Who gets to live?

[Deb]

First, I have to say that politically I am a moderate. I unfortunately can see both sides of every argument, and base my decisions on what makes sense to me in a common sense way.

But in light of a couple of US states approving abortion up until the day of birth (to me the induced delivery of a full term baby has to end with killing in most cases), I'm horrified. I saw this video about a young man who has Down Syndrome and is trying to make people see that his life does have value, not only to him but to others. He thinks. He has feelings. He has people who love him, and he loves his life. I realize there are degrees of DS, as with other types of genetic variance. How does anyone know what to expect in advance?

Seth has said many times that our mere existence is proof that we are valid. But who can judge in advance if a person's life is going to be valuable or not? According to whose values?

I'll leave that open.

[Sena]

Deb, I agree with Seth on this:

"And if the consciousness picks a mother who wants to abort, then the consciousness is only here for a short trip. A look around. It is like the seed from an apple tree who travels into the next yard but does not mature. It looks around and tries again. Any consciousness that wants to be born is born. And it picks a mother that wants to carry a child all the way."
—TPS5 Deleted Session December 2, 1978

[Deb]

Sena thank you. You are always the voice of reason.

Your response speaks to the perspective of the aborted fetus. What do you suppose of the perspective of the mother who makes the decision to end another's  life?

Is it just a matter of both sides of a drama?

[jbseth]

Hi Deb,

This is a great question, and I'll respond, but I want to think about this before I do.

Quick thoughts that come to mind are these:

Seth tells us: "There are no accidents."  He also talks about the Holocaust and many of our problems come from spiritual ignorance.

Just because a state allows a person to abort up until the day of birth, this doesn't mean that this is the action that would be taken by a spiritually evolved person.

jbseth

[Deb]

Seth tells us: "There are no accidents."  He also talks about the Holocaust and many of our problems come from spiritual ignorance.

Yep, you're absolutely right. No accidents, no victims, spiritual ignorance. I know this stuff, but then I get caught up in current events and my mind goes, "well but what about this" and "what about that." It applies to all levels of living and killing and dying: We are learning. We are both the murderer and the victim, and there is no death.

"And I have told you before, there are no accidents! No man is sent accidentally, and innocently, off to war. He who kills must learn what killing is by being the victim. You will learn that you cannot buy peace through violence. You will learn it. You will learn not only that human life is sacred, but that the life within each molecule and atom is sacred."
. . . .

"You will learn that consciousness is sacred. And until you learn that truth, you will not be free. You cannot kill another man, you cannot kill another woman and be free. You cannot even eat the meat of a cow, not nonchalantly. Not without thanking the cow for the food and the nourishment which it has given you, not without realizing that the cow, like yourself, is a part of the chain of life without which physically you would not exist and be free."

—TECS2 ESP Class Session, March 17, 1970

Sena, I found the beginning of quote you added above, which I thought was also interesting:

"([Ingrid:] "Seth, isn't it somewhat of a waste if people have abortions all the time? To me it just seems like a waste to become pregnant when all along, whenever you just thought of becoming pregnant, to have an abortion. It just seems like a waste."

(Seth:) It may be dumb. I do not know if it is a waste. For the consciousness will come to life if it wants to."

—TPS5 Deleted Session December 2, 1978

[Sena]

What do you suppose of the perspective of the mother who makes the decision to end another's  life?

Deb, Christians of course would condemn her. But the fact is that bringing up a child for 18 years is not an easy task. I imagine that the decision to terminate would be a painful one for any mother.

[jbseth]

Hi All,

Sometimes, on issues like this, I like to spend a little time alone, in a contemplative / meditative state (psychological time) and tune into my inner voice just to see what it has to share with me. Over the years, I have found that this inner voice, very often contains powerful messages of wisdom.

When I tuned into my inner voice on this particular topic, what came to me was two concepts: 1) Seth's discussion on the "Lumanians" and 2) Seth's discussion on the issues around the fact that while a murderer kills nobody and while there is no punishment for this after death, this doesn't mean that there aren't any consequences for these actions. These consequences come as a form of growth and adjustments.

While Seth's discussion on the Lumanians didn't take me long to locate ("Seth Speaks", Chapter 15) it did take me much of the day to locate his discussion on this idea of consequences (TES8, Session 397). While looking for this today, I also found a good example of this in TES1, session 32.

I've documented these 3 sections of Seth's comments below (the bold font in these sections are my doing).



So here's the thing. Let's say that a woman, who is almost 9 months pregnant and lives in one of these states, decides to abort her baby.  Does this mean that she will face any legal consequences as a result of her actions? From what I understand the answer is no.

