Can I Carry So Great A Seed?

Posted on November 28, 2020 by Douglas

The community of the New Message from God has a gathering every two years. We have traditionally called them “Encampments” but we are disrupted this year by the pandemic. We have held an online event this year called the Summit. We prepared for the Summit by reading the recently released book, “The Worldwide Community of the New Message from God.” I consider this book to be a roadmap for how our community will move forward.

Can I carry so great a seed?

There is a portion in the chapter “Being a Person of the New Message” that touched me. The larger context of this passage is the work to be done in escaping the shadows of the past. There is work to be done to effectively serve a world in transition. Here is the passage:

“You are a person of a New Revelation, and you become unbound and unhindered by the past, for you are the seed bearer of the future. You are carrying the vessel of the future.”

I am recalling a poem by Rainer Maria Rilke (1875-1926) as I contemplate this passage. This poem is part of what has come to be known as “Rilke’s Book of Hours,” published in 1905. Here is the poem in German.

Du bist die Zukunft, großes Morgenrot

Du bist die Zukunft, großes Morgenrot
über den Ebenen der Ewigkeit.
Du bist der Hahnschrei nach der Nacht der Zeit,
der Tau, die Morgenmette und die Maid,
der fremde Mann, die Mutter und der Tod.

Du bist die sich verwandelnde Gestalt,
die immer einsam aus dem Schicksal ragt,
die unbejubelt bleibt und unbeklagt
und unbeschrieben wie ein wilder Wald.

Du bist der Dinge tiefer Inbegriff,
der seines Wesens letztes Wort verschweigt
und sich den Andern immer anders zeigt:
dem Schiff als Küste und dem Land als Schiff.

Here is the translation by Anita Barrows and Joanne Macy:

You are the future, The red sky before sunrise
Over the fields of time.
You are the cock’s crow when night is done,
You are the dew and the bells of matins,
Maiden, stranger, mother, death.

You create yourself in ever-changing shapes
That rise from the stuff of our days–
Unsung, unmourned, undescribed,
Like a forest we never knew.

You are the deep innerness of all things,
The last word that can never be spoken.
To each of us you reveal yourself differently:
To the ship as coastline, to the shore as a ship.

Can I carry so great a seed? I take joy in Rilke writing of the “deep innerness of all things,” No particular future is guaranteed. But the essence of everything can be approached. Can the world survive the difficult times ahead? Can humanity emerge into a greater community with its freedom intact? Can humanity keep Knowledge alive, when it has died in so many worlds? Can I carry so great a seed? All I know is that I must put forth my best effort.

* * *

Welcome to Mystery of Ascension! We are students and advocates of the the New Message from God. We are members of a worldwide community. We seek to assist the world in successfully navigating difficult times ahead. We seek to assist the world in successfully emerging into a greater community of intelligent life. You will also find some poetry. Find out more about us here. Contact us here.

I Must Climb This Great Mountain

Posted on May 11, 2019 by Douglas

Over the past two years, I have read the revelation “Building the Four Pillars of Your Life” on a semi-regular basis. It was received by Marshall Vian Summers in September of 2008. I wrote a post about this teaching slightly over five years ago, called “An Antidote For Inconsistency.” Repeated readings have yielded encouragement to me. Each time I find a little more of the treasure within.

I must climb this great mountain

In this revelation, living a life of greater purpose is likened to climbing a great mountain. There are many people who relish such an idea. Alas, many of these people fail to consider the preparation necessary for such a life. The necessary preparation is building strength and balance in the areas of relationships, health, career/providership, and spiritual development. You can imagine that this is a great deal of work. Many people want a short cut. There isn’t one.

“It [living a life of greater purpose] is like climbing a great mountain. You start off and you realize it is really steep, and you do not have the right kind of shoes for it, and the things that you are bringing along are not really the things you really need, and you find you do not have the strength to get very far. You do not have the provisions. Your expectations were perhaps too romantic. You thought this was going to be easy.”

I cannot settle for the little mountain

So many people fail for lack of preparation. How do they respond? Many settle for less than their greater purpose in life. Rainer Maria Rilke wrote about this in his poem “The Man Watching:”

What we choose to fight is so tiny!
What fights with us is so great.
If only we would let ourselves be dominated
as things do by some immense storm,
we would become strong too, and not need names.

When we win it’s with small things,
and the triumph itself makes us small.

