“Thou shalt not
destroy thy conceptions before they are brought forth; nor kill them after they
are born.” (The Epistle of
Barnabas 14:11; page 163, The Lost Books of the Bible, MCMLXXIX.) ***[Here is info from Wikipedia the free Encyclopedia,
(via google) on the disciple, Barnabas, who along with St. Paul, spread the
gospel of Christ Jesus and Christianity throughout Jerusalem and many other
parts of the ancient world following the ascension of Christ Jesus]: Barnabas (Greek: Βαρνάβας), born Joseph, was an early Christian, one
of the prominent Christian disciples in Jerusalem. According to Acts 4:36 Barnabas was a Cypriot Jew. Named an apostle in (Acts 14:14), he and Paul
the Apostle undertook missionary journeys together and defended Gentile
converts against the Judaizers. They
traveled together making more converts (c
45–47), and participated in the Council of Jerusalem (c 50) Barnabas and Paul successfully evangelized
among the "God-fearing" Gentiles who attended synagogues in various Hellenized
cities of Anatolia. Barnabas' story appears in the Acts of
the Apostles, and Paul mentions him in some of his epistles Tertullian named
him as the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews but this and other attributions
are conjecture. Clement of Alexandria and some scholars have
ascribed the Epistle of Barnabas to him, but his authorship is disputed. For a long time, I have failed to write on the subject of abortion because of its divisive nature in the USA. It is better to be positive than negative in most things, so I’ve just kept silent. But I finally felt led to write because young girls in America are growing up today with the notion and practice that it is all right to kill and mangle their off-spring while these individuals are incubating in the womb, or until they have grown enough to move about outside the womb. This has even led many women
across the country to reason that since their bodies carried their off-springs, they have the
right to destroy these individuals.
This conclusion even leads some women to believe that they have the
right to actually kill their children after
they leave the womb and are growing up, since she ‘gave’ them their life
in the first place. If she has the right to take away their life in the womb, she has the right to do so, at any
time.
(This accounts for many parental murders,
sometimes of their helpless children by drowning, poisoning,
or leaving them in hot cars to die.) In other words, believing this fallacy that life comes from
us, instead of through us, some women declare ownership over these
individuals in the womb, claiming that since she created them, she has the
right to destroy them, anytime, at will.
This conclusion was conveniently reached, despite the fact that no one
destroyed the woman’s own life as it
was materializing in someone else’s womb. Having no sense of even ‘fair-play’ to the
new life emerging from her womb, she also has no sense of a spiritual
component of life’s chain of existence that connects us all. So,
because other females in our society have killed their young, many girls of
today are taught, or just like to
believe, that it is right and good to
follow them in this kind of cowardly destruction…and yes, I said cowardly. For harming those who are so tiny and
vulnerable and need to grow a bit before they can pop out into the material
scene is an unbelievably cowardly thing to do, despite what false sense of ‘rights’ one may entertain. No one’s life is ours to give or take. God, alone, is the giver of life. No one is ‘born’ alone. Each individual life materializing itself is
connected to an endless chain of life forms that eventually emerge from a
womb. Each unique identity brings parts of
the past from the links that came before us.
Each life form is reaching forward, toward a future that will still tie
us to every other identity that arrives here, in this earthly experience. And this endless chain is not to be broken. We will each leave this material sense of existence at our
own, appointed time. But, no woman (or
man) ever came into this physical, finite identity as the source or creator
of anything, or any one. No woman ever,
ever, ever, owned one of the material off-spring she conceived as her part in the
continuation of the life chain. Those
who have conceived have an assignment which they have accepted, or were chosen,
possibly for some higher reason than they could imagine. All of creation comes from the same divine Source. All life belongs to the Creator; therefore, each
woman who has killed one of her human off-springs has interfered with this
spiritual chain of God that exists beneath the surface of everything and
everyone. Each woman who has killed an
individual who is gestating in the womb has materially-killed one of God’s off-spring…not man’s
off-spring. Each one conceived was
pre-ordained for a divine reason, or mission, while here, in this finite,
material sense of existence. For any individual woman to believe that she was allowed to live, but she had the divine right to kill her
human off-spring is engaging in ‘fuzzy thinking.’ We are each, and every one of us, a caregiver
and a part of this materialistic life-chain; but the Source of that
chain has connected us all to each other.
And deep within each soul-link of this never-ending chain is that divine
Spirit and Infinite Intelligence of the universe, called God, who contains each
and every, unique soul, or identity. Now, each soul’s identity has made a journey into this
finite, material sense of reality for
some, individual, reason. And we
are not to interfere with that divine reason. Every identity created by God has his and her
own, unique, purpose of existence. We
are to walk our own path, without being destructive to the path of others. We are to ‘live
and let live’ in this temporary, material sense of existence, until we are
called Home by God...not by man nor woman.
