The Trial Of The Man Who Said He Was God Read Online Free PDF Page A

of; (2) I do so now; (3) I do so in the spirit of a little child who takes what he gets; and (4) I notice whether what I’m pointing at is face-like or space-like, human or non-human, a thing or no-thing, small and bounded or limitless, dead to itself or alive - alive to Itself, in all Its blazing obviousness and uniqueness and - yes! - power. It looks as if Eckhart got it right: ‘When the soul enters into her Ground, into the innermost regions of her Being, divine power suddenly pours into her.’
    COUNSEL: First, members of the Jury, we were regaled with the spectacle of a fairly friendly punch-up. Now we have the winner positively exploding with admiration at himself - at the divine power he wields. But of course! He worships the ground he walks on- all the way to the dock today for sure. All the way to the scaffold tomorrow, it may be.
    MYSELF: I appeal to His Honour and to each member of the Jury to ignore Counsel’s blatant attempt to whip up prejudice against me and to test with an open mind what I’m saying. Just to watch and listen to me carrying out this crucial experiment would be worse than useless. What have you and I to fear from the truth? I beg you to follow my example, point right now - repeat, right now - to the Spot that’s nearer than your breathing, and see for yourself what I’m going on about. Don’t be nervous! Even if your mother (like mine) told you it was rude to point at anyone, I tell you it’s all right to point at this One. He loves it! O how He loves it!
    What is it like right where you are? What, on present evidence, are you looking out of? Who lives at the Centre of your universe? Only you are in a position to see and to say.
    Till you have addressed - let alone settled - the question of your own identity, how can you settle mine? Wouldn’t it be absurd and unjust to condemn me for claiming to be Someone, without looking to see whether you are that very same Someone? That incredible Someone?
    I ask you: looking in now at what your two forefingers are pointing at, isn’t it Aware Capacity for them and for the scene that lies between - namely, those little feet and those foreshortened legs, and those thighs, and the lower part of your trunk? Doesn’t Diagram No. 3 (which I ask you to turn to) give a fair representation of what you’re experiencing?

    Diagram No. 3
    Just what name do you propose to give to this Immensity that’s nearer to you than your hands and your feet and your breathing, to the Radiance here that is the Light and all It lights up? To call It Mary Smith or William Brown or Gerald Wilberforce or John a-Nokes would be as perverse as to call it Little Green Apples. It’s precisely the opposite and the absence of those persons. Here is the one place in my world that’s clean of John a-Nokes, where I’m let off being that little fellow, so opaque and unluminous. Here, at my Centre, is the one place where there shines the Light that lights up the light. This is the Light which, according to Dante, ‘makes visible the Creator Himself to His creature, who finds his peace in seeing Him’.
    To put Jack here at the Centre of his world isn’t just diabolical pride and blasphemy: it’s being horrible to myself. It’s playing Bottom the Weaver, and mounting a jackass’s head on these shoulders. It’s unbelievably stupid. The third person’s not for divinizing, the First Person’s not for humanizing. True humanism there is true divinism here. The very best I can do for Jack is to keep seeing him off, and God in.
    In so far as I am, I am Him. As Rumi explains:
    ‘I am God’ is an expression of great humility. The man who says ‘I am the slave of God’ affirms two existences, his own and God’s, but he that says ‘I am God’ has made himself non-existent and has given himself up... He says ‘I am naught, He is all: there is no being but God’s.’ This is extreme humility and abasement.
    Out of the scores of further witnesses I have lined up, these are the