The knowing that you avoided the engagement of which you dreamed, is a great disappointment. “Building the Four Pillars of Your Life” teaches,

“Or it proves to be hard, and you really do not have the strength to undertake it. So you settle for something much less in life. You tell yourself, “Oh, well. This relationship will be good enough for me,” or “This job will be good enough for me.” And you compromise yourself, and you give your life to things that really have no promise. You give your life to people who are really not going anywhere. And though you might feel more secure or relieved of the challenge, in your heart there is a great depression, a great misgiving.”

Climbing the great mountain is not a dream

People see how much effort is required. People see how many people fail for lack of preparation. People see how many people settle for less. People see how many of those who settle for less have a great depression, a great misgiving. Therefore, many people think that living a life of greater purpose is a dream, an illusion, a fantasy. “Building the Four Pillars of Your Life” heads that off at the pass as well:

“That is why to give you the promise that you have a greater purpose and a greater meaning in life, the essential elements for building the foundation for this must be provided for you. And the education must be provided for you. Otherwise, the idea of living a life of a greater purpose, greater meaning, is only a dream—beyond your reach, beyond your capabilities.

But it is not a dream. It is the fundamental reality of your life. But it requires a very strong foundation, and this foundation must be sustained through time. This will give you strength and confidence. This will free you from dangerous obsessions. This will prevent you from falling into despair or being pulled away by the obsessions and the addictions of others.”

Therefore, I must prepare

Hikers preparing. I must climb this great mountain

If I attempt to climb the great mountain unprepared, I will fail. If I settle for climbing a little mountain, I might succeed, but the triumph will make me smaller. If I call climbing the great mountain a dream, I will be ignoring the reality of my life. Therefore, I must prepare. I’m reconciled with this taking a great deal of work. I must climb this great mountain.

* * *

An Unseen Inner Work

Posted on August 25, 2014 by Douglas

Why don’t some people see what you see? Why don’t you see what other people see? There must be more to it than just someone telling someone something. It is as if there is an unseen inner work going on as well. The New Message from God speaks of this unseen inner work in the revelation “The Rays of Initiation,” received by Marshall Vian Summers in July of 2012.

An unseen inner work

The Angelic Assembly is looking for a particular kind of person. A kind of person who has undergone a certain ripening. Not everyone has undergone, or even desired, this ripening. It seems like a good idea to take Rainer Maria Rilke, and some other poets, as companions on this journey. Rilke draws a distinction:

They wanted to bloom
and to bloom is to be beautiful.
But we want to ripen,
and for that we open ourselves to darkness and travail.

How do the Angelic Orders find such a person? By the response to the spirit of the quest, and the readiness to respond to a greater purpose and a greater calling in life.

How does a person develop the readiness to respond to a greater purpose and a greater calling in life? They recognize there is more to life than satisfying the cravings of the animal soul. They are calling for something more permanent and essential to their true nature. As Rachel of old cried out to her husband Jacob “Give me children, or I’ll die!” (Genesis 30:1, New International Version), these people cry out “Give me the truth of my life, give me my real life, or I’ll die!”

What do the Angelic Hierarchies do when they find such a ripened person? They shine Great Rays. Great Rays of light and power. Great Rays which start reckoning and evaluation, many stages of initiation, a great turning point. Great Rays which are shined on the changeless part of a person, bypassing the intellect.

And what happens after that? It’s a long and winding road. Many changes, many reevaluations of things. I imagine that Jacob had an experience such as this during his night of wrestling. Rilke wrote of that night:

What is extraordinary and eternal does not want to be bent by us.
I mean the Angel who appeared to the wrestlers of the Old Testament:
when the wrestlers’ sinews
grew long like metal strings,
he felt them under his fingers
like chords of deep music.

Whoever was beaten by this Angel
(who often simply declined the fight)
went away proud and strengthened
and great from that harsh hand,
that kneaded him as if to change his shape.
Winning does not tempt that man.
This is how he grows: by being defeated, decisively,
by constantly greater beings.

There is more that could be said about “The Rays of Initiation,” but I believe I have made a proper introduction of an unseen inner work.

* * *

Who If I Cried Out Would Hear Me?

Posted on August 21, 2014 by Douglas

In the opening line of the Duino Elegies, the poet Rainer Maria Rilke (1875-1926) cried out “Who, if I cried out, would hear me among the Angelic Orders?” In the next few lines, he confessed that the terror of his cry being heard outweighed the longing of his cry, saying “And so I hold myself back, and swallow the cry of a darkened sobbing.”

Who if I cried out would hear me?

