Chapter 6: The Lessons of Love

III. The Relinquishment of Attack

¹ We have used many words as synonymous which are not ordinarily regarded as the same. We began with having and being, and more recently have used others. Hearing and being are examples, to which we can also add teaching and being, learning and being, and, above all, projecting and being. This is because, as we have said before, every idea begins in the mind of the thinker and extends outward. Therefore, what extends from the mind is still in it, and from what it extends it knows itself. That is its natural talent. The word “knows” is correct here, even though the ego does not know, and is not concerned with being at all.

² The Holy Spirit still holds knowledge safe through His impartial perception. By attacking nothing, He presents no barrier at all to the communication of God. Thus, being is never threatened. Your Godlike mind can never be defiled. The ego never was and never will be part of it, but through the ego you can hear and teach and learn what is not true. From this, which you have made, you have taught yourselves to believe that you are not what you are. You cannot teach what you have not learned, and what you teach you strengthen in yourselves because you are sharing it. Every lesson you teach, you are learning.

³ That is why you must teach only one lesson. If you are to be conflict‐free yourselves, you must learn only from the Holy Spirit, and teach only by Him. You are only love, but when you denied this you made what you are something you must learn. We said before that the message of the crucifixion was, “Teach only love, for that is what you are.” This is the one lesson which is perfectly unified because it is the only lesson which is one. Only by teaching it can you learn it. “As you teach so will you learn.” If that is true, and it is true indeed, you must never forget that what you teach is teaching you. What you project you believe.

⁴ The only real safety lies in projecting only the Holy Spirit, because as you see His gentleness in others, your own mind perceives itself as totally harmless. Once it can accept this fully, it does not see the need to protect itself. The protection of God then dawns upon it, assuring it that it is perfectly safe forever. The perfectly safe are wholly benign. They bless because they know they are blessed. Without anxiety the mind is wholly kind, and because it projects beneficence, it is beneficent.

⁵ Safety is the complete relinquishment of attack. No compromise is possible in this. Teach attack in any form, and you have learned it and it will hurt you. Yet your learning is not immortal, and you can unlearn it by not teaching it. Since you cannot not teach, your salvation lies in teaching the exact opposite of everything the ego believes. This is how you will learn the truth that will set you free, and keep you so as others learn it of you. The only way to have peace is to teach peace. By learning it through projection, it becomes a part of what you know because you cannot teach what you have dissociated.

6 Only thus can you win back the knowledge that you threw away. An idea which you share you must have. It awakens in you through the conviction of teaching. Remember that if teaching is being and learning is being, then teaching is learning. Everything you teach you are learning. Teach only love, and learn that love is yours, and you are love.

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