Prayer and Fasting

If you needed another reason to use the Authorized Version (KJV) of the Bible rather than the new translations that subtract much from the Bible here is one: Mark 9:29 -

And he said unto them, This kind can come forth by nothing, but by prayer and fasting. [KJV]

Modern versions leave out 'fasting'.

This is an example of how the KJV rewards seekers who 'know more' or who can 'see more' in the Word of God. The KJV presents the original without trying to 'correct' it or decide by 'modern scholarly discernment of manuscript evidence' (or whatever) what should be included or taken out. The KJV keeps in the 'inconsistencies' and strange details that the modern translations by modern scholars determine are 'mistakes'. For a reader with spiritual discernment those 'mistakes' contain worlds of knowledge. (And they, of course, are not mistakes even on a surface understanding level...) This subject obviously involves choice of manuscripts, but the KJV translators just simply used the most inspired manuscripts, but that is another issue. Suffice to say: if you want the complete Word of God in English, go to, ultimately, the King James Version.

Prayer and fasting correlate to the active practice of the 1st and 2nd conscious shocks. The Real Will volition that one exercises once one has Real Will.

It is - ironically - perhaps easier to see how fasting correlates to the 2nd Conscious Shock (which is, foundationally, Non-Identifying). You 'fast' from being drawn by the external moving world of things and events. All the influences and impressions of life (internal as well) that draw you towards them; that a person promiscously lusts after in a state of uncontrolled attention and sleep. Being drawn in and caught and asleep in the web of illusion that surrounds one in life. The constant swirl and presence of A Influence and mechanical laws and influences and impressions of life and the General Law. To fast from that, in a real sense, is the act of Non-Identifying. (For a direct, practical description of non-identification see Ouspensky's Fourth Way or Psychology of Man's Possible Evolution or In Search of the Miraculous; it can, though, only be seen ultimately when a person is able to see the Work itself and it's practices and do them.) Then, of course, to fast at the critical point when accumulated energy needs either to be wasted through a negative/mechanical expression or be transformed it is at that point where 'fasting' becomes the Second Conscious Shock (and that aspect of fasting and the 2nd Conscious Shock can be seen as correlating to the second of the two sacraments mentioned in the New Testament: the Lord's Supper. Because to be able to fast from the world at that critical point, when higher energy is 'at the door' of transforming from H12 to H6 needs the 'presence' of Real I - which is a monad of God, and can be seen as the presence of Christ literally within one, and one within Christ - and there is, in a real sense, a food involved, whether friction or suffering or gratitude in place of resentment, i.e. a sacrifice. But, without getting too deep into that symbolism - which the Lord's Supper is - there is enough in all that to at least see the real connection.)

Prayer, on the other hand, as the 1st conscious shock (which is, foundationally, Self-Remembering) is less obvious a correlation (though still somewhat easy to see in a general way). Prayer is really such a big thing that you can't define it by self-remembering alone, yet one can see that if you see prayer as needing a 'state of worship' to accompany it then self-remembering comes into the picture. Being in a heightened, awake state (in Biblical terms, being 'in the Spirit' rather than merely 'in the flesh') in the moment brings together understanding of self-remembering and worship. Prayer, though, involves actual communication with God and request and connection to His will (Real Will) and is more an active volition where a person begins to utilize what they have made contact with in the higher parts of their inner being and God Himself. Using that now 'quickened' chain-of-command from Real I down to Many 'I's, to effect real doing (moving mountains).

Prayer (and the 1st conscious shock of self-remembering) correlates to baptism (as fasting and the 2nd conscious shock correlates to the Lord's Supper) this way: Self-Remembering accumulates energy into you. This is energy of consciousness. There's only one source for what is conscious in the Macrocosmos, and that is God. Being filled with the Holy Spirit (or baptised with the Holy Spirit) is something that happens over and over (ideally) in the life of a Christian. Not just at the experience of regeneration. Prayer and self-remembering - the first conscious shock - effects this. Also as one increases one's capacity for containing the Holy Spirit (by increasing level of being) one is able to take in more and more of the Holy Spirit.

It needs to be seen in this regard that fasting becomes more difficult the more one engages in prayer. Being awake and having inner command go hand in hand. Prayer provokes limits; fasting extends those limits. (Prayer as 'doing' involves communication with God through the internal chain-of-command within you. Ask and ye shall receive. If ye have faith. This is the Master doing and glorifying God.)

But, here's a footnote from Wayne Grudem's Systematic Theology (pg. 391):

"In Mark 9:29, when the disciples asked why they could not drive out a certain demon, Jesus replied, 'This kind cannot be driven out by anything but prayer.' Many early and quite reliable Greek manuscripts and several early manuscripts in other languages read 'by prayer and fasting.' In either case, it cannot mean prayer that is spoken at the time the demon is being cast out, for Jesus simply cast out the demon with a word and did not engage in an extended time of prayer. It must mean rather that the disciples had not previously been spending enough time in prayer and that their spiritual strength was weak. Therefore the 'fasting' that is mentioned in many ancient manuscripts fits the pattern of an activity that increases one's spiritual strength and power."

Prayer and fasting 'increases one's spiritual strength and power'. It 'builds you up' internally (in faith and in level of being). It raises you above the Law of Accident and brings you into the Law of Will (it is the actual reins of volition of the Law of Will). It does - because it is the Two Conscious Shocks - all that the Work teaches regarding the increase of Level of Being.

- c.t., 12/04