But the very fact that Rilke was even able to contemplate such a thing showed that he had some of the frame of heart spoken of by the New Message from God revelation “The Rays of Initiation.”

Perhaps some introductions are in order. “The Rays of Initiation” is one of roughly 900 revelations received by Marshall Vian Summers from 1982 to the present. These revelations were recorded on audio, and transcribed shortly after they were received. This particular revelation was received in July of 2012. The audio for this revelation is available at the link.

While I have been actively engaged with the New Message from God since 2010, I freely admit that words like “rays” and “initiation” are not part of my native spiritual vocabulary. The references to the Great Rays in A Course in Miracles made a lovely whooshing sound as they went over my head in 1987. The parts I understood were challenging enough.

The spring of 2010 was a difficult time for me. About a year and a half before that, I was approved for Social Security disability due to Asperger’s Syndrome, a form of autism. I received this designation relatively late in life, at the age of 51. I considered it the refutation of my life. I could see in my mind’s eye the word “LOSER” in large, black letters on my forehead and my right hand. I could see in my mind’s eye the U.S. Government designating me as the human equivalent of filler meat, pink slime. Who if I cried out would hear me? I didn’t cry out to anyone in particular. I cried out to whom it may concern, “What am I good for?” A voice in my mind’s ear answered “You’re good for finding Knowledge.” I knew what this meant because I had studied Steps to Knowledge shortly after it was received in 1989.

My original plan was to write a post unpacking the contents of “The Rays of Initiation.” Between December of 2013 and now, I have written three such posts unpacking the contents of an individual revelation. I will still do this, just not in this post.

Who, if I cried out, would hear me? I realize this may sound a bit presumptuous, but I dare to claim my cry was heard.

* * *

My Inner Life Imitates, Drinking In Silence

Posted on May 8, 2014 by Douglas

This is another literary experiment. There are already two perfectly good English translations of the poem “Ich habe viele Brüder in Soutanen” from The Book of Hours by Rainer Maria Rilke. One translation is by Robert Bly, and another translation is by Anita Barrows and Joanna Macy. Here is the original German:

Ich habe viele Brüder in Soutanen
im Süden, wo in Klöstern Lorbeer steht.
Ich weiß, wie menschlich sie Madonnen planen
und träume oft von jungen Tizianen,
durch die der Gott in Gluten geht.

Doch wie ich mich auch in mich selber neige:
Mein Gott ist dunkel und wie ein Gewebe
von hundert Wurzeln, welche schweigsam trinken.
Nur, dass ich mich aus seiner Wärme hebe,
mehr weiß ich nicht, weil alle meine Zweige
tief unten ruhn und nur im Winde winken.

My inner life imitates, drinking in silence

Barrows and Macy suggest that the Madonnas Rilke is talking about in this poem are the Madonnas of Sandro Botticelli, like this one:

and this one:

I read the existing translations, and I think to myself “I know that’s what he said, but that’s not what I think he meant.” And since I’ve already railed against complaining, I have to do something about it instead. So I did. It’s definitely not an exact translation, but it says what I think he meant.

I have many brothers, in holy brown robes
In the south, laurels in monastery gardens.
The way they imagine the Madonna – so human
As I often dream of Titians
Through whom God walks as fire.

Though I dig into the rich, dark earth of myself,
My God is still deeper
My inner life imitates, drinking in silence

The life you see springs from his abundance,
More than that is a mystery to me.

I am pleased with myself for following in Robert Bly’s footsteps, stealing a grain of sugar from the castle of sugar which is the poetry of Rainer Maria Rilke.

* * *

Познание истины

Posted on February 28, 2014 by Alisa

For English version click here.

Познание истины

Я продолжаю заниматься Шагами к Знанию, которые часто призывают к познанию истины, к тому, чтобы испытывать истину, ощущать её всем телом и существом, ведь только так можно проникнуть в суть истины.

А что для меня истина? И зачем в неё вникать? Суть вопроса для меня скорее кроется в том, чтобы определить для себя: иду ли я по верному пути по жизни или нет, делаю ли я всё в моих силах, чтобы развиваться духовно и помогать другим развиваться, выйти на высший уровень эволюции и повысить вибрацию нашей планеты? А всё начинается с себя, надо осознано жить, жить так, чтобы вложить свой маленький вклад в развитие человечества. А для этого надо восстановить Знание внутри себя, следовать Знанию, и позволить Знании вести меня по жизни. Тогда истина откроется.

