A: Of course, error doesn’t come because error doesn’t exist. Where does two times two is five come from? There isn’t any. No matter how many times it presents itself to you, please know—and until you prove it to yourself, take my word for it—in the whole history of the world there has never been one single two times two is five—never, never, never. No one has ever discovered anywhere under this blue dome, one single two times two is five. Can’t be found.
So from that standpoint, let me say this to you: Jesus Christ, in his entire ministry, never found a sin or a disease or a death, because every time he came into the presence of an appearance of it, the appearance quickly got up and ran away. It dissolved. It disappeared. And so I say to you that in the presence of any degree of spiritual consciousness, there is no such thing as sin, disease, or death. They never have existed any more than two times two is five existed, and when you see them or experience them, remember you are only seeing or experiencing the same thing you do when you get two times two is five in your checkbook—just a little error of belief. And as you recognize that you’re not dealing with an entity or identity, but rather with a belief, you will find the way to make that thing, which isn’t a thing, disappear.
And I might take a few minutes, right here, to caution you about that word “illusion.” In metaphysics we say that the sin or the disease is an illusion, and still, I wish you could know how many letters I receive saying, “You know this illusion still stays with me, and I can’t get rid of it.” You know, all there is to treatment, all there is to healing work, is the discernment that the so-called condition exists as illusion. After that, you don’t do something to it, or think something about it, or treat it, or try to get rid of it.
The Hindus have wrecked their entire country and their entire health and their entire wealth and freedom—they’ve lost their freedom—because of a misunderstanding of the word “illusion.” If you ask the average Hindu about illusion, he will tell you that this material world and this material body are illusion, and that someday you must put them off or get rid of them, and that’s how India has been wrecked.
You know the nature of an illusion? An illusion doesn’t exist out here. You can’t get rid of something out here that has no existence out here. The illusion exists as a mental misperception. Now, let’s look at the car tracks that come together. That’s an illusion, isn’t it? Can you get rid of it? Can you send a gang of workmen out there to move those tracks?
Where is the illusion? In your thought. And how are you going to get rid of it? Your recognition that it’s an illusion is that which gets rid of it. There’s nothing to do after that. Your acceptance of disease as illusion is the treatment. Now don’t try to do something to the illusion!
In the same way, even in metaphysics, you will find metaphysicians trying to treat the illusion or get rid of it out there on their bodies. In isn’t on their body. Never has there been a disease in or on the body—never, never, never. It has no existence there. If it ever had, there never would have been a metaphysical healing from the very first day, because nobody that I ever heard of in the metaphysical world has ever tried to cure a disease in the body or on the body, because it isn’t there.
The disease exists as a belief about a body, and it exists only in thought. It’s a misperception of that which is there. That is one reason why, in the message of The Infinite Way, every book that I have written has a long chapter on the nature of error. Why? Not to frighten you about error, not to make a lot of error, but to bring home the real nature of error, which is non-existent—if non-existence can be said to have a real nature.
Don’t you see that there is no disease in the body, and there’s no disease on the body? Where would God be if there was a disease also? What would you think of an infinite God, good, that permitted disease? There is no disease. Disease is merely a belief that we have accepted in our atheism—in the centuries of atheism that we had before Jesus Christ came on earth, the years of atheism before Buddha and Lao Tzu revealed the truth, and the years of atheism since 300 AD. That is what constitutes our diseases. Atheism is the conviction that if there is a God, it’s something unknown on a cloud up there, and with a lot of praying to It, we’ll get help. That’s atheism, and that atheism constitutes our disease.
Disease is not a condition of body. There is no disease in or on the body. If there is, there is no God, good. You can’t have an infinite God, good, and an infinite Power of good, an Omnipresence of good, and have disease, can you? It just doesn’t make sense—even humanly. Then what of disease? According to all metaphysical teaching, disease can only exist as a belief, as a temptation, as an appearance, as an illusion, and where can those things be? In belief, in thought; not in the body and not on the body—in thought. What dissolves them? Not using the arm of flesh, not using physical power or mental might. A reliance on the word of truth dissolves them; the reliance on the Lord God Almighty that fights our battles, that dispels our illusions. “And they rested in the words of Hezekiah.”
If we were to rest in the words of Jesus Christ, whom we take as Lord and Master; if we were to rest in the words of Jesus Christ as the Hebrews rested in the words of Hezekiah; we would find the enemy fighting itself and destroying its own king. We would find the diseases of the flesh destroying themselves if we would stop the battle, because I know this: Joel can’t heal, but the Lord God Almighty in the midst of me can, and if I can open my ears, open my consciousness, so that the presence and power of God can be made visible and manifest, It will open the Red Sea. It will make manna fall from the sky. It will make the sins and the diseases of the body to disappear.
Joel can’t, but the presence of God appearing as Joel can. But Joel must get out of the way, let his consciousness be the arena, and let the activity of God do the work. That is done in silence, and that is the major part of treatment. Even if you use the first half that I outlined to you [Joel is referring to contemplative meditation], your work isn’t done until you have completed the second half—get quiet and rest in the Word. Let your consciousness be the arena, but rest. Rest, and let the word of God come through.
I was just thinking about one of Mrs. Eddy’s hymns: “I will listen for Thy voice, lest my footsteps stray.” Perhaps some of you remember it. “I will listen for Thy voice, lest my footsteps stray.” You see, the moment the voice of God comes in, even if it isn’t a voice, if it’s a sensing of the presence of God, the footsteps can’t stray. The ill health can’t remain, the lack and limitation can’t remain, because you can’t have the presence of God and error. And so if there is error or discord in your experience, you haven’t a conscious awareness of the presence of God, and there’s only one way in which you’ll get that—silence. Silence. You must be still and let the presence of God come through.
1 This excerpt is from Recording 610A: 1951 Second Portland Series, “The Arm of Flesh.” This excerpt is posted with kind permission from the Estate of Joel Goldsmith, which holds the copy protection on all of Joel’s recorded classes and the copyright on the class transcripts. The full transcript of this recording is available at The Infinite Way Office website or by calling 1-800-922-3195.