In The 7 Mysteries of Imagination

In my previous article, I mentioned the Mystery of Prayer and Fasting as one of the seven mysteries of your wonderful imagination. This article dives deep into the mystery of prayer and fasting. It is spiritual and practical also.

The religious world all over observes fasting, a period of abstinence from fleshly pleasures, especially eating. Some systems even observe it at regular (annual) intervals leading up to some festivals. You need no education in worldly affairs we have been so familiar with. However, when fasting is mentioned in Scripture, as with everything mentioned there, it is a profoundly spiritual practice.

That which is spiritual is not touched by anything physical, for the Spirit is not flesh and blood. The Spirit is Man, the Eternal Body that is called the Imagination. You are all Imagination and the most practical thing about you is imagining with feeling. This is what the mystery of prayer and fasting is all about.

1. The Mystery of Prayer and Fasting is not in Denying Fleshly Pleasures

God is not mocked. Paul said, ‘Be not deceived. God is not mocked. For he that sows to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption, but he that sows to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting.’ (Gal. 6:7-8) So he tells us that to invest in any activity from the physical standpoint is wasted. Only what is invested spiritually is profitable. When one denies oneself of any physical food and pleasures but mentally commits all the atrocities in the world, they have sown to harvest corruption.

So, he took it further and said you must hold to your Imagination only! That is the Head by whom all your body of beliefs is held together. Otherwise, you conform to the limitations of this world. ‘Do not touch. Do not taste. Do not handle… which have an appearance of wisdom in self-imposed religion, false humility, and neglect of the body, but are of no value against the indulgence of the flesh.’

To deny the flesh while in imagination you hold on to the horrors of the world and feel your limitations to be true, is of No Value. Thus this mystery, when we are ready to act upon the truth, confronts us as inapplicable on a physical level.

The mystery of prayer and fasting is not a physical activity. That which cannot be done eternally is not the will from heaven. Imagining can be done eternally, but here you will leave behind your body someday.

2. The Mystery of Prayer and Fasting Is in Denying the Evidence of the Senses

You will know that this is indeed a mystery, a parabolic revelation of truth when you carefully consider the scenario where Jesus recommended it to his disciples for casting out undesirable spirits.

When they asked him why they were unable to perform the miracle, he attributed it to their unbelief. He said ALL they required to do that miracle and to move mountains would be belief. Then he said, ‘This kind goes out by prayer and fasting.’ That is paradoxical.

Blake said, ‘In the age of imagination, a persistent assumption moves mountains.’ So, Jesus is telling them exactly how to have this Faith. He said it is by Prayer and Fasting. In other words, by persistent assumption. A man who prays and fast is he who holds the belief only in his wish fulfilled.

Even though reason denies it and your senses deny that which you desire, you believe in the reality of the imaginal state that implies you have it.

When Jesus heals the possessed, he assumes he is of the perfect spirit. When he calmed the sea, he assumed there has been only calmness in himself. He did not accept the evidence of the senses, and that is what it means to fast. To not feed on the evidence that your senses bring unto you, that is fasting.

Prayer is to persuade your own self, the being that is your Imagination, of the truth of your wish fulfilled. Feelingly convinced of that truth, which conviction is in your inner conversations. That is the prayer to ever make. This is the mystery of prayer and fasting.

3. Continuous Revision

To live in imagination is to be in continuous revision. Isaiah rebuked those who denied their fleshly pleasures to try and make an external god do something for them. They wait for him to fix their problems but continue to hold them there in imagination. He made them realise that fasting has nothing to do with all their humble actions, denials and sufferings of their body. It has nothing to do with the generosity of their material goods. It has all things to do with revision.

To fast, they must rise to the point in imagination where their sensory impressions of this world is dimmed by the glorious appeal of their feeling of the wish fulfilled. The glory of their satisfied desire must be within them more illuminating than the limits of their old state. This you see in Isaiah 58. That is from a being who masters the mystery of prayer and fasting.

In conclusion, you pray and fast in imagination. You feed on the feeling of your wish fulfilled rather than the concerns for the means to realising your objective. It has nothing to do with your eating. You violate no spiritual code when you eat your natural diet. Yet, mentally fast; mentally feed not on the beliefs in anyone’s limitations. And mentally pray, mentally appropriate the objective hope with an inner speech of the wish fulfilled. This mystery of prayer and fasting shall then be revealed to you by experience. For It Works!

The second mystery of your imagination will be the topic of the next article. That is the mystery of tithes. Until then, practice my friend.