We continue the methodical study of the Pentateuch Kardec, which focuses on the five major works of the spiritual doctrine, in the order they were first published by Allan Kardec, the Encoder of Spiritualism.
The answers to the questions presented, founded in the 2th edition published by FEB, based on translation of Anna Blackwell, are at the end of the text below.
Questions
A. What is the spiritist position on marriage?
B. There are people who, while living in places of plenty and abundance, do not have sufficient means of subsistence. What should we attribute this?
C. The voluntary mortifications and privations have some merit in the eyes of God?
D. Why man, knowing that death brings us to a better life, is instinctively afraid of dying?
E. For what purpose God reaches man through destructive calamities?
Text for reading
394. The absolute indissolubility of marriage is a human law, contrary to the law of nature. (L.E., 697)
395. The voluntary celibacy, as practiced by selfishness, displeases God and deceived the world. (L.E., 698)
396. When it is done for the sake of humanity, celibacy, any sacrifice is worthwhile. So greater the sacrifice greater is the merit. (L.E., 699)
397. Polygamy is the abolition of which human law marks a social progress. The numerical equality that more or less exists on earth between the sexes is an indication of the proportion that should unite, because everything in nature has a purpose. Marriage, according to the sight of God, must be grounded in the affection of beings who join. Polygamy does not exist: there is only lust. (L.E., 700 and 701)
398. Instinct is the law of conservation of nature and all living beings have it, whatever the degree of his intelligence. (L.E., 702)
399. Everyone has to contribute to fulfilling the designs of Providence. That's why God gave them the need to live, because life is necessary for the improvement of human beings. Living beings feel it instinctively, without realizing it. (L.E., 703)
400. God has always provided one the means of subsistence. If he does not find, that does not understand. We cannot think that God has created the need for man to live without giving him the means to achieve it. This is the reason why the earth produces in order to provide the necessary to those who inhabit it, whereas only the necessary and useful. What is never superfluous. (L.E., 704)
401. Nature is an excellent mother. The land would produce whenever necessary, with the need to know the man be content. But he uses the surplus which could be applied in necessary. Look in the Arabian Desert, who always think that the living, because it creates for itself fictitious needs. Verily I say: Nature is not wasteful, is the man who cannot regulate your life. (L.E., 705)
402. There is always deserve to suffer all the trials of life with courage and selflessness. Those who sacrifice their similar hunger to kill, commit double fault, which will be doubly punished. (L.E., 709)
403. In the worlds most advanced living beings need to eat, but their food is in relation to their nature. (L.E., 710)
404. The use of goods of the earth is a right of all men, because that right is the consequent need to live. (L.E., 711)
405. The existing attractions in the enjoyment of material goods were created by God to urge the man to fulfill its mission and try it out through temptation. The goal of temptation is to develop his reason, which should preserve them from excesses. (L.E., 712 and 712-A)
406. Nature drew lines to the joys, to show us the limits necessary. However, the excesses, the man comes to satiety and punishes himself. The man who seeks the refinement of these excesses enjoyment is more worthy of pity than envy; it is very close to physical death and moral death. (L.E., 713 and 714)
407. The thoughtful man knows the limit required by intuition, but many only come to know it by experience and at his own expense. Being insatiable vices will alter the constitution and create needs that are not real. (L.E., 715 and 716)
408. Those hoarding the goods of the earth to provide the superfluous, to the detriment of those who lack the necessary forgetting the law of God and will have to answer that have caused hardship to others. (L.E., 717)
409. It is the law which man seeks to provide for the needs of the body, because without strength and health, is impossible to work. It is also the natural desire of well-being. God only forbids the abuse, as contrary to the law of conservation, and does not condemn the pursuit of well-being, provided it is not at the expense of others and will not diminish its forces or physical or moral force. (L.E., 718 and 719)
410. It is permissible to eat everything that does not harm health. Given their physical constitution - say the spirits - the flesh feeds the meat, otherwise the man dies. He has, therefore, that as food claims her organization. (L.E., 722 and 723)
411. Refrain from feeding is only worthwhile if committed for the benefit of others. In the eyes of God exists only when there is deprivation mortification serious and useful. (L.E., 724)
412. The sufferings are the only natural that rise, because they come from God. The voluntary sufferings are useless if not for the good of others. Why, instead of sacrificing themselves, do not work for the good of his fellows? Clothe the needy, comfort the weeping, the work that's sick, suffering hardships for relief of the unhappy and then your life will be useful and, therefore, pleasing to God. Suffering voluntarily only for its own sake is selfishness; suffer for others is charity. (L.E., 725 and 726)
413. The survival instinct has been given to all beings. Punish your mind and not your body, mortify your pride, choke your selfishness, which resembles a snake biting you in the heart, and do much more for your down payment than inflicting rigors that you are no longer this century. (L.E., 727)
414. Everything must be destroyed to be reborn and regenerate. What you call destruction is nothing but a transformation, which is aimed at the renewal and improvement of living beings. (L.E., 728)
