The Spacious Present

[Caleb Murdock]

Seth said that all times or eras -- past, present and future -- exist in a spacious present.  Our camouflage universe, however, must be processed a moment at a time because that is all our biological brains can handle.  Seth said that there are other planes of existence within the multiverse (a term Seth didn't use but I do) that also have time, but that time functions differently in each plane.  For example, I remember that he gave the example of time running backwards instead of forward in some planes.  However, time, wherever it occurs, is essentially illusory because, in actuality, everything exists simultaneously.

Past, present and future, then, are not objective references, but personal references.  "Past" represents what I have done, "present" represents what I am doing, and "future" represents what I will do.  But the location of my past may be the location of someone else's future.  So the words "past", "present" and "future" only have private meanings.

I have come to see that this is why we are immortal.  If we exist anywhere in the spacious present, we simply exist.  Existence is kind of like being pregnant -- you either exist or you don't (or you exist as a probability not yet actualized).

However, Seth said things that confused me a little.  He said that all of reality is in a state of flux or change.  He also said that one's present actions can change the past as well as the future.  Yet other parts of the Material give me the impression that events are fixed and can be revisited by those who are able to do that.

I guess my question is:  If reality (i.e., the spacious present) is always in flux, does that mean that the past as I remember it may cease to exist?  To me, it kind of sounded like Seth was saying "everything that happens, happens in a spacious present, but the spacious present isn't permanent".  Is it possible that the "flux" that reality is undergoing leaves a record of itself so that any event in reality can be found if one searches hard enough (and has the ability to search for it)?  Did Seth even explain these things?

You can see my confusion.  I have started re-reading the books, but that could take me years.

[Sena]

I guess my question is:  If reality (i.e., the spacious present) is always in flux, does that mean that the past as I remember it may cease to exist?

Caleb, this is an interesting topic. I would like to compare Seth's teaching of the spacious present tp the Christian concept of Eternal Life. Eternal Life is either in heaven or in hell, purgatory is only temporary.

How I see it is that the spacious present makes Eternal Life nonsensical. Eternal Life is based on the idea that our present-day idea of "clock time" also exists in non-physical reality. If there are no physical clocks, what we have is the spacious present.

There is a view that if anyone believes in the Christian doctrine of Eternal Hell, it is wrong for anyone to have children, because there is a risk that one's children could end up in Hell:

For similar reasons, Kenneth Einar Himma has argued that some widespread moral intuitions, "together with Christian exclusivism and the traditional doctrine of hell, entail that it is morally wrong for anyone to have children" (Himma 2011, 198). That argument seems especially forceful in the context of Augustinian theology, which implies that, for all any set of potential parents know, any child they might produce could be one of the reprobate whom God has hated from the beginning and has destined from the beginning for eternal torment in hell.

https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/heaven-hell/

All the more reason for giving up the idea of time going on for ever and ever. In Seth's spacious present there is no "hell".

In answer to your question, the past does not cease to exist. The past exists in the spacious present.

[Caleb Murdock]

Thank you for chiming in, Sena.

I am not a Christian and don't look to Christianity for my answers.  I do have a little interest in comparing the Seth Material to other systems of ideas, but that's as far as my interest goes.  I was hoping that someone who was more familiar with the Material than I am might have a ready answer.

I do think I have an answer of my own, but it is an answer that I have come up with on my own.  It would seem that reality (as described by Seth) is always "additive".  If you exist in one plane for a period of activity, and then move to another plane.  The plane that you lived in is still there, and you are still there engaging in your activities; but you also exist in your present plane.

Perhaps the answer to my question about reality always being in "flux" is that the flux is not destructive.  Perhaps the changes that occur as reality changes are simply added to whatever was there in the first place.  If so, what was already there would not be altered or destroyed.