Posted on 25 May 2020, 15:24

It was in early 1897 that George Wright, then living in Titusville, Pennsylvania and teaching chemistry at nearby Meadville High School, began studying paranormal phenomena by sitting in mediumship circles. On November 6, 1897, George wrote to his brother, Jay: “… I have seen enough and heard enough and felt enough to not only make me believe in the continuity of life and conscious existence after the change you call death, but to make me know its reality and to demonstrate to me the fact that communication can and does take place between those who have experienced this change and those who have not.” 

After a year or two, George began displaying mediumistic abilities of his own – abilities which would soon lead to some profound teachings from an apparently advanced spirit through George’s hand while he was in a trance state. In the absence of any identifying name, the advanced spirit was referred to initially as the “Master-Mind” and later simply as the “Master.”  The teachings were compiled between 1900 and 1912 in an unpublished green leather journal referred to as “The Green Book.” It was not until some 60 years later that Theon Wright, George’s son, told the story of his father and the teachings in a 1970 book, The Open Door.

Michael Prescott, at his popular blog, mentioned the book in his April 29 post, stating that Paul Smith, has done a reconstruction of The Green Book (Reconstructing the Green Book)

“What I find particularly interesting is that the metaphysical teaching of the ‘Master,’ as given in the Green Book, precedes by decades any generally accessible comparative teaching in the West,” Smith commented in an email to me, mentioning that it closely parallels Aldous Huxley’s The Perennial Philosophy, which was published more than 30 years after the last of George Wright’s scripts.  Others have suggested it resembles the teachings of Seth, which began around the time The Open Door was published. However, it would be more proper to say that the Seth teachings resemble the teachings of the Master.

Author Theon Wright served as a colonel in the U.S. Army during World War II and later as an executive for several corporations. His best-selling book appears to have been Rape In Paradise, a true story of mistreatment of native Hawaiians. “We now have a generation coming into active participation in life and world affairs with little or no faith in what has been learned in the past, and even less for the future,” Theon Wright offers in the first chapter. “Religion and philosophy have defaulted, and scientific materialism has failed to fill the void.  And yet the question persists: what happens to us when we die?”  He says that the book is an effort to help fill the void and explains that it is a narrative of experiments carried on by three generations of his family, seeking to establish communication between the living and the dead. 

While he was in a trance state or even while sleeping, messages would come through George Wright’s hand in peculiar handwriting.  He explained that he experienced being something apart from his body. “My body there on the chair is writing words as fast I formulate the idea, but it is only a machine obeying my will, and if it has consciousness I know nothing about it,” he recorded, further explaining that this separate consciousness was devoid of any element of space and that his ordinary consciousness seemed “cramped and absurd” compared with this broader consciousness. Many of the things he wrote about were unfamiliar to him and not in his style of writing.  In some cases, the handwriting was entirely different.

Before George married Nella Stowell on August 19, 1900, after a courtship of less than a month, he received an appointment as an instructor in chemistry at Allegheny College in Meadville.  Nella was quite surprised to find that the “young professor” was a medium, but she adapted quickly and became the primary historian of all that took place in the family circle, which included George and Jay’s parents, while maintaining The Green Book. 

Until Nella joined the family circle, the phenomena had been primarily physical and evidential, including voices and floating objects produced by lower-level spirits. However, Nella’s presence apparently brought some higher spirit links to the circle and during September 1900, after members of the circle had joined hands, a deep voice, identified as Lone Feather, an Indian who was one of a band of spirits who had been communicating with the circle members in the preceding months, informed them that someone new was there to provide “knowledge.” This new spirit was identified as “Akasta,” said to be one of Nella’s guides, and it was explained that Akasta would be an intermediary for a more advanced spirit, one at too high a vibration to directly communicate with the circle.  The circle member began referring to “him” simply as the “Master.” (The pronoun “he” is given to the advanced entity for language simplification.)

