at all afraid of him. He gazed at me with his loving eyes, saying: 

Welcome, Herfronzo, to the land of redeemed souls.  

Redeemed, Redeemed? Now I should have a contest with Jesus. I glanced around the table, and every eye was turned upon this man of Nazareth and myself, but the eyes were all deeply loving, deeply wise. I found my tongue at last, and my old earth love of argument returned upon me hot and heavy.

Redeemed? I said at last. Am I to understand by this, that you consider yourself the redeemer of mankind?

Yes, he answered mildly, I am a redeemer of mankind. I hope, dear Herfronzo, that you will also become a redeemer of mankind.

Am I then to understand there is a hell from which the spirits and angels of this life have been redeemed?

Yes, he answered more mildly than before, there is a hell from which all human souls are constantly being redeemed; but the proper name of this hell is error and ignorance, and I am constantly doing my best to redeem man from this hell. All other angels are redeemers as well as myself.

Were you begotten by the Holy Ghost? well, on earth it is understood to mean God?

That is right, he said. God and the Holy Ghost are one. I was begotten by God, which is the Holy Ghost.

Then you mean to tell me that Mary was your mother, and God was your father?

Yes, he replied, Mary was my mother and God was my father.

Your assertion sounds very strange, coming as it does from the lips of a pure white Angel as you certainly appear to be.

I and my father are one; he repeated, and if I and my father are one, then I am the father of myself.

His wise and loving eyes held mine in a magnetic grip.

The father of yourself, I said, a derisive smile curling my lips, for I had always cherished a slight prejudice against Jesus, and I believe I could have faced Hades and its reputed master, rather than allow such nonsense to go unchallenged. I glanced at Voncelora, for he was my father, and I, at least, had not been begotten by the Holy Ghost. I laid my hand on Voncelora s arm, and as I did so, Jesus did the same to one that sat by his side.

This is my father, I said. Do you claim that you had no earthly father?

I and my father are one, he again repeated, I am the father of myself, and so are all other beings.

If I had not been an Angel and in heaven, I should have been angry; but a solemn gentle stillness reigned over all the assembled company. No derisive smile was on any face but my own. Helene sat with bowed head. Jesus hand rested on the arm of the angel that sat by him.

Now, Herfronzo, I know my talk sounds as paradoxical to you, as Voncelora's did when he told you that you were not a married man; and that you never were married. But I believe he proved to you the truth of his statement; and I also hope to prove to you that I existed before my father, or, at least, was co-existent with him. And as you say that Voncelora was your father; so in the same manner, this Angel that sits by me was my father.

But I understood you to say that you were begotten by the Holy Ghost; and that Angel is not God, or the Holy Ghost, and must have once been a man, like as we all were.

Yes, he replied, and we were all begotten by God, or the Holy Ghost.

I began to feel a little ashamed of my anger.

Oh! I said, I begin to understand you. Then you do not claim that you were begotten any differently from the rest of us?

No, he answered, and I never did intend to claim, when I was on the earth, that my earthly parentage was any different from that of other men. My words were misunderstood by men, the same as you have misunderstood them now; but I meant to be understood spiritually instead of literally. I meant that my earthly father was not the first or primal cause of my being; that I was co-existent with God, or the Holy Ghost; and I was right. I said, I and my father are one; and I meant by this that I was God, and God was I, as all other men and angels are God, as all things that exist are God, as the great whole constitutes God, and God or the Holy Ghost dwells within all things.

Are you willing now to admit that I and my father are one, and that I was begotten by the Holy Ghost? Are you also willing to admit that I am a redeemer.

But the churches on the earth teach that you are the only redeemer, or Saviour.

Herfronzo, will you be one with me to help redeem the Churches from error and ignorance on this point? The Angels within this sphere are all redeemers, and are at work as I am at work.

Well, I said, before I can work with you, I must be thoroughly enlightened on many points.

True; he replied, and that is why you have been invited to this supper; to you it is the Lord's Supper.

Again I felt nettled. I am not willing to own you for my Lord and Master; in fact, I think I like Voncelora much better.

He that loves father or mother, brother or sister more than me is not worthy of me.

Then I am not worthy of you, I answered, for I love Helene and Katrina, Aristotle and Voncelora, better than I do you.

Again his eyes held my own with their sweet magnetism.

Is it their personality which you love, or the love and wisdom which shines through that personality? And when I said, he that loved father or mother, brother or sister more than me, was not worthy of me, I merely meant the love and wisdom that was higher than myself, or any other personality; the love and wisdom which shone through the personality.

You have not yet made it clear to me how you can be co-existent with God, or the Holy Ghost.

In order to make this perfectly plain to you, I will introduce Galen and Harvey. Two angels arose as Jesus spoke, and gently inclined their heads toward me and again seated themselves.

Herfronzo, said Galen, you are willing to admit that spirit and matter are forever and eternal, they had no beginning, they can never have an end; that spirit and matter is God, the great father and mother of all things, or in other words, of all form that exists. That the blending, or union of spirit and matter produces, or brings forth form, and all forms are the children of spirit and matter?

