(T-15.V.1:1-2) The holy instant is the Holy Spirit's most useful learning device for teaching
you love's meaning.
For its purpose is to suspend judgment entirely.
So the letting go of judgment, as we all know from our work with the Course, is one of the
key, key messages of the Course.
But again, the way I let go of judgment is first to be aware of all of my judgments, otherwise
my choosing to forgive and let go of judgment makes no sense at all.
Again, one understands the 2000-year tragic history of Christianity.
It is a history of otherwise well-meaning people who thought they were giving up judgment,
and all they really did was bury their judgment, and when you repress something then you automatically
and inevitably must project it out.
When you don’t at the judgment of yourself, you invariably will judge everybody else.
That’s what Jesus, again, means when he says you must give up your deception, the
deception that you are a loving and forgiving kind person.
But we could learn how to become like that by first recognizing how much we don’t want
to become like that, and how much we want to protect this unconscious decision to continue
to believe we are guilty but to blame everybody else for it, because if I’m guilty it means
I’ve sinned, and if I’ve sinned, it means I’ve separated from God and that’s a fact.
That’s what we all want to hold onto, so in a sense we all want to keep the separation
that we believe we stole from God but to avoid all responsibility for it.
Again, that’s why the ego counseled us in that original moment to make up a world fast,
because in this world of billions and billions and billions of forms we have an almost infinite
amount of projection opportunities.
We keep the cake of judgment but we eat it and enjoy it because now the pain will be
experienced by everybody else.
So again, we want people to attack us.
We’re impelled to do this, and then what impels us is the need to avoid looking at
our own hatred of ourselves.
That’s why this is so, so difficult.
Okay: (T-15.V.1:3) Judgment always rests on the past, for past experience is the basis on which you judge.
This is the ego’s use of the past.
There is another use of the past.
The ego’s use of the past, however, is always to judge; first, ourselves, which we keep
secret even from ourselves, and then the projection of that judgment onto other people.
And even when we are aware of our own self-hatred, there is still someone
or something we are blaming for it.
“Yes I’m terrible, yes I’m awful, yes I’m inadequate, yes I’m evil, yes I’m
sinful, but it’s not my fault.
I was born this way.”
So it doesn’t matter whom you blame, there will always be judgment inherent
in one’s hatred of oneself.
(T-15.V.1:4) Judgment becomes impossible without the past, for without it you do not understand anything.
Okay we always use the past as a way of justifying (which then means understanding)
why we are so filled with hatred and why we are so justified in feeling unfairly treated.
(T-15.V.1:5-7) You would make no attempt to judge, because it would be quite apparent
to you that you do not understand what anything means.
You are afraid of this because you believe that without the ego, all would be chaos.
Yet I assure you that without the ego, all would be love.
And, of course, that’s again the heart of the matter.
The ego says, “If you let me go there’ll be nothing, and what little there is God will destroy.”
And so it takes a lot of patient teaching on the part of our Teacher to convince
us that letting go of the ego means all that will remain is love, which, of course, is
the last thing in the world anybody here wants because love—true love—means everybody
is included in that love without exception.
As we’ll see later on, the way to reflect that love in this world is to recognize we
all share a common interest, and if you do not perceive a situation as existing in which
everybody involved—victim and victimizer —share the same interest, there is no way
of effectively and lovingly resolve the situation.
That’s why we’re not interested in Jesus’ love.
That’s why 2000 years ago the world wasn’t interested in his love, because what was erected
on the altar was not his love but special love, and we all embrace special love.
Special love always is built on contrast, comparison; one or the other.
And of course in specialness there are the “good guys” and the “bad guys.”
There are the good parts of our body and the bad parts of our body.
There are the good parts of a personality and the bad parts of a personality.
It doesn’t matter what level we look at it in, and it’s always the same.
There’ll always be a perception of differences.
That’s why there’s that very, very important line a little later in the text where Jesus
says, “Nothing so blinding as perceptionof form,” (T-22.III.6:7).
“Nothing so blinding as perception of form,” because form clearly demonstrates the reality
of differences, not just male/female, fat/thin, high/low, black/white, north/south.
Form demonstrates the reality of differences that we think make a big, big difference:
good/evil, victim/victimizer, truth/falsity.
These are the ego’s definitions of “good” and “truth,” of course.
In our world, “truth” only has meaning when it’s juxtaposed with “false.”
In our world, “good” only has meaning when it’s juxtaposed with “evil,” and
in order—which means in order for there to be good in this world there has to be evil,
to distinguish “us” from “them.”
That’s just how the world is.
When we chose the ego, inevitably and automatically we chose against God.
When we chose for separation we chose against unity.
When we choose good we choose against evil.
When we choose truth we choose against falsity.
It’s always one or the other, and you need both: one that you choose
and one that you choose against.
That’s why in the teacher’s manual Jesus explains perception basically as a psychologist would,
or physiologist would, that in perception, what’s built into the system is a system
by where you perceive certain things and choose against others, so you could not live your daily life.
You could not live right as you’re living at this moment if you did not make
a distinction in your perception.
You’re obviously are tuning out certain parts of your perceptual field as you’re
sitting in your chair.
You’re not looking at everything.
Hopefully, you’re looking at me and listening to me, or maybe you’re screening me out
and focusing on something else. But in order to live in this world, which is a world of
perception, you choose some things and choose against.
What you choose for is what you deem important.
What you choose against is what you say is unimportant.
It’s always a selection; it’s always a judgment.
Something is important; something’s not important.
Now obviously, if we’re going to exist in this world we need such a dynamic because
we couldn’t literally exist if we reacted to all the stimuli at the same time.
You couldn’t eat!
But the basic dynamic that underlies all perception in this world is judgment.
Again, that’s why he says, “Nothing so blinding as perception of form,” (ibid.)
because the form conceals the content.
So when you look at a world of form you see a world of differences, and when you look
through the eyes of the ego, those differences make a big difference, which belie the underlying
content; the only content that’s true in this world is that we all are the same.
We may not look the same because our bodies are different but we are all the same.
We are all equally insane otherwise we wouldn’t be here and, as Jesus says at the beginning
of the text, “Frightened people can be vicious,” (T-3.I.4:2).
Well insane people can be vicious too.
In fact, “insane” and “fearful” are the same.
We all do vicious things to protect our own vicious thought, and that makes us all the same,
and until we recognize and accept that sameness we will not know our real sameness as Christ.
You don’t skip over steps in this course.
You must walk through the ego system first, a system of hate, a system of judgment,
a system of fear; only then can you get to the other side, which is where the love is.