The Master explained that he was no “Savior of Man,” but simply a friend, brother, and “humble tool,” attempting to help mankind understand the bigger picture. He was drawn to them because his individualization was similar to theirs.  His teachings, he said, embodied the messages of the Master-Mind called Jesus, the Christ – “not the man, nor the God that has been created by churches for worship – but the Intelligence which manifested through Jesus, and on account of which received the reputation of a God.”

The first message from the Master extended to about a thousand words, and began: “My children, Back of and beyond the Universe you know, permeating and transcending it, there exists an Underlying Reality, the nature of which you cannot conceive or express in terms of your ordinary everyday experiences or language. It is a Cosmic Consciousness that is aware of its own Being.  It is intelligent, universal, integral in its essence and in its manifestations.  It is coherent, indivisible, and a complete Whole that expresses its potentialities in a diversity of individual manifestations….

“And in your functioning on this plane and these levels of manifestations, you gain wider and wider experience, express more and more the potentialities inherent in your particular individualization of the Underlying Reality, and thus by your specialized activity, you enrich the Whole and participate in its unfoldment …..”

The Master explained that progress toward self-realization and fulfillment is represented by different planes of development, “from the crudest, densest physical expressions through graduated and overlapping levels of consciousness to the highest spiritual individualizations.”  He further explained that on the higher levels, consciousness becomes so expanded and merged that it approaches unification with the Universal Self, the Cosmic Consciousness of the Underlying Reality. The physical universe, he said, comprises the lower, denser levels of manifestation.

The Master further communicated that below the physical plane is a sub-material world in which Cosmic Consciousness first appears under conditions that are difficult for us to comprehend because they are outside the scope of our experience.  Similarly, there is a “world” of consciousness and manifestations above our plane of existence.  He referred to it as the “Psychic Universe,” the next step in our progress and unfoldment, adding that it is superimposed upon the physical world, interpenetrating and overlapping it. It is keyed to rates of vibration and dimensions which few in the physical world can perceive.

“The condition that you know as consciousness is one of the personal attributes that man possesses while passing through a human experience,” the Master said.  “It is that which measures limitations, making everything finite and commensurable. Now I, who am outside of consciousness, must become conscious whenever I take upon myself the conditions of limitations, and while manifesting through an instrument (a medium) I am personally conscious in the ordinary sense.”  He added that normally he exists in a hyperconscious state, which bears the same relation to the conscious that the infinite does to the finite.”

The realization of “Oneness,” he continued, is the highest form of hyperconsciousness, or universal self-realization.  Nevertheless, he added, the individual spirit continues to exist whenever there is spirit activity along the particular line of their individualization.

While George and Nella moved from Pennsylvania to California, Nevada, and then Hawaii, the messages continued during their evening hours.  Upon finding that others showed no interest in the messages, they continued for their own self-knowledge.  There was apparently no thought given to making the contents of the Green Book into a published book until Theon visited his mother at her home in Honolulu in 1946, following the war and the death of his father in 1944. 

The Master further communicated that souls on the psychic plane are entities as real and as positive as the humans they meet in everyday life. “These souls have the power of exerting force in the form of influence, and can direct it upon either mind or body.  They have the power of penetrating and occupying your bodies at the same time as the permanent soul that is you.”  While much positive influence comes from them, there are “undesirable influences,” which can be overcome when the strongest self-assertion is maintained.  Other teachings of the Master:

Truth:  “As there are different degrees of knowledge, so are there different degrees of truth, different grades of steps in the approach to the Underlying Reality.”

Discord: “Discord always arises out of the attempt to make others see the truth as you see it before they are ready for it.”

Good Works: “The purpose of activity lies not in the accomplishment, but in the process itself.”

Obstructions: “Tonight I will tell you of the three chief fetters to development.  These fetters are Fear, Doubt, and Hate.”

Fear: “Fear is the shrinking of the ego from all that is objective, a terror lest in some way its individuality be lost or merged into the universe, when in reality such merging would not be a loss but a vast gain.”

