Episode:Melchizedek Gospel—Response in the Orient (Part 5)

From Symmetry of Soul


Like many other spiritual and moral teachers, both Confucius and Lao-tse were eventually deified by their followers. But China failed to progress in the true path of the development of that God-consciousness which is indispensable to individual and social evolution. In India, Gautama Siddhartha, another prophet of the 6th century B.C., taught many truths; but he too failed to perceive the personality of God.

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Keywords: Urantia, Melchizedek of Salem, Confucius, Morality, Buddha

Note: Ann was away this week, and this episode had only 3 co-hosts.

Summary by Kermit

with final edits by James

Commentary on Review

Concerning the intriguing 6th century B.C.‏‎ proliferation of “great religious, moral and philosophic teachers all over the civilized world,” the point was made that this “awakening” only occurred in those areas of the world that could be said to be civilized. There are no miraculous divine interventions that can spiritually or philosophically uplift peoples who do not have a requisite foundation for becoming civilized. As has been repeated on this show, civilization is not automatic. Civilization is initiated and maintained through freewill choosing.

94:6.9 Lao-Tse and Confucius (cont.)

We then took up in Paper 94:6 with Confucius, a younger contemporary of Lao-tse in China. We are told that while he was rejected during his lifetime, his writings and teachings continue to have great influence in China, Japan, and not excluding the western world.

Confucius made a new fetish of order and established a respect for ancestral conduct that remains venerated by the Chinese today. Rather than worship the divine source of order, worship became fixed on the manifestation of order itself, whether it is the social order or the pattern of the cosmos. Unfortunately the potential God concept in Confucianism was almost completely subordinated to this emphasis on the Way of Heaven, the pattern and order of the cosmos. So again, we see the failure of recognition of a personal God in an eastern religion. This leads to the question: is Confucianism a religion or a philosophy? In our discussion the spark of religious origin is sufficient to label Confucianism a religion even though it may take greater spiritual insight to recognize its truth, than if the idea of a personal God were directly expressed.

Today, for a large proportion of this world’s population, the moral teachings of Confucius are foundational. However, the perpetuation of the ancestral past restrained the spirit of investigation that had produced their venerated achievements. This stasis of the past was challenged unsuccessfully by both Ch’in Shih Huang Ti’s imperial efforts and the teachings of Mo Ti, which embodied many principles distinctly Jesusonian by today’s comparison. Unfortunately, the disciples of Confucius vigorously and effectively opposed these efforts.

Both Confucius and Lao-tse were eventually deified by their followers during the dark ages of China. Our Melchizedek author describes these times as spiritually decadent centuries during which the religion of the yellow race degenerated into a pitiful theology betokening the returning fears of the unenlightened mortal mind. Their onetime ascendency in human society due to an advanced religion was lost because of their temporary failure to develop that God–consciousness which is indispensible to the true progress of both the individual and evolutionary civilization. As has been mentioned before, this is the crux of the current day planetary emergency to which the fifth epochal revelation speaks. We note that the revelators are giving us this information not merely as a history lesson, but coordinated essential knowledge foundational to the recognition of truth today, lest we fail to maintain forward progress in civilization.

7. Gautama Siddhartha

Gautama was another of the great teachers of the sixth-century B.C. Although some of the details of his origins and early life were inflated, he was a real prophet. We are told that after six years of the futile practice of Yoga he formulated the original theories that later grew into Buddhist philosophy.

We took note of the reference to Gautama’s “futile practice of Yoga.” To clarify, it was pointed out that the futility of practicing Yoga is in the attempt to unify mind and body through elevation of the material (body) to the mindal-spiritual level, or bottom up. There is nothing wrong with the pursuit of Yoga as a health practice to ensure a worthy vessel (body) through which the divine stimulus to love and serve can come down from above and out to others. It becomes a problem when focus on the Yoga practice becomes an end in itself.

Gautama labored to no avail against the caste system. His sincerity and unselfishness endeared him to the people. His more moderate teachings came as a relief from the confusion and extreme cult practices of India. While denouncing gods, priests and their sacrifices, however, he failed to recognize the personality of the One Universal. Also, because he did not believe in the existence of individual human souls, he fought against he concept of the transmigration of souls. In his efforts to deliver men from fear, to feeling at ease and at home in the universe, he failed to show them the pathway to their true destinies of Paradise ascension and eternity service.

The revelation tells us that had he heeded the instruction of a hermit, Godad, whose ancestors had never lost the traditions of the Melchizedek missionaries, Gautama might have aroused all India to a revival of the Salem gospel of salvation by faith. As it was, one of his pupils in his school at Benares imparted to him the traditions of the Salem missionaries about the Melchizedek covenant with Abraham, thus facilitating Gautama’s advanced stand on salvation through faith, notwithstanding his less than clear concept of the Universal Father. He sent forth his students in groups of sixty proclaiming “the glad tidings of free salvation; that all men, high and low can attain bliss by faith in righteousness and justice.”

Siddhartha’s wife and son were instrumental in spreading his influence and teachings, she by founding an order of nuns; and he grasping the new idea of salvation through faith and extending the cult. Although, we are told he wavered from the idea of salvation through faith in his later years.

“When proclaimed at its best, Gautama’s gospel of universal salvation, free from sacrifice, torture, ritual, and priests, was a revolutionary and amazing doctrine for its time. And it came surprisingly near to being a revival of the Salem gospel. It brought succor to millions of despairing souls, and notwithstanding its grotesque perversion during later centuries, it still persists as the hope of millions of human beings.

“Siddhartha taught far more truth than has survived in the modern cults bearing his name. Modern Buddhism is no more the teachings of Gautama Siddhartha than is Christianity the teachings of Jesus of Nazareth.” [94:7.7-7.8]