APPENDIX

The Stone The Builders Rejected

Moderator: On December 1, 1910, Mrs. Eddy went for her last drive. When she returned she asked for her writing pad. On it she wrote what would be her last written message to the world, namely, “God is my life.”

Sally, I understand Dorothy Napkie loaned you a book by Fernand E. d'Humy, Mary Baker Eddy Fulfills Prophecy, in which he records how through divine inspiration he was led to see a deep meaning in those last four words. Would you give us a brief review of what d'Humy tells, which is so remarkable since he knew nothing of the “system” of Christian Science. He was a physical scientist of international reputation. He was Research director for the Western Union Telegraph Company.

“God is my life” (d'Humy's Explanation)

Sally: Regarding “God is my life,” d'Humy says, substantially:

These were significant words which she could have uttered orally had she chosen to do so; but no, their importance was too great to trust them to the memory of her hearers. These words were to be preserved for future generations. They expressed a precise statement. An oral expression of her four words might be regarded as an incidental remark and not register on its hearers any more seriously than would casual conversation.

Never before had Mary made a direct statement about herself which intimately united her with the Supreme Power and in a manner which denoted the verity of the work which was wrought through this association. We have seen how she consistently shrank from personal credit for her work and always emphasized that the truth she gave to the world came direct from God, divine Mind. But here was a statement which would make clear for all time the impersonal verity of Christian Science and its divine ordination.

....The work she had performed was God's, divine Mind’s, and His alone. She was only the medium through whom He, Principle, Love, worked. It was important that the world remember this truth in all future generations because to do so would strengthen faith in the Source and purpose of her divine accomplishment.

With these thoughts in mind, how could Mary have helped being impelled to leave a final word which would prove to the world that what she had delivered was unmistakably an important part of an over-all pattern in which the Holy Scriptures held the central place? Clearly it was essential that irrefutable evidence be given.

Asking for a writing pad, in itself, gave evidence of a definite purpose, that Mary desired to write down something for future reference...The message was concise, composed of four short words having a total of eleven letters in all. These numbers had a purpose of their own and this purpose would be revealed in later years. [Remember Mrs. Eddy's illustrated poem, Christ and Christmas, has eleven pictures, the first seven corresponding to Mind, Spirit, Soul, Principle, Life Truth, and Love; the last four corresponding to Word, Christ, Christianity, and Science. Also those of us who are familiar with the system in the textbook know that the Science in it rests on the seven synonymous terms for God, and the four mediums—Word, Christ, Christianity, and Science—through which the seven synonyms or elements of God are expressed. The Bible too when seen in the light of Christian Science is entirely composed of these eleven elements.]

Because of the brevity of the message there was danger of its importance being overlooked. To insure against this, these four words should stand alone on a single sheet with nothing to distract from them.

At no time must it be overlooked that Mary's writings were divinely revealed to her. This she repeatedly emphasized so that there be no misunderstanding. Therefore, it is certain that her four last written words were also written through divine revelation.

....All through Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures there radiates the significance of this memorable sentence, God is my life. Its meaning is woven into page after page. It is there for everyone to see who reads understandingly. [Mrs. Eddy could also have said, God is my God, or God is my Truth, or any other truthful statement, but they would not have had the chosen number of letters, nor would they have conveyed exactly what she wanted to convey.]

....The word “is” implies an ever-presence with no beginning and no ending. God had always been her life, was now her life, and forever would be her life. Mary was God's expression on earth and this expression led to the unfoldment of Christian Science. This Science always was, just as the law of mathematics always existed and will always exist in the ever present is. Like all else, it had no beginning and will have no ending. Through this two-letter word, Mary denoted the permanency of Christian Science.

Like Jesus, Mrs. Eddy could have comforted them with, “For I have given unto them the words which Thou gavest me: and they have received them, and have known surely that I came out from Thee, and they have believed that Thou didst send me” (John 17:8).

But Mrs. Eddy reduced her last message to the simplest expression which contained an all-comprehensive meaning of her life's work…The absence of a period at the end of God is my life may be interpreted as denoting that the four words, while complete in their meaning, shall be considered in the broadest sense, namely, without limitations, without termination, eternal. Like the law of mathematics, its meaning was always there and always will be in the future.

.…From the foregoing we see how the legacy by which she endowed the world was concisely expressed in four short words having a total of no more and no less than eleven letters.

What do these numbers point to? d'Humy gave a long explanation of the meaning of each word showing how carefully Mrs. Eddy had chosen it and no other for this last message…Every word carries weight, even the absence of punctuation is significant. The use of four words, no more no less, and eleven letters to make up the four words, could not be without purpose. These words were the last to be written and like all that Mary wrote were written through divine revelation. They must be so regarded, and therefore carefully examined.

....Mary truly was an apostle of God. In her consciousness of this she desired that it be made known and proved to future generations that Christian Science was authentically given by God. Therefore let us seek for a further and final proof of this divine authority, a proof supported by the Scriptures. None other will convince the world!

