Manuscript 14 Het Herstel Van Het Altaar - a podcast by Een Cursus in Wonderen

VI. The Restoration of the Altar

As psychologists know, when defenses are disrupted there is a period of real disorientation, accompanied by fear, guilt, and usually vacillation between anxiety and depression. 2The process discussed here is different only in that defenses are not being disrupted but reinterpreted, even though it may be experienced as the same thing.80 3In the reinterpretation of defenses, they are not disrupted, but their use for attack is lost. 4Since this means that they can be used only one way, they become much stronger and also much more dependable. 5They no longer oppose the Atonement, but greatly facilitate it.

2 The Atonement can only be accepted within you. 2You may perceive it largely as external, and this will make your experience of it minimal. 3You can be shown the chalice without accepting it for yourself.81 4This is due to the improper use of the defense of externalization.82 5Do not fail to appreciate, however, how remarkable your progress can be in this respect. 6You may perceive the chalice at first as a vessel of some sort whose purpose is uncertain. 7Even then, however, you can notice that the inside is gold, while the outside, though shiny, is silver. 8This is a recognition of the fact that the inner part is more precious than the outer side, even though both are resplendent.

3 The reinterpretation of defenses is essential to break open the inner light. 2Since the separation, defenses have been used almost entirely to defend yourself against the Atonement, and thus maintain your separation. 3You generally see this as a need to protect the body from external intrusion. 4Fantasies about the body arise from the erroneous belief that the body can be used as a means for obtaining Atonement.

4 Perceiving the body as the temple is only the first step in correcting this kind of distortion.83 2Seeing the body as a temple alters part of the misperception, but not all of it. 3It does recognize that the concept of Atonement in physical terms is not appropriate. 4But the next step is to realize that a temple is not a building at all. 5Its real holiness lies in the inner altar around which the building is built.

5 The inappropriate emphasis which people have put on beautiful church buildings is a sign of their own fear of Atonement, and an unwillingness to reach the altar itself. 2The real beauty of the temple cannot be seen with the physical eye. 3The spiritual eye, on the other hand, cannot see the building at all, but it perceives the altar within with perfect clarity. 4This is because the spiritual eye has perfect vision.

6 For perfect effectiveness, the chalice of the Atonement belongs at the center of the inner altar, where it undoes the separation and restores the wholeness of the mind. 2Before the separation, the mind was invulnerable to fear, because fear did not exist. 3Both the separation and the fear were miscreations of the mind, which have to be undone. 4This is what the Bible means by the restoration of the temple.84 5It does not mean the restoration of the building, but it does mean the opening of the altar to receive the Atonement. 6This heals the separation, and places within you the one defense against all errors which can make you perfectly invulnerable.

7 The acceptance of the Atonement by everyone is only a matter of time. 2In fact, both time and matter were made for this purpose. 3This appears to contradict free will, because of the inevitability of the decision. 4If you review the idea carefully, however, you will realize that this is not true. 5Everything is limited in some way by the manner of its creation. 6Free will can temporize and is capable of enormous procrastination. 7But it cannot depart entirely from its Creator, Who sets limits on its ability to miscreate by virtue of its own real purpose.

8 The misuse of will engenders a situation which, in the extreme, becomes altogether intolerable. 2Pain thresholds can be high, but they are not limitless. 3Eventually, everybody begins to recognize, however dimly, that there must be a better way.85 4As this recognition is more firmly established, it becomes a perceptual turning point. 5This ultimately reawakens the spiritual eye, simultaneously weakening the investment in physical sight. 6The alternating investment in the two types or levels of perception is usually experienced as conflict for a long time, and can become very acute. 7But the outcome is as certain as God.

9 The spiritual eye literally cannot see error, and merely looks for Atonement. 2All of the solutions which the physical eyes seek dissolve in its sight. 3The spiritual eye, which looks within, recognizes immediately that the altar has been defiled and needs to be repaired and protected. 4Perfectly aware of the right defense, it passes over all others, looking past error to truth. 5Because of the real strength of its vision, it pulls the will into its own service and forces the mind to concur.

10 This reestablishes the true power of the will, and makes it increasingly unable to tolerate delay. 2The mind then realizes, with growing certainty, that delay is only a way of increasing unnecessary pain, which it need not tolerate at all. 3The pain threshold drops accordingly, and the mind becomes increasingly sensitive to what it would once have regarded as very minor intrusions of discomfort.

11 The children of God are entitled to perfect comfort, which comes from a sense of perfect trust. 2Until they achieve this, they will waste themselves and their true creative powers on useless attempts to make themselves more comfortable by inappropriate means. 3But the real means is already provided, and does not involve any effort on their part at all. 4Their egocentricity usually misinterprets this as personally insulting, an interpretation which obviously arises from their misperception of themselves. 5Egocentricity and communion cannot coexist. 6Even the terms themselves are contradictory.86

12 The Atonement is the only gift which is worthy of being offered to the altar of God. 2This is because of the inestimable value of the altar itself. 3It was created perfect and is entirely worthy of receiving perfection. 4God is lonely without His Sons, and they are lonely without Him. 5Remember the poem which begins:

6And God stepped out on space,

And he looked around and said,

“I’m lonely—

I’ll make me a world.”87
7The world was a way of healing the separation, and the Atonement is the guarantee that the device will ultimately do so.88

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