Article November 6, 1909 Issue

Christian Science analyzes all discord and inharmony as...

Willard S. Mattox—Birmingham, Alabama

Age-Herald, Birmingham, Alabama

Christian Science analyzes all discord and inharmony as error, and declares that the remedy is Truth. The Christian Scientist believes that his method of healing is in conformity with Jesus' methods, and he refuses to believe that Jesus was a hypnotist. The idea is repugnant to Christians and Christian Scientists alike. In fact, it is the very thing Jesus was accused of by his scholastic enemies, and your contributor is doubtless familiar with Jesus' reply: "If I by Beelzebub cast out devils, by whom do your children cast them out?"

If, as it asserts, Christian Science does its work in imitation of the practice of Jesus, it is important to know what he thought of his own methods, and how he described his healing. According to John, he declared, "My Father worketh hitherto, and I work." Again he said, "The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he seeth the Father do: for what things soever he doeth, these also doeth the Son likewise." Here it is plain that Jesus ascribed his healing power, not to any hypnotic ability of his own; not to the human mind, but to his Father, to the one infinite intelligence called God. Paul understood this when he said to the early disciples, "Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus." In other words, Christian Science is Mind-healing on a spiritual basis. Hypnotism is mind-healing on a material basis. The Mind employed by the Christian Scientist is not what in common parlance is called his own mind, but is the Mind that governed Jesus Christ, and which, he said, did the works.

If our critic is correct in asserting that Jesus was a hypnotist, and if we accept Jesus' statement that his Father was responsible for all that he did, then we must conclude that God is the master hypnotist of the universe; a conclusion so monstrous that it cannot be considered seriously for a single instant. God is "of purer eyes than to behold evil." This critic may have his own theories and beliefs about Christian Science practice, but until he has put them to test and has actually attempted to heal the sick, according to the rule of Christian Science, he will not be in a position to speak with authority.

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