The Essential Edgar Cayce (22 page)

SUMMARY
of Edgar Cayce’s Approach to Holistic Healing

Healing is best understood in terms of
systems.
First, we need to understand that the various systems of the physical body—the nervous system, the circulatory system, the endocrine system, and all the internal organs—are interconnected profoundly. A disorder in one system can produce symptoms in another. But just as surely, achieving balance and harmony in one system can benefit the others.

This systems approach applies to the bigger picture as well. Each of us is made up of a body, a mind, and a spirit that are interconnected. For healing to be total and lasting, we need to work to integrate all three aspects of ourselves. We not only need to promote physical healing for the body, we need to transform the attitudes and emotions that govern it, and we need to discipline ourselves to keep clearly in focus the spiritual ideals that guide it.

CHAPTER FIVE

THE SOUL’S JOURNEY: REINCARNATION AND LIFE PURPOSE

THE SECOND-LARGEST CATEGORY OF EDGAR CAYCE’S READINGS addresses self-understanding and the journey of the soul to find a purpose in life. With nearly two thousand
life readings
in all, they include details about past life experiences and ways to discover your soul’s purpose and how to deal with karmic patterns that are holding you back.

Reincarnation was always a problematic topic for Cayce, in part because he himself had been slow to warm to the idea. Not surprisingly, initially many people he did readings for were new to his work and probably had the same reaction. But for the twenty years that he gave life readings, 1924 to 1944, he was well ahead of the Western world’s modern-day familiarity with the concept.

Reincarnation was always presented by Cayce as a series of
human
lives, not different species, as with some Eastern religions. Even more significant, his approach retained the flavor of his early Christian faith. He suggested that even though we can learn, and our souls can grow from one lifetime to the next, the cycle can be stopped only by adhering to the
law of grace
—the power to reconcile and heal that comes from God’s merciful love rather than due to our own efforts. We can make
little steps
forward in developing the soul (or back, since free will leaves room for rebellion and separation from God). But the truly
big step
toward enlightenment comes only through willingness to surrender to that spark of the divine that has always lived in us.

In this chapter, we explore three readings that illustrate Edgar Cayce’s approach to the journey of the soul, and, specifically, his theory of reincarnation.

The first reading was given for a group interested in proving the validity of reincarnation.

The second, one of his so-called
mental-spiritual
readings, of which there are some eleven hundred in number, offers advice about holistic living. These discourses rarely dealt with the specifics of past lives but nonetheless included the concept of reincarnation. This specific reading includes a succinct statement about the mission of every soul, but one devoid of metaphysical details, with no intricate scheme about higher dimensions, no complex explanations of how reincarnation, karma, and grace work. These topics can be found in other readings. Our
essential
Cayce material comes down to more practical, simple matters: Can the soul learn to be more
patient
and
tolerant
in the fullest sense? Can the soul learn to live in a way that actually
applies
what it knows? Can the soul learn to
be present in the moment
so that it can receive and meet lovingly whatever arises?

The final discourse for this chapter is a life reading given for a six-year-old boy. While it doesn’t have as many details about past life experiences as most other life readings do, it nevertheless is one of the finest examples of Edgar Cayce as spiritual philosopher and life coach.

HOW AND WHY TO STUDY REINCARNATION

By 1937, Edgar Cayce had given life readings to hundreds of people, a few of which included details about past lives right here in the United States—what were called
American incarnations.
Because they included names, dates, and locations, not surprisingly some of his more enthusiastic followers wanted to conduct further research to corroborate evidence, even to provide convincing “proof.” (Several have tried since 1937, sometimes with tantalizing results, but nothing that could be held up as definitive.) Nevertheless, reading 5753-2 is an articulate statement about the search for truth—on any topic, really—and the care we must exercise when looking into past life experiences.

Cayce first reminds the group that what constitutes the truth for one person may not be adequate for another. There is a certain quality of
relativity to the evidence,
and, ultimately, it is only
personal
experience that can convince one completely. What’s more, he warns that we shouldn’t pursue knowledge just for knowledge’s sake but only as applicable to our lives in some practical way. The following passage from the reading captures the very essence of his thinking about what makes any endeavor worthwhile: “Only that which produces or makes for experiences that may make a citizen a better citizen, a father a better father, a mother a better mother, a neighbor a better neighbor, is constructive.”

In fact, Edgar Cayce comes down rather hard on curiosity seekers, such as those compelled to know one’s name or place of birth in a past life. “And to find that ye only lived, died and were buried under the cherry tree in Grandmother’s garden does not make thee one whit better neighbor, citizen, mother or father!”

If we really want to explore the reality of past lives, it’s found in the social and moral dimensions of everyday life. We experience ourselves as souls who have been in the world before, and now we are willing to take some responsibility for the mess the world is in today. It’s a matter of opening our hearts to the suffering all around us and seeing our role in it. It’s a matter of knowing that we “in the present may correct it by being righteous—THAT is worthwhile!” By being compassionate toward others, we begin to remember who we really are, and part of that remembering is a broader awareness of what it means to be a soul.

Edgar Cayce even invites us to study the life of King David, who he says committed most every sin in the book, but only once, since he always learned from his mistakes. “Well that ye pattern thy study of thyself after such a life!” In living life passionately and fully, taking risks and making mistakes, and yet learning from his mistakes, David discovered that karma and grace don’t have to wait until the next lifetime but are here to guide our living today.

Reading 5753-2 no doubt was a far cry from what the research group hoped to hear from Cayce. They wanted methodology, and instead they got a discourse on what makes life really worthwhile—this and any other life.