Does this mean that she will face any punishment after death, according to Seth, as a result of her actions? Once again, from what I understand, the answer is no.

According to Seth, there are no accidents.

Does this mean that she will face any consequences, according to Seth as a result of her actions? From what I understand, according to Seth, here the answer is not once again, no, but yes instead.

While there is no legal consequences or punishment after death for this, there is a world of understanding, and knowledge that must be attained (see TES8 Session 397 below). Furthermore, the idea of punishment enters into this situation as the individual takes the consequences for the action and the intent of her choice.  Furthermore, this consequence may come in the form of a needed adjustment (see TES1 Session 32 below) for growth and development.


SS Chapter 15: Session 562


They were particularly concerned in the beginning with developing a human being who would have built-in safeguards against violence. With them, the desire for peace was almost what you would call an instinct. There were changes in the physical mechanism. When the mind signaled strong aggression, the body would not react.

The energy, often in your time given over to violence, went instead into other pursuits, but began to turn against them. They were not learning to deal with violence or aggression. They were attempting to short-circuit it physically, and this they found had complications.

The vitality of the civilization was therefore weak — not because violence did not exist, but because freedom of energy and expression was automatically blocked along specific lines, and from outside physically. They well understood the evils of violence in earthly terms, but they would have denied the individual's right to learn this his own way, and thus prevented the individual from using his own methods, creatively, to turn the violence into constructive areas. Free will in this respect was discarded.

They were, therefore, subject to all of the ordinary human fears which were then exaggerated, since physically they could not respond even to nature with violence. If attacked, they had to flee.



TES8 Session 397 March 6, 1968


[... 26 paragraphs ...]

Evil, so termed, is a lack of knowledge, a lack of fulfillment, a lack of growth, measured against that which has felt inward enough to understand more of its nature. Evil is therefore less desirable. The whole process however is toward understanding in which the evil is doubled and erased, but the growth must come from something that is not yet grown, and you cannot call a seed evil because it is not yet the flower.

We will in the future deal with the problem of evil, and hint of some of its implications in our life after death material.

Disease is not evil, for example. The murderer kills no one, yet if his intent is to do so then he must face the consequences of his intent. Crime after death is not punished. There is no crime to be punished, but between those last two statements lies a world of understanding, and knowledge that must be attained. And punishment enters in between those two statements as the individual takes the consequence for the action and the intent.

By the time he realizes the truth of the second statement, neither crime nor punishment affect him.
There is no final judgment, for nothing is final. (Long pause.) There is no judgment because all is in transition toward greater knowledge and understanding. Between those two statements again lies worlds that must be deciphered.

The child is not evil because he is not a man, and cannot be judged for his childishness. Value fulfillment is always working, yet there is between those two statements—you realize the ones to which I refer—the idea of judgment as an impetus and spur against the inner self's knowledge of the growth that must come.

[... 21 paragraphs ...]



TES1 Session 32


The same personalities are not always reborn for example in the same race. It is true that your history shows a continuity of Jewish persecutions, that is persecutions of Jews. The fact is that many personalities who have been famous in many eras have also been proud, brilliant and cruel, and have belittled and persecuted those they considered beneath them.

These personalities, often talented in many directions and often with past experiences of wealth and power, choose to be born as Jews of their own volition, and this is a karmic compensation, not in any sense punishment but a needed adjustment on the part of the personalities involved.

The horrible misdeeds committed upon the Jews by the Germans were certainly not asked for specifically. However large numbers of those Jews were Huns of a very cruel variety in a past existence.


jbseth

[Sena]

However large numbers of those Jews were Huns of a very cruel variety in a past existence.

jbseth, the above statement seems to me nonsensical. It is the old idea of karma, which I thought Seth disagreed with.

[Deb]

Just yesterday I was listening to one of the Seth audio tapes (6) and I may be able to add some information about this.

Seth (and Rick) were talking about karma not being what religions teach. Seth points out that with simultaneous time, all of our incarnations are existing at the same time and we can and do communicate and share information. Usually during our sleep period. There is no payback or cause and effect for something "wrong" we've done in the past because technically there is no past. About 8 mins into the 6-2: "All time is now. You are real now, your reincarnational selves are real now. What you do affects each other."

Rick came up with an interesting story on 6-1 involving Lawrence and on the audio Lawrence (in modern times) talks about his experience:

It was afternoon and Lawrence decided to shave. As he was looking at himself in the mirror he saw someone else's face and for a moment their minds merged. The other man was a Confederate officer, during an interrogation of a Union captive. The man was cruel, violent, maybe even sadistic. Larry's mind instantly recoiled, he was horrified and disgusted by the person. He also realized this was another aspect or incarnation of his and was shocked that he could so strongly dislike another "part of himself."

