The
Seth
MATERIAL


The Seth Material is a system of philosophy presented by Jane Roberts and her husband Robert Butts as a consequence of the trance communications of an entity named Seth. The origin of the material, however, is far less significant than its scope. It has logical consistency, and the validation it receives, as millions of people read and use its ideas in their lives, is growing daily. During our current period of worldwide stress and conflicting ideologies, it makes sense of our situation and gives hope. Between 1963 and 1984, Seth communicated through Jane discourses which have appeared in the twenty volumes that comprise the Seth Material.

Seth: "I have been sent to help you, and others have been sent through the centuries of your time, for as you develop you also form new dimensions, and you will help others. I am in this room [speaking to Robert] although there is no object within which you can place me. You have a vehicle to use, a body that you call your own, and that is all. You are as disembodied as I. I come here as though I appeared through a hole in space and time. What you call emotion or feeling is the connective between us."

"Now, there are no limitations or divisions to the self. You can indeed depend upon seemingly unconscious portions of yourself. The seemingly unconscious portions of your body draws energy from food and molecules, from the air to form your body. All this happens because the inner portions of your being operate spontaneously, joyfully, freely; and all of this occurs because your inner self believes in you, often even while you do not believe in it. The you that you consider yourself to be is never annihilated. Your consciousness is not snuffed out, nor is it swallowed, blissfully unaware of itself, in some nirvana. You are as much a part of a nirvana now as you ever will be. You are in the process of expanding your psychic structure, of becoming a conscious participant with the soul. You are becoming what your soul is.

"There is nothing in your exterior experience that you did not originate within yourself. Interactions with others do occur, yet none occur what you do not attract or draw to you by your thoughts, feelings, attitudes or emotions. In your terms this applies both before, during and after physical life. In a most miraculous fashion you are given the gift of creating your own experiences.

"In this physical existence you are learning how to handle the inexhaustible energy that is available to you. Some of your feelings and thoughts are translated into objects. These exist in a medium you call space. Others are translated into events that exist in a medium you call time. Both of the concepts of space and time are illusions. They exist only in the physical realm. Since you are a part of "being," then you in effect give yourself the life that is being lived through you. While physical, while you are in the flesh, you are a portion of nature therefore, not apart from it. You can not strive to be above nature, and still be yourself.

"Beyond myself there is another self and still another, of which I am aware. And that self tells you that there is a reality beyond human reality and experience that cannot be made verbal or translated into human terms."

"Now, reality has no beginning and no end. Hopefully— hopefully— hopefully, in your terms of time, you may get a glimpse of what I mean. There is indeed an expanding universe, and it is formed in the eternal present. In my book I will go as far as I can into those precepts, yet some [of you] will not follow. You create your own reality. That works, and is true, whether or not you follow, or care to follow, into these other realms.

"For those of you who do accompany me, I promise you an adventure, a creative alteration of consciousness, and experiences beyond those that you have known in your terms. You look at the world around you and are amazed at its richness and variety. Do you think that the inner world is not as rich, even more rich, more valid? Do you think there is but one kind of consciousness?

"Your world is formed out of the vast unpredictability of consciousness. From it you form your own ideas of significance and of yourself... You must stop thinking in terms of ordinary progression. It is bad enough when you worry about keeping up with the Joneses. It is something else, however, when you start worrying ahout which kind of self [Or consciousness] is superior to another kind."

What's in a Name?

From the ESP class session for April 17, 1973

"So I ask you: 'What is your name, each of you?' My name is nameless. I have no name. I give you the name of Seth because it is a name and you want names. You give yourselves names..., because you believe they are important.

"Your existence is nameless. It is not voiceless, but it is nameless. The names you take are structures upon which you hang your images . . . What you are cannot be uttered, and no letter or alphabet can contain it. Yet, now you need words and letters, and names and objects. You want magic that will tell you what you are.

"You believe that you cannot speak to me unless I have a name, so I am Seth.... I told Ruburt from our earliest sessions that he could call me Seth. I never said, 'My name is Seth,' (but 'I call myself Seth'—my emphasis), for I am nameless. I have had too many identities to cling to one name!"