....Why should these four words containing eleven letters be given attention and serious thought? Because they are Mary's last written words which were divinely revealed to her. We must seek and find; knock and the door will open. There can be only one door through which to enter—the one which leads to the pages of the Holy Scriptures.

....Because all through her life Mary emphasized Love, it is logical that we search the New Testament for the secret unfolded in the two sets of divine numbers. . . This work of hers clearly was an act of an Apostle. Accordingly, we should look for the disclosure we seek in that noble book of the New Testament—The Acts of the Apostles. Therein is revealed in Chapter 4 (four words), Verse 11 (eleven letters):

“This is the stone which was set at nought of you builders, which is become the head of the corner.”

Now, in the year 1953 A.D. it is revealed that Mary Baker Eddy, by the number of words and the numbers of letters contained in her divine sentence:

God is my life

pointed to:

The Acts of the Apostles
Chapter 4 (four words), Verse 11 (eleven letters).

The soundness of the reasoning which leads to The Acts of The Apostles is plainly confirmed by the product obtained from the two numbers of the cryptogram. This product, forty-four, gives the sequential position of the book, The Acts of The Apostles, in the King James version of the Holy Bible. Thus the decoding of the cryptogram is complete and indisputable....

THE CAPSTONE OF THE GREAT PYRAMID AND THE STONE THE BUILDERS REJECTED

This illuminating disclosure led d'Humy to see that the capstone of the Great Pyramid was a symbol for “the stone which the builders rejected”—the stone which Mary Baker Eddy did not reject.

He feels that in this disclosure we have Biblical evidence that Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures is authentically given by God. All evidence, all history, all scientific research relating to the divine meaning and purpose of the Great Pyramid, compel the acceptance of this truth. The Holy Scriptures came to us as the Word of God. This has been unqualifiedly accepted by all who believe in Deity, in the one God-Mind who created and governs all, the same one-God who caused to be erected a great monument in stone [“the great pyramid of Egypt—a miracle in stone” (Hea. 11:12)] which would endure through the centuries so future generations would find an enduring confirmation of the authenticity of the Holy Scriptures. That is why the Great Pyramid of Gizeh has reverently been named the “Bible in Stone.” Its incomparable construction was divinely inspired and there were no details from its foundations up, or as to its location in Egypt and orientation on this earth's globe, which came with the learning or capabilities of man alone to evolve except by the guidance of a Supreme Power.

....Of this Pyramid, Jeremiah (32:19, 20) writes: “Great in counsel....which hast set signs and wonders in the land of Egypt, even unto this day, . . . and hast made Thee a name, as at this day.”

The Great Monument Without a Capstone

The great Monument, for nearly five thousand years, has stood without a headstone—the “head of the corner,” silently and symbolically awaiting the completion or crowning of the Holy Scriptures. The Bible like the Pyramid, would not be complete until a textbook was added which would unify its pages into a comprehensive lesson which would aid man in overcoming his many vicissitudes. [The stone which the builders rejected is referred to seven times in the Bible. Mrs. Eddy also refers to it many times.] It was to her textbook Mrs. Eddy was pointing in the cryptogram she wrote two days before she departed this mortal world. That this cryptogram was divinely revealed to her there cannot be any question or doubt. A message of such import could have come in no other way.

The Pyramid with its headstone suspended above it in a halo of glory symbolizes the crowning of the Scriptures with the Christian Science textbook…Divine prophecy was perfectly fulfilled when the biblical Headstone was symbolically placed on the Holy Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy. Thus we can truly say, “Despise not prophecy.”

“God is my life” is telling us that we can never rise from the temporal debris of error, belief in sin, sickness, and death until we learn that God is the only Life. Spirit will have overcome the flesh when the belief that life and sensation are in the body is overcome by the understanding of what constitutes man as the image of God. (See 289:2.)

With the coming of Science and Health which placed the capstone on the Bible, a material life-basis has been seen to be a misapprehension of existence. The sacred and true knowledge the textbook contains transforms the material with the ideal, and human thought frees itself from self-imposed materiality and bondage.

Margie: As material history draws to a close, we see the spiritual, in every direction, urging its highest demands on mortals (No. 45:25). As these demands are accepted and implemented “the whole earth will be transformed by Truth on its pinions of light, chasing away the darkness of error” (191:13).

Moderator: In Pulpit and Press (10:16) Mrs. Eddy asks us if we have planted our “standard on the rock of Christ, the true, the spiritual idea—the chief cornerstone in the house of our God”—and then assures us that, as Jesus prophesied, “The stone which the builders rejected, the same is become the head of the corner” . . . Let us rejoice that the chill vicissitudes have not withheld the timely shelter of this house, which descended like day-spring from on high.”

What comes “from on high”—the capstone—is Love, the descending city foursquare, or consciousness where we start every thought from God. Then “How is man, seen through the lens of Spirit, enlarged, and how counterpoised his origin from dust, and how he presses toward his original, never severed from Spirit! O ye who leap disdainfully from this rock of ages, return and plant [your] steps in Christ, Truth, 'the stone which the builders rejected'! Then will angels administer grace, do thy errands, and be thy dearest allies” (My. 129:15).