Seth talked about the incident, also asked Lawrence at about 5:45: "did it not occur to you that he also slipped inside your head and that YOUR ideas change HIS ideas?"

Seth: "For again, you live simultaneous lives, your thoughts and attitudes are not fixed in your terms in your future and your past and so through your current experience that other self also becomes aware of ideas that would not otherwise those terms have occurred to him. And he is initially, initially, as appalled by your ideas [as you are of his]. And yet they do enter into his consciousness so he wonders where these ideas of cowardice come from. That is HIS interpretation. But the new knowledge that you have in your terms becomes available to him so that he can us it and interpret it in HIS terms. And that therefore if he chooses to change his behavior, there is always a give and a take. You are therefore effecting his reality as he is yours. And both of you are learning. For he is sure of his energy and from him you can learn to be certain and proud of your own. Though I hope that you decide to use it in a different manner."

Afterwards Lawrence talks about his reaction to what Seth said, his feelings about the incident. Very interesting and worth a listen.

But what it comes down to is that for all practical reasons, there is no karma or punishment to come around and kick us in the *ss for past indiscretions (of course there is the self-punishment that comes from guilt). I don't think of punishment as a teacher: a deep personal understanding of the wrongness of an act is a lesson that makes a lasting impression. To regret an action, to "repent" during a current lifetime, is the best result I would think. The goal is for us grow out of our personal spiritual ignorance, with the help of all of our incarnational selves and the other players in our dramas. To learn what things we are doing that is harmful and change our behavior. ("The child is not evil because he is not a man, and cannot be judged for his childishness.") My thought is that our natural guilt plays a big part as well. I can say there have been many things I've done in this life where I immediately think, "that was wrong," and that serves to modify my behavior in the future. Even something as "minor" as spraying Raid on an ant colony that has moved itself into my living space or stepping on a spider. I now employ catch and release, lol.

I'm adding an audio file link if anyone wants to listen to the first half of 6. It will try to autoplay when you click on the link, so plan ahead and turn your volume down. You can also download the file.

https://speakingofseth.com/images/06-1Multi-Dimensional.mp3

BTW I feel Seth's Jew/Hun comment is easily misunderstood in that it does look like karma at first glance. But now in light of the story of Lawrence's experience with one of his incarnations, I see it more as an example of how the Jew/Huns would have or did modify their beliefs and behaviors the way Larry and his Confederate officer are doing.

Following the Huns quote: "The Germans of that particular generation were not revenging past misdeeds. Revenge has no place in this discussion. In one sense there is no excuse for what happened.... Your generation as a whole had to learn the importance of thought and responsibility. You had to learn that basically to hate is to kill. The lesson was a practical one. The Germans and the Jews made it plain. Had the hatred not existed in the Germans, it could not have been channeled as it was against the Jews. Free will operated here as always." Seth says we are beginning to learn.

Then later:

"You will all be taught the sacredness of all of life, and in the most practical way."

"Until you learn reverence for all living things, you will continue to slaughter each other. Again, this does not involve punishment in any sense of the word, but the idea of killing permissiveness is not discriminating. Once you allow yourselves to kill you will kill any living thing. In future lives this involves the race in further adjustments." (TES1, Sess.32)

Now I have to figure out if pulling weeds out of my garden and thereby killing them is a crime against life? Really?

My biggest question now is if we are a part of ATI, why do we have to learn this lesson? How did the killing begin? It must be something ATI also needs to learn...?

[jbseth]

Hi Deb, Hi All,

Wow Deb, thanks for your awesome reply to Sena's statements about karma.  I think your reply here is one of the best I've ever seen on this topic and I'd say you really nailed it.  No only did you talk about the nature of "karma" given simultaneous time, but "cause and affect" as well.

The story about Larry and the confederate soldier is really fascinating. I've never heard it before, and Seth's comments about this soldier slipping inside Larry's head and Larry's ideas affecting him, are very evocative.

Your question about pulling the weeds out of your garden and killing them, I suspect is really much deeper than many of us often think about, and I'd say that it warrants discussion as another topic for us to consider. If you'd like to start another topic on this subject, I'd enjoy participating in a discussion on it. 

jbseth

[jbseth]

Hi All,

It has occurred to me that this new abortion law, may have been put in place for a very specific and practical purpose. To be honest, I haven't heard anything about this new law and so at first, it seems to be really questionable. However, I'm also open to the possibility that this law was agreed to and signed into law for a very legitimate purpose.

