Rosa Veritas Learning

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The rolling spirit of Galilee

An edited extract from an address delivered in Melbourne August 2002.

THE BIBLE, like any sacred writing, can be used to portray an unfolding picture of the spiritual journey we are undertaking. One way to do this is to consider what we can understand from these images about the inner landscape of our soul. So, this is another example.

There is a place in the Bible, in the New Testament, which is called the place of rolling energy. The direct translation from the Hebrew is more like a moving circle – or a circuit which is turning. We recognise the name of this place as Galilee and through a gentle exploration, light up the feeling of being in ‘Galilee’, in this place of rolling spiritual energy, where the forces of vitality and soul substance are activated.

In the Gospels Jesus worked in the Land of Galilee. It is where he travelled, teaching and healing and performed many of his miracles. He called his twelve disciples near the shores of the Sea of Galilee.

Galilee was a part of Palestine that was blessed with the potential for great abundance and diversity of produce, both on land and through the sea. From a geographical point of view it was marked by great contrasts in land features and as a result, a great contrast in climactic conditions.

It has coastal plains, high mountains, extended valleys and on one side the Mediterranean Sea and in it’s midst the sea of Galilee. The low altitude, and circles of mountains, plus the presence of large masses of water, meant a warm temperate and often quickly changing weather pattern.

So the atmosphere of Galilee was unpredictable and always subject to a number of changing factors.

The people of Galilee were a little like the weather. They too were unorthodox. The most orthodox part of Palestine was Judea – and there was a constant changing, trading flow amongst the people who visited and did business in this prospering part of the land.

From the way we read about Galilee in the scriptures we get a bit of a sense that the people of this area were a bit ‘ common’ and certainly nothing like a ‘Messiah’ was expected to come from this place – which exposed itself to all the forces from around.

These characteristics are actually the ones that to my way of thinking, are part of the appeal.

There is something really amazing about being out amongst it and in the middle of all of life’s eddies and flow.

The past
The bible, like any sacred writing, can be used to portray an unfolding picture of the spiritual journey we are undertaking. One way to do this is to consider what we can understand from these images about the inner landscape of our soul

Places in the bible are states of consciousness we experience from time to time and when we look at a place like Galilee, we use our imagination and consider how we find ourselves from time to time, in a place where there is a constant interchange of energy and all is not predictable but anything is possible.

From a spiritual point of view, in the past we have walked different spiritual paths for our development.

Most often, if we were wanting to dedicate our life to a spiritual cause, we would have had to retreat from ordinary, ‘common’ life to do this. We would have been taken to the temple in Egypt for initiation or service, the mountains, forests, caves and lakes for other initiations, the monasteries and seminaries of the church

In these cloistered protected environments we would have undertaken activities, with discipline and without distraction to achieve a spiritual life that set us apart.

The present and the future
Jesus was quite different to the leaders of his day.

He did not seek authorisation or accreditation for his mission by the spiritual authorities of the day. He was not the protégé of a rabbinical tradition and did not wear the garments of an orthodox figure.

Instead he chose to commence his work by entering into the life and people within the district of Galilee – so I guess we could say that he had the common touch.

The stories of what occurred in Galilee paint a picture of how it is now and will be in the future, to undertake spiritual work, within the very fabric of life. This work in the landscape of our constantly changing lives, is both the fabric with which we must work and the substance which will bring about our own spiritual transformation.

It is our task, no longer to lock ourselves away, but to enter into the richness of the vital rolling energy of all the spiritual beings who share our path.

We no longer need the restrictions of just one set of orthodox thinking, one set of dogmatic beliefs, externally imposed, we now have a much more difficult task.

We need to journey in love – and deal with what comes to us by searching our own souls for our own inner answers and direction, for what will magnify the purposes of spirit, in the next thing we think, or say or do.

The rolling energy and the circles
The Sea of Galilee, that large expanse of water within Galilee, is fed by seven underground springs, famous for their medicinal purposes.

Underneath the surface of our life, there are currents of spiritual purpose. We need to have a desire to understand this quiet source within our selves which if we listen, will speak steadily and quietly to our conscious being, and give us the direction we seek.

We then need to trust in the path that life has placed before us and engage in every opportunity for spirit to resonate, through each encounter.

And sometimes it will be the love and purpose of others that will gather us to this experience and we will develop a further appreciation for the gifts we have given ourselves of the precious people who come into our lives.

We are celebrating that spiritual energy is life energy and it permeates us in our waking and in our sleeping.

And we are celebrating that there is a gathering of that energy which will bring about some things that can mean, if we enter into it, that we cannot remain the same – we are enlarged and we are growing.

And most of all – we are celebrating that like the Christ who walked before us – it is our task to bring the spiritual gift of love to life – to wake it up in our small ‘common’ corner of the world – and to honour the transforming power of each deed, born in love.

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