Christ: “Christ’s mission, as symbolized by the Cross, was one of service to humanity, a service that tried to unite the severed bonds that once linked the inhabitants of the Earth in peace and love.”

Evolution: “When we view the process of Being in the light of future enfoldment and relate the ultimate to the process in the light of cause under the domain of Time, we call it ‘evolution.’ When the ultimate is looked upon as the effect, of the process of Being and Becoming, or better, the manifestational activity, we call this ‘involution’.”

Other Realms: “It is difficult to convey to your minds any idea of the conditions on the other plane, simply because there are no conditions as you know them.”

Warnings: “Our activity is in the realm of the abstract.  We think and act in broader and more general terms than those which enter into your limited and finite lives; thus, we cannot give you the specific information you seek, because we ourselves do not know in detail the facts of your concrete and material environment.”

Ebb & Flow: “The whole universe is one vast and mighty tide, whose ebb and flow marks cycles as it does seconds. And there is associated with this ebb and flow an attractive force that seems to draw things together, while an apparently repellent force seems to drive them apart.”

Repulsion:  “In its actual nature, so-called repulsion is only another form of attraction – the attraction that draws away toward something else.”

There is so much more in the way of teachings offered in the book, teachings which appeal to reason and are consistent with other teachings coming to us from the spirit world over the last two centuries. And yet, they were and are still buried away and ignored while Harry Potter type books become best sellers.  It is very strange. 

Michael Tymn is the author of The Afterlife Revealed: What Happens After We Die, Resurrecting Leonora Piper: How Science Discovered the Afterlife, and Dead Men Talking: Afterlife Communication from World War I.
His forthcoming book, No One Really Dies: 25 Reasons to Believe in an Afterlife is due later in 2020.

Marie,

Thank you for your comment and interest.  Ironically, my interest in the subject matter pretty much began with Edgar Cayce about 30+ years ago.  I have quoted him here and there over the years, but I have not done anything extensive on him, primarily, I think, because of the somewhat jumbled verbiage.

Hi all, I am new to Michael’s blog- I happened upon it last night and have been reading as much of it as possible in the last 24 hours. I am familiar with Seth and others’ work. Like many of you, I’ve been reading these hidden gems for a few decades. I’m wondering,(again haven’t perused all Michaels work yet) if he delves into Edgar Cayce’s work or any ACIM material? To Michael- a huge thank you for your insights, and persistence in sharing your summations. For me, it never gets old and I always learn something new- or at least take in information to either renew me or expand me-or cause me pause—it’s a passion for me that never wains-
Thank you!!

For Jean, way back on May 25. The reason I continue to search and read is the same reason I read a lot of the most important works repeatedly: every time I read them, I do it with more underlying understanding each time, and I understand more than I did the first time, so my knowledge continues to grow in both extent and complexity. I can easily do this re-reading without giving up anything important, of course.

Michael,
I always appreciate these archives that somehow you manage to find.

Thank you
Eric

James Paul,

Thank you for your comments.  I’m sorry if I implied that I saw your initial comment as a “challenge.”  I really struggle to understand the worship/praise/adoration aspect of Christianity and was simply searching for a different perspective on this.  The Medjugorje apparitions seem to go well beyond fraud or hallucination, but when the Blessed Virgin starts talking about a devil with horns and the need to worship her Son, I can’t help but wonder what I am missing.