Yes, I answered, this is to me most reasonable.

Then the germs of all things reside within the never-ending ocean of spirit and matter?

 Yes, this view of it seems grand truth to me.

And it is truth, he answered, as all wise angels know. Then, if the never-ending ocean of spirit and matter is God, father and mother in one, and their blending brings forth form, and the germs of all things reside within this eternal fount, and they never had a beginning and consequently can never have an end, was not Jesus right when he said, I and my father are one, and by the Holy Ghost was I begotten? And now I will explain this matter to you a little. Jesus was a despised Nazarene. Could any good thing come out of Nazareth? This was the way the people talked and it was to teach them that it did not matter who his parents were, or from what town he came; all this was unimportant, he was a son of God, or Wisdom; and existed long before his earthly father had taken on a form, and was co-existent with God. But the most of the people, in those days, had smaller brains than Jesus; he was a man ahead of the times in which he lived, and therefore became a martyr, as thousands of others have, to truth.

I now looked at Jesus more complacently. I was being reconciled to Jesus; but in a different way from which it is commonly understood by man.

You say, we were all co-existent with God, or rather, that we all existed within the ocean of spirit and matter as germs. This interests me greatly. Will you not go on and tell me more?

With pleasure, answered Galen. When I lived on the earthly plane, I was a physician, as perhaps, you well know; and I studied deeply into all things pertaining to the life of man. Man, know thyself. This thought was continually within my mind, and I was greatly desirous of understanding the law of propagation, and for many reasons which I will not now mention, I became convinced that if a man had a spirit or soul, it was not propagated down through generations of men, and boys had not the power of propagation. I came to the conclusion that man's soul was put into his body in some mysterious way after birth. This was as far as I could go when in the earth-life. As soon as I became an angel my mind again reverted to this subject, and I soon learned the truth. I found that man existed as a germ with in the everlasting ocean of spirit and matter. That these germs were breathed into the lungs of men. That man being the positive force, attracted and held them. From the lungs they passed into the blood, and there became clothed with material substance; and after they had been nourished and fed by the mother, they were born into the earth-life as human beings. Therefore, man is co-existent with God – is a part of God – and as Jesus said, is the father of himself.

Harvey, said Galen, will you tell Herfronzo what you discovered?

With pleasure, answered Harvey.

I suppose, my dear Herfronzo, you are aware that I was the first to discover the circulation of the blood; and while I was making minute examinations, I discovered within the product of man's blood, germinal points. Since my time on earth, other physicians have, under the microscope, discovered and analyzed these germinal points, and many are convinced that these germs are breathed in from out the atmosphere by man, and this is true. In the form of spiritual germs we had no beginning; in the form of progressed angels we can have no end; we are eternal, and co-existent with God, which meaneth all things that are, or ever shall be.

I do not yet comprehend the law of soul mates, or counterparts; although already united to my counterpart and consequently a completed angel; yet I am still ignorant of the law which governs it.

Socrates, said Galen, will you explain to our brother Herfronzo, the great law of counterparts?

Herfronzo, said Socrates, let us examine one of these spiritual germs before it has ever been breathed in by man, and we shall soon discover the law which regulates soul counterparts. Saying this, he waved his hands toward me in a gentle manner. Immediately my sight expanded and I saw innumerable small pellucid transparent globes floating here, there and everywhere. I took one of them in my hand and examined it closely. I found it was an indestructible spiritual germ, in the form of an egg, and within it were two perfect forms, the man and woman to be; the male and female in one; the future angel. The forms were perfect, but the eyes were closed; they were not yet self-conscious, or intelligent. Consciousness and intelligence were yet in store for them.

How is it, I asked, that children are born singly, not in pairs as this germ would indicate?

These globes which you now see, are perfect germs, they have never yet been breathed into the lungs of living man; that is reserved for them, answered Socrates. When these perfect germs are breathed in by man, the positive or male half germinates, or develops first; the female half or negative is thrown back into the atmosphere in the form of an oblong globe, for they must be separated in order to be born male and female; for if this were not so the law of propagation would be at an end. This latter globe, being oblong, never rises above the dense atmosphere, and the lungs of man have a far greater attraction for it than they did when it was a perfect globe; therefore, it almost immediately becomes incarnated. And now I have explained to you the true law of the sexes, for they are born into life in equal numbers. Now after these germs have expanded and become intelligent men and women, or otherwise, and then leave their bodies or die, they are again united and form one completed Angel. Yourself, dear Herfronzo and Helene, once existed within one of these perfect globes or germs, as one; from thence you became man and woman, performed your work on earth, becoming conscious and intelligent; from thence you have become again united and are now a perfected Angel, far on your road toward heavenly wisdom. Which would you prefer to be, Herfronzo, an Angel, or the undeveloped germ of an Angel? for many people say, they wish they had never been born.

There is but one answer to this question, I said. It is as much better to be an Angel than a germ, as it would be if there were a hell, to be in heaven instead of hell, for now I can examine all things with intelligent eyes and be wise as a God. I can now enjoy the happiness of eternal love; truly, love and wisdom are the everlasting hand-maidens of God.