And we are not to walk another’s path, nor cause any destruction to
others, if we can avoid it. “Thou shalt not kill”
has always been one of the Ten Commandments handed down to Moses on the Mount. Christ Jesus, in his ministry, talked often
of the importance of the little children among us, in order to protect them
from the evils of this world. Jesus even
spoke of more concerning the murder,
or doing harm to the innocent young ones among mankind. He once told the crowd following him, “And whoso shall receive one such little child in my name receiveth me. But whoso shall
offend one of these little ones which believe in me, it were better for him
that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and that he were drowned in the
depth of the sea.” (Matthew 18:5 & 6;
King James Version (KJV). Christ Jesus also told his followers: “Take heed that you do not despise one of these little ones, for I say
to you that in heaven their angels always see the face of My Father who is heaven. For the Son of Man has come to save that which was lost.” (Matthew 18:9-11; New
King James Version (NKJV). (I think this last sentence means, ‘lost
in one’s material sense of existence that doesn’t yet perceive the spiritual
reality of being’.) Whatever false belief we’ve accepted in the past, there is still good news for those who suffer (i.e., the babies killed; those who suffer from the news of all these baby murders; or those who are suffering guilt from a past abortion). God is a loving God and does not turn away from anyone who truly wants to find the way to correct whatever past wrongs we’ve done. If we truly want to get right with the Almighty, the way always comes. For, even though we appear to live and die as finite, material beings, appearances are quite deceptive. Material man or woman is not the real identity of anyone. We are spiritual, not material beings. Whoever believes we are
finite creatures, unconnected to our God-Source, is existing in a false,
sense of reality. Therefore, as we
awaken more and more to spiritual, rather than physical reality, the false,
material sense of ourselves and our ‘universe’ begins to fade from thought,
along with wrongful behavior of every kind we’ve previously entertained. Here is the reason we must
turn away from all our destructions, including killing our young: In the Kingdom of God, there can be no murder
of any thing or any one. If any
destruction were to be in the kingdom of Heaven, that destruction, however
minor, would eventually destroy the entire kingdom from within. Therefore, wrongful thoughts and their subsequent behavior are kept out of our heavenly kingdom (Home). Oh, the kingdom of God is always ever-present within our spiritual memory banks, but we don’t remember it in the materialistic, false sense of reality that we entertain. As Christ Jesus said, “…the kingdom of God is within you.” (Luke 17:21; New King James Bible Version (NKJV). That means it is in our deeper, spiritual memories. The invisible kingdom of God (our Heavenly Home) has never left us…we
just have to awaken to it. It is always, but invisibly, omni-present
with us. But we will not see it with
these eyes, nor hear it with these ears…for we are still sleeping in the dream
of finite materiality and do not remember who we really are (God’s spiritual
children). Concerning the killing of our young, there is no one who can really die; for whom God has created is spiritually alive, forever. But this temporary human experience is our school, and we are the students. In this school, it is our spiritual ignorance that makes us think we are creators of anything; for the divine Mind, alone, creates all that dwells within its spiritual realm. Fleshly, finite life and
death both seem real, on this material level of thought and perception, to
those who do not yet discern our spiritual Selfhood, which is our own,
individual Christ-identity. Jesus’s
name was never, ‘Jesus Christ’ (like, John Smith). But rather, he was ‘Jesus, the Christ’ meaning ‘Jesus, the spiritual one’. More precisely, ‘The Christ’ is a universal symbol that
identifies God’s spiritual children, as opposed to the false, (and temporary)
earthly names we carry in this human experience. The Christ Consciousness is the shared,
spiritual consciousness that dwells deep within us all. But as long as our false material sense of
being allows such barbaric, murderous actions, as killing the vulnerable among
us, we are not awakening, in much of any way, to our innate, spiritual level of
thought and existence, nor our own Christly Self. It is only through the
process of spiritual awakening that thought draws the inner memories which
begin to emerge from our divine consciousness within. Even then it may take several material life
experiences before some awaken to the reality of being. But we must all evolve, or come out of the
deep-sleep, (the Adam-dream) of finite, fleshly being, sooner or later. When we each fully awaken to our true,
spiritual Self and our spiritual place that eternally lives in the divine
kingdom of God, we will find no destructiveness there, nor in ourselves. In this human experience
(where we seem to be both spiritual and material beings), to kill anyone, however
small or at any stage of development, is a big deal, spiritually speaking. It is a lower, spiritual level of thought
that fails to perceive any spiritual component to life. For, until we begin to awake spiritually
to the higher principles of existence, we will seem to be trapped in this finite, physical
level of thought, where we experience all the nightmares of our own material
beliefs and the results of our darker behavior. Evil, on any level, cannot
enter (awaken) to the ever-present kingdom of God. For the ability to fully awaken to spiritual
reality and the harmonious kingdom of God is hidden to us, (or keeps us asleep
in the false sense of materiality) possibly for many lifetimes. Until we seek to be ‘born again’ (mentally put on our own Christ identity as Jesus
advised) as individuals, we will not shake off this finite, collective ‘Adam-dream’
of finite materiality. Nor will we leave
all our destructive behaviors behind us.
In the Kingdom of God,
there can be no murder of any thing or any one.
For, no one can really kill
what or whom God has created. It is
our spiritual ignorance that makes us think we are creators of anything; for the divine Mind, alone, creates all that
dwells within its spiritual realm. We do
not have the right, or ability, to actually kill anything that divine Spirit
has created. But, just as our human
laws declare, ignorance of the law is no
excuse. There is a price to pay for
breaking spiritual laws, and unless we pray our way out of our wrongful
acts, get right with God concerning whatever bad we’ve done, we won’t find
heaven, even in our dreams. It is the realm of infinite
Love we must reacquaint ourselves with, before we even come close to the
harmonious kingdom of God that is invisibly present all the time, even though
we can’t perceive it with the material senses. For, it is universal love that is the key to enter the door of Heaven’s
harmony and everlasting life. | |||||||