I appreciate the comments of Don Porteous.
There appears to be some hierarchy in the Trinitarian Kingship, and I am not competent to comment on the intricacies of it or is there anybody? In Medjugorje messages, Our Lady reemphasis the concept of Holy Trinity. I am quoting one example:

November 02, 2019 “Dear children, my beloved Son always prayed and glorified the Heavenly Father. He always said everything to Him and trusted in His will. This is what you, my children, should also do, because the Heavenly Father always listens to His children. One heart in one heart - love, light, and life. The Heavenly Father gave Himself through a human face, and this face is the face of my Son. You, apostles of my love, you should always carry the face of my Son in your hearts and your thoughts. You should always think of His love and His sacrifice. You should pray to always feel His presence, because, apostles of my love, that is the way for you to help all those who do not know my Son, who have not come to know His love. My children read the book of the Gospel. It is always something new, it is what binds you to my Son who was born to bring the words of life to all of my children and to sacrifice Himself for all. Apostles of my love, carried by the love for my Son, bring love and peace to all of your brothers. Judge no one. Love everyone according to the love for my Son. In this way, you will also be caring for your soul, and it [your soul] is that what is most precious, which truly belongs to you. Thank you.”

I appreciate Mike’s depth of knowledge of mediumship literature and his goodwill to help those who are in the search for eternal realities. I am only seeking help and not challenging. In these days of many unexpected deaths, fear of death and grief reactions following the demise of loved ones, a belief in life after death can be a solace.
James Pandarakalam

James…“It must be Mary who should have the final say about the Divine paternity of her son…”

You’re absolutely correct (IMO) and this burning question was at the heart of the final major section of my recent (still unpublished) book. Having looked at the direct comparisons between Mary’s attitudes, and those of a broad range of spirits on a full palette of spiritual questions, here (a brief clip from page 480 of my book)is what Mary had to say on this most key question…

“Mary, when speaking of her Son,is not always as consistently predictable as we might expect. At times she can speak in the most orthodox fashion…

  * “The same…Father…is the same…Son—the same…Father and Son…is the same…Holy Spirit.” (Amsterdam, 1955. The Lady of All Nations, 86-87)

At another, with just a hint of ambiguity…

  * “The Sole Prince of this world, the Lord Jesus Christ.” (Amsterdam, 1951. LAN, 53). [Italics (Sole Prince) in the original. “Prince” and “this world” might invite some interpretation.]

And on another occasion, she could make a statement that agrees entirely with Imperator and most of the other teaching spirits…

  * “There is only one King, God the Father.” (Cuenca, Ecuador, 1988. God Sent, 146)...

(Back to this column)...The bottom line being that while her Son is (as we all are, via the Spirit within us) a child of God, and while the actual physical method of His paternity might have differed (supernaturally) from the norm, that while he was the direct “Son of God” does not imply that He was the “equal” of the Father. This interpretation, held by Imperator and many others, would also be in concert with the thoughts of many of the ante-Nicene (pre-Council of Nicaea) fathers.

James,

Let’s assume you are correct and that Jesus is the literal Son of God rather than the “Chairman of the Board” as I prefer to see him.  Do you think I will then be punished for my false belief? If so, that suggests a very narcissistic Son of God.  If not, what is the benefit of believing he is the “Son” of God while otherwise leading a moral life?

