Saturday, October 20, 2007

The Truth behind 'The Secret'

I just finished reading The Truth Behind The Secret, 'The Secret' being the book and DVD by that title about the (so-called) 'law of attraction'. Since I had a small rant in my booklet about the (so-called) 'law of attraction' I thought I'd post a bit of a follow-up here.

The book confirmed that the 'secret' book is based on some of the teachings of Abraham, a group of 'entities' (i.e. demonic spirits) channeled by Esther Hicks. I used to subscribe to their tape series and had several of their books, before I came to Christianity and repented and have thrown out all of the books. I may still have a few of the tapes, in a box somewhere. There's also some influence of the Religious- Mind Science / Unity teachings. Since the authors are much more knowledgeable in these areas, I was glad to see it also agreed with the conclusion in my booklet that they basically preach pantheism. (God is in all things, and/or is a 'universal energy' but isn't a personal God that can save you from their demonic deception.)

The biggest thing I've gotten out of it, now that I've been out of it for a few years and studied the Bible, is that their focus is on 'the deception of riches' -- which is essentially believing the devil's lie that riches are going to bring you happiness and security. I'll certainly admit that struggling financially isn't a lot of fun, but as Jesus said: 'For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?' (Mar 8:36 KJVA) and see also Matthew 16:26.

I wanted to share a couple of paragraphs from pages 44 and 45 of the book, it's discussing channeling in general.

THE DANGERS OF CHANNELING
Most interesting is Klimo's warning about evil spirits in connection with channeling. As a proponent and practitioner of channeling, Klimo is familiar with the traditional Christian perspective that fallen angels (demons) may be involved. Although Klimo does not completely agree with this perspective, he readily acknowledges that some channeling does involve evil beings bent on deception.
In his interview, he explained, "not every ancient spirit is wise or benevolent" -- some belong to "the dark brotherhood." Klimo repeatedly referred to these dark beings as spirits who are involved in some kind of invisible warfare against all that is good. While he believes these evil spirits are in the minority, he recognizes a significant potential danger when it comes to channeling, noting" [There are] even more dangerous sources ... nonhuman demons, evil spirits, forces of Satan or Lucifer and the 'Dark Brotherhood'. These entities await every opportunity to tempt and control human spirits. Historically, the negative presence of lower astral human spirits has been attributed to these demonic entities."
If we accept Klimo's explanation of channeling, then we have to acknowledge that deception is possible. There is a possibility of fraud and fakery, self-deception on the part of the channeler, a mental illness or psychological phenomenon, or even an evil, demonic spirit pretending to be a wise helper.


The book is certainly worth a look, it covers a good deal in 149 pages (before the end-notes). I read a copy from my local library, and it's also available here, or here.

Apparently there is also going to be a DVD documentary, there's a link on their website to view a preview clip.

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