Я недавно вспоминала то время, когда я впервые приехала в Россию в 1981 г. Я приехала в Москву, чтобы совершенствовать мой русский язык после окончания университета в Сан-Антонио, Техас. В ту пору я вела дневник и на днях читала его заново. Запись за 25 февраля 1981 г. поразила меня. Я написала её после того, как ходила вечером в одном из парков Москвы и наблюдала за закатом.

“Лучи заходящего солнца накрывают снежные сугробы темно-розовой шалью” писала я в дневнике. Я сидела какое-то время на лавке и наблюдала за этой красотой, погружаясь в таинственность и тишину. Я писала о том, что с моего приезда в Россию, что-то изменилось в себе, жизнь стала и сложнее и проще, яснее одновременно. Как будто я смотрела в прозрачную воду озера и увидела свое истинное отражение, не жалкое, ничтожное, а что-то ценное. Я увидела, как судьба моя становилась ясным, перед мной появилась цель, а все лишнее отпадало. “Я хочу ответственности, хочу знания, хочу познавать мир, хочу испытывать жизнь и свое место в ней”, писала я дальше в дневнике. Мне тогда было 23 года.

Познание истины

Сегодня, тридцать три года спустя, я могу сказать, что судьба с мной распределилась именно так, как я тогда хотела. Я знала тогда, что хочу жить в России, что моя судьба здесь, и так и получилось. Я переехала жить в России навсегда и ни на минуту не жалею об этом. Я тут как раз продолжаю свое духовное развитие, делаю свой маленький вклад в общую картину. Начинаю познавать истину.

Я недавно узнала, что Райнер Марии Рильке, поэт, которого я открыла для себя будучи студенткой, тоже впервые посетил Россию, когда ему было 23 года и был глубоко затронут ей, называя его “своей духовной родиной”.

Он полюбил Россию и хотел переехать туда на постоянное жительство, но по какой-то причине, его мечта не сбылась. А в какой-то момент он начал писать стихи на русском языке.

Я, как и Рильке, тоже считаю Россию своей духовной родиной.

Я, как и Рильке, тоже была глубоко затронута Россией во время моей первой поездки сюда.

Я, как и Рильке, хотела переехать в Россию на постоянное жительство. А, в отличие от Рильке, моя мечта сбылась.

Тут я познаю истину.

Я, конечно, ни в коем случае пишу тут о Рильке, как будто я рядом с ним стою. Отнюдь! Он же великий немецкий поэт, а я простая гражданка Алиса. Просто мне очень по душе эти совпадения. И ещё одно совпадение – я тоже начала писать на русском языке, не стихи, конечно, но в каким-то образом можно называть это «поэзией». Неграмотно пишу, с чудными особенностями, но от чистого сердца и «с любовью к языку, которого может быть даже хорошо и не знаешь».

Может кто-нибудь когда-нибудь прочтет мои неуклюжие, сумбурные строки, и что-нибудь поймет.

* * *

I Feel The Truth Arising

Posted on February 25, 2014 by Alisa

Step 18 Today I Feel the Truth Arising is bringing up memories from the past.

Part of the step reads:

The truth must be fully experienced … It is an experience, and so it is something that is deeply felt. … Truth is something you will feel with your entire body, with your entire being.

This confirms for me my own experience with knowing the Truth so far.

I would like to share an entry from a diary I kept during my first trip to Russia in 1981. I went to Moscow to study Russian for a semester after graduating from university in San Antonio, Texas. This is what I wrote (reproduced verbatim) on February 25, 1981 after walking in one of Moscow’s snowy parks at sunset. I was 23 years old at the time.

The dusky pink sun as it set this evening mirrored my heart, that mystery, that deep hushed silence, the pink quiet, I was completely content just sitting and watching, drinking in the calm and feeling a quiet joy in just being alive. I can’t explain what has happened since I’ve come here, but things have changed. All of a sudden life is more complex, yet clearer and simpler. I am beginning to grasp, experience, and understand feelings and ideas that before were just vague dreams, distant and unrealized. Suddenly my destiny is beginning to take shape before my eyes, I am becoming aware of who I am and what I want out of life. No matter what happens, where I go, what I do, I am me, true to my own purpose, and the things that are dear to me, that make me tick, make my heart beat, make me aware, are the most important. All the other superfluous things in life seem to be falling away and I look into a crystal clear pool, see my reflection, see that I am, see that I am worthwhile. I want responsibility, I want knowledge, I want to find out, want to understand, want to experience.