Something I observed to a friend many years ago might offer a contrasting, or perhaps complimentary view to that just stated in this thread.  If one reads sufficiently broadly in the posthumous/discarnate literature, three things become apparent.  First, such literature as we have comes overwhelmingly out of an Anglophone and, to a lesser extent, broader European cultural context, which is historically Christian in cultural orientation and self-understanding.  Such a cultural orientation remains the case even among contemporary secular members of such societies – they are ‘secular’, or even atheist, in a specifically Christian mold.  As there is a fundamental continuity in understanding and outlook prior to and following physical death, it is not surprising that many communicating back maintain, for some time, the outlook they had while physically embodied.  Second, and despite this, the posthumous/discarnate literature we have speaks of Christ, whether in direct encounter or through mediated knowledge, in exalted terms, as a spiritual being of great advancement, overwhelming presence and profound compassion.  It does not, in the main, however, speak of Christ as the Son of God.  Third, and this is not without a certain strange irony, the closest ‘terrestrial’ understanding of this collective portrait of the nature and significance of the discarnate figure of Christ is not that of Christianity but that of Islam, and this despite the fact that posthumous/discarnate accounts from culturally Islamic sources are almost nowhere to be found in the literature, even among NDE accounts.  Christ, in Islamic understanding, is an exalted spiritual figure, one of the greatest of the Prophets, one among a handful (along with the Virgin Mary) of perfected human beings, but not the Son of God.  The Qur’an in particular mentions Christ (and his mother) frequently, and in unfailingly glowing terms, but rejects Christian Trinitarianism and the Sonship of Christ as an affront to Divine Unity. “He [God] begets not, neither is he begotten,” as the central 112th chapter of the Qur’an states.  This emphasis on Divine Unity, which one finds not only in Islam, but in many other traditions as well, is also consistent with the broad testimony of the posthumous/discarnate literature regarding the Divine source and ground of all things.  This is not to say that the Islamic figure of Christ and the posthumous figure of Christ correlate or match perfectly – they do not.  A further point of clarification is that nowhere in this posthumous/discarnate literature is Christ understood or explained in specifically Islamic categories – to the contrary, they don’t enter into the literature at all.  But the fact that the Islamic figure of Christ correlates much more closely to this posthumous figure of Christ that the Christian figure of Christ does should give specifically Christian readers of this literature pause.

Christ, a Direct Flame from the Divine Flame
Once I was having a discussion with a good friend of mine who was sceptical about the Divine paternity of Christ. I asked him, suppose I am inviting him for a great celebration in my home and he is unable to attend it, who would he send to represent him? My friend said that it would be his son. The answer was spontaneous- God sent His only Son as a representative to the Earth and not His servants.
When mediumistic communicators speak about Christ, they go about in a roundabout way using terms like “teacher, advanced soul etc.” I struggle to accept their interpretations. It is the way these respectable spirits understood Christ in their incarnate forms. The Jewish priests of Christ’s time could not grasp His Divine paternity, even misunderstood Him as a fraud or rebel. I wonder if some of them formed a spirit colony in the discarnate realm and communicate to us, how would they describe Christ. As you know very well, our mindset would not change drastically after discarnation and continue to latch on to many of our earthly assumptions. The best time to understand the Carpenter God is in our earthly life when we are being moulded with earthly sufferings and not when we are comparatively in an enjoyable period in some of the so-called advanced realms. How come, the communicators talk truly little about the richest dimensions? In these contexts, Marian apparitions come for our rescue and elaborate on the highest realms. If we are planning to settle in Washington DC, why waste time studying the road maps of Atlanta. Let us bet on a billion-dollar lottery, rather than a thousand dollar one!
Ultimately, it is the mother who certifies the paternity of her children (DNA tests are not infallible). So, it must be Mary who should have the final say about the Divine paternity of her son and she has consistently certified it in all her earthly manifestations. Metaphorically, Christ was a direct Flame from the Divine Flame and we are all sparks from the Divine Fire.
I do appreciate that Mediumistic messages offer valuable evidences for discarnate existence, but they should be supplemented with the evidences from Marian apparitions. Unfortunately, Mary’s appearances have been overlooked by survival researchers and even Catholic church who were supposed to be the custodians of these apparitions did not promote them enough. Marian apparitional studies can satisfy the 21st century’s intellectual and spiritual hunger.
Once we know that heavenly dimensions truly exist, we should try to grab it at any cost.Fr Slavko Barbaric (1946-2000), the spiritual director of Medjugorje visionaries (Bosnia) used to say that the greatest tragedy of life is not to become a saint, meaning to miss the opportunity of heavenly birth. Fr Barbaric died on 24th November 2000 soon after completing the way of the cross. On the following day, Mother Mary reassured about his heavenly transfer to one of the visionaries. May I take the privilege of quoting Mother Mary’s message announcing his heavenly transformation: Message of November 25, 2000 “Dear children! Today when Heaven is near to you in a special way, I call you to prayer so that through prayer you place God in the first place. Little children, today I am near you and I bless each of you with my motherly blessing so that you have the strength and love for all the people you meet in your earthly life and that you can give God’s love. I rejoice with you and I desire to tell you that your brother Slavko has been born into Heaven and intercedes for you. Thank you for having responded to my call.”
Dr James Paul Pandarakalam