415. Creatures are instruments that God uses to reach that purpose objectives. Living beings are destroying each other, to feed themselves. This destruction has a twofold purpose: maintaining the balance in the reproduction and use of the spoils of the casing, which is simple accessory, not an essential part of the thinking being, which is not destroyed and produces in the metamorphoses through which it passes. (L.E., 728-A)
416. Nature around the living means of preservation and conservation so that the destruction does not occur prematurely. All destruction shall prevent the early development of the intelligent principle. (L.E., 729)
417. The need to destroy the state holds proportion with more or less material worlds, whose living conditions are very different worlds more advanced than Earth. (L.E., 732)
418. The need to destroy the man weakens, as the Spirit overcomes matter. That's why the horror of destruction increases with the intellectual and moral development. (L.E., 733)
419. The man has no right to unlimited destruction of animals: that right is governed by the need to find sustenance and security. The abuse was never right. (L.E., 734)
420. The destruction, when it exceeds the limits of the needs of sustenance and security, as the hunt for the sheer pleasure, reveals the predominance of bestiality on the spiritual nature and constitutes a violation of the law of God, that man should be accountable. (L.E., 735)
421. God uses every day - in addition to the destructive calamities - other means to lead humanity to moral improvement, because it gave everyone the means to advance the knowledge of good and evil. As he does not take advantage of these means, it must be punished in his pride and feel your own weakness. (L.E., 738)
422. During life, all the man refers to his body, but thinks differently after death. Now the life of the body is very little. A century in our world is but a flash in eternity. Spirits form the real world. The bodies are mere disguises with which they appear in the world. In major disasters - like destructive calamities - that kill men, the show is similar to an army whose soldiers during the war, they would keep the uniforms damaged, broken or lost. The general, however, is concerned more with soldiers than with their clothes. (L.E., 738-A)
423. If we regard the life it is, and how little is in relation to infinity, would give less importance to it. In another life, victims of scourges will find ample compensation for their sufferings, if they know bear them without murmuring. (L.E., 738-B)
424. The destructive calamities are also useful in terms of physical, but good results from them only the future generations to experience. (L.E., 739)
425. Partly it is possible for man to ward off the evils that afflict it. Many evils result from the improvidence of man. However, among the evils that afflict humanity, some are of a general nature that are in the decrees of Providence and of which each individual receives more or less, the response. To these nothing can resist a man, unless its submission to the will of God. (L.E., 741)
Answers to questions
A. What is the spiritist position on marriage?
The marriage, ie, the permanent union of two beings, is a progress in the march of humanity, because it establishes fraternal solidarity. Its abolition would be a setback to the infancy of the race and put the man down even some animals that give you the example of constants unions. (The Spirits' Book, questions 695, 696 and 697.)
B. There are people who, while living in places of plenty and abundance, do not have sufficient means of subsistence. What should we attribute this?
The selfishness of men who do not always do what they deliver. Then, and most of the time, should it themselves. "Seek and ye shall find" - these words do not mean that, to find what you want, just look at that man to the earth, but that it is necessary to look for him, not with indolence, but with earnestness and perseverance, without tiring against the obstacles that are too often simply means that if you use Providence to experience the consistency, patience and firmness. In situations where the lack of livelihood does not depend on the will of the people, their deprivation is a test, often cruel to one who suffers it, which he knew in advance, who would be exposed. Its merit is to then submit to the will of God. If death comes harvest it, he should receive it without a murmur, considering that the hour of deliverance rang true and despair at the last moment you can cause the loss of the fruit of all his resignation. (Ibid., questions 704 to 708 and 717.)
C. The voluntary mortifications and privations have some merit in the eyes of God?
It depends. Let us know who they enjoy and have the answer. Depriving oneself and work in favor of others; such mortification is true according to Christian charity. Worthy is the temptation that draws the excess or the enjoyment of useless things, is the man out of what is necessary to provide that lack of enough. If the deprivation no more than lip service is a mockery. (Ibid., questions 720 and 721.)
D. Why man, knowing that death brings us to a better life, is instinctively afraid of dying?
The man should always seek to prolong life, to accomplish his task. This is why God gave him the instinct of preservation, an instinct that the evidence supports it. Were it not so, he very often yielding to discouragement. The inner voice, which induces him to repeal the death, she says she still can do something for your progress. This is then the main reason why men generally fear death. (Ibid., question 730.)
E. For what purpose God reaches man through destructive calamities?
To make it move faster. Destruction is a need for moral regeneration of the Spirits, which in each new existence, climb a step on the scale of improvement. The so-called flagella are often needed to be more ready to give the advent of a better order of things and to be accomplished in a few years which would have required many centuries. In another life, their victims will find ample compensation for their sufferings, if they know bear them without murmuring. The flagella are further evidence to give man the opportunity to exercise your intelligence, to show his patience and resignation before the will of God and that offer you an opportunity to express their feelings of self-denial, of selflessness and love for others, if not dominates selfishness. (Ibid., 729 questions, 737 to 741.)