I feel the truth arising

Thirty-three years later I can say I have manifested in my life the yearnings of my younger self. I feel the truth arising, but now I am conscious of its source, it comes from Knowledge, the Knowledge I am reclaiming as I take Steps to Knowledge.

I recently found out that a poet I discovered in university, Rainer Maria Rilke, and felt a resonance with also first travelled to Russia when he was 23 years old and was deeply affected by it, calling it his “spiritual motherland.”

The article quoted above goes on to say, “On returning from his first trip to Russia, full of deep impressions and planning to move there permanently (a dream that never came true), Rilke suddenly found himself writing poems in Russian.”

Like Rilke, I was deeply affected by my first trip to Russia and felt it was my spiritual homeland.

Like Rilke, I wanted to move to Russia permanently.

Like Rilke, I found myself writing in Russian, although not poetry and not immediately. I did not think I could write in Russian until a few years ago, but I write today in Russian with the same linguistic idiosyncracies as Rilke wrote his Russian poems.

Step 18 “Today I Feel the Truth Arising” ends with:

Throughout the day as well, without doubt or hesitation, pursue your true goal in life. From this true goal will come all of the important things that you will need to accomplish and the great power of vision and discernment that will allow you to find those individuals that you have come into the world to find.

I did not know of this Step thirty-three years ago, but there it amazingly was in my life. Today I am consciously reclaiming it.

Some people may not see the significance or value in the coincidental dates and ages, but I do and I like them, which is why I am sharing Rilke’s story along with my story on this particular day, February 25, 2014.

* * *

I Believe In All That Has Never Yet Been Spoken by Rainer Maria Rilke

Posted on February 18, 2014 by Douglas

This poem was written sometime in late 1899, shortly after Rilke’s first trip to Russia. It is part of the book “The Book of Hours.” The Book of Hours is more commonly called “Rilke’s Book of Hours” to distinguish it from the Christian devotional book of the 16th Century. After writing the group of poems containing this poem, Rilke wrote in his journal “I have begun my life.”

Anita Barrows and Joanna Macy are the translators of this rendering. I haven’t heard of either of them until recently. Translating Rilke isn’t the main occupation for either of them, but their three Rilke translation collaborations have been warmly received. I believe they are (or are becoming) to Rilke what Coleman Barks is to Rumi; beloved late 20th-early 21st Century interpreters.

All that has never yet been spoken

Here is the poem in the original German.

I believe in all that has never yet been spoken.
I want to free what waits within me
so that what no one has dared to wish for

may for once spring clear
without my contriving.

If this is arrogant, God, forgive me,
but this is what I need to say.
May what I do flow from me like a river,
no forcing and no holding back,
the way it is with children.

Then in these swelling and ebbing currents,
these deepening tides moving out, returning,
I will sing you as no one ever has,

streaming through widening channels
into the open sea.

Does the title need work? The German version has a title “Alles noch nie Gesagte” (All that has not yet been said). Barrows and Macy took poetic license with the second line, changing “most pious feelings” to “what waits within me.” It wouldn’t hurt my feelings if the title of this poem was “I believe in what waits within me.” But most people know this poem by its first line.

Why am I sharing this poem with you now? Because the bit about “what no one dared to wish for” got me. What is it that no one dared to wish for? A new message from God, that’s what.

A fellow student wrote something yesterday which provides an exclamation point:

“Show me the prayers of humankind and I will show you a New Message from God; show me the fate of a spiritual people and I will show you God’s Prophecy; show me the promise of intelligent life and I will show you God’s blessing; show me purpose, meaning and direction and I will show you a Time of Revelation. Such is upon us. Such is the power of our prayer and of our existence.”

* * *

Mystery of Ascension

A great mystery / Is my true self that I bring / From my ancient home

Tag Archives: Rainer Maria Rilke

Can I Carry So Great A Seed?

Can I carry so great a seed?

I Must Climb This Great Mountain

I must climb this great mountain

I cannot settle for the little mountain

Climbing the great mountain is not a dream

Therefore, I must prepare

An Unseen Inner Work

An unseen inner work

Who If I Cried Out Would Hear Me?

Who if I cried out would hear me?

My Inner Life Imitates, Drinking In Silence

My inner life imitates, drinking in silence

Познание истины

Познание истины

Познание истины

I Feel The Truth Arising

I feel the truth arising

I Believe In All That Has Never Yet Been Spoken by Rainer Maria Rilke

All that has never yet been spoken