Spiritual truths have been continually transmitted to mankind since humanity’s beginnings…

We are very ignorant, backward and have needed constant reminders throughout the ages…

Little by little, our spirits will listen, understand, believe and then try to put moral and spiritual principles into practice
in order for us to progress through our own merit to reach higher and higher levels of moral, intellectual and spiritual enlightenment.

It will take a myriad of material lives and an eternity…for our immortal souls to reach those higher states of being of which
we cannot even fathom at our current levels of knowledge and development….

So we plod on…hopefully, with perseverance, willpower, moral courage, patience, compassion and love.

Respectfully,
Yvonne

Paul—-Interesting comment. Thank you. I confess that I could never really get into Seth, although they’re all sitting on my shelves, simply because of his comment about Christ at the end of one the books (I don’t recall which one) to the effect that during the Good Friday events, a “switch” was made, with some other poor soul being crucified, and Jesus disappearing into the woodwork. (It’s been a long time since I looked at it—-hope I didn’t butcher that too drastically…)

Having read all three in depth, I consider the “Master” to be more profound in outlook than either Imperator or Silver Birch.  Seth is a closer point of comparison, but even there I would grant weight of profundity to the “Master”, even if the record of communications is thin compared to these other discarnate sources.

Michael—-Although I live in Pennsylvania, this was completely unknown to me as well. Have just ordered a copy from Weiser’s. From your summary, it sounds like the communicator tracks pretty closely with Imperator, Silver Birch, etc. Will look forward to digging into it—-

I should have noted that there are a number of used copies of this book available at bookfinder.com

Dear Michael Tymn,

I want to share the expression of appreciation that others are voicing for your huge erudition. I have said before that we all owe you a huge debt for bringing to our notice sources of knowledge we are mostly unaware of.

Eric Franklin

Interesting.  I had never heard of this body of work.  Thank you for continuing to ferret out these lesser-known mediums for us, Mike!

I enjoyed this article. Thanks again, for finding these gems. Your work is so appreciated.

Jean,

You ask why waste energy on all this once we accept it.  The same may be said for churchgoers.  Once they’ve read the Bible and been baptized, why bother to go to church every week?  I think it is because most of us need regular renewals of faith or conviction.  And there is always the possibility of going beyond what we think we know and adding to it.  No one is suggesting that all of our energies or even more than 10% of it be focused on understanding the larger life.  But let’s say we give 10% to it.  What would we be doing with that 10% otherwise?  Watching television?  Texting? Reading a novel?  If that 10% means we are neglecting our loved ones, then maybe 10% is too much, but I doubt that is the case with most people.  I see it as no different than an hour a day devoted to exercise and physical fitness.  The body needs vigorous renewal on a regular basis.  The same goes for the soul.

I’m going through a spell of not thinking clearly, so forgive me.  Once one believes in the continuation of life, and that there are many levels before reaching the Underlying Reality, and understanding being loving and acting kindly and justly is the way to live, then it seems to me to be better to focus our energies on living as best we can in that way.  That we are using energy seeking to know the Beyond instead of using that energy for the good, here and now.
The “Master” indicates we can’t know much more.

This sounds excellent. These events like so many others have been largely ignored by the general populous as they were not ready to accept them

MIke, the breadth of your reading in psychical matters is remarkable, and always clearly explained and summarised in your blogs. So I look forward to your forthcoming book mentioned in the last line of this blog, ‘Musings on Life After Death.’

Another great discovery from the forgotten annals of decades past. No one is more likely to find them for us than Michael Tymn.