Article November 30, 1946 Issue

The Real Body or Temple

JOSEPH GEORGE SHANNON

Paul writes in his first letter to the Corinthians (6:19), "What? know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God?" Paul had a very different concept of body from the commonly accepted one of his day and ours. He recognized the spiritual identity of man as "the temple of the Holy Ghost." as an individualized embodiment or expression of the perfect, universal Mind. In "temple," Paul saw a structure of holy ideas. By declaring these to be the real substance of man, the apostle opened the way for a clearer understanding of the healing Principle which the Master demonstrated.

On page 595 of the Christian Science textbook, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures." Mary Baker Eddy, the Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science, defines "temple" in part as "body; the idea of Life, substance, and intelligence;" and on page 588 she defines "Holy Ghost" as "divine Science." Thus Paul's query, as illumined by Christian Science, becomes a definite statement that man's body is "the idea of Life, substance, and intelligence," individually expressing divine Science. How far removed is this definition from the unhappy, discordant, material concept which mortals claim as their body!

Christian Science teaches that matter is an unreal concept of the discordant mortal mind, and that Spirit and its reflections are the only reality. Mrs. Eddy has given to the world a tremendous truth in her discovery that the so-called material body is merely a misconception of man's real, perfect embodiment of ideas, deducing this from her understanding of God as Mind, the one creator, and of man as made in His image and likeness. In her remarkable definition of man (ibid., pp. 475-477) she brings out that he is constituted of right ideas, reflecting God in His completeness. If man is so constructed, then in order to be conscious of our real body we must become conscious of the right ideas that constitute man. Christian Science commands and enables us to do this.

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