Oneness of Manhood and Womanhood

Francie: Mary Baker Eddy's presentation of womanhood, Love, and the founding of it in human consciousness, was the “capstone.” Mrs. Eddy brought from on high the stone which the builders had rejected; she lowered it into place on the foundations laid by Jesus, his apostles and the holy men of the Bible. These foundations Mrs. Eddy presents in the first twelve chapters of Science and Health in fulfilment of Jeremiah's prophecy (31:22), “A woman shall compass a man.”

Tina: Isn't it a fact that the stone which the builders rejected could not become the headstone of the corner until manhood and womanhood had become one, as qualities—as two individual natures in one compound spiritual individuality?

Margie: Yes, the true capstone is spiritual divinely scientific consciousness in which manhood and womanhood are one as the image and likeness of the one God. That is the Principle, Love. There can be but one whole complete image and likeness of one God. This the “builders” have always rejected. Mrs. Eddy has now revealed the capstone as the oneness of manhood and womanhood, and it is accepted by spiritually minded students the world over. This true sense of Love—Love wedded to its own spiritual idea—will destroy forever the physical plagues imposed by material sense. (575:3)

Billy: Could someone put in very simple terms what this analogy is concerning the Great Pyramid and its rejected capstone, and the Bible with its rejected “cornerstone”?

Francie: The Great Pyramid referred to as the Bible in Stone had its foundation completed, but its capstone was rejected. In a similar way, allegorically speaking, the Bible had its foundation well laid but as in the case of the Great Pyramid, its headstone or capstone had been rejected.

Billy: What specifically was it that “the builders” rejected?

Francie: They rejected their divine Principle, Love. This means they rejected man's divine origin, his oneness with his divine Principle, Love, which in essence means manhood and womanhood one, in a divinely united spiritual consciousness.

Billy: Why do you think they rejected it?

Cross: Surrender of Mortality

Francie: Because in order to understand our incorporeal divinity we must lay down the mortal. Without the cross of giving up the mortal there can be no crown, no capstone. Love, the capstone, is won only through the cross. “All have the cup of sorrowful effort to drink in proportion to their demonstration of His Love till all are redeemed through divine Love” (26:7). This deep note of sorrowful effort sounds again and again beneath the triumphant affirmations of Science. Mrs. Eddy's own “gracious preparation” was a series of disasters, humanly seen. The “builders” want to escape the laying down of the mortal.

Mrs. Eddy chose the cross and crown as the emblem for Christian Science because it symbolizes that without the crucifixion of the mortal viewpoint there can be no crown, no capstone. The crown can be won in no other way than through continuing to “pour in truth through floodtides of Love”—love for the spiritual. Everything Mrs. Eddy wrote or spoke revealed her commitment to the Christian ethic of love—love for her fellowman and love for her enemies. Since the publication of Science and Health the world's commitment to the Christian ethic of love for one's fellowman has steadily grown, “for the world feels the alterative effect of truth through every pore” (224:2).

Grace: So the Bible writers took the Great Pyramid whose capstone had been rejected as a symbol of the Holy Scriptures which were also incomplete and were awaiting the second coming of Jesus, in his femininity, in order that God might be represented in His fullness, i.e. in both his masculine and his feminine nature.

Bessie: Could you repeat very simply what the capstone symbolizes?

Left for Mrs. Eddy to Position

Grace: Yes, it symbolizes Mrs. Eddy encompassing mission. Hers was a “descending” mission. This simply means that she showed us how to start every thought from God. She did this by explaining the Principle of man's being, the same divine Principle Jesus was using to calculate with when he fed the five thousand, raised the dead, walked on the water—the same Principle and rule he was using in the tomb when he effected “his mighty, crowning, unparalleled, and triumphant exit from the flesh” (117:21).

Moderator: d'Humy says, “Enter the home of any Christian Scientist and there upon the table you will see the Bible, and upon that Holy Book there will rest Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures.“ For other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ—1^st Cor., iii II. “What a reminder this is of the 'rejected stone' at long last finding its resting place on the 'Bible in stone'—the Great Pyramid and its divine prophetic message.”

The Consciousness of Love

The holy city, that spiritual divinely scientific consciousness, the “capstone,” comes “down from God out of heaven” (Rev. 21:2) as an ever present divine Principle with which we can calculate; and this assures us that our foundations too have been laid in heaven, for like produces like.

We lay our foundation in heaven when we start with Mind, Spirit, Soul, Principle, Life Truth, and Love. Other foundations there are none, since the starting point of divine Science is that God, Spirit, is All-in-all....that God is Love, and therefore He is divine Principle” (275:6). Love is a circle that has no starting-point. Thus Christ is one whole body, “in whom all the building fitly framed together groweth into an holy temple in the Lord” (Eph. 2:21). This “holy temple in the Lord” is the consciousness of Love, and is why Mrs. Eddy, like Jesus, could say, “Lo, I am with you always.” Love is the capstone Mary Baker Eddy lowered onto biblical foundations.