Here's a story I just came up with that explains what I mean here.

Suppose a young girl, say 9 or 10 years old, was raped by a stranger. Furthermore, suppose this young girl, who has some medical condition, like leukemia, ended up getting pregnant because of this.  In this situation, let's say that this girl is going through chemotherapy and possibly radiation therapy to save her life. Furthermore, let's also say that under these conditions, an abortion using either chemical concoctions or surgery might turn out to be extremely dangerous and life threatening for her. 

I can conceive of a situation where the medical staff and her parents all agree that the safest option for the girl was to let her carry this unwanted fetus until it either aborted itself or she delivered it via natural childbirth. 

Now I imagine that in this scenario, the chemotherapy and radiation therapy would very much destroy the fetus during this pregnancy time period and what would be given birth, after 9 months, would not in any way resemble what we would call a happy healthy baby.

I apologize for being so graphic here, but this law may have been created to address issues similar to this and it may not be applicable to other situations like the situation where a young woman ends up getting pregnant by her boyfriend and then after some later time period, she decides that she doesn't want this child.

In the situation with the young 9 or 10 year old girl, in our society, the girl's parents own the responsibility of doing what is best for their daughter. As a result of this, I suspect the consequences and adjustments that I mentioned in my previous post, may in fact be much different for those involved in this young girl's situation.

jbseth

[Deb]

No arguments here, this is all fairly new to me too.

This is what I've heard about the reason behind the new abortion laws from a couple of different people. I did some research today and it seems it's more about protecting reproductive rights. Some people are afraid that Trump will put another republican in the senate, and that the senate will reverse Roe v. Wade (I'd heard the decision was not made on solid grounds but don't know the details). The states used to decide abortion laws on their own, but that was taken away with the passing of RvW—abortion became federally regulated. Some states are revamping their local laws on abortion in case that happens. Why extending the legality of abortion to full term? I don't know the reasoning behind that other than protecting reproductive rights 100%. It would make more sense that it's to protect the life or health of the mother but it feels less personal and more political to me.

This is not an easy issue, but to me there are understandable reasons women would want or need an abortion, and many that are hard to understand. A friend had a friend who'd had 9 abortions last count, she was using it as birth control. I can't think of any personal reasons to wait until the end of the third trimester, even into the second trimester, but that's just me. There are some reasons given here. With the diagnostic abilities we have now, it's fairly easy to  detect of problems with the baby early in the pregnancy. I can't see someone going through chemotherapy and radiation while pregnant and expecting the baby to be ok. I've known women who have aborted because of this reason. There can be late-term emergencies, such as placental detachment, placenta previa, fetal distress, preeclampsia, but babies can be delivered by caesarian and can now survive as early as 22 weeks. But there are emergency situations. I suppose acute mental problems in the mother are harder to deal with. I also can't see a woman who has been severely injured in an accident, unconscious even, of being able to withstand the additional trauma of a late term abortion. Miscarriage would be more likely.

Here's the revised Act that passed recently in New York—lawmakers and bystanders stood up, cheered and applauded when it was announced it had passed. I am not a prude or religious in any way, but that just feels wrong to me.

Then there was the pink lighting of the World Trade Center. The first comment is priceless, "Who thought, hey lets take the world trade center, something which represents all the killings on 9/11, and make it pink to represent the killing of babies! Great idea guys."

I also found it interesting that in the Act "A death caused by a suspected criminal abortion" was struck from deaths a coroner is authorized to examine. I guess it goes back to the Amendment 14 right to privacy clause WvR is based on. Also, in the green type, line 42 just says "a health care practitioner" rather than doctor... is qualified to determine the abortion is necessary, and perform it, to protect the patient's (mother's) life or health.

I watched a YT video today, a former Planned Parenthood doctor describing what's involved in a late term abortion. It does not involve induced labor (which a baby can survive). It's extremely gruesome. I won't attach it.

This seems so complex, and yet Seth really makes it all simple and basic, and without judgment.

"And if the consciousness picks a mother who wants to abort, then the consciousness is only here for a short trip. A look around. It is like the seed from an apple tree who travels into the next yard but does not mature. It looks around and tries again. Any consciousness that wants to be born is born. And it picks a mother that wants to carry a child all the way."
—TPS5 Deleted Session December 2, 1978

[Sena]

There is no payback or cause and effect for something "wrong" we've done in the past because technically there is no past.

Deb, thanks for clarifying this.

[jbseth]

Hi Deb,

Thanks for the additional information on the new abortion law. It sounds like its probably more political than anything else.

jbseth