Conversations with God
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Conversations with God is a three-part dialogue written by Neale Donald Walsch that he claims to have channelled during the 1990s using automatic writing. (It has since been expanded by the author, though the original trilogy remains central.) The books outline the principles of God, ethics, metaphysics and the nature of reality in the format of a continuing dialogue between God and the author.
In the dialogue many philosophical ideas are presented that had already been advanced earlier by major western thinkers, but Walsch presents the information in language for modern readers and does not specifically cite any of these philosophers. In fact, Walsch claims that he had never known most of these ideas before his revelatory experiences.
Worldview and concepts within the dialog
Some fundamental parts of Walsch's writings include:
- God is everything (Spinoza)
- God is self-experiential (hence it is the nature of the Universe to experience itself) (Hegel) (This is similar to process theology, first outlined by Alfred Whitehead)
- Good and evil do not exist (but in a different context and for different reasons as Nietzsche)
- Reality is a representation created by will (Schopenhauer)
- Nobody knowingly desires evil, even individuals such as Hitler (Socrates)
- It is not in God’s nature to judge or punish, only to teach. We are all children of God and "work in progress"
- Humans are composed of mind, body and spirit (again, in a different context as the Catholic belief of Trinity)
- God is a creative, self-reflective being (hence man is created in God's nature)
In Walsch's first dialog, God notes that "knowing" and "experiencing" oneself are different things. That-which-Is, cannot know itself fully, as it stands. It cannot know itself as love, since no other object exists to love.. cannot know itself as gviing since nothing else exists to give to, cannot experience itself in myriad ways.
This present creation then, in Walsch's viewpoint, is established by and within God, so that sentience can exist which does not directly remember its true nature as God. Split into a billion billion forms, life can live, experience, and rediscover its nature as God, rather than just "know" itself in theory. It is essentially a game, entered into by consensus, to learn and enjoy and explore, knowing that ultimately there is no finish line which some will not reach, no learning that is not without value, no act that does not carry lessons for future or for others. In Walsch's view we have a common interest in keeping the game going, for there is nothing else to do except to experience our existence and then experience more of it, to uncover deeper layers of truth and understanding. There are no external rules, because all experience is valued, and can be chosen. But within this, there are ways that (it is stated and implied) people will gradually come to learn are better, and ways which are worse, learnings that will take place over time, and over hundreds and thousands of lifetimes.
In addition, "God" makes several major, controversial statements:
- There are in fact only two primary polarities of emotion: love and fear. Al others are blends and shades of these.
- Alcohol is one of the worst substances known to mankind;
The second and third books deal with political and social issues. According to the book, God recommends many economic and social changes if people want to make a more peaceful world, and also recommends that more attention should focus on the environment. The conversations also teach that reincarnation and life on other planets exists.
Writers with a comparable philosophy
Walsch's worldview is comparable to that of Richard Bach, when he wrote in his book The Bridge across Forever:
- "That's what learning is, after all; not whether we lose the game, but how we lose and how we've changed because of it and what we take away from it that we never had before, to apply to other games. Losing, in a curious way, is winning...."
- "We're the bridge across forever, arching above the sea, adventuring for our pleasure, living mysteries for the fun of it, choosing disasters triumphs challenges impossible odds, testing ourselves over and again, learning love and love and love!"