THE READING

✜
THIS PSYCHIC READING, 5753-2,
WAS GIVEN BY EDGAR CAYCE ON JUNE 29, 1937.
The conductor was Gertrude Cayce.

GC:
You will have before you the New York Research Group, members of which are present here, and their desires and purposes to study and secure evidence to check the American incarnations of those who have had life readings through Edgar Cayce. You will advise this group as to the best methods for undertaking this study with a series of Readings to secure further data on individual records. Answer questions.

EC:
Yes, we have the group as gathered here, the members of the New York Research Group, as a group, as individuals; with the desires, the purposes for research as evidence of incarnations of individuals.

In giving that as we find that may be helpful in such an experience, first they of the group should each determine within their own mind WHAT is evidence; and then be sure that is NOT evidence to thy neighbor.

For we are not all of one mind, and evidence or knowledge is an individual experience—and must be experienced.

Know that from the conscious mind only that which is drawn by comparison is evidenced in that consciousness.

Incarnation is not of the material, though—as the mind—manifests through the material.

Hence while it is part and parcel of the material, its evidence is rather in what is done about it.

Again the group should as individuals determine within themselves as to what they will do with same, when there has been proof-positive to them.

Do not gain knowledge only to thine undoing. Remember Adam.

Do not obtain that which ye cannot make constructive in thine own experience and in the experience of those whom ye contact day by day.

Do not attempt to force, impel or to even try to impress thy knowledge upon another. Remember what the serpent did to Eve.

In the studies, then, know WHERE ye are going. To gain knowledge merely for thine own satisfaction is a thing, a condition, an experience to be commended, if it does not produce in thine experience a feeling or a manner of expression that you are better than another on account of thy knowledge. This becomes self-evident that it would become then a stumblingblock, unless ye know what ye will do with thy knowledge.

As to the manners of interpreting—these may be observed, these may be made constructive by the study of those influences that in the associations and dealings with thy fellow man ye have had weaknesses, inclinations. These are mental, not material things, though they may have brought material activity. Warnings, constructive activity in warnings, then may prove to be of helpful experience in the activity of any individual group.

That this should not include documentary data or evidence, to be sure, is well; for documentary evidence to the mind of the masses is nil. Only that which produces or makes for experiences that may make a citizen a better citizen, a father a better father, a mother a better mother, a neighbor a better neighbor, is constructive.

And to find that ye only lived, died and were buried under the cherry tree in Grandmother’s garden does not make thee one whit better neighbor, citizen, mother or father!

But to know that ye spoke unkindly and suffered for it, and in the present may correct it by being righteous—THAT is worth while!

What is righteousness? Just being kind, just being noble, just being self-sacrificing; just being willing to be the hands for the blind, the feet for the lame—these are constructive experiences.

Ye may gain knowledge of same, for incarnations ARE a FACT!

How may ye prove it? In thy daily living!

Using the experience of David the king as an example, what was it in his experience that caused him to be called a man after God’s own heart? That he did not falter, that he did not do this or that or be guilty of every immoral experience in the category of man’s relationship? Rather was it that he was sorry, and not guilty of the same offence twice!

Well that ye pattern thy study of thyself after such a life!

There may be an excuse—yes, there may be a forgiveness for those that err once; is there for twice, is there for thrice? Yea—though ye forgive, if ye would be forgiven! For that is the law.

Then, such a study is WELL—if ye know whither ye go.

If ye do NOT know whither ye go, ye had better leave it alone!

THE MISSION OF THE SOUL

Once we have grasped the idea that life is purposeful, and that each of us has a distinct purpose in life, it’s only natural to wonder, How am I doing? Am I doing what I’m here to do? Am I making it?

The fifty-seven-year-old man who received the following reading had the benefit of Edgar Cayce’s psychic counsel to help answer those questions. He had gotten assistance from Cayce twice before, and now he was asking for a penetrating assessment of his inner and outer development, a sort of
spiritual audit.
He was presented with a profound description of the spiritual tasks we
all
face, a picture of the human soul and its essential job while in the material world.

To develop the soul requires an ideal; spiritual growth occurs within the context of having chosen a purpose. It doesn’t just happen to us, like losing baby teeth or finding that first gray hair; it requires initiative. More specifically, Cayce recommends certain ideals:
patience
and
tolerance.
What is it about these ideals that contributes so significantly to the mission of the soul? Patience and tolerance force us to shift gears and to look at life in a new way, requiring that we
go beyond
appearances. In other words, our consciousness shifts and we see and feel things in a different way.

When we’re patient, we have a new sense of time; when we’re tolerant, we see the behavior of other people in a way that leaves room for understanding and forgiveness. Neither quality makes much sense from a materialistic point of view; for example, the appearance we’re going to miss the boat if we don’t hurry up, or that people are going to get the best of us if we let them get away with it. But even though patience and tolerance don’t always seem very logical, they are qualities that awaken us to the realization that we are indeed souls. It’s that awareness that is so very key to our mission here on earth.

To examine this concept further, let’s return to questions addressed in earlier chapters: What exactly is the soul? When we begin to awaken spiritually, what is it that we realize about ourselves? Edgar Cayce suggests two answers in particular:
immortality
and
individuality.
As he says in this reading, we start to sense “the continuity of life . . . [that] which lives on and on”; and, furthermore, we awaken to our own uniqueness and freedom, “that which is individual of each and everybody as